Rental #2

We all had great times at 171 Stourbridge Road and I think Steve Wellings forgave everyone for the gags we pulled on him…if I remember correctly it was invariably something to do with the Fray Bentos steak pies he used to bring in for his lunch. The outing Derek organised at Pinewood Studios was a wonderful day, with around 12 of us being given a tour by one of the studio managers. All I can remember is Steve Wellings’ excitement at finding props from ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’ and watching Richard Chamberlain, under direction from Brian Forbes, rehearse for a simple shot for the musical ‘The Slipper and the Rose’. I wonder if any of the old staff can recall the Christmas staff dinners at The Gladiatori, where Derek would always have ordered a whole suckling pig, which was place in the center of the table! Anyway on with this weeks post.

Like the many video rental shops that had sprung up every where by the mid 80’s, Derann’s Super 8 library catered for callers who wanted to pick up a film they’d booked or the casual caller who just wanted to just pick up a feature film or a couple of cartoons to show the children. Weekdays would see a steady flow of rental callers, but Saturdays would see a queue waiting for the shop to open and we would take on part time staff to cope with the influx, more so at 99 High Street. Any film that a customer asked for would have to be checked, to make sure that it had no booking(s), you must remember that all films were hired for a period of seven days, so if a customer wanted 4 films it might several minutes to ensure that the films he hired were not required for a booking. Some local customers returned their hire films late so frequently, that we began to make a charge and for very bad offenders, their membership was terminated. At Christmas the shelves in the 8mm would be all but empty, as would the video library many years later. There reached a point around 1978 when we became aware that a Chinnon projector launched by Dixons was causing sprocket damage to many of our features and we banned their use. Derek had a phone call from our local Dixons, followed by a strong letter of protest, following feedback from disgruntled customers who wanted to return or exchange their projector for a different machine, but we persevered and eventually they settled the matter by discontinuing the model in question. In 1986 Derek completed a deal with Harris Films, who took over our 16mm library lock, stock and barrel and sent us a royalty check every month, until they too closed their doors. The 8mm library was sold off, but after a short break restarted on a much smaller scale, but this too closed by the early or mid 90’s. There were a number of 8mm libraries operating in the U.K., but Derann had been among the largest. The 16mm on the other hand, was a very different matter with large catalogues from Rank, EMI, Columbia/Warner, FDA (UA & Fox) and Harris Films who handled the MGM output. There had also been several small 16mm rental concerns like ourselves, including Intercontinental and 20th Century Movies.