Redbox rental kiosks apparently aren’t as appealing when its “new releases” are no longer so new. Thanks in part to an agreement not to stock new discs from major studios until 28 days after release, Redbox sales are down despite kiosk traffic remaining consistent.

The Seattle Times reports Coinstar, which owns Redbox, reduced its fourth-quarter sales estimates from the $415-$440 million range to $391 million. People are apparently perusing the kiosks as often as ever, but no longer renting as many DVDs on each trip.

This past period marked Redbox’s first holiday season in which it had to delay movies. Coinstar CEO Paul Davis said in a statement that the 28-day delay was only part of the problem. He said too many kiosks were lacking wide selection because many customers returned DVDs they rented to different kiosks, throwing the supply off balance.

“We have already taken a number of decisive steps to better align content purchases with our consumers’ behavior, including offering more day and date titles and better allocating Blu-ray titles to high demand areas.

Does the inability to rent a movie in the first four weeks stop you from using Redbox as often?

Coinstar shares plunge after lower 4Q estimate [The Seattle Times via High-def Digest]

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