We’ve all seen these movie club offers where you can get so many movies for $1 or something like that. But then we look into it and read the fine print that we have to buy a certain amount of movies at full price later in order to get those deals now. So I decided to crunch some numbers and see if it is really worth it.
Example:
Disney Movie Club offers you four DVDs for just a $1. All you have to do is buy 5 movies at regular price in the next five years. Shipping is free on the initial order, plus you can take advantage of a deal to scratch off 2 of your 5 movies you are required to buy at full price, but with an additional discount.
Here are the numbers:
4 DVDs for $1 + Free Shipping = $1
Buy 2 more DVDs with first order at special price of $14.95 and $9.95 + Free Shipping = $24.90
Total you spend on first order: $25.90 for 6 Disney DVDs
Then you are required to buy 3 more DVDs at $19.95 + $3.95 S&H for the first and $1.49 S&H for each additional DVD on that order. So to get the best deal, you need to buy the next three you are required to buy all in the same order (you have two years to do this). Here are the numbers for your second order:
3 DVDs @ $19.95 + $3.95 + $1.49 + $1.49
Total you spend on your second order to complete your requirements: $66.78 for 3 DVDs
Final total for 9 Disney DVDs (counting in your first order) = $91.68 or $10.18 per Disney DVD
So is it worth it? Maybe. Not all the movies you want will go on sale with a coupon. It’s always good to crunch the numbers with these types of offers. I personally prefer Blu-Rays, so for me it’s not worth it. But $10 isn’t bad for Disney Movies. You’re getting half off of the retail price for nine movies. One thing you do need to watch with these movie clubs is that they automatically ship you a new title every month unless you opt out of it in your account area.
Are you a movie buff, and have used a movie club to get a deal on movies? Do you think it’s worth it?
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Thank you for breaking it down the way you did.
I have thought about joining these clubs but have never done it.
nope. absolutely not. you can get such killer deals at garage sales and thrift store. you can pick these movies up for a a buck, sometimes even .25 cents. dont have a vcr anymore? buy one at a yard sale for 5 bux.
I’ve always been curious about music and movie clubs like the Disney movie club listed in the article. I guess $10 really isn’t that bad of a price to pay for new movies, but there are so many other outlets that offer these same great movies at cheaper prices. Most of my movie collection is made up of used DVDs that I have accumulated from yard sales and used movie stores like MovieStop. Even more recently I discovered http://www.abundatrade.com, which is a company that buys and sells used and new DVDs, CDs, video games, and books at drastically marked down prices. $10 may not be too much, but when you can get the same thing for $2 or $3, $10 seems a little steep.
another thing i was going to mention was the library. renting it for free is much more satisfying that owning it in my (maybe not so humble) opinion.
We just finished up our “fine print commitment” on the Disney club. Ours was 5 DVDs for $1 and purchase 4 more at regular price throughout the year. I actually think it has it perks… example, we are now finished our commitment and the deal last month was $24.95 (free shipping) for a blue ray/dvd combo pack of BugsLife – decent deal on BlueRay combo – BUT you got 60% off any other movies(blueray or dvd) you purchased. (once you complete your commitment you get other deals) so if you are a movie buff (like my hubby and ever increasingly my daughter -gasp!) it turns out to be a decent deal at times.
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