Retailers point finger over breach of Lord Of The Rings DVD embargo.(News)

Retailers are demanding action after series of supermarkets broke the embargo on one of the biggest DVD releases of the year.

Dealers looking forward to an early autumn boost to sales voiced fury last week after stocks of the Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers DVD, which was officially due to be released last Tuesday, went on sale the previous Friday.

As retailers across the country quickly tried to assess the situation, most chains followed suit so that, by the end of the Friday, most retailers had put the title on sale.

Paul Evenden, the sales and marketing director for the title's distributor, Entertainment In Video, says, "Without our consent, a retailer decided to go earlier with the release, breaking the worldwide embargo. We are appalled that the release date could not be kept and we will be reviewing our trading relationship with the party who was responsible for this breach."

Sainsbury's, who was identified by many retailers as the outlet which led the spate of early sales, last week denied it was the first to break the embargo. In a statement issued on Thursday, the supermarket said, "We never break a written embargo. We will always remain competitive so when another retailer decided to sell the film early, we too decided to sell it before the bank holiday."

...