Redbox to Rent Warner Bros. Movies Seven Days After DVD Release

Redbox, whose thousands of DVD rental kiosks are still humming along despite the overall decline of physical discs, announced a new agreement with Warner Bros. under which new-release DVD and Blu-ray Disc titles from the studio will be available to rent at Redbox kiosks seven days after their retail sell-through date.

Previously, WB titles were subject to a 28-day delay before Redbox was permitted to rent them. Two other big studios — Universal and 21st Century Fox — currently mandate a 28-day wait for their theatrical titles on Redbox after home-video release.

Meanwhile, Redox has direct output deals with Lionsgate and Paramount for same day as home video release. It currently does not have an agreement with Sony Pictures Entertainment and hasn’t had a deal Disney since 2012.

For movies from studios with which it doesn’t have a direct deal, Redbox purchases DVDs on the open market for its kiosks. Redbox charges $1.50 per day for DVD rentals and $2 per day for Blu-ray rentals.

Redbox this year plans to roll out a net 1,500 new kiosks across the U.S., adding to its current base of 40,000, and execs say it’s expecting to add even more in 2018.

Redbox’s parent company, Outerwall, was acquired by private-equity firm Apollo Global Management in a $1.6 billion deal that closed last fall. Since then, Apollo has split up Outerwall’s three segments into distinct businesses, so Redbox is now entirely separate from Coinstar and ecoATM. Redbox CEO Galen Smith said in an interview this month that the company now manages its kiosk network for optimal cash flow rather than per-kiosk margin percentage.

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