Concession is King
Written by Dan
The point of yerterday's post was to demonstrate that there is very little profit in ticket sales. The only way a theater can sustain itself is through selling grossly overpriced concessions. And that's it. End of story. Over. Done. Period.
Of course, that's not completely true. Theaters can also whore themselves out to national ad services, who will in turn provide them with AT LEAST 20 minutes worth of commercials for the US Army, Mountain Dew, Fanta, and Axe Body Deoderant. Nothing makes an audience happier than being forced to watch 20 minutes of grainy, originally-filmed-for-television commercials... and nothing makes me happier than sitting through said advertisements and only getting to see one trailer... for Garfield. What was Bill Murray thinking?! I'm veering off subject here. My point is that theaters can only stay afloat through concessions and advertising.
All theaters are hungry for your concession money. They will do anything to get it... well, anything outside of charging a fair price for it, that is. It's been shown that only 20% of the movie-going public will make a trip to the concession area. That's only 1 out of every 5 people who walk through the door! Why so low? Well, who knows, but my personal opinion is that theaters don't try hard enough to earn your buck. The first thing they need to do is start offering a better concession selection.
A lot of theaters don't give you much of a choice beyond the typical popcorn and soda pop fare. You get to choose between Twizzlers (cunningly served in a package that makes it look like you're getting a lot more than what you actually end up with), Dots (if you're lucky), Squirms, Sour Patch Kids, Care Bear Gummi Bears (do kids still know who the Care Bears are?), Nestle Crunch Balls, Rasinettes, et al. Then you have the "additional items," which can be anything from nachos to cotton candy to frozen bananas... these little jems rotate frequently and are usually selected strictly for their high profitability.
"So what are you going to do that's different," you ask? Well, for starters, we're going to offer beer and wine. I know it sounds trite, but in Midwestburg it's a selling point. We'd be the only theater in town where you can watch a movie while sipping on some wine or chugging a beer. We're also going to sell hard-to-find candies, but I'm not sure which ones yet, because they're just so darned hard to find! Sorry, I couldn't resist. We're going to offer fresh pastries and baked goods from local bakeries, and gourmet coffee from a popular coffeehouse just down the street. In lieu of serving butter on our popcorn, we're going to offer a wide variety of specialty seasonings, so people can flavor to taste, and vice versa. We're going to serve our popcorn in bags - small, medium, large, and DAMN THAT'S HUGE, which will be served in a paper grocery bag. The DAMN THAT'S HUGE will be more of a novelty than anything else, but whatever gets people to the concession area is fine by me.
Uh... what else. I'm going on and on, aren't I? I better wrap things up, because I still have a lot of work to do on our business plan... and some real work to do too. The moral of today's post is that theaters need your money, so when you go see Harry Potter this weekend, make sure you remember to stop by the concession area and buy a little something to help keep your theater afloat. Unless, of course, you're seeing the movie at a huge, nameless, faceless, corporate-run MEGA-multiplex... in which case you should stop by your local convenience store, pick up some Dots, and smuggle them in under your shirt.
Let's all go to the lobby,
Let's all go to the lobby,
Let's all go to the lobby,
And have ourselves a snack.
Please buy our overpriced Twizzlers,
Please buy our overpriced Twizzlers,
Please buy our overpriced Twizzlers,
And something, something, something, something snack.
