DVD availability

Kia ora! Here at Palmerston North City Library there are still DVDs you can borrow, at time of writing. But the availability of new ones for purchase is continuing to dwindle. Here are some reasons why.

There are fewer DVDs being produced these days, worldwide. The companies involved make more money from having their work on terrestrial TV, in movie theatres, or on streaming services. It’s a gamble for them to create a physical product and hope it sells.

This is also why many of the big DVD manufacturers no longer distribute to Aotearoa. It’s a small market here, so it’s even more of a gamble.

A library can only legally lend DVDs which have a New Zealand rating label, which is why overseas purchases (and most of the ones on TradeMe) are not available to libraries. As an individual you can buy a DVD from overseas if you like, but a library can’t. This can cause friction, when someone says “the library is missing series 2 of my favourite show, but I saw it for sale online”. It’s usually not something the library can purchase.

Which brings us to vendors. The reason a library has approved vendors is because they must be able to do invoicing and order tracking a certain way. Libraries receive hundreds of titles every year, so the supplier must be able to work with the systems and processes in place. They also need to be a supplier that can be trusted to supply the DVD with the correct rating label (so, again, not TradeMe). Ideally, they would also provide a rudimentary catalogue record for each title and some basic processing. For books, there are library supply companies that do this, but for audio visual companies that’s not often provided.

Palmerston North City Library is committed to keeping the DVD collection going for as long as people want to use it. If you have any further questions, please contact us.