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> they sell tickets for way under what they cost, they take their cut and pass it on to the theater That's not how it works. You select a specific movie in a
by shawndellysse 9y ago
> they sell tickets for way under what they cost, they take their cut and pass it on to the theater
That's not how it works. You select a specific movie in a specific theater in their app, it loads the exact amount on to the moviepass mastercard, and then you purchase the ticket with the mastercard. The theater gets the full ticket price.
They claim they're going to be harvesting the data from their customers and sell that to make a profit. I personally think it's a red herring, if I were in their shoes I'd aggressively undercut the price, secure a dominant market position, and then place pressure on chains to play ball, or raise the price of the subscription in small increments ala Netflix. Honestly, it'll probably be a combination of both.
This all can sound a bit nefarious but at the same time I don't see the movie theater industry surviving without some sort of subscription model such as this. AMC, Regal, and Cinemark are squandering their market dominance by not implementing some sort of similar plan for their own specific chain (cinemark's $8.99/mo plan isn't even comprable).
- delinka 9y ago"...I'd aggressively undercut the price" Aren't they? For $10/mo, I can go see one movie a day, no additional cost to me. And it's not the theater chains that need convincing- it's the studios. The theaters just aren't permitted to take any sizable percentage of the ticket price. If anything, "butts in seats" shows demand. If demand drives prices, then the studios think the prices can go up because demand is up. If MoviePass's plan is to profit from data, I personally don't have faith in their future.
- shawndellysse 9y agoI wrote that response quickly, but that's what I was saying: > If I were in their shoes, I'd [do what they're doing right now and] agressively undercut the price... I also agree, if they're telling the truth that their plan is to make their earnings off the data, yes I don't have faith either. I'm saying, if they managed to pull a miracle and get a majority of the movie-going public on to movie pass, they could be in a position to then negotiate with the theaters (and other forces down the line) to strong-arm their way into profitability. Even if it's just "oh hey pay us and we'll feature your theatre to our users in the area". This is all conjecture, arm-chair theory.
- baddox 9y agoI think you’re underestimating the leverage MoviePass could have over cinemas (and thus the studios who dictate terms to cinemas). As an extreme example, imagine MoviePass tells AMC that if they don’t cut some rev share deal, MoviePass will turn off AMC support and drive their price-sensitive customers to competing cinemas.