Video Rental Stores

[DragonmasterDan]

Over the weekend I was feeling nostaligic, hit the internet and found the closest video rental store to my house. I didn't actually RENT anything but I did pick up a few previously viewed movies that were inexpensively priced. However, the sheer feeling of having walked back in time stuck with me during the experience.

Does anyone here still rent movies (or games) from a brick and mortar specialty store?

 

[Undefined]

We have not had any rental stores in my town for years. I guess the closest thing would be the many Redbox locations out in front of what seems like every gas station and grocery store.

 

[Ray]

Most of the video rental stores in the Netherlands have closed in the last 10 years. There is still a single "Videoland" in The Hague, which is one of the last.(Videoland used to be our biggest video rental chain, they survived by becoming a streaming service like Netflix)

My father still regularly rents movies there. They also offer converting VHS tapes and resurfacing discs, which is probably how they managed to survive at all.

 

[MattBlah]

When I was a kid there were plenty of independent ones in my town, full of all sorts of awesome films with brilliant covers. Then Blockbuster came and killed most of the independents, and then the internet killed Blockbuster. I know of one little news agent here that still has a small DVD section you can rent from, I don't think they get any new releases though, just whatever has been sat there for years.

I really do miss the days of going to rental stores on the weekend and picking out some random horror films for the weekend.

 

[NeoCverA]

There's a Hastings in my town that has a video/game rental sections. We don't rent stuff so not sure what they charge but everything else is over-priced normally. There are the occasional sales and discounts. I feel no sense of nostalgia walking into it since it is not a little mom and pop.

 

[prof]

Video rental stores are still fairly common throughout Michigan and Ohio, at least in the two areas of those states that I have lived over the past ten years. I have a shop called Family Video just down the road from my home that I rent from sometimes. They specialize in new releases of course, but have a decent selection of older movies as well. Great prices too. Their video game selection is so-so, but I rarely go back there anyway other than to rent a Wii game for my daughters.

 

[NeoSneth]

I do not, but there are still Family Video stores in the rural parts of southern MO and IL.

I know of adults my age that still go there.

 

[DragonmasterDan]

I do not, but there are still Family Video stores in the rural parts of southern MO and IL.

I know of adults my age that still go there.

Yeah,
I hit a Family Video in suburban Chicago. It's one of only two video rental stores I could locate within single digit miles of me.

 

[JoeAwesome]

There's a Hastings in my town that has a video/game rental sections. We don't rent stuff so not sure what they charge but everything else is over-priced normally. There are the occasional sales and discounts. I feel no sense of nostalgia walking into it since it is not a little mom and pop.

One Hastings left town, one Hastings left. I feel the same way about it, but it was a great store to build store credit from. Redbox is just about everywhere, so people seem to use that, but more and more it's just Netflix.

 

[FAT$TACKS]

We have a family video here. I think other than those redbox - bluebox units, it is the only place left to rent videos.

There used to be a day when every grocery store and gas station store had video rental, as well as little small time shops all over town. We also had two really huge independent video rental places. One was this building that had been an old rollerskating rink and the other was a big place on the main strip through town. Then the Blockbuster and Hollywood video both moved in on the main strip and the two big players died. The grocery stores and gas stations were next to stop carrying rentals, and finally the little mom and pop places began drying up.

Now Blockbuster and Hollywood are both long gone, but a Family video came to town a few years back and it seems to be doing pretty good. It is kind of positioned just on the cusp of some pretty shitty parts of down and it gets a lot of that traffic.

Now, back in the day, by far the best video and game rental place in town was, oddly enough a private video store that was leasing space inside of a Save-A-Lot grocery store. You would in the grocery and through it and there was a room that had this video store. Later they had made enough that they were able to open their own location when a empty space in that plaza opened up.

They were awesome because they were closed on Sunday, so you always got that day for free and returns had to be by the closing time rather than that 7 or 8 bull shit from block buster, or the twenty four hour deal from Movie Warehouse. Oh you rented a movie at 2:30, well it has to be back by that time the next day, and we close early on Sunday so if you rent it late on Saturday you still have to have in before we close on Sunday.

 

[Fritz]

I have a local spot here that I visit. All movies are $2 on tuesday and $3 otherwise if you buy a 6 rental pack. They have a great selection for being a smaller store with about 18,000 movies.

 

[Rocko]

There is one store my bus goes past every day. By the looks of it they mostly sell candy and popcorn with a great mark up...

 

[cat]

Nope all gone from my area now the last remaining one was blockbuster and it shut up shop about 18 months ago.
TBH you only thing i miss with blockbuster is the games rentals, was handy to try out an xbox360 game before dropping £40 on it.

 

[PolluxTroy]

Blockbuster had those video game contests ala The Wizard.

 

[xelement5x]

When I was in college there was an amazing place called That's Rentertainment in Champaign, IL which had the most unbelievable selection of films,TV, documentaries, anime, whatever. You name it they had it. Unfortunately it closed down last year, but after going to that place as much as I did during college I was ruined on every other rental store out there.

 

[Electric Grave]

What about porn shop video rentals...remember those, how about the video rentals with a porn section, remember the black bags? lol...how about the smell of porn rentals...like cheap motel...oh the taboo of it all...

 

[DragonmasterDan]

What about porn shop video rentals...remember those, how about the video rentals with a porn section, remember the black bags? lol...how about the smell of porn rentals...like cheap motel...oh the taboo of it all...

I'm too timid to head into such a closed off room but even FAMILY video appears to still have such a section.

 

[norton9478]

Family Video thrives in poor neighborhoods.

 

[Liquid Snake]

A wonderful memory.................

 

[GregN]

There's a family video in Anoka about 15 miles from my parents house. I rarely rent anything anymore.

 

[Earthquake24]

There aren't very many places to rent movies or games anymore. Like everyone else has said, there's just some Redbox locations, mainly inside Walmarts, that are around here. Not many independent places like there used to. In the late 80s- early 90s, the town video store I used to go was the place to be where a bunch of us would go bike riding to after school or during the weekend. There was the section right by the door with boxed NES, Genesis, SNES games you could rent. Great selection of movies from sci-fi, horror, docs, comedy, anything that peaked your interest from the front and back covers. The adult section of course with the "Do not enter unless 17 or older" sign with the curtain was there. Another one that I went to, Video Video, where you could rent a AES Gold and some of the earlier AES games for 7 days. $25 to rent the system and $10 bucks for the games. That place lasted until around 98 or 99, closed down and replaced with a Chinese restaurant.

 

[NeuroticMoose]

There's a couple in my neck of the woods that I drive by from time to time, but most of them no longer exist, Video King held on for as long as it could, but now its a Batteries and bulbs store, the one that gets me down is the old hollywood video I used to visit as a kid that helped ignite my love of film.

When all the Hollywood videos went out of business the one I grew up in got turned into a discount clothing store, the cool thing was the owners kept the neon lights from when it was a video store so it was somewhat comforting to drive by and see my old haunt still in use in some way. Since then the discount store has folded and the old building was demolished, its now being built up into something. I still get a twinge of nostalgia whenever I drive past it

 

[Day_Man]

There is a rental shop about 10 miles from me but they don't have any games and parking is a bitch.

 

[StevenK]

None left anywhere near me, but I have fond memories of them. It was a lot easier to pick a film to watch when you had all the boxes in front of you, and they managed to make even the shittest movie sound great with the blurb and the cherry picked reviews. I reckon I miss out on a lot of hidden gems nowadays because I'm always searching for movies greater than 60% on Rotten Tomatoes or something like that, whereas I've had so many great times in the past with movies that probably land in the 30% and less region.

As for games we used to go to a place called Ace Video and rent out master system games but that really was a long time ago.

 

[wyo]

None left anywhere near me, but I have fond memories of them. It was a lot easier to pick a film to watch when you had all the boxes in front of you, and they managed to make even the shittest movie sound great with the blurb and the cherry picked reviews. I reckon I miss out on a lot of hidden gems nowadays because I'm always searching for movies greater than 60% on Rotten Tomatoes or something like that, whereas I've had so many great times in the past with movies that probably land in the 30% and less region.

As for games we used to go to a place called Ace Video and rent out master system games but that really was a long time ago.

Yeah, man. I remember when we got our first VCR going to our local video shop (Barker's on Street Lane in Leeds) and renting Street Trash because the cover looked amazing They had an adult/porno section which was off-limits but they'd rent you hidden "video nasties" from under the counter if you knew to ask.

Maybe I'm just old and lazy but choosing a film to watch seems more difficult now even though I don't have to leave the house.