[MacDV] Direct to DVD release

[Richard Brown]

Well, assuming you can supply your own DVD authoring, design and art 
services for the DVD disc as well as the cover art/insert/book, the 
replication of the disc, all inclusive down to the shrinkwrap, is 
largely dependent upon the quantity produced, but you'll rarely, even 
in smaller runs, ever get above $2.00 to $3.00 per disc. Large 
quantities can drop replication costs significantly, in the dollar and 
change vicinity. You must, on top of the replication cost, add shipping 
fees from the dupe house to your warehouse, more shipping fees to 
either sub distributors or direct shipping to customers, who will also 
help defer your costs through a shipping and handling fee. Here, deals 
with your shipping agent (UPS, etc.) count. You can recover almost all 
of your replication and shipping expense in the S&H fee. On top of 
shipping concerns, I'm assuming you are speaking of a independent title 
that has had limited to no theatrical distribution. In this case, you 
must also bear the cost of advertising - which could be almost any 
amount, depending on media and ad sizing. Internet ads vary in price as 
well. Online sales at places like Amazon and DVDEmpire are useful in 
that you have little to know cost to get in, but each service will take 
a percentage of the sale for handling the transaction. This could be 
likened to the "distributor's cut" in a traditional theatrical run, 
which runs variably around the 40% mark. And then, you have to recoup 
production costs... In short, the profit is a complex equation, but 
assuming your independent production had a low initial budget, your 
break even point could be pretty low, very low, in fact, next to any 
studio production. The trick is to attract people to your film, where 
again, the Internet can prove invaluable. Sites are available to help 
in this pursuit (including some I happen to be developing, such as 
worldpremieredvd.com - not up yet, but coming) and with care, through 
the Internet, a new era for independents, which changes the financial 
equation of filmmaking, may be in the offing.

Richard Brown

On Wednesday, January 1, 2003, at 11:27 PM, finalcutpro8 at netscape.net 
wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Can anyone here tell me based on a sale of $19.99 USD what the actual 
> cost of producing a DVD is? I am talking like the cost of the DVD 
> disk, insert, casing...
>
> How much of the sale piece would be profit?
>
> Chris