Locally Owned Redbox Alternative Stakes Out Claim in Boston's South Station

There are 38,500 Redbox machines in this country and then there's Brad Wiescinski - the independent owner of Why Wait DVDs.

2012-10-09

NORTH VANCOUVER, BC, October 09, 2012 (Press-News.org) There are 38,500 Redbox machines in this country and then there's Brad Wiescinski - the independent owner of Why Wait DVDs.

His locally owned movie rental kiosk in the Main Terminal Food Court of Boston's South Station is an independent business making a go of the same industry that landed Redbox parent company Coinstar (CSTR) at number 15 on this year's Fortune Magazine's 100 Fastest-Growing Companies List. The movie rental business has also been the driving force of the company's profitability, with Redbox revenue surging 26% to $458 million in the second quarter of this year.

Wiescinski is one of a growing number of independent operators joining Redbox to fill the vacuum left by the closure of major video store chains across the country.

"I miss the days when I could walk to my old neighborhood movie store and how easy it was to go pick up a movie," he says. "I'm not the only person who feels this way, and I wanted to bring that back to Boston."

A movie buff who spent five years working in a one-screen movie theatre, Wiescinski purchased his machine from DVDNow Kiosks, a company that provides movie rental kiosks as a business opportunity to entrepreneurs. The ready-made business gave Wiescinski the opportunity to realize his dream of becoming an entrepreneur while keeping the stability of his full-time job in client operations at a bank.

"Now that I've launched, it only takes up to a couple of hours a day to manage my DVDNow Kiosk business," he says, adding that if any businesses in the area would like a DVD rental kiosk at their location, he is looking to expand.

Wiescinski lives just a few blocks away from his kiosk in the Fort Point neighborhood of South Boston. When he launched his kiosk last March, he was one step ahead of Redbox but soon after a Redbox moved in a few blocks away.

The independent advantage

His kiosk, which rents movies for as little as $0.99, may look a lot like a Redbox, but it comes with some big advantages. He's not bound by the movie distribution contracts of Redbox and Netflix (NFLX) and is able to offer his customers new release movies from Fox, Warner Bros. and Universal up to 28 days earlier. That's the inspiration behind his company name: Why Wait DVDs.

Unlike Redbox, his kiosks rent movies in the original cases, which are visible through the machine's glass front display panel.

Recent research shows Americans still prefer watching movies on discs. DVD and Blu-ray rentals accounted for 62 percent of movie rental orders in the first six months of 2012, while video streaming made up 38 percent, according to the NPD Group's VideoWatch VOD report, released August 2012.

"The closing of Blockbuster and other video stores left people in the lurch," says Scott McInnes, CEO and Founder of DVDNow Kiosks. "People have invested heavily in high-quality home entertainment systems with Blu-ray and large LCD or plasma TVs and they want to watch movies that take full advantage of their systems. Video streaming doesn't compare."

About Why Wait DVDs

Why Wait DVDs is a locally owned movie rental business run by South Boston resident Brad Wiescinski that rents movies for as little as $0.99 in the Main Terminal food court of Boston's transportation hub, South Station. He acquired his kiosk from DVDNow Kiosks, a company that supplies movie rental kiosks as a business opportunity to entrepreneurs.

About DVDNow

DVDNow launched in June of 2006 and quickly became the leading provider of independently operated DVD rental kiosks. Today, with operations in over 16 countries, DVDNow has the largest independently operated DVD rental kiosk network in the world.

Website: http://www.dvdnow.net

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