You Want Me to Pay How Much?

People have been talking about "the death of the movie theater business" for a while now. It's one of those trends that always feels just on the verge of happening for one reason or another. For the same reasons that video rental chains went out of business you'd expect movie theaters to eventually die as well -- streaming video and the comfort of watching movies on your high-end home theaters -- and yet, so far, the business hasn't out and died yet. One assumes it will soon.

Many Online (ourselves included, a few times in our podcasts) have assumed that theaters were going the way of the dodo. And it's for those reasons above. For starters, why would I want to pay for a movie at a movie theater when I can wait just a couple of weeks at this point (sometimes less) to watch it at home? It costs me ten bucks or so for a streaming service, likely one I would have paid for anyway. I can pay that, or the ten, fifteen, twenty bucks for a ticket to a movie, plus the elevated costs of everything else associated with going out as opposed to staying in. End of the day, it saves me a lot of money to not go out.

Think about it like this: yes, I have to pay for my snacks, whether at home or at the movie theater. At the theater a box of candy is five bucks whereas the same box is, at most, a buck-fifty at the grocery store. Drinks have the same markup, as would hot dogs, popcorn, or anything else you can think of. I save money there if I just eat what's at home, and I make myself happier if I know I'm gonna watch a flick later and just grab snacks while I'm out doing other stuff. That saves me time and money, which is a double win.

That doesn't even take into account if I'm going with other people. A movie trip is expensive enough on my own, but you can multiply that by however many other people you're going with. It seems cost prohibitive to me alone, and it's usually just me catching a matinee on the weekend. If I had kids I had to deal with, and I was taking an entire group to the movies that I was paying for all out of my own pocket, I'd be looking at upwards a a hundred bucks for a simple film. And that's not an exaggeration as my fellow podcaster, Josh, has told me exactly that price when he takes his kids out. That legitimately expensive.

On the time front, you have to go to a theater on their schedule, watch when they want to show the film, and you have to factor in drive time, traffic, and everything else. Not only is that a hassle, I'm spending upwards of an extra hour for an "outing" than I would to watch the same film at home. Considering my normally hourly rate of pay, I'd rather have that hour to do anything else than go to a theater. Again, what is the best cost benefit for me on this excursion? It doesn't seem like going out.

And there's comfort to speak of. If you watch a movie at a theater you're again on their schedule, and that means you can't stop, start, or playback a movie. If you like a scene you can't go back and watch it again. If you have to pee you can't pause part way. If you get a call either you ignore the call or you miss a chunk of the movie because of the call. In all respects, I don't have to deal with the time schedule when I'm at home and that makes me more comfortable. Couple that with being able to sit on my comfy couch in pajamas, have the lighting just like I like, being able to grab whatever I want from the fridge when I feel like it, and not being around anyone I don't like, and, man, the theater experience sounds awful now.

That's the thing, though: the theater business hasn't really changed in the last, what, hundred years? More? Their technology has gotten a little better -- silent films into talkies into color into digital projection -- but from the audience side, has much really changed? You go into a dark theater, watch a film, leave. I'd argue it's gotten worse, in fact, as over the decades we lost the ability to pay for a ticket and get a whole set of stuff to watch. No more news reel, cartoon, double-feature. Now it's one ticket, one flick, go home.

That's why I argue that technology has disrupted the way the theater experience worked, the theater chains just haven't bothered keeping up. The last nice innovation I could think of was giving us stadium seating so we didn't have to see heads in front of us as we watched a film. And there are some theaters that let you order dinner while you watch your film, which can be a nice change of pace. Nothing that's offered, though, really competes with the same experience as the home, and that's a much more recent change. Once home theaters got nice enough to compete with theater chains -- flat screens, sound bars, 4K UHD movies -- the theaters were on borrowed time. Aside from getting movies a couple of weeks early, they have nothing to recommend them over the home.

There are things the theater chains could have done to keep themselves relevant, mind you. Instead of letting an outside company like NetflixOriginally started as a disc-by-mail service, Netflix has grown to be one of the largest media companies in the world (and one of the most valued internet companies as well). With a constant slate of new internet streaming-based programming that updates all the time, Netflix has redefined what it means to watch TV and films (as well as how to do it). come up with streaming content, AMC or Regal could have done it. They already had connections with the movie studios. They could have said, "hey, let's look at doing this whole theater experience Online Rent movies day and date, count it as a movie watching. Watch Online with other friends in a social chat experience. Do this all from the comfort of your home." But they didn't because the money for a theater isn't in the movies but the concessions. If they let you watch at home they couldn't sell you popcorn at 5,000% markup.

So instead of seeing what Netflix was doing and electing to compete directly, theaters assumed heir gravy train would always be around. They had guaranteed 90 day windows for movies from the studios. They had a lock on releases. If people wanted to watch films there was nowhere else they could go. What could possibly keep people stuck at home when movies were right there, waiting for them? There couldn't possibly be some big, worldwide event that would completely change the way people consumed media, right?

Naturally, there was. We were overdue for a pandemic, honestly, so when one hit we all had to stay home and wait for it to pass. We all spent over a year at home, barely going out, while movie theaters suddenly had to close and couldn't make their money. Plenty went out of business. A few of the chains that stuck around had to consolidate debt and negotiate loans and desperately clutch to the idea that one day they would reopen. They did, but most people would note that attendance at movies hasn't really recovered. Marvel films make at least 33% less than they used to pre-pandemic, and those are some of the few films that can break through and make any money at all. The people just aren't showing up the way they used to. Why? Because they got used to watching movies at home even if they had to wait a week or two to see the newest title.

So you would think now, this time, the theaters would learn and try to finally shake up their business. It's time to find ways to appeal to the populace, to give them what they want so they decide to come back to the theaters. And that big idea: charging you more for the seats you like. That's AMC's plan, at least. Want to sit anywhere other than the front row? Upcharge. What those sweet seats right at the back, in the center-middle of the theater that get the best view? Extra upcharge. Oh, and you have to have a membership to get any of this, with most memberships costing you extra.

In the past I was a fan of AMC Stubs A-List, the movie watching subscription they had (back before I stopped going to the theater because of the pandemic), because I could see up to three movies every week for the cost of seeing two movies a month, total. It was great. I used it a ton, and even if I never saw three a week (most weeks I only watched one) I was still saving money. Plus I could get the tickets early, know where I was gonna sit, and do everything ahead of time so i could slip in, watch a flick, and slip out. That was nice enough to make the cost savings handy. But even still, forcing people to get a subscription if they want to do anything special with their seats is pretty shitty. So is charging extra for normal seats.

Some will point out that the basic AMC subscription is free, and that's all you need to get the cheap seats. But it's not really free because you'll be using that subscription when you pick up those tickets, and then AMC has your data which they can sell to everyone else. They aren't saving you money, they're making more off your information. And that's to get the cheap seats. At some point AMC is going to say, "hey, we're raising prices," and suddenly the cheap seats are normal price while the normal priced "normal seats" are more expensive, and on up. Suddenly that ten bucks you were spending for a ticket is already a base price of twenty and movies become even more expensive.

This is, in short, a business move made by corporate suits that no one in the audience asked for, wanted, or needed. It's just to pad their bank accounts while theaters try to recover in the post-pandemic. And all it's really going to do is shove more and more people away from the theater because the movie watching experience at home has improved to the point where it's not just "good enough", it's legitimately good.