If you didn't get a DVD player for Christmas today, don't fret.
You'll probably end up getting one soon and join the millions expected to help the DVD player retire the VCR by 2005.
``DVDs have been the fastest-growing consumer electronic product of all time. That trend is continuing this year,'' said Tara Dunion, a spokesman for the Consumer Electronics Association in Arlington, Va.
Since 1997, the digital versatile disc player - which plays compact discs that contain seven times as much data as a music CD on each of up to 4 layers - has gone from being in just 0.3 percent of American households to being in 56 percent of households.
It took VCRs, or videocassette recorders, 13 years to get into just 20 percent of U.S. households.
Meanwhile, the venerable VCR appears to be on its last legs, but it might not disappear immediately.
``What we're finding is people are not getting rid of their VCRs,” Ms. Dunion said. “They're just peacefully coexisting - for now.''
The VCR has had a 28-year reign, with pinnacles of $4.1 billion in sales in 1985 and over 23 million units sold in 2000, according to eBrain Market Research.
But it has been on a fast decline because of DVD machines, which have dropped sharply in price to an average of $180 from $490 in 1997.
This Christmas, in fact, has become the year of the $50 DVD player, with base models going for a tenth of what they were five years ago. Sales are expected to hit $2.8 billion this year, up from $171 million in 1997.
``Many people who already owned a DVD player are buying a second one this year for their bedrooms,'' said John Oswald, vice president of Appliance Center, in Maumee.
Sales of DVD players and accessories have skyrocketed this year for the store.
Best Buy Co., Inc., the dominant electronics retailer in the Toledo area, used to carry dozens of VCR models. It now carries 11, priced from a $50 standard model to $800 for one that records high-definition TV programs. It carries 35 DVD player models, ranging from $54 to $800.
``We sell products based on the demand of our customers. We have tech-savvy customers who go for the latest and greatest, which is why we are now carrying more DVD players than VCRs,'' said Donna Beadle, a spokesman for Minneapolis-based Best Buy.
The company now carries 3,000 DVD movie titles in its stores and just 500 titles on video cassette, a spokesman said.
Said Ms. Beadle ``We still think the VCR is a viable option for customers. When we look at the top 10 in movie sales, we still see a lot of children's titles coming up for VHS tapes. We think the people who are buying the DVD players are still keeping a VCRs and giving them to their children.''
Perhaps price and home libraries of videotapes will keep VCRs alive for some time, experts say.
The devices cost an average of $70 and can be purchased for as little as $30. And the few DVD players that can record movies can cost $400 to $500.
John Day, founder of Toledo's Video Connection chain, which was purchased by Movie Gallery, Inc., said the tape rental business is slowing markedly.
``There's a lot of things that we get in the stores today that we buy on DVD that we do not bring in on tape. So we're already shifting,” he said.
First Published December 25, 2002, 4:07 a.m.
