Making the most of Christian- and family-themed home-viewing options

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: How are DVD sales in your stores these days?

Hicks: I would say consistently month in and month out, they are probably better. I think on the year we are a little behind. I'm at a loss right now. Compared to year-to-date, we're down, but that's because Fireproof came out last year in late January or February.

Marsh: Our DVD sales have been down in the last year. Of course, Fireproof did make a big difference last year, but if you didn't take that into account, then our DVD sales from last year to this year have been about the same. We have actually have seen growth in our DVD sales in the last month, which is surprising.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: And to what do you attribute that?

Marsh: We've actually been doing a little closer monitoring of just the video department alone, just to see which titles are going through quickly and make sure those are stocked, and we have found that those are the lower-priced DVDs.

Efird: Year to date on movie sales, I am at 331 units, but at the same time last year, I sold 410 (copies of) Fireproof, so my loss is strictly Fireproof, if you go unit by unit. So I think it shifted because we haven't had a big title. Maybe Letters to God. If we can push it, it might help us with some of that loss. I agree that we are doing lower-priced DVDs, and that has helped our sales, especially through the summer.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: What are your stores doing to increase DVD sales?

Hicks:  I think we've had more featured in our catalog through Covenant stores. We've started doing a DVD-of-the-month type promotion that is, again, trying to get something down there below the $10 mark, but also push some units that way. ... I have not made a ton of in-store changes yet. There are definitely some improvements we need to make as far as merchandising.

Marsh: Merchandising a little bit differently and some rearranging of the videos. Our video department is located within our music department, and we have just done some rearranging to see if we can bring it to people's attention that we do have videos and a wide variety that we do offer. 

Efird: Like Pee Dee, our video section is in our music section, but we have been featuring the sale DVDs, the promotional ones up front. We have a big screen that we show some of the movies, but we are also going to try to move toward some other computers or units with DVD players so we can feature some specific ones, more than one at a time. ... Our listening stations have died, and we can't get them fixed. We are going to replace them with video screens.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: Steven and Gerald, do you actively promote DVD sales with monitors playing new releases?

Hicks:  I do have a couple of TVs and VCRs and DVD players that are running. Sometimes we run music videos through those, and sometimes we will put in the new (releases). These are TVs that were put in more to function in our music department, and they happen to be on a freestanding-type display that goes from floor to ceiling. It's a permanent fixture-type thing, and they are near the top of it. 

Marsh: We have three monitors playing videos. We have one in our children's area—they have an area they can play in—and we have a kids' video, one of the new ones with a display outside, so the parents can see what they are watching. We do also promote the Gaither videos on one display. We always promote their newest one there. We also have another that plays a demo of a new movie, like Letters to God.  

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: Besides having a specific DVD section, do you have any DVDs located elsewhere for impulse buying?

Marsh: We do a couple of smaller, impulse-buy sections, but normally it is the video section. We may cross-merchandise with one title in the book department, just depending on what release is available and what kind of specials we can offer for that DVD. 

Efird: When we are promoting our catalog items, we will pull some of them out and feature them on a fixture in the front of the store.

Hicks:  I will pull some out and put on what is normally a book endcap that is a little bit separate from our regular DVD rack in our book department. We will also put some major feature stuff up. We have a big back counter with slatwall … so we may feature something back there on the back wall, as well as around the register, so that people can see them easily there as well. 

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: What did you do with Fireproof?

Hicks:  We had a pre-buy. We do so many I can't remember exactly what the offer was, but I know we had a pretty good pre-buy offer on it. Then of course, we did in-store displays, and it was featured in catalogs and flyers. Between the two stores we probably sold close to 1,000 units. 

Marsh: We did a presale as well, and we sold over half of the copies that we got through our presale, and the other half we sold quickly thereafter and we've had to continually reorder it. We did have a hard time selling ours because we have a LifeWay and a Family (store) within just a few minutes of our store, and they were offering better deals than we could, with combined packaging and things like that, so we had to come up with different ways to promote it. I think we sold a little over 100 copies, which is unusual because normally it takes us several years to sell 100 of one video. We can sell 12 within a few months, but then after that, the sales slowly dwindle down. We can sell 12 within a few months, but then after that, the sales slowly dwindle down.

Efird: My lifetime is over 500 and it is still selling. We have some in stock and we are still selling a few.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: Do feature films and children's programming make up the majority of the titles you stock, or do you also carry small-group DVDs?

Hicks:  We might cross-merchandise some of the Bible study stuff from time to time in with regular DVDs, but actually we keep those separate and factor in our system a lot of times in a different department than our feature films. For example, I think Claire would know with Covenant, we've got a couple of DVDs that are like a Beth Moore and another one on marriage in our Covenant catalog now that are Bible study-type DVDs, and we actually have those they are not even in our DVD department from a sales standpoint. 

Marsh: We carry a small selection of small-group study DVDs. We don't really focus on that. We don't get a lot of calls for those, and when we do stock them, they have actually just taken up shelf space for a while. 

We just started expanding our kids' DVDs a little more, as well as feature films. In our area, Gaither is one of the main releases.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: What do you think about the new rating system for DVDs proposed by CBA and the Dove Foundation?

Hicks: I think it's going to work well. I'm hoping that instead of confusing some stuff, it can add some clarity because there are a lot of movies that have varying degrees of either language or violence or something along those lines that I know a lot of parents in particular who are going to watch it with kids are going to want to know before they make the purchase, so it can help us and help them better distinguish exactly what is in this movie. 

Also, you have people who, because we're selling it in a Christian bookstore, they may or may not have different expectations of what is going to be in that movie. 

There are some movies that have a "softer Christian theme" to them, a la Blind Side, whereas other movies have a very strong Christian message to them.

Marsh: I personally watch a lot of movies, but I am not able to watch every one of them ... so something to help categorize movies a little easier for us to say, "Yes, this would be a great movie for you to show your child, that you should sit in and watch with them." Or, "hey, this would be a great movie for them to watch by themselves." 

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: Is your DVD section an area of concern or do you think it's going to continue to grow and thrive?

Marsh: We have for several years watched the sales fluctuate. We will get a little up and then a little down. We have to take advantage of whatever release comes out and make the most of it as we can. ... We have thought about absorbing the music department back with the video department and making it one big department instead of two separate. We are trying everything we can to get the sales up.

We noticed that all of our customers are taking advantage of lower price points so we are trying to see if we can come up with some promotions or work with our sales reps on things like that, to offer DVDs at lower prices and hope that it will bring the customers in to look at those.

Our video department is not a destination—it's an impulse station. A customer will just happen to walk by and think, "Oh, I forgot I wanted to get this DVD."

Efird: I really think if we can take advantage with each release we get, there is potential for growth, especially if we can get a good price. That's a great way of entertaining a family in the down economic time.

CHRISTIAN RETAILING: Gerald, are you content with your DVD sales?

Hicks:  I can't necessarily say I'm content from the standpoint of, I feel there is a whole lot more I can do to better merchandise and better market and promote them. Right now, my DVDs are kind of a part or right beside, back in my music department area. Actually my DVDs are merched for the part on a music rack that I had available from downsizing the amount of music we carry. And they are alphabetized, they are not even merchandised thematically.

I'm actually looking to pick up some used fixtures maybe from closing stores. ... I'm leaving some opportunity on the table by probably not merchandising it as well in the stores (as) I could. 

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