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TIME: Almanac 1990s
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Time_Almanac_1990s_SoftKey_1994.iso
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1994-03-25
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<text id=92TT2461>
<title>
Nov. 02, 1992: A Blockbuster Deal
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1992
Nov. 02, 1992 Bill Clinton's Long March
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
THE WEEK, Page 19
BUSINESS
A Blockbuster Deal
</hdr><body>
<p>A video-rental giant decides to get into the music business,
big-time
</p>
<p> The world's largest video-rental chain has decided to market
music as well as films. Blockbuster Entertainment Corp. has
agreed to pay $185 million, including debt-assumption, for two
record chains: Music Plus, based in Southern California, and
Sound Warehouse, many of whose stores are in Texas. The
combined 236 outlets immediately make Blockbuster the seventh
largest U.S. record retailer, controlling about 4% of an $8
billion annual market. Despite soaring profits -- Blockbuster's
third-quarter revenue jumped 24%, to $283.7 million -- the new
acquisitions seem to reflect an industry assumption that the
video-rental market is softening and that increasingly pervasive
pay-per-view movies on cable will further slake the demand. But
Blockbuster now faces some entrenched and ferociously
competitive rivals in music retailing, like Musicland Stores
Corp, not the mom-and-pop outlets it bulldozed while
revolutionizing video rental in the 1980s.
</p>
</body></article>
</text>