Blu-ray at $8.99 in Target Black Friday sale! (And Walmart's pre-BF sale began last Saturday) - UPDATE: Best Buy offers Blu-ray catalog at $7.99

UPDATE - November 13, 2009:
Best Buy offers Blu-ray catalog at $7.99 - Recent new releases Monsters vs. Aliens, Wolverine at $9.99

Video Business is reporting today that Best Buy will offer Blu-ray discs at a lower price than Target (and others), as indicated in yesterday's report (further below). Here's the latest news:

The price wars continue to heat up, with a leaked Black Friday ad for Best Buy showing the retailer will offer such catalog Blu-ray titles as The Departed, Silence of the Lambs and Dirty Dancing for $7.99, undercutting Target's $8.99 price for older movies on high-definition.

Best Buy also plans to make doorbusters out of recent new releases Monsters vs. Aliens, X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Fast & Furious, dropping their Blu-ray price to a new low of $9.99. Note: other Blu-ray titles will be offered for $12.99.

With DVD titles, Best Buy is matching Target's $3.99 for titles such as last year's best-selling The Dark Knight.

And Best Buy plans to match other retailers' $149 pricing of Sony and Samsung Blu-ray players, as well as continue to offer its own Insignia high-def set-tops at $99.

Best Buy also is offering a number of videogame deals, including such new titles as "Brutal Legend", "FIFA Soccer 10" and "Madden 10" at $34.99, and two console bundles for $299.99: a 120GB PlayStation 3 with "Little Big Planet," and "Ratchet and Clank" and a 120GB Xbox 360 Elite with four games.
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(previous reports below)

Note: the following news is courtesy of our friends at VIDEO BUSINESS »

Nov. 11 | Target will roll out some DVD and Blu-ray Disc steals for its Black Friday promotion, according to ads that have leaked online.

A number of Blu-ray titles will be priced as low as $8.99, including GoodFellas, 2001: A Space Odyssey and I Am Legend. That marks one of the cheapest known tags yet for the format, which had previously hit a low of $9.99 at retail.

Target also is dropping several standard-definition complete-season TV DVD sets to $8.99, including Weeds, Friends and Flight of the Conchords. TV DVD sets, with their larger amount of content, are usually priced at a premium over movie discs.

And Target is pricing some blockbuster titles on DVD, including last year's biggest theatrical movie The Dark Knight, with the retailer's lowest price of the year—$3.99. Other DVDs offered at this level are Baby Mama, Elf and Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

On the hardware side, Target is following a number of retailers, including Sears and Walmart, in advertising $149 Blu-ray players for the holidays. Target ups the offer some in including a $20 gift card for the chain with the purchase of its $149 Sony BDP-S360 player, which originally retailed for $199.

Continue reading...
View the entire news report at VB's website.

By Susanne Ault
-Video Business, 11/11/2009
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(bonus article below)

Walmart starts pre-Black Friday sales Saturday (Nov 14) — Sony Blu-ray player priced at $148 among discount offers

Starting Saturday (Nov 14), Walmart is rolling out a week-long pre-Black Friday sale, featuring such deals as a $148 Sony Blu-ray Disc player.

The $148 price for Sony's BDP-S360 Blu-ray player represents a $51 cut from current retail pricing, but might prove to be only a tease for some consumers. Walmart is widely expected to lead the way on cheap Blu-ray player deals on Black Friday and is anticipated to offer $99 models.

Walmart also will be selling the Xbox 360 Arcade console for the standard $199 price, but consumers will receive a $100 chain gift card to use toward future purchases.

Another offered deal will be a sub-$300 H-P notebook computer, featuring 3GB of memory and a 16GB harddrive.

Other highlights include Sharp HDTVs at $498 for 42-inch sets, $698 for 46-inch sets and $898 for 52-inch sets. A 46-inch Panasonic plasma will be priced at $788. And a Magnavox upconverting DVD player will be set at $29.

Walmart has set up a Walmart.com/ChristmasShop site with sale details.

The chain seems to be making early bird holiday sales a regular event. It made waves a couple of years ago with a $99 Toshiba HD DVD player deal.

Walmart wants to take maximum advantage of seasonal shopping. The chain said that 50% of consumers shop for discounts on non-gift purchases at this time in addition to seeking out presents for friends and family, according to BigResearch.

Also, the Consumer Electronics Association notes that four out of five adults plan to buy electronic items during the holidays.

"Each holiday season, we focus on delivering a better price on quality entertainment and electronics, and this season is no different," said Gary Severson, senior VP of entertainment at Walmart. "We're excited about our electronics event that starts Saturday. It will be evident through the coming weeks that this year Walmart will offer more opportunities for our customers to save than ever before."

Separately, Kmart Black Friday ads have leaked online, and DVDs are among the retailer's low-price offerings, including fairly recent movies at $3.99, including Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Hellboy II, The Pursuit of Happyness and The Devil Wears Prada. Also offered will be $8.99 DVDs featuring movies released earlier this year, including Taken, Marley & Me, 17 Again and Fast & Furious.

By Susanne Ault
-Video Business, 11/04/2009