{"id":250090,"date":"2026-04-03T13:41:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T13:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/250090\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T13:41:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T13:41:10","slug":"is-this-the-last-dvd-rental-store-in-the-sacramento-region","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/250090\/","title":{"rendered":"Is This the Last DVD Rental Store in the Sacramento Region?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n It\u2019s a sunny Thursday afternoon
\n as a middle-aged woman walks into Bizarro World<\/a>, a comic book shop in Davis. In the front
\n are brand-new releases, freshly sealed trading cards and the
\n latest games. In the back is a time machine. There, it\u2019s the year
\n 2003. DVDs are the dominant medium, and this rental store has
\n them lined on shelves by the thousands.\n<\/p>\n

\n Amazed, the woman tells an
\n employee, \u201cIt\u2019s just like the old days.\u201d Owner Dan Urazandi,
\n overhearing the two during our interview, turns to me and says,
\n \u201cThose sorts of conversations are every day here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Today, the last Blockbuster is a
\n tourist attraction in Oregon. The chain, which peaked at 8,000
\n video rental stores worldwide, filed for bankruptcy in 2010 and
\n closed its remaining locations over the next four years.
\n Blockbuster\u2019s killer, streaming giant Netflix, ended its
\n DVD-by-mail rental service in 2023. Redbox, with its red DVD
\n rental kiosks, ceased a year later. As for private businesses
\n that rent out DVDs, only one appears to remain in the greater
\n Sacramento region.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe industry collapsed on
\n itself. Nobody would think of doing it. Who could possibly invest
\n money into that? That would be crazy, right?\u201d says Urazandi about
\n operating a DVD rental store in the present day.\n<\/p>\n

\n Urazandi started Four Star Movies
\n about 15 years ago as an adjacent business to Bizarro World. He
\n has 30,000 different titles available for rent on DVD, Blu-ray
\n and even VHS. Demand petered out over the years as streaming
\n became more popular. Urazandi thought he\u2019d close eventually, but
\n upkeep costs were low, so he kept the rental service going. Then,
\n a few years ago, demand plateaued. Now it\u2019s slightly growing.
\n \u201cWe\u2019ve passed the low point,\u201d Urazandi says. \u201cI think it could be
\n something that becomes more viable.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n Dan Urazandi started Four Star Movies about 15 years ago as an
\n adjacent business to Bizarro World.\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n \u2018I loved
\n it\u2019\n<\/p>\n

\n In 2011, a year after filing for
\n bankruptcy, Blockbuster closed its Davis store. An independent
\n shop in town called 49er Video also closed that year. At that
\n time, Urazandi had operated his comic shop for two decades and
\n had moved into a property with more space than he knew what to do
\n with. He tried running an arcade in his back room with video
\n games, air hockey and pinball. It was a great spot for his son\u2019s
\n birthday parties, but otherwise proved unpopular. Plus, the
\n machines were too expensive for him to maintain.\n<\/p>\n

\n Urazandi needed another idea and
\n saw the loss of two video rental stores in town as an
\n opportunity. Thus, Four Star Movies was born. He bought shelves
\n from the defunct 49er Video and began his rental service with a
\n few thousand films. People still wanted DVDs, especially the
\n elderly who weren\u2019t used to streaming. It wasn\u2019t lucrative, but
\n it was sustainable back then. Urazandi liked movies and wanted to
\n keep the business going as the market turned, even though he
\n received snide comments online, like \u201cwhere\u2019s your horse and
\n buggy?\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n The last DVD rental store in
\n Sacramento proper, Awesome Video, closed in 2018, but smaller
\n mom-and-pop shops in the rural edges of the Capital Region lasted
\n slightly longer.
\n Pine Grove Video<\/a> in
\n Amador County held on for over a decade and a half before closing
\n in 2022. Owner Ray Jennings says, \u201cI lost more money than anybody
\n else doing DVDs in the final five years of the business.\u201d Despite
\n financial pressure, he continued out of a love for his customers,
\n who often stopped by just to chat.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI loved it,\u201d Jennings says.
\n \u201cThere\u2019s the problem, you know. They say if you do what you love,
\n the money will come. That\u2019s not necessarily true, but at least
\n you\u2019re doing what you love.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n Ray Jennings operated one of the last video rental stores in the
\n Capital Region. It closed in 2022. (Courtesy of Ray Jennings)\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n Before opening the shop, Jennings
\n mostly worked as a local entertainer, spending time as a birthday
\n clown, juggler, magician, musician and Elton John impersonator.
\n Husband and wife Gary and Pam Reeder started Pine Grove Video in
\n 2006 with around 1,200 DVDs in stock. The owners decided to sell
\n it after six months because they had to take over another family
\n business. At that time, Jennings worked as a mortician and was a
\n frequent customer. He bought the shop after he overheard that it
\n was for sale.\n<\/p>\n

\n In the early days, Jennings says
\n business was good. He contacted a distributor and eventually grew
\n his catalog to 10,000 titles. He attributed success to the
\n location. The shop was in a rural area with an older population
\n used to DVDs and with poor internet access. \u201cI\u2019m not sure which
\n was faster at that time here, technologically speaking, whether
\n it would have been the internet or using smoke signals,\u201d Jennings
\n says. Business peaked about six years later.\n<\/p>\n

\n Jennings wanted to continue for
\n as long as possible. He launched several side hustles just to
\n keep the lights on. Along with movie rentals and sales, he sold
\n snacks, take-and-bake pizzas and his wife\u2019s homemade brownies. He
\n operated disk-repairing machines and rented out the recording
\n studio he initially installed in the property for personal use.
\n Then he became proficient at buying items at estate sales and
\n reselling them on eBay. Redbox coming to Pine Grove was the first
\n nail in the coffin. The final nail was COVID-19. It was too much
\n for Jennings. He sold off his inventory and closed shop in
\n 2022.\n<\/p>\n

\n DVD \u201cwas a great medium for
\n entertainment, I thought it really was,\u201d Jennings says. \u201cIn its
\n time, it was perfect. And I was obviously sorry to see it go,
\n hoping it comes back.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n \u2018I\u2019m hanging
\n on\u2019\n<\/p>\n

\n Some signs point toward a DVD
\n extinction. Brendle Wells is a librarian at the Sacramento Public
\n Library responsible for its movie selection. Pre-pandemic, she\u2019d
\n order 50 copies of the latest Marvel blockbuster. Now she
\n typically orders 30. Overall demand for physical movies is
\n decreasing, but people still turn to the library for films that
\n aren\u2019t available on digital platforms (or ones they aren\u2019t
\n willing to pay for). So far this year, members have checked out
\n DVDs over 30,000 times, though the library also offers the
\n streaming service
\n Kanopy<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n

\n Just as with VHS tapes, Wells
\n believes there could come a time when the library no longer
\n offers DVDs if they are discontinued. Apple TV is known for
\n having the vast majority of its original content exclusive to the
\n online service. It\u2019s possible other streamers could eventually
\n follow suit. \u201cThere are a number of entertainment companies that
\n just don\u2019t put their product out on physical media anymore,\u201d
\n Wells says. \u201cSo it may not be that there\u2019s no more demand, it
\n just may be that there\u2019s no more product.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n There are signs of a DVD revival.
\n The Digital Entertainment Group, a trade association,
\n released
\n a report in<\/a>
\n February that found \u201cspending on
\n all physical formats, including DVD, Blu-ray and 4K UHD showed
\n some resilience.\u201d Last year, overall sales dropped by nearly 10
\n percent, but spending on premium and less common 4K Ultra HD
\n Blu-ray rose by 12 percent compared with 2024. It shows people
\n are willing to spend more for quality physical media. Urazandi
\n says people increasingly want true ownership of a movie that
\n isn\u2019t tied to an internet connection or a monthly
\n subscription.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cPeople started to think, you
\n know, having an actual physical copy of things has real value,
\n makes sense,\u201d Urazandi says. \u201cThe same trends that brought young
\n people back into records brought them back into buying CDs and
\n DVDs.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n One local retailer says there\u2019s a
\n growing demand for an older, discontinued format: VHS. Guy Rogers
\n owns
\n Sparky\u2019s Retro Resale<\/a>,
\n a vintage collectibles shop in Sacramento. He sells action
\n figures, comic books and old media. In 2024, after he first
\n opened, Rogers sold a few VHS tapes a month. Today, he\u2019s selling
\n a few hundred a month. Sales increased drastically after he grew
\n his inventory. \u201cWe got a really nice collection, and from there,
\n it just snowballed,\u201d he says. Last year, Sparky\u2019s sold roughly
\n 1,200 DVDs and Blu-rays and 1,400 VHS. Demand for the analog
\n format is holding steady, if not growing. \u201cIt\u2019s really, really
\n popular right now,\u201d Rogers says.\n<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n These days, Guy Rogers sells more VHS tapes than DVDs at Sparky\u2019s
\n Retro Resale. He recently installed two spinning racks to hold
\n part of his growing inventory.\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n So who\u2019s buying all these tapes?
\n Horror fans, mostly. Not every film made its way onto DVD or
\n streaming, so sometimes VHS is the only way to watch them. Rogers
\n says some people collect their favorite films in every format.
\n Others enjoy the old analog look of VHS played on CRT TVs. Some
\n people prefer the tactility of physical media, just like with
\n vinyl. Nostalgia is a factor, but it isn\u2019t the only one.\n<\/p>\n

\n Young parents are a growing
\n market. Rogers says they want more control over what their kids
\n watch. Some consumers are experiencing streaming fatigue. They\u2019re
\n tired of paying for multiple services to see all their favorites,
\n with the chance that titles could be removed or censored. Plus,
\n all that choice can be overwhelming. A self-curated VHS or DVD
\n collection can cut down on the hassle. \u201cIt\u2019s a way to contain the
\n information overload,\u201d Rogers says.\n<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\n Dan Urazandi runs possibly the last video rental store in the
\n Capital Region, with more than 30,000 titles in his collection.\n<\/p>\n

The
\n quality of VHS is often worse than that of DVD. That\u2019s a selling
\n point to some, Urazandi says. A grainy horror film is scarier
\n than an enhanced version showing the strings puppeteering the
\n fake monster. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t explain why you would watch a rom-com
\n on VHS now,\u201d he says. A decade ago, it was mainly \u201chipsters\u201d who
\n enjoyed the outdated format, but Urazandi has recently seen it
\n grow in popularity among other young adults. Regardless of why
\n people want a movie in any physical format, he isn\u2019t going to
\n stop selling or renting them anytime soon.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWhy am I still doing it? I\u2019m a
\n nostalgist and an archivist and kind of a fool,\u201d Urazandi says.
\n \u201cI hang on to things that are obsolete, and I distrust things
\n that are novel. And that\u2019s just been my way my whole life, and it
\n has served me well in the business that I chose to go into, and
\n I\u2019m hanging on.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

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\n inbox.\n<\/p>\n