Trade Show Guru

While I’m no movie guru, or Siskel and Ebert, I decided I’d start a “movie” category to let you know when I see a movie that I think is worth seeing (which is probably 1 out of 3 or 4 movies that I see). When I see a movie that I think is worthy of “two thumbs up“, I’ll write a post about it here.
We don’t go to the theatres, so I won’t be writing about “new releases”. We only watch movies on DVD at home. I like watching DVDs at home – I never have anyone’s head in my way (though I’ve heard the relatively new stadium seating at our local theatres does a good job of solving that headache).  All the movies I watch come via Netflix. I’ve gotta say that I’m a huge fan of Netflix. We’re on the “3 movies out a time” plan. I remember the old days of driving over to Blockbuster to get a movie. I’d spend 5-10 minutes looking for a parking place, then go inside a find that all of the “good” new releases were checked out. I’d select a movie from the limited selection left based on the “which of these will suck the least” principal. Once I paid for the movie, I knew the 48 hour clock started ticking to get it back without getting charged a late fee. My wife still gives me grief because I stopped at Blockbuster to return a movie while we were on the way to the hospital for her to delivery our first child. Hey, she made it in time, and I think it’s a great story. I used the outside drop box so it didn’t really take that long.
Anyway, we dumped our local Blockbuster as soon as we heard about Netflix, and haven’t looked back. Their website is awesome. You can get almost any movie. If you like an actor, you just type in their name and bam! you get a list of every movie they ever made. Gotta love technology. As I said above, we can have three movies out a time. They mail each DVD with a prepaid return envelope. It takes a day to get to us, and once we watch the movie and drop it back in the mail, it takes a day to get back to them, and then they send us another one. Because we have three out at a time, we are never without a movie. We could watch one every night, but there just aren’t that many good movies and we have other things to do - like hangout with friends, watch Lost, or do sudokus. We probably watch two movies or so a week.
I’ve got to tell you, ordering ANY movie I want online and then walking out to the mailbox to pick it up sure beats driving three miles to Blockbuster, fighting for parking, wondering what will be available, and then driving back to return it. In all fairness to Blockbuster, I know they now offer “movies by mail” too, but I sticking with the original – Netflix.
You know, I think Netflix is a good example of a company that knows about Marketing Basics and has their own Secret Sauce. Stay tuned for the first movie I’ll be reviewing, Run Fatboy Run.