The video-rental business, May 1, 1987

(I recently came across this story which provides a snapshot in time of the consumer video-rental business. In mid-1987, rental shops purchased videos for between $50 and $80 each, then rented them to the masses who paid a few bucks per night, per title. By this time, most consumers had their own VCRs (remember when we rented those along with the tapes?), but the cassettes themselves were prohibitively expensive, so only video stores could afford to purchase them. And, like the story says, Hollywood was dumping movies from their backlog into the marketplace along with newer releases.)

May 1, 1987
By DONALD PORTER
Standard-Examiner staff

People who rent a lot of videos know how to play the game properly. They know where to get any sort of videocassette a person might want to see.

Since not all video shops are created equal, they have several memberships spread around town at different stores: ones that carry zillions of copies of the newest releases like "Top Gun," another with a good selection of classic films, and maybe -- if they're a little bit daring -- a membership at a store that devotes a corner rack to (gasp!) adult video fare.

Video enthusiasts who subsist on the latest releases, of course, are able to get by with a single membership. But for serious video-movie watchers, the multiple-store rule is a necessity of life, since no single store has the cash -- or the inclination – to stock their shelves with all the older movies available on tape, even if they are classics. So folks with slightly esoteric tastes in movies are, by necessity, well-traveled.

"'Top Gun' and 'Tough Guys' are the ones you can't keep in," explained Shirley Ward, manager of Movie Tonite Video in North Ogden. Very few older titles are really popular with the masses, she said. The movies of John Wayne, Alfred Hitchcock, Cary Grant, Walt Disney and various musicals are the most popular of the comparatively unpopular older films on her store's shelves, she said.