[Germany] Koch Media - Koch Films (Plaion Pictures)

Sold some gold so I could catch up with these releases (true story).
But now I’m even more confused by Koch’s packaging decisions.

Navajo Joe - Amaray with card slipcase - why no digi-pack ?

Kanonen Fur Cordora & Tote Brauchen Keine Dollars - Amaray with numbering system on spines (03 & 04) - why no digi-pack ?

Silbersattel - Blu-ray Disc, can’t watch this but got in case it goes OOP before I can.

Todeskommando Panthersprung - off topic but Garko & Kinksi in a WWII movie, how cool is that.

I think the digipaks were limited edition. They probably cost more so the company went back to the amarays. Thats my guess.

well the first edition of navajo joe was in digipak, so you came too late. the ones with numbers on the spines are part of some sort of 70s collection I think.

Are you sure? I have an Amaray in a paper sleeve (or card slipcase), and don’t think there was a Digi of this according to what I have read.

The Euro- and the US western series of Koch are all in an Amaray. Some special films were released as Digi (Mercenario, The Hired Hand, The Shootist)

i might be confusing navajo joe with the mercenary

How are things going with Koch? Are they still releasing SWs?

Thanks for the replies fellas, especially Stanton for clearing things up and making me feel a bit better about it all :wink:
Strange no digipak for Navajo Joe, but I’m sure Koch know more about DVD marketing than I do.
Cash flow problems apart, I’ll make sure to get future releases as soon as they come out.

Me too, I bought it pretty early on as well.

A new SW series is announced for next spring. The rumours say that Requiescant and The Ruthless 4 are maybe the next releases. Rumours …

I still don’t understand why they skip the Rainbow collection only to start a new collection …
The new ones will be more expensive than the Rainbow collection, about 14 to 15 €. Which is the usual price for a Koch disc.

why not continue the rainbow collection? I mean the only people buying those are us fans anyway, so why try all these marketing tricks…

That’s the point: the Koch-SWs are not only bought by the hardcore-fans, you can see that when you check the numbers. X-Rated said that they sold around 500-1000 DVDs, when Kinowelt released Gli specialisti they sold around 500, I heard a rumor that KSM sold around 800 of “Grand duello”.

A normal Koch-title (Drei Kugeln für Ringo…) sells 2-3.000 units. Something like Mercenario or Man of the East 10-20.000.

So you can see that the “fanbase” in Germany collects around 500 people and that’s not enough to release a movie.

Btw.: Paramount sold around 1 million “Once upon a time in the west”-units…

[quote=“Karl, post:752, topic:50”]That’s the point: the Koch-SWs are not only bought by the hardcore-fans, you can see that when you check the numbers. X-Rated said that they sold around 500-1000 DVDs, when Kinowelt released Gli specialisti they sold around 500, I heard a rumor that KSM sold around 800 of “Grand duello”.

A normal Koch-title (Drei Kugeln für Ringo…) sells 2-3.000 units. Something like Mercenario or Man of the East 10-20.000.

So you can see that the “fanbase” in Germany collects around 500 people and that’s not enough to release a movie.

Btw.: Paramount sold around 1 million “Once upon a time in the west”-units…[/quote]
I believe Koch is selling quite a lot outside of Germany too, Kinowelt and KSM discs aren’t english friendly so they’re mainly just for german market. X-rated were too expensive and hard to get which explains low sales I think.

I see.

So what can we conclude from that? Am I right in assuming that the following factors are key: popularity of the title or actors (OUATITIW, Mercenary, Terence Hill movies…), market reach of the distributor (Paramount), package design (Ouatitw, mercenario), quality.

Somehow I think that the package design of the Rainbow collection is not quite appealing to the spontaneous custumer, as the covers to not easily suggest big names, or action, traditional western themes, or anything like that.

I think what KSM for example does wrong, is that the quality of their discs usually is lacking, in terms of language choices, version length of the movies, and “wuehltisch” nature of their products.

the problem with kinowelt is, that they do not put up a particular effort to market their SW releases, and Specialisti is not a very popular title, and was not english friendly…

if Koch relaunches a new collection, how will it be different from the rainbow? I am assuming the cover design will change and be more similar to “man of the east” etc?

I have always had my problems with X-Rated (and various similarly-named P.O.Box “companies” associated with it), as they operate mainly in the mail-order world and never looked quite professional enough, and therefore had quite a dubious image.

I think what X-Rated etc need to do is become more like a regular distributor, with normal packaging (what’s with these hardboxes?) and availability on Amazon.de

There are no real numbers but guesses that around 100 are sold to people outside of Germany Austria Switzerland (GAS)

PS: This shows that it is normally completely insane to put English subs on the discs as such subtitles are very expensive if you make them at a professional company (I have no idea who makes the subs at Koch)

100 sounds indeed very low, especially after such relatively comfortable online stores as Xploitedcinema are gone, etc…

Only 500 of The Specialists? That’s a big disappointment.

My guess would have been around 5000.

100 !..I am surpised.

Yeah they should just keep it simple.