BUSINESS BATTLING A GIANT\T.O. video store owner seeks city intervention.

Byline: Enrique Rivero Daily News Staff Writer

Video store owner Ernest Martel is a survivor in the battle of the independents against the giant rental chains.

His latest challenge could be competing with a Blockbuster Video store just a few hundred feet from his business in the Westlake Plaza Shopping Center.

Having failed to persuade the city to reject the store, Martel plans to ask the Thousand Oaks Planning Commission on Monday to move the Blockbuster Video to another location in the shopping center to ease the impact of the competition.

"It's a David and Goliath kind of syndrome," said Martel, 52. "The little guy is trying to survive Blockbuster. Pretty soon it's going to be so saturated that the little guy won't be able to survive."

Wally Knief, a spokesman for Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Blockbuster, said the company does not comment on what competitors may say about the company's marketing strategies.

"You don't expect him to be happy if there's going to be competition, do you?" Knief said.

When Martel first argued his case during a Nov. 2 administrative public hearing of the city's Planning and Community Department, he presented more than 500 signatures from customers opposed to the Blockbuster and argued it would hurt his business, which faces Agoura Road.

City officials said they do not have the authority to block the Blockbuster for economic reasons as long as the giant meets city requirements.

On Monday, Martel will ask the Planning Commission to move the Blockbuster to the Westlake Boulevard side of the shopping center, away from his 3,800-square-foot business.

"I feel it is a direct attempt to get my customer base," he said of Blockbuster's plans.

Martel first got into the video business in 1980, when he lived in Chatsworth and noticed a largely untapped market.

There was only one video store near his home then. He recalls spending $150 on rentals in one month. "It made me realize I was on the wrong side of the counter."

Later that year he moved to Thousand Oaks and opened his first video store, Video-4-You, at Moorpark and Janss roads. At the time, there were only about 300 video titles available and he had only two competitors in the Conejo Valley. Soon he opened his Video Depot store in the Westlake center.

His first battle with a chain came in 1985, when a Wherehouse video store moved into the Ralphs Shopping Center about 300 feet from Video-4-You.

Martel said the competition forced most of the city's independents out of business. He credits customer loyalty and his location with his success in staying in business.

"People assumed I was the Wherehouse because the entrance took them right to me," he said.

Blockbuster Entertainment Group, which also operates separate music stores, has 3,180 video outlets across the United States, with 178 in the Los Angeles area including Thousand Oaks, Knief said. In addition, the company is preparing to open stores in 23 foreign countries, he said.

The company bases choice of locations on factors such as demographics, ease of entry and exit and drawing power of nearby businesses, he said.

"We have a very long list of criteria," Knief said. "This location scored very high in the criteria list."

Westlake Village resident Dana Hoover, a customer at Video Depot for about two years, said he prefers the personal service that only an independent like Martel can provide.

"I just don't think they need (a Blockbuster) here and if they bring it in, I won't go," he said.

The Planning Commission will meet at 7:30 p.m. Monday in the Forum Theatre at the Civic Arts Plaza, 2100 Thousand Oaks Blvd. ?Photo: Ernest Martel does not want a Blockbuster store by his Video Depot.

Hans Gutknecht/Daily News

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