There are some brand names used every day in houses all over the globe. Google, Band-Aid, Chapstick, and — my favorite brand — Netflix.
I got on board with Netflix right in the early days when the company still posted DVDs through the mail. It seems almost impossible now to imagine waiting days to watch your chosen content and yet Netflix was a game-changer even then.
Netflix’s world domination started in 1997 when, after receiving a late fee on a movie rental (remember those?), Reed Hastings came up with a radical new approach to content distribution. Reed partnered with Marc Randolph, who he carpooled to his day job with, and the two started the now $99.5 billion organization from there. I wish my drives to work were as profitable!
People who are less familiar with Netflix may describe it as a video streaming app, but it’s not. Netflix is an experience — one that’s unique to each user. And that’s what gives the brand such stickiness. You can use Netflix for an education on world affairs, you can fall back in love with cult classics, and you can even ‘Netflix and Chill’ if you’re living in a 2010s time warp.
Netflix applies some super-powerful algorithms to its database to help viewers discover new content. Did you know that UK Netflix customers have 41 thousand hours of TV and movies to choose from? Amazon Prime, the second-biggest streaming service, has just 26 thousand. And while this may cause ‘choice paralysis’ for some people, you really can’t fault Netflix on the breadth of content available.
Pricing is the only thing I could think to fault the company. My subscription costs have been sneaking up over time — and it doesn’t help that my Mom and cousin both use my login so I have to have the multi-profile subscription tier. Still, I wouldn’t deprive my family of their personal Netflix experience. To my sadness this sharing was limited by Netflix in 2023.
I recently saw a study that claimed the average Netflix user has watched 49 days’ worth of TV and movies since they opened their account — and that sounds like a great use of time to me.
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