As ticket prices go up AND as it gets easier to watch movies for free. Hmmm... should I allow myself to get ripped off or should I do the ripping off?


--Previous Message--
: Would you go to the movies more if tickets cost less?
:
: "Yes, absolutely," said Sarah Galvin. "We go
: twice a month, we'd go every single weekend."
:
: Ms. Galvin had shown up to see 'Captain America: The First
: Avenger,' in 3-D, at the AMC Santa Monica 7 theater here on
: Wednesday. She had a little one in tow, in superhero costume.
: Adult tickets were $15.75, children's, $12.75. "It costs so
: much," Ms. Galvin said.
:
: After years of grumbling about steadily rising ticket prices,
: consumers achieved the nearly unthinkable earlier this year:
: they forced a momentary drop in the average cost of a movie
: ticket, to $7.86 in the first quarter, down from $8.01 in the
: fourth quarter of last year, partly by opting out of costly 3-D
: tickets for movies like 'Mars Needs Moms,' and watching films in
: cheaper 2-D.
:
: But prices started rising again this summer. In a conference
: call with investors on Thursday, executives of the Regal
: Entertainment Group, the nation's largest theater chain,
: predicted the usual average price increase of 3 percent or more
: across the industry by year's end.
:
: If so, it will be the 17th consecutive annual increase in a
: business whose prices have outpaced the effect of general
: inflation by more than half since 1999. Theater attendance has
: fallen by about 10 percent in that period, or even more when
: measured as a share of the growing population.
:
: Executives from Hollywood's major studios are generally
: reluctant to discuss prices. But with domestic box office down
: 5.55 percent - to $6.42 billion from $6.80 billion - from last
: year at this time, according to Hollywood.com, even some of the
: best-compensated players are beginning to wonder whether
: exhibitors and studios are pushing their luck with consumers.
:
: Historically, the big theater chains like Regal, AMC
: Entertainment, Cinemark Theatres and Carmike or their
: predecessors have been reluctant to raise ticket prices because
: their profit margins were higher on the sale of popcorn and
: other concessions than from tickets. Thus, they had an interest
: in raising the number of attendees, rather than maximizing film
: revenue that would be shared with studios.
:
: The industrywide average ticket price - which factors in
: low-price small-town theaters, second-run houses and discount
: sales through outlets like Costco - can appear impossibly low to
: urban dwellers, who are accustomed to paying far more at
: theaters in cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and New York, where
: real estate is expensive and zoning laws can require, for
: instance, a lobby as large as the auditorium, to avoid lines on
: the street.
:
: In some markets, too, pricing changes have caused surprising
: distortions. In Santa Monica, for instance, the price of a
: regular adult ticket at AMC Loews Broadway 4 theater, also owned
: by AMC, has risen by 47 percent since 2001, to $11.75 from $8 -
: only a little more than the 41 percent increase in the average
: ticket price for the same years. But children's tickets rose 67
: percent for the period, to $8.75 from $5.25, while senior
: tickets are up 95 percent, to $10.75 from $5.50. Add 3-D, and a
: child's ticket goes to $12.75, while a senior pays $14.75, two
: to three times the cost of a ticket 10 years ago.
:
: Plans for new theater construction in Santa Monica have been
: held back by a regulatory review and the need to resolve zoning
: issues.
:
: Though generally well tended, the Santa Monica 7 theater is
: showing its age. Here and there, the wallpaper is cracked or a
: piece of trim is missing, and the basement level, where 'Captain
: America' was showing on Wednesday in a large 3-D auditorium, had
: a distinctly musty smell.
:
: As for Ms. Galvin, she just wished the tickets were a little
: cheaper. "I'd bring my husband," she said.
: