Fields' influence on display at Blockbuster; former Wal-Mart prez shifts spotlight to total entertainment - Bill Fields, Blockbuster Video and Music stores, Wal-Mart Stores

Discount Store News, Oct 7, 1996 by Pete Hisey

FT. LAUDERDALE, FLA. - Bill Fields, the former president of Wal-Mart Stores, is putting his stamp on Blockbuster Video and Music stores. Since joining the company last spring, he has made several moves to turn the company's 2,000-plus video stores into entertainment superstores.

The idea, apparently, is to develop a quasi-Viacom superstore, similar to The Disney Store and the Warner Bros. Studio Store, but with the accent on home entertainment. (Separately, the first true Viacom store is due to open in Chicago this fall.)

Blockbuster's video rental stores have recently added a small selection of new release and top hit compact discs on a four-way display near checkout, with movie soundtracks getting the best shelf space, along with recent releases from Pearl Jam, the Fugees, Tom Petty and other popular acts.

The company has also introduced "Prop Carts," similar to the opportunity carts common at WalMart and Target. This month, they're featuring goods from parent Viacom's Star Trek and Goosebumps properties. The Goosebumps selection, aimed at preteen and early teen consumers, is heavy on T-shirts, backpacks, baseball hats and school supplies. The Star Trek section features apparel, pens, keychains that look and sound like phasers, and Star Trek executive toys.

A nearby endcap merchandises video game accessories, like cleaning units for Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis, as well as game pads and universal remote controls.

A roadblock pallet fixture in the main aisle merchandises Coca-Cola products in oversized bottles for 99 cents. and two fixtures vend snacks like Fig Newtons and movie-sized boxes and bags of candy.

Both video and music stores feature a new magazine department, although the section at Blockbuster Music is far larger and clearly directed at Generation X consumers.

In the video stores, the selection includes Blockbuster's own magazine, Feature, which debuted in September, along with mass market favorites like People and Premiere.

At the music stores, the selection is tilted heavily toward music magazines like Rolling Stone, Spin and Vibe; several computer titles, including Wired; and lifestyle titles like Sassy, Details and GQ.

According to Larry Johnson, president of Middlebury, Vt.-based RetailVision, a specialty magazine distributor focused on the mass market, the selection in larger Blockbuster Music stores includes 360 titles occupying 32 ft. Smaller stores receive only about 90 titles, running eight feet. Altogether 426 Blockbuster Music stores have installed the program, which debuted in late July. And with an even more limited selection scheduled to move into the remainder of the stores, the total will exceed 500.

Johnson said that the program was custom-developed for Blockbuster based on its customers' age and socioeconomic characteristics. "It's very heavy in computer gaming, sports, women's titles. Internet-related titles, fitness and general news and lifestyle publications," he said. "Fields' feeling is that if you already have a music store, you might as well make it a full entertainment center."

RetailVision targets nontraditional retail outlets, including hardware stores, bicycle shops, office superstores and home centers with "a mix of titles targeted at the people who shop there most," Johnson said. "It's the biggest piece of new business to hit the magazine industry in years."

According to Johnson, putting the program together to meet Blockbuster's standards was a six-month-long process. "We spent a long time with their visual merchandising and store design people," he said. "They want to expand more and more into related businesses," but not at the cost of making the stores impossible to shop.

The magazines, coupled with the music industry's self-imposed "every Tuesday" schedule for new CD releases, "give the customer more reasons to visit the store weekly."

The addition of cold Coca-Cola products, snacks and theater-sized candy packs are aimed at keeping customers in the stores longer. In most stores, shoppers can listen to about a dozen new or recent releases at a comfortable record bar, and many stores will open virtually any CD for the customer to preview.

The music stores have also added other impulse items, including the aforementioned candy and snacks, plus calendars, a limited selection of music-oriented books, personal electronics, an expanded audio/video accessories department, wrapping paper, batteries, entertainment-oriented apparel, closeout computer software and necklaces and amulets with a New Age/ Grateful Dead feel. About 80 stores nationwide will also add a selection of CD-ROM titles.

"They're taking a category management approach to the business," Johnson said. "We're already seeing a strong turn rate in magazines, although it's too early to really assess the total impact."

The chain has also worked at lowering its prices. Although its standard prices for new releases are $15.99 and $16.99, the chain advertises "thousands of CDs for $9.99 or less." Dozens of titles, generally new releases and hot sellers, are promoted at $11.99 and $12.99, with some, including the new Eels record, as low as $7.99. About a third of Blockbuster's pop releases are discounted at any given time.