Redbox is a DVD/Blu-Ray rental company which utilizes kiosk machines placed in convenient, high-traffic locations. The first Redbox kiosk was opened by McDonald’s in 2002. Redbox was later purchased by Coinstar, Inc., and over the years, Redbox has rented over one billion movies and has grown to more than 27,000 locations in restaurants, grocery stores, pharmacies and convenience stores nationwide. Redbox proves to be a very unique way to rent DVD’s and by the nature of Redbox’s rental process, most businesses would benefit from the increased traffic generated by having a kiosk machine at their location. This type of relationship proves to be a win-win situation for both Redbox and the businesses which are housing the kiosk machine.
Redbox’s primary target market proves to be the busy, I don’t have time to visit Blockbuster or login to Netflix type of consumer. There kiosk machines are located in common shopping locations which lend themselves to the “lazy” consumer. Furthermore, Redbox is also targeting the casual movie watcher who isn’t necessarily intending on renting a movie. In a way Redbox has turned renting movies into an impulse item. As a result, Redbox provides consumers with a service never seen before and has emerged as one of the largest DVD rental chains in the world.
Redbox’s marketing mix is simple, unique, and clever. They have successfully turned a shopping item into a convenience item. Times have changed since the first movie rental store, Magnetic Video, was opened during 1977 in Los Angeles, California. During that time home personal computers were barely seen and the internet was nowhere on the horizon, so movie rental stores with good customer service provided the consumer with knowledge about the movies they were interested in. However, in today’s fast moving, information crazed world, consumers can obtain better information on the fly with there Blackberry, iPhone, or any other internet ready