Major US retailers such as Best Buy, Circuit City, and CompUSA are fuming over the ongoing battle between HD DVD and Blu-Ray, calling the consumer-bewildering battle "nightmarishly unfriendly" and "stupid." While consumers grow increasingly confused over the two formats, the major retail chains face a customer service nightmare.
While all three may sell millions of players and discs, the consumer backlash from a failing format could be very strong. Worse yet for retailers, many consumers may sit out the stormy first months and wait for one format to be declared the winner.
Best Buy CEO Brad Anderson was particularly concerned, stating "We are going to wind up with some number of consumers probably buying
a format that dies, and we are probably going to wind up having to sell
it to them. They are not going to be happy with us." CompUSA CEO Larry Mondry was equally as pessimistic, calling the industry "stupid" for repeating the BetaMax-VHS wars of the 1980s.
"I don"t care which way it goes, I just want it to go one (particular) way," he added.