Blockbuster failing like newspapers

by Richard Kelleher, MBA

World’s First Marketing Sociologist

Blockbuster reports it may fail. The company is blaming NetFlix. That’s a loser’s limp – you know, where the sports figure misses a play and then limps off the field.

It all goes back to an upheaval in business at the beginning of a century and businesses not learning how to change. It happened at the beginning of the 20th Century as boys left the farm to move to the Great Lakes manufacturing cities like Cleveland, Chicago and Detroit.

Thank God my MBA school taught change management. So many businesses refuse to change to meet new business models of the 21st Century. The example applied throughout this blog is public relations practitioners who won’t let go of press release mentality and adopt Marketing Sociology.

Check the blog below on Shankman and Godin. YouTube, Hulu and my local library are killing Blockbuster, not NetFlix.

What if Blockbuster married with a television manufacturer, delivered a discount (substantial) big screen with Bluetooth capability? Then Blockbuster could charge $3-5 to deliver a movie to a home via the ‘Net.”

The family could be watching the movie, surfing the Web, even barbequing. Freedom – what the 21st Century family wants. Instead, Blockbuster holds to a 1980s model of “brick and mortar.”