Our DVD and Blu-ray sales estimates are based on weekly retail surveys, which we use to build a weekly market share estimate for each title we are tracking. The market share is converted into a weekly sales estimate based on industry reports on the overall size of the market, including reports published in Media Play News.

For example, if our weekly retail survey estimates that a particular title sold 1% of all units that week, and the industry reports sales of 1,500,000 units in total, we will estimate 15,000 units were sold of that title. The consumer spending estimate is based on the average sales price for the title in the retailers we survey.

We refine our estimates from week to week as more data becomes available. In particular, we adjust weekly sales figures for the quarter once the total market estimates are published by the Digital Entertainment Group. Figures will therefore fluctuate each week, and totals for individual titles can go up or down as we update our estimates.

Because sales figures are estimated based on sampling, they will be more accurate for higher-selling titles.

DVD and Blu-ray Releases for October 25th, 2011

October 25th, 2011

It's a rather strong week on the home market with several top-notch releases and no matter what your tastes are, you should find something to enjoy here. Even if you just look at contenders for Pick of the Week, there are first run releases (Captain America: The First Avenger on Blu-ray Combo Pack); limited releases (Attack the Block on DVD); TV on DVD releases (Robot Chicken: Season Five on Blu-ray), Box Sets (Jurassic Park: Trilogy Box Set) and even classics (Laurel & Hardy: The Essential Collection on DVD). In the end, I went with the Winnie the Pooh Blu-ray / DVD Combo Pack, which should pick up an Oscar nomination and might be the favorite to win Best Feature-Length Animated Film. More...

DVD and Blu-ray Releases for August 9th, 2011

August 9th, 2011

This week's list is highly frustrating for two reasons. Firstly, while there's a pretty big list of first-run releases, many of which had some pre-release buzz, almost none of them matched expectations. Secondly, my internet access kept cutting out, so it took till 4:30 a.m. to get this done, and by the end I was swearing nearly constantly. (Even 15 minutes of the Smooth Jazz Nyan Cat wasn't enough to calm my nerves.) Moving on... There were two main contenders for Pick of the Week, Paul on Blu-ray and Stargate: Atlantis: Complete Series Megaset on Blu-ray. In the end I went with the latter, partially because the screener for the former hasn't shown up yet. More...