Netflix Raising Prices Up To 60%

[Woochifer]

Right on cue. As I've been predicting for months, Netflix has made a major shift to their pricing tiers. While the basic streaming plan remains at $8/month, the DVD mailer option is no longer bundled into the plan options. The basic plan with the DVD mailer option now starts at $16/month, which is a 60% fee hike for people who stream and use the disc by-mail service. Currently, the plans start at $10/month and allow for unlimited streaming plus one disc out at a time.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...,4419525.story

Contrary to the tech press' obsession with streaming, 80% of Netflix's subscribers currently enroll in some form of combo streaming/DVD mailer plan. So, this is a massive price hike for the vast majority of Netflix's current subscribers.

Those of us who subscribe to Netflix know how many movies and TV series are missing from Netflix's streaming. This makes the DVD mailer an essential part of the Netflix service by filling in the many gaps in Netflix's streaming library.

Essentially Netflix is protecting the streaming business by now having the DVD mailer plans subsidize the escalating streaming content costs. DVD and Blu-ray acquisition costs have not increased, yet it's the optical disc mailers that are getting this massive price hike.

I subscribe to the $10/month plan, and while I like it, I'm not sure that I will keep it at $16/month. I would opt to scale the service back to an $8/month streaming-only plan, but my wife uses the DVD mailers for TV shows that are not available via streaming.

[BallinWithNash]

i think its bullsh*t and all of us who had it should be grandfathered in on the old pricing ... do you know if the price is going up for those of us who have 3 DVD's plus streaming ?

[Jack in Wilmington]

The new price of 3 DVD's plus streaming is $23.98 or $27.98 for blu-rays. I decided to cut out streaming and just do DVD's. I'm hoping to get to the movie theater more often now.

[ForeverAutumn]

In Canada, Netflix is only available through streaming. We don't have a DVD option at all. After taking a look at the available content, I'm not even sure I'd get value out of it at $8/mth. The content here is very, very limited. They need to step up their game.

[Worf101]

The new price of 3 DVD's plus streaming is $23.98 or $27.98 for blu-rays. I decided to cut out streaming and just do DVD's. I'm hoping to get to the movie theater more often now.

I JUST got of my Netflix account page. Cancelled streaming (I don't have a streaming capable device in my house) and went with just the Blu/DVD package. Sigh... you knew it had to go up sooner or later but 60%? Yipes.

Worf

[markw]

We've currently got a "both" plan with one DVD at a time and just started streaming. For < $10/mo it's a no brainer. But now they make the cheap in me think, and homey don't like that.

I do note that the selections for streaming are quite limited but they do have a lot of TV programming that almost make it worthwhile. And, the quality for streaming, both video and audio (which is stereo), are not up to what one can get from a DVD.

So, if one wants to save money and go for only one, that forces a choice: Convenience with a loss of quality or deal with the mail for the good stuff.

Fortunately, we have a Blockbuster a block away that just dropped their prices to compete with Redbox, which is the same distance away in the other direction. ...and I could use the exercise.

[L.J.]

Sigh....Guess I'll be dropping down to streaming only service.

[pixelthis]

Right on cue. As I've been predicting for months, Netflix has made a major shift to their pricing tiers. While the basic streaming plan remains at $8/month, the DVD mailer option is no longer bundled into the plan options. The basic plan with the DVD mailer option now starts at $16/month, which is a 60% fee hike for people who stream and use the disc by-mail service. Currently, the plans start at $10/month and allow for unlimited streaming plus one disc out at a time.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...,4419525.story

Contrary to the tech press' obsession with streaming, 80% of Netflix's subscribers currently enroll in some form of combo streaming/DVD mailer plan. So, this is a massive price hike for the vast majority of Netflix's current subscribers.

Those of us who subscribe to Netflix know how many movies and TV series are missing from Netflix's streaming. This makes the DVD mailer an essential part of the Netflix service by filling in the many gaps in Netflix's streaming library.

Essentially Netflix is protecting the streaming business by now having the DVD mailer plans subsidize the escalating streaming content costs. DVD and Blu-ray acquisition costs have not increased, yet it's the optical disc mailers that are getting this massive price hike.

I subscribe to the $10/month plan, and while I like it, I'm not sure that I will keep it at $16/month. I would opt to scale the service back to an $8/month streaming-only plan, but my wife uses the DVD mailers for TV shows that are not available via streaming.

YEAH, that extra six bucks is gonna KILL ya, but you PAY
for sat radio.
I HAVE AVOIDED all of the strum un drang with one word...
REDBOX.
My only problem is the rednecks in front of me getting everything good before I DO.
Not claiming to be perfect, but I HAVE A SYSTEM AND IT WORKS(thanks Klattu).

[GMichael]

YEAH, that extra six bucks is gonna KILL ya, but you PAY
for sat radio.
I HAVE AVOIDED all of the strum un drang with one word...
REDBOX.
My only problem is the rednecks in front of me getting everything good before I DO.
Not claiming to be perfect, but I HAVE A SYSTEM AND IT WORKS(thanks Klattu).

The sat radio charge is to get a service I didn't have before. It is so much better than AM/FM. The $10 to $16 hike is to keep getting what I already had (or even less than what I had).

[Jack in Wilmington]

YEAH, that extra six bucks is gonna KILL ya, but you PAY
for sat radio.
I HAVE AVOIDED all of the strum un drang with one word...
REDBOX.
My only problem is the rednecks in front of me getting everything good before I DO.
Not claiming to be perfect, but I HAVE A SYSTEM AND IT WORKS(thanks Klattu).

Plus Redbox around here doesn't do Blu-Ray. Does yours, or doesn't that matter? I like the convenience of not having to go to the store where the Redbox are located.

[kevlarus]

.
.
REDBOX.
My only problem is the rednecks in front of me getting everything good before I DO.
Not claiming to be perfect, but I HAVE A SYSTEM AND IT WORKS(thanks Klattu).

Luckily, a majority of rednecks don't have internet access so you can reserve what you want online, long before they get there ahead of you.

[Woochifer]

YEAH, that extra six bucks is gonna KILL ya, but you PAY
for sat radio.

Talk about assumptions, I've never subscribed to satellite radio. And as GM pointed out, what does sat radio have to do with Netflix raising their existing service rates on their existing customers?

I HAVE AVOIDED all of the strum un drang with one word...
REDBOX.

Redbox's selection is nowhere near what Netflix provides, and Redbox serves a very different market because it focuses on recent releases.

[RGA]

Umm people - it's called BTJUNKIE or other bittorent search engine.

Download any tv show and movie for FREE. Then if you like said tv show or movie and want a good quality version of it then buy it.

I pay for internet - no cable or sat. It's a ripoff to pay for advertising and netflix's offerings are pathetic - it's not worth $8 when the world is your oyster for your already paid for internet charge.

With the torrents you get what you want - most of which is difficult or not available on DVD or Blu Ray. Downloaded the entire series the "Practice" - when the hell is that ever going to come on DVD if ever? Bah why wait? Doctor Who the complete Tom Baker and John Pertwee run - sure you can buy a boxed set of a Season for a ridiculous $100+ dollars (which I paid for) but that's one season of Tom's 7 year run (and not the best one - key to time) and the quality is better than the download but - I connect the tv to the PC input and you pretty much get the regular tv broadcast quality - it's free and it's "good enough" quality. A truer original tv going experience at least.

Granted in Canada this is legal - don't know about the U.S. Uploading will cause you problems however i believe. But you are allowed to listen to CD's in the store before you buy. So my take on it is that watch it - but if you like it - buy it - support the artist and film/tv industry - So I downloaded Boston Legal - I liked it so I purchased the entire Series on DVD. I downloaded battlestar Galactica - I liked it so again bought the entire series on DVD. Downloaded Bob Newhart's original series - didn't really like it enough to want it so I deleted it didn't buy it.

Like the show Taxi - would buy it - they used to sell the series here but can't find it anymore so until I see it I am keeping it on my drive. Practice isn't available so I'm keeping it and some other shows I will buy when the price isn't absurd.

And if it wasn't for torrents I never would have likely watched a show like Dexter - and because of BTJUNKIE - I watched Dexter - told all my friends to watch it - I bought all the seasons that are available and so did most of them - so before you dump on downloading the film industry got a bunch of sales out of it than they ever would have if such sites didn't exist - because I would never buy HBO and never would have seen it. So because of downloading they sold a bunch of discs. Granted some people won't but some sales is better than zero sales.

[SlumpBuster]

I spent way more than $16/mo at blockbuster before netflix, so I'm not complaining. I won't use a service like Blockbuster or Redbox that charges me for each day. I got kids and sh!t to do, screw that. I've had Robin Hood on blu ray for the last three weeks and haven't gotten around to watching it yet. And even at $16 i'll still get all my money's worth thru streaming. Netflix thru Apple TV is da bomb, yo!

[Woochifer]

I JUST got of my Netflix account page. Cancelled streaming (I don't have a streaming capable device in my house) and went with just the Blu/DVD package. Sigh... you knew it had to go up sooner or later but 60%? Yipes.

Worf

I guess for people who don't use the streaming, unbundling the DVD-by-mail from the streaming service results in a lower fee?

Netflix's problem is that their streaming content rights fees are getting renewed at ~10X what they were paying just last year. IMO, they're screwing over their DVD-by-mail customers in order to pay for those huge fee increases.

Their problem right now is that Netflix's content costs are way outpacing their subscriber growth, so they have to raise revenue in other ways.

Uncoupling the DVD-by-mail service from the streaming subscription is one way of doing that. They avoided the ugly cancellation carnage that would ensue if they raised the streaming fees to match the content costs, so they're counting on the DVD-by-mail customers being more loyal patrons. We'll see how this all plays out.

[Woochifer]

Umm people - it's called BTJUNKIE or other bittorent search engine.

Download any tv show and movie for FREE. Then if you like said tv show or movie and want a good quality version of it then buy it.

This is also very illegal, and a pain in the arse for most people who don't care to connect computers to their TVs. Netflix has grown to nearly 25 million subscribers because it's easy to use (the app is included with the majority of Blu-ray players and gaming consoles), it's cheap, and the content library (in the US at least) is huge.

I pay for internet - no cable or sat. It's a ripoff to pay for advertising and netflix's offerings are pathetic - it's not worth $8 when the world is your oyster for your already paid for internet charge.

Netflix's offerings in the US are far more extensive than what they carry in Canada. You have no idea what kind of an impact Netflix has actually had in the US market. By some estimates, upwards of 1/3 of all US broadband activity in prime time is Netflix traffic.

And how much bandwidth are you going through every month by torrenting? In case you haven't noticed, most ISPs are starting to impose data caps on their broadband service. Canadian ISPs were among the first ones to go in that direction, and their data caps start a lot lower than what we're seeing in the US. And because torrenting simultaneously uploads while downloading, it chews through bandwidth much faster than using another streaming site.

With the torrents you get what you want - most of which is difficult or not available on DVD or Blu Ray. Downloaded the entire series the "Practice" - when the hell is that ever going to come on DVD if ever? Bah why wait? Doctor Who the complete Tom Baker and John Pertwee run - sure you can buy a boxed set of a Season for a ridiculous $100+ dollars (which I paid for) but that's one season of Tom's 7 year run (and not the best one - key to time) and the quality is better than the download but - I connect the tv to the PC input and you pretty much get the regular tv broadcast quality - it's free and it's "good enough" quality. A truer original tv going experience at least.

"Good enough" quality doesn't cut it when you try playing it on a larger TV. The quality issue is the main reason I don't do much torrent downloading.

In the US, most current network TV series are now available online through the networks' websites (or Hulu, which is a joint venture funded by ABC/Disney, Fox, and NBC/Universal). Their sites also host several cancelled/completed series as well. The Practice, for example, is available for streaming on Hulu to US viewers.

And with Doctor Who, all of the revival episodes, aside from the current season, are available for streaming on Netflix, along with several of the classic Doctor Who serials.

Granted in Canada this is legal - don't know about the U.S. Uploading will cause you problems however i believe.

It's not legal in either country. Canada's status is more uncertain, and so far there have not been any mass P2P lawsuits filed. Just because actions haven't been taken does not mean that P2P file sharing is explicitly legal. Canada's in more of a legal limbo on this issue than anything.

In the US, the legal lines are more clearly demarcated. There have been lawsuits filed and the plaintiffs have won many of the judgments issued so far. Most of these cases are settled out of court, because fighting them in court is a lot more expensive.

The problem with using P2P is that your IP address is public information, and that can be easily culled by a plaintiff for a lawsuit. For example, over 20,000 P2P users in the US that "shared" The Hurt Locker were notified that if they didn't pay a settlement of ~$2,000, they would be sued. That case is still going through the court system, but it illustrates the risks that go along with the rewards of "free" movies.

And in case you didn't know, downloading on BitTorrent automatically means that you're also uploading -- and yes, it is the uploading that opens up the legal Pandora's box.

But you are allowed to listen to CD's in the store before you buy.

But, you're not allowed to take a copy home, or start ripping files in the store. And this listen before you buy service is not unlimited, and does not occur in every store. (good luck "trying before buying" at WalMart for example) It's not like you can just crack open a new CD and pop it into your CD player for your in-store listening.

And if it wasn't for torrents I never would have likely watched a show like Dexter - and because of BTJUNKIE - I watched Dexter - told all my friends to watch it - I bought all the seasons that are available and so did most of them - so before you dump on downloading the film industry got a bunch of sales out of it than they ever would have if such sites didn't exist - because I would never buy HBO and never would have seen it. So because of downloading they sold a bunch of discs. Granted some people won't but some sales is better than zero sales.

And Dexter is available for streaming on Netflix in the US.

You're really on a slippery slope with all this equivocating. Piracy is stealing, simple as that. If you're fine with it, then so be it. But, don't start with all this moralizing about how pirating Dexter was a good thing because you got your friends to buy it. I mean, I've done some P2P downloading as well, but I'm not going to sit here and claim that it's legal or find some farflung justification for it.

[Woochifer]

We've currently got a "both" plan with one DVD at a time and just started streaming. For < $10/mo it's a no brainer. But now they make the cheap in me think, and homey don't like that.

That's kind of where I'm at right now. At $10/month, it is a no brainer. My wife catches up on previous seasons of House using the DVD mailers, and I catch up on Torchwood via streaming. But, overall I view Netflix as one of those nice conveniences -- much easier to jettison than Directv.

Fortunately, we have a Blockbuster a block away that just dropped their prices to compete with Redbox, which is the same distance away in the other direction. ...and I could use the exercise.

Netflix has competitive threats on all sides. Their DVD-by-mail business has probably plateaued, but their bottomline has been propped up by the explosive growth in their subscriber numbers since introducing the streaming service. This growth has come with even more exponential content cost increases. Their business model simply was not sustainable.

They're changing their price plans at a time when Amazon is about to make a big push with their streaming platform (they already have a $7/month video streaming service available, but it has a lot of holes and has yet to receive any significant marketing).

This is a gamble all the way around, because they're now imposing a big fee hike on 80% of their subscribers. Only the streaming-only subscribers won't be affected, and given that streaming is what has driven Netflix's costs through the roof, it remains to be seen if DVD/streaming subscribers cry foul over this by simply canceling their service.

[Woochifer]

Sigh....Guess I'll be dropping down to streaming only service.

Good to hear from you! I might be following in your footsteps as soon as my wife finishes watching the remaining seasons of House.

[Smokey]

Since I get their service for free, I'm not worry about the price increase

[Woochifer]

Since I get their service for free, I'm not worry about the price increase

Oh right, with your "borrowed" password.

Better not move to Tennessee anytime soon, since they just made password sharing a crime.

http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-pi...legal-2011062/

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Okay, so I have to pay six more bucks a month...no big deal. While I only get their Blurays delivered to one address, I have streaming available at all of my residences. When you combine that with the ability to access my movie server(1500 movies stored and growing), I have movies coming out of my ears. One thing is for sure, I am never bored.

[02audionoob]

It seems like I remember when streaming came along they added it to our service without a fee hike. If I'm remembering right, then we're just going to be right back where we started, if we cancel streaming.

[BallinWithNash]

I'm cancelling mine and going to amazons stream service ... I get it for $40 a year ... screw you netflix!

[Worf101]

Just a couple or random thoughts now that I've been thinkin' on this a bit.

1. My Costs: Yeah, I'm right back where I started by unbundling from a streaming service I NEVER used. I guess I'm not alone.

2. Netflix totally underestimated the negative response to this hike.

3. People will vote with their feet and wallets quite quickly on this as there ARE other alternatives out there.

4. I've no axe to grind with Netflix on this one, costs have gone up or are going to and to cull out the most expesive service and ask people to pay for it makes perfect sense.

5. Unlike the cable companies, at least they offered us a choice. I personally can't wait till FIOS hits my neck of the woods so I can tell Time Warner Cable to kiss my bulbous, Black ass.

Worf

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

I'm cancelling mine and going to amazons stream service ... I get it for $40 a year ... screw you netflix!

Since I am a Amazon Prime Member, I get their streaming services as a add on. Since it has no app for the PS3, and I do not like watching movies on a computer, Amazon streaming services is too inconvenient. Even with the Amazon app on Playon, it does not look very good on a larger screen. Besides, they have pretty much the same offerings as Netflix.

Personally I don't know what all of the hubbub is about. It is just a six dollar jump in prices per month, and these increased prices will give netflix the capital to acquire the rights to more movies. Everyone should have known the prices would not stagnate at $8.00 forever, a price hike was bound to happen. Nobody on this website should be a bit surprised, Wooch has done an excellent job at keeping us abreast on Netflix's activity. His analysis has proven spot on, and I thank him for his participation on this website.