DVDs are a hot seller on online auction sites like eBay. The challenge for potential DVD retailers is finding quality DVD wholesalers. There are four major types of wholesale DVD sellers, bulk wholesale, drop-shippers, liquidators, and imitations.

First, imitations are extremely common in the wholesale DVD market. Overseas, imitation DVDs are mass produced with impunity in countries where there is little copyright protection. These sellers are troublesome for two reasons. In most markets, selling these imitation DVDs is illegal, and can lead to stiff fines or jail. Auction sites will reject these copyrighted items as well. In addition, these mass produced knock offs usually have serious quality issues. Often the video is of poor quality, filmed inside the theatre. The manufactures use poor quality DVDs, and cheap imitation covers. Expect frequent issues with customers if using these imitations, regardless of the legal issues.



Bulk wholesalers are sell DVDs in quantity. They will only sell to licensed resellers, and will expect minimum orders. Some allow the mixing of titles in quantity orders, others require case lots of the same title. For new releases in short supply, expect to buy case lots, and sometimes find all available products already sold to top customers.

Drop shippers sell single lot quantities, and ship directly to the seller’s customer. Most drop shippers have drawbacks. Typically, the price is significantly higher than with bulk wholesalers, often comparable to prices on auction sites. In addition, they often do not have the newest releases, as most of those are in the hands of the bulk wholesalers. Finding a drop shipper with a product in stock at a profitable price is challenging, but often worth the effort.

Liquidators in this industry tend to buy large lots of overstock from retailers and sell in mixed lots. This leads to a large mix of usually older titles, but at extreme discounts. Finding old titles in demand, that for some reason did not sell from the store shelf, is often difficult. However, the prices available from the liquidators allow for undercutting others on the products that are available. Both drop shippers and liquidators are usually flexible on whom they agree to sell their products. Some require a resellers certificate, others do not. Those offering the best prices usually do however.