The world's last remaining Blockbuster video store in Bend, Oregon. Photo: James Breeden
For more than 30 years, Ron Debello was a regular customer at his local Blockbuster.
After he retired, the 72-year-old former landscape designer began coming in daily and browsing the same shelves, which he's been raiding for decades.
With his membership, he can trade two rental cards as many times as he wants, meaning he can watch dozens of movies for $29 a month (£29 ).
But Mr. Debello's daily routine is one few are lucky enough to enjoy because he lives in Bend, a small mountain town in Oregon that boasts the world's last surviving blockbuster movie.
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“This surprises the hell out of me,” Mr. Debello says, browsing the new releases section.
“Why Bend, of all the places Blockbuster had?”
In 2004, Before streaming services and online shopping became popular, then-video rental giant Blockbuster had more than 9,000 stores, including more than 500 in the UK.
But 10 years later, in a tough Competition from Netflix and mounting debt, Blockbuster closed all of its corporate stores, leaving 50 franchises to fend for themselves.
< img src="/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/d89c345b58f4dbe4a2382b220521b978.jpg" />Ron Debello, 72, has been a loyal customer for more than 30 years. Photo: James Breeden for the Telegraph
As the number of stores gradually dwindled, the Bend store remained open against all odds.
In 2018, two locations in Anchorage, Alaska, closed. and it became the last blockbuster in the USA.
The following year, the penultimate location in Morley, Western Australia, followed suit, leaving Bend behind. .
“They contacted us on their last evening, said goodbye and wished us all the best. It was pretty emotional because we thought, 'Oh, man, this is us,'” recalls manager Sandy Harding, 52, who has worked at the store for 24 years.
“We were just riding it. while everything seemed to have fallen away. This is the fifth year [we will be ranked last in the world] and we are still going strong.”
Located next to Papa Murphy's take-out pizza, Blockbuster has become a tourist destination, with thousands of people making the annual pilgrimage to enjoy the hazy yellow nostalgia.
Visitors have traveled from Qatar, Australia and South Korea to walk on the colorful blue carpets and revisit the many DVDs.
Almost everything inside the store is exactly the same as what is in the store. The company's heyday, from the buttery yellow walls to the strip lighting and returns drawer.
The computers have not been updated – they are the same ones used in the 1990s, with floppy disks. and no Internet access.
Travis Bigler checks out a couple of DVDs on a 1990s computer system. Photo: James Breeden for the Telegraph
Even the distinctive smell, which Mrs Harding describes as “a cross between popcorn and old shoes”, has not changed.
But while most items have been preserved as rare artifacts, there is one major difference: A huge portion of the sales floor is now dedicated to merchandise.
About 80% of the store's revenue now comes from tourists, who buy everything from $20 Blockbuster T-shirts to yellow and blue dog bandanas for $7.
One of the customers buying the souvenir T-shirt is John. Williamson, 22, who came from Atlanta with his wife Karen Mauricio, also 22, and his uncle Nathan Acuff, 23, from Boise, Idaho.
“We decided to stop and look, you know, remember a little,” Williamson, 22, tells The Telegraph.
“I remember going out, pestering my parents to go to the cinema, then losing film, and then I had to pay the fee,” he adds. < /p>
Manager Sandy Harding in a recreated 90s living room in one corner of the store. Photo: James Breeden for Telegraph
Meanwhile, delivery driver Finuviel Schwartes, 36, who buys A Bug's Life on VHS, “almost burst into tears” because the store brings back so many memories.
Mr Schwartes, who lives three hours away Portland, who still carries a 2007 Blockbuster card, adds, “It's just nostalgia—it's wonderful.”
But along with those flocking to Blockbuster, Bend, as far as new items go, There is still a dedicated customer base that regularly goes there to rent movies.
Tuesday is release day for new movies, which means Mrs. Harding has to rush around town trying to buy movies at Walmart and Best. Buy for your customers.
Their supplier went out of business at the end of October, and the last remaining US supplier is too expensive for the small number of films they need.
Ms. Harding fears it will become even more difficult for them as chains like Best Buy stop selling DVDs.
“I bought everything I could and then I ordered more from Amazon and they'll be here next week,” she says.
Customer Callissa Miller, 51, and her four-year-old granddaughter Kennedy Credit: James Breeden for the Telegraph
Among those looking for new items is Isaac Niemi, 21, who visits the store every week and spends about £8 each time dollars.
Mr. Niemi, who works at a snowboard shop, does not have a single streaming subscription.
“This is great. They have a bunch of new releases and stuff like that. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything.
“I think I make a lot of things look old-fashioned. Like I really love analog and physical media, like cassettes, vinyl records, DVDs and VHS,” he says.
Although his local friends don’t think anything of it, he says people outside towns “think it's kind of funny that I come here regularly to rent movies.”
Another regular is Callissa Miller, 51, who visits the store with her four-year-old daughter Kennedy every Tuesday “like clockwork” after ballet class.
Ms. Miller, who moved to Bend from Los Angeles, because she wanted to raise her daughter in a “community,” says she doesn’t like the immediacy of online viewing.
“Kennedy is allowed to watch DVDs on her own, and when she’s bored she goes out to play and then comes back instead so that I want something next.”
Isaac Niemi visits the store every week, spending about $8 each time. Photo: James Breeden for the Telegraph
“I definitely like routine and nostalgia,” she adds, before Kennedy, who was marching down the aisles in her baby pink tutu, jumped up and exclaimed: “I want to rent a Barbie movie.”
Mrs. Harding, who grew up in rural Eastern Oregon, was a shopper herself.
“I came to this store with my husband 30 years ago when we were dating. It was his birthday, and we came here and rented “A Few Good Men and Forever Young,” she laughs.
The store was then called Pacific Video, opened by local couple Ken and Debbie Tischer in 1991 year. The film became a blockbuster in 2000.
Tishers is no longer a franchise, and every year Tishers signs a licensing agreement with Dish Network, which owns the Blockbuster brand.
Ms. Harding, whose three sons all worked at the store, remembers attending Blockbuster corporate conventions and hearing from the “good old boys” who “didn’t want to change a thing.”
A mother of four, herself who has subscriptions to multiple streaming services, adds: “I'm not trying to sound like an armchair quarterback or anything, but I remember when they were talking about Netflix and all these different things, like, 'Oh, this won't last. for a long time”. It's just a whim.”
Delivery driver Finuviel Schwartes, 36, 'almost on the verge of tears'; because the store brings back so many memories. Photo: James Breeden for the Telegraph
But despite the difficulties, the store's support has been “overwhelming”, Ms Harding says.
After becoming America's latest blockbuster they added to their books about 5,000 participants.
“After that we almost stopped counting,” she says.
Just as some people donate to wildlife charities to help protect endangered species, some dedicated fans send money to the store every month to support the place. Some clients have traveled thousands of miles on emotional pilgrimages, and Ms. Harding recalls one client bursting into tears as she walked through the door.
“She lost her father.
p> and they went to Blockbuster together when she was a girl.
“When she came in, I thought something terrible had happened, and then she just told me how great it was that she was here and remembered her father.”
The emotional connection some customers have with the store visible from messages scrawled in the guest book.
A huge part of the sales floor is now dedicated to merchandise Photo: James Breeden for the Telegraph < p>“You have given me the best memories of my life,” says one.
UK residents are less emotional: one family simply writes: “Johnsons – England.”
“For For me, having grown up here, this is normal. This [blockbuster] has always been here,” says employee Travis Beiler, 31.
“So it’s weird that people are surprised by it. It took some getting used to. And we're really trying not to get tired because people are very excited.”
Ms Harding and her team are always looking for new ways to promote a blockbuster.
This year they launched advertising on Instagram during the Super Bowl. It depicts the end of the world, leaving only a barren landscape, a cockroach called Steve and Blockbuster.
Mrs Harding says she gets “emotional” at the thought of closing the store.
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“What will it be like when he is no longer there? I think I'll have to move because I have a feeling I just can't stand not driving by and seeing this.
“Steve and I will both be here until our bitter end.”< /p>
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