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Author
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Topic: NPR 1A Program on Movie Theater Industry
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Martin Brooks
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 900
From: Forest Hills, NY, USA
Registered: May 2002
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posted 05-01-2019 12:27 PM
Haven't listened to it yet, but films like this latest Avengers film prove that you can still fill seats if you play the right content. In this context, "right" doesn't necessarily mean good - it means films that will draw customers.
Domestic boxoffice hit a record last year. That's largely due to increasing prices, although according to the trades, the average ticket price is just over $9 ("The Numbers" has it at $9.11 and "Box Office Mojo" has it at $9.03 and $9 really isn't very much money. Look at the price of almost any other entertainment outside of the home.
On the other hand, as I've posted before, AMC, the largest theater chain, only averages 92 patrons per day, per screen. That's quite incredibly awful and I'm amazed they can stay in business at that level. They did lose $487 million in 2017, but had a slight $110 million profit in 2018.
I'm not going to pretend to know more than theater owners, but it does seem to me that this rush to pull out all the seats to install lounge seating is not necessarily the best strategy. Every time a show sells out because there's not enough capacity, money is being left on the table. Unlike back in the day, when a film like Star Wars played for a year, patrons who can't get into a show don't necessarily come back - they just might wait for home video, which isn't that long a wait these days.
In Manhattan, the Regal E-Walk (13 screens) was originally 3276 seats and it's now around 1344. Landmark opened a new theater where the smallest screens have just 19, 22 and 25 seats. That's not the way I want to see a movie. At the (AMC) Loew's Lincoln Square, screen #1 (originally called the Loews) used to have 814 seats. It's now a Dolby screen with just 289 seats.
But film attendance has been declining since 1947, so it's nothing new. And even in the 1960's and 70's, the "golden age" of roadshow attractions in very large theaters, overall attendance was pretty bad. In 1946, there were about 86 million weekly domestic admissions. By 1950, it dropped to 50 million. In 1964 it was 20 million. In 1984, it was 23 million. In 2002, it achieved a modern peak of 30 million. In 2018, it was 25 to 26 million. (Of course, the population has gotten much larger over the years, so movies per capita has dropped even when the total number of weekly admissions has remained the same.)
In the coming years, I think it's inevitable that many theaters will be closing. On the other hand, after a series of closures in NYC, there are a number of a new theaters in the works: Alamo is opening a 12 screen downtown and a 10 screen in Staten Island, Regal is opening a 14 screen on the lower east side and Regal is opening a 7 screen in a new development in Flushing, Queens - a total of 43 screens.
But not including those, NYC has lost 40% of its theaters since 1999, 15% of the net screen count since 2001, 32% of the seat count since July of 2012 and 59% of the seat count since mid-1987.
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 05-01-2019 12:59 PM
quote: Martin Brooks
Domestic boxoffice hit a record last year. That's largely due to increasing prices, although according to the trades, the average ticket price is just over $9 ("The Numbers" has it at $9.11 and "Box Office Mojo" has it at $9.03 and $9 really isn't very much money. Look at the price of almost any other entertainment outside of the home.
I don't know where they're coming up with that $9 figure. It sure seems like that average should be at least a couple or so bucks higher. Just going off what's available in my region, which has some of the lower living costs in the nation (along with fucking low wages), matinee ticket prices for ordinary screens are at or near $9 and the evening ticket prices are between $11 and $14. Throw in a premium thing like IMAX with Xenon the cost is in the $17-$20 range per ticket. And that's here in freaking Lawton, Oklahoma.
For a couple taking a night out at the movies in my town it's easy for a pair of tickets alone to cost close to $40. A trip to the snack bar can push the total cost to $50 if they share a popcorn and drink and over $60 if they get their own drinks and popcorn. God forbid if they have kids and want to pay for a babysitter. Or eat out before the show. The cost will balloon out from there well north of $100. I don't know what the "average person" is making in New York City or Los Angeles. But I do know that not very many people in my town are making solid six-figure annual incomes. Strangely a LOT of things are getting priced as if everyone is rich, not just theater tickets. Price gouging is happening with housing, health care, higher education, cars and more. Yet somehow the nation's official inflation rate is low.
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Mark Lane
Film Handler
Posts: 6
From: Crystal, Mi, usa
Registered: Apr 2019
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posted 05-02-2019 03:42 PM
"The local AMC is an AMC Classic, which means a dollar house in most places, but here it is $3.99 before 5 and $5.99 evenings. And they run first run. Yes, catch a matinee of the Avengers for $3.99. Not sure how they get away with it other than they are AMC. When I mention it to the distributors I work with, they always express surprise (and then book the movies in their anyway)."
We are showing Avengers Endgame and only charge $3.00 for weekdays and matinees, $5.00 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. Discount days are often $1.00.
We don't go through a booker, we work directly with the studios and our relationship with Disney has grown stronger. Disney doesn't care what we charge, they only focus on our bottom line.
New to this forum.. will update the profile soon.
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 05-02-2019 11:36 PM
quote: Bobby Henderson
I don't know where they're coming up with that $9 figure. It sure seems like that average should be at least a couple or so bucks higher. Just going off what's available in my region, which has some of the lower living costs in the nation (along with fucking low wages), matinee ticket prices for ordinary screens are at or near $9 and the evening ticket prices are between $11 and $14. Throw in a premium thing like IMAX with Xenon the cost is in the $17-$20 range per ticket. And that's here in freaking Lawton, Oklahoma.
We've been over this before.
You guys have got to remember that large cities (100,000 and more) aren't the only places that have movie theaters.
And, the average price is not calculated on the "adult ticket price." It's calculated on the TOTAL gross from each cinema divided by the total number of tickets sold at all prices, including cheaper kids prices.
Our ticket price for adults here at the Roxy is $7.75, and the Montana Theatre down the road from us in Miles City is $6.50. The Cottonwood Theatre in Big Timber is $7.00, and the very famous Washoe Theatre in Anaconda (a classic art-deco house with 1400 seats) is $5.00.
The Hyart Theatre in Lovell, Wyoming, which has the best sound system in about a 20-state region, is $5.00, and the Vali Twin in Powell, WY is the highest price of this whole group, at $8.00.
These are just the few I know about firsthand.
And all of us have even lower prices for kids.
None of the above listed towns have populations over 9,000. We're all first run theaters (all but the Washoe and the Cottonwood are showing Avengers Endgame right now) and there are THOUSANDS more like us all over the country.
That's why the average price isn't higher.
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