DVD Sales: People Stay Home With Their Valentine
June 9, 2010
There were a handful of new releases that reached the top 30 on this week's sales chart, including the new number one. However, none of them were particularly strong. Valentine's Day led the way with 498,000 units sold, generating $8.46 million in opening week sales. Given its box office performance, this is a disappointing start.
Avatar remained in second place, adding 316,000 units to its running tally of 7.02 million units / $120.32 million. Invictus opened in third place with 236,000 units / $4.24 million, which is not bad compared to its theatrical run, but it was soft theatrically, so this is faint praise. Legion fell from first to fourth with 143,000 units for the week and 545,000 units after two. So far the film has generated $10.04 million in DVD sales. The Spy Next Door was a fraction behind with $143,000 units / $2.86 million during its opening week of sales.
Extraordinary Measures opened in seventh place with 119,000 units / $2.24 million, making it just as disappointing on the home market as it was in theaters. The final new release to chart was The Jeff Dunham Show, which placed 15th with 62,000 units / $683,000.
Blu-ray was down again this week, falling 21% to $15.1 million. Compared to last year, it was down nearly 28%, which was again the worst year-over-year decline in the format's history. To be fair, this week last year saw the release of the box office record-breaking film, Paul Blart, which sold 1.71 million units on DVD and over 100,000 units on Blu-ray. Compared to DVD, Blu-ray generated 12% of total sales and 19% of the top twenty comparison, so the format is strong, it's just that the overall market is weak. The best selling release continues to be Avatar, which sold an additional 200,000 units, while the best new release of the week was Valentine's Day at 80,000 units.
Filed under: Video Sales, The Spy Next Door, Valentine's Day, Invictus, Avatar, Legion, Extraordinary Measures