LoveFilm

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LoveFilm is a British DVD rental company which provides online DVD rentals in the UK and Europe. It operates the LoveFilm.com website, as well as providing the actual website and delivery infrastructure for an array of branded services in partnership with other British companies. LoveFilm has grown through merger and acquisition of other online DVD rental companies, such as Webflix and DVDsOnTap.

LoveFilm officially launched in March 2004, although apparently had been running for a few months before that. It claimed to reach 50,000 subscribers in December 2004, and 100,000 in March 2005, a month in which it shipped almost 700,000 rentals. The current claims are over 120,000 members and over 62,000 titles. LoveFilm faces major competition from the online operations of Blockbuster and Amazon.co.uk.

Lovefilm merged with Video Island (which similarly had multiple brand partners) in April 2006. ScreenSelect, which was the main trading style of Video Island, has now renamed itself under the LoveFilm banner.

[edit] Pricing plans and associated rental services

LoveFilm's own service provides "Unlimited" (£9.95-£14.95) pricing plans[1], ranging from 1-3 discs out at a time (a 4-disc plan at £19.95 has been offered in the past). There are also "Combination" plans which allow the rental of both DVDs and video game discs at higher prices.

Each of the "powered by" services will typically have plans similar to Lovefilm's (although some may only have a subset), and may have varying prices, different length free trials, etc. It is not known whether customers of the various companies are treated differently when it comes to choosing titles to be sent, etc. Customers are limited to a single free trial among the array of related LoveFilm-powered companies.

The company has come in from criticism from users over its claim to offer 'unlimited' DVD rentals. Many regular users have found the company in fact uses long delays at the shipping stage to reduce the number of films a month a customer can rent. The company itself claims that this 'fair usage' policy means all customers get a similar service.

The list of LoveFilm-associated rental companies (partners and White-label) includes:

  • CD-WOW![2] - an online retailer. Offers Unlimited-3
  • Sofa Cinema[3] - the Guardian newspaper sponsors this one, offering Unlimited-3 and Light-2.
  • WHSmith Movies Direct[4] - from the WH Smith bookstore chain. Offers Unlimited-3 (£13.99) and Limited-1.
  • Tesco DVD Rental[5] - Service for the Tesco supermarket chain website, offering 1-3 unlimited DVD rental plans.
  • EasyCinema.com[6] - Service in conjunction with the Easy Group.
  • five Movie Club[7] - Britain's Channel Five tv network[8]. Offers Unlimited-1,2,3.
  • BraFilm.com[9] - Service for Norway and Denmark, acquired by Video Island and currently being rebranded as LoveFilm.

Defunct LoveFilm/Video Island-associated rental companies:

  • Sainsbury's DVD Rental - The Sainsbury's supermarket chain. Offered Unlimited 1-4 plans at lower prices than the regular LoveFilm levels. This was closed by Sainsbury's.
  • MSN DVD Rental - Service operated through Microsoft's MSN channel.
  • ITV Movie Club - Service operated through the ITV website.
  • mymovies - in association with the mymovies.net portal site.
  • FilmFour DVD - Film Four free movie channel[10]. Offers Unlimited-2.
  • lastminute.com - offers Unlimited 1,3,4 and Lite 1,2,3.

In addition, companies such as Virgin and Woolworths may provide special offers for the LoveFilm service.

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