Because of a Substack Notes thread (and I tend to get nostalgic about old Fresno), I was thinking about video rental and remembering Friday nights at a Blockbuster. I happen to be living in Los Angeles during the Golden Era of video renting, so my memory of Fresno’s video rental stores isn’t complete as it could be. But I remember some. Before Netflix. Before the fall.
- Blockbuster at West & Dakota. This was my neighborhood from, like, 94 to 2010 ish. So the mid-nineties, I was there most weekends. Now it’s a laundromat.
- Hollywood Video on West Shaw in the Winepress Center. They used to have good discounted DVDs and VHS to buy.
- Blockbuster at First & Nees. I think it was a Blockbuster (Southeast corner shopping center). This was my early 20s when I actually had disposable income, and I bought way too many overpriced DVDs.
- Blockbuster – West Shaw & Feland. There was a girl who worked there I was too intimidated to ask out – this is the thing I remember the most 🤣.
- The Warehouse at Barstow & Blackstone. They had the movies in the back where the Chuck E Cheese animatronics were. I can’t remember renting from there, but I remember buying. Really, I would go back there to try and picture the old Chuck E Cheese shows.
- Blockbuster on Olive in the Tower. When you didn’t score at any of the bars, you at least had a video to take home and watch.
There are more, but those are the Fresno video stores that came to mind first. If you want to be overwhelmed by VHS/DVDs/Blu-rays today, check out Mad Monk on Blackstone.
If you feel like deep diving into some Blockbuster content:
-Mikey
