A Truly Great Idea: 99 Cent Rotating Movie Rentals on iTunes
Apple has started sending out emails letting users know that each week one select movie title will be available to rent for just 99 cents. This is an ingenious way to kick up usage of the rental store.
Context & Ripple Effects
The 99-cent weekly rental is Apple's first promotion since the January launch of iTunes Movie Rentals with all major film studios, a rollout that itself grew out of the Fox deal reported in December and was even foreshadowed by an accidental store slip-up revealing rental options back in September.
The move matters because the rental store is barely a month old and needs a habit-forming hook: by rotating one discounted title per week, Apple is testing whether price promotion — not just catalog breadth — drives repeat visits to the storefront.
First-order effects
- iTunes users get one studio title per week at roughly a third of the standard rental price, giving Apple an immediate lever to lift traffic and transaction volume on the month-old rental store.
Second-order effects
- Competing download services such as Amazon's Unbox and physical rental chains like Blockbuster now face a visible sub-$1 digital price anchor from the largest music retailer, pressuring them to match promotions or justify premium pricing.
Third-order effects
- If the weekly discount lifts rental volume enough to satisfy the six major studios, expect discounting to become a recurring feature of digital film storefronts rather than a launch gimmick — shifting digital video economics toward volume-driven, promotion-led pricing.
The trend: Digital movie storefronts are entering a promotional pricing phase, with platform owners like Apple using loss-leader titles to build rental habits against physical and cable alternatives.