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VB: ‘TWILIGHT’ IS THE YEAR’S BEST-SELLING DVD SO FAR

Posted March 30th, 2009 By: Evie 9 Comments »

Video Business.com is reporting that Summit has sold 5.6 million units of ‘Twilight’, including Blu-ray, in the first nine days:

 
MARCH 30 | Summit Home Entertainment’s Twilight sold 5.2 million DVD and Blu-ray Disc units in its first week on shelves to become the top seller of the year so far.

Summit said consumers purchased 5.2 million copies of the modern vampire tale in the U.S. during in the first week following the title’s midnight release on Saturday, March 21. Including last weekend, the title’s nine-day take was 5.6 million units, according to Summit.

A common yardstick used by studios is 20,000 units in first-week sales per $1 million at the box office, which would put the expectation for Twilight, with a $191 million box-office take, at 3.8 million units sold in its first week. At 5.2 million units, Twilight performed more like a $260 million theatrical release.

Summit’s home entertainment chief, Steve Nickerson, attributed the title’s success in large part to its Saturday release, noting that many retailers would not have staged midnight parties for a standard Tuesday release. “These [fan] girls would rather have a community event,” said Nickerson. “All we did was help facilitate what the fans would want.”

The title sold less than 5% of its units on Blu-ray, Summit said, pointing to the movie’s overwhelming appeal to females. The majority of the audience for Blu-ray is still male. However, the Blu-ray version of Twilight was only available at Target and Best Buy.

About 5,800 stores nationwide—spanning Blockbuster, Borders, Hot Topic, F.Y.E., Hastings Entertainment and Wal-Mart—stayed open past midnight on Saturday, March 21, to sell Twilight as soon as it became available.

Cast members made appearances at some stores, with 2,500 fans showing up in Salt Lake City to see Rachelle Lefevre (Victoria) at a Wal-Mart; 2,000 people in Los Angeles to see Ashley Greene (Alice) at Hot Topic; and more than 1,000 fans in Dallas for director Catherine Hardwicke at Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart set a companywide single-day DVD sales record, with some of its stores’ release parties attracting more than 1,000 Twilight fans, according to a spokeswoman. The mass merchant also said the $191 million U.S. box-office hit represented its largest consumer pre-order ever. Wal-Mart is the exclusive sell-through retailer for the single-DVD, which it priced at $17. The retailer staged midnight events in about 2,400 stores, with an exclusive fan greeting filmed on the set of Twilight’s sequel, New Moon, broadcast exclusively through its in-store TV network.

Summit said Twilight’s 3.1 million-unit first-day sales ranked it among the Top 5 best first-day DVD releases over the past two years, along with Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment’s Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End; Warner Home Video’s The Dark Knight and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix; and Paramount Home Entertainment’s Transformers. Each of those titles had box-office grosses 50% to almost 200% more than Twilight.

SOURCE

(Thanks Kaly)

Impressive numbers on the DVD sales. I guess it paid off to have so many different versions of the DVD available. I hope this shows Summit that we are willing to support the entire ‘Twilight’ franchise!

What do you think of the DVD sales numbers? Are you surprised?







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  • Tasha

    I am not surprised at all, I pre-ordered it at blockbuster and was one of the first to pick it up at midnight, so did most of my friends. Lots of people were counting down the days till it came out too, there’s a reason they wanted a midnight release everyone knew it would sell a lot.

  • kijo921

    That’s really awesome! I just hope that with each movie that’s made, they get to have a bigger budget! I mean, Breaking Dawn is going to need a massive budget! And, it either needs to be 3-4 hours long or a two-part movie! I’m rereading it now and just thinking about how to make that movie makes my head spin!

  • Staar84

    I offended about what summit said about the blu-ray. I buy most of my movies on blu-ray, because I have this thing about seeing details in my movies. Same reason I like seeing movies in theaters. I have a flat screen too. Does that mean I’m acting like a boy? Nope, don’t think so. That comment is an insult to all the male fans too, like they’re not supposed to enjoy the series. Maybe summit should focus on “fan base” rather than “fan girls”. Or at least leave comments like that out of offical statements.

  • Elsa

    I have bought 4 different versions of the DVD and 1 Blu-Ray.

  • kerri

    I agree Kijo921. Eclipse and Breaking Dawn are going to need a massive boost in the budget department! So, the better we do, shelling out the big bucks, they’ll do so on their end. Good job everyone.

  • bostoncullenfan

    Too bad they didn’t have figures on how many people bought multiple copies. I wonder how many copies would have been sold if they didn’t have so many different versions that we wanted to buy. I bought the Target edition and the Borders deluxe edition.

  • Lea Sanders

    Well, why wouldn’t it be? Between me and my daughter, we have 5 copies all from different stores! =) How’s that for stimulating the Twilight economy?

  • mcullenvamp

    i’m not surprised that it’s doing so well… us twilighters are collectors and we’ll snatch up anything Twilight quickly! I bought 2 versions of the dvd and am waiting to get my borders one.

  • http://twilightersanonymous.com/video-business-twilight-is-the-years-best-selling-dvd-so-far.html F

    I’m not surprised at how well its doing, what with all of its fans. And the DVD hasn’t even been released in the UK or a few other countries yet (UK is on the 6th April) so I imagine that the figures will keep rising quickly. I can’t wait to get my copy.

 

 

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