Sébastien Simonetta (GALEC): "The heritage cinema still resists"

What does the MIFC represent for a company like Galec ?

For the Leclerc movement, of which Galec is the purchasing center, an event like the MIFC is an excellent way to exchange with publishers who will be brought to offer us their products in the coming months. In a market in which the segmentation becomes more and more important, being able to talk directly with them about what works best with customers is an opportunity not to be missed.

How is heritage cinema doing in the DVD / BluRay market?

The physical market continues to shrink as a result of the new consumption habits induced by dematerialization. But it's clear that the segment dedicated to heritage cinema still resists, and even very well compared to the general offer, especially because the digital offer dedicated to heritage films is still unsatisfactory for consumers today.

This market is declining in favor of digital but who is it still targeting ? Does retail like Leclerc have an interest in continuing to be interested in physical edition ?

Of course ! The Leclerc network, through Espaces Culturels but also in its hypermarkets, aims to offer to the widest possible audience the most complete choice: many customers attend the store because they know they can find there heritage products, both French and foreign, absent from the traditional lines of certain brands. This clientele is older on average than the typical video shopper, but knowing that the physical product is more and more offered as a gift, and heritage films editions are the most carefully edited by publishers, everything leads us to think that this market segment still has very good days ahead. At least in our brand.

In the DVD v.s. BluRay match, does the DVD still win ? What do you think it is about ?

At the time of the appearance of high definition, the entire industry has totally failed with consumers to understand the interest for them to switch to blu-ray support: we still remember the battle HD-DVD v.s. Blu-ray, which did not help to clarify the offer at the start ! And subsequently, the larger expenses asked to the publishers for the blu-ray manufacture than for the DVD's undeniably slowed down its development and its installation like the reference format, in place of the DVD. The result of this lack of overall vision is that we find ourselves today with customers equipped with 4K TVs, who watch their newspaper TV and their football games in ultra-HD but who, at the time of buy physical media, can still sometimes choose to buy only DVD. Nothing is lost yet of course, but in the field the work of catching up and pedagogy to the customers will still be long, and must be carried out daily.