MoviePass Drops to $9.95 a Month For a Movie a Day

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by RayS, Aug 15, 2017.

  1. mmars982

    mmars982 Forum Resident

    Location:
    Pittsburgh, PA
    Woof! I’m Chloe, the Director of Barketing at MoviePass. I’d like to explain why from time to time you may have had a “ruff” experience with us but it turns out that I’m a dog and I can’t talk. What I do know is that I see these humans working like crazy to make MoviePass better and better for you as fast as possible. They are so grateful for your membership and support while they work it out. We’re listening. We’re learning. We’re changing.
     
    mrjinks and Jrr like this.
  2. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
    Wow. :faint:
    Personally, I think if man's best friend was running Moviepass, things would have gone much more smoothly...
    If the email would've come from, say, this guy:
    [​IMG]
    … their customer service make some sense.

    Here's a word or two for those thinking of changing ships:
    Sinemia has emerged as a cheap MoviePass alternative, but it has hidden fees and awful customer service
     
    mmars982 likes this.
  3. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
  4. tommy-thewho

    tommy-thewho Senior Member

    Location:
    detroit, mi
    I'm on the verge of cancelling.

    Even matinees during the week aren't available.
     
  5. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

  6. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    Summary:

    Moviepass is effectively dead.

    Sinemia are scamming losers.

    AMC deal is ok not great and now that the competition is dying, they're gonna start raising their prices.
     
  7. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    AMC already announced prices that change in January, IIRC. Some modest increases for a few areas, but no place will be higher than $24/month.

    I could see AMC raising the prices a bit more down the road, but I don't see large increases because they know that'll crush the program.

    I'm thinking they've realized $20-$24 is the "sweet spot" for a program like this. I also imagine they've seen a boost in concessions sales - of course, unlike MP or Sinemia, AMC gets all those ancillary profits, so they can absorb "losses" from ticket sales...
     
  8. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    I doubt you are correct. The price increase where I live (Boston area) is 20%. I imagine they will keep increasing it substantially as time goes on until they hit that magical marginal revenue/marginal cost vertex. Or they'll start to impose restrictions if they find that the program is "overused" by some users--as assuredly it will be.
     
  9. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    My wife uses all three of her AMC A-List showings every week, so I'll let you know.
     
  10. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    The nearest AMC to me is 75 minutes away. I made that drive on Saturday night because it was my only shot to view a film I was eager to see ("Thugs of Hindostan"). One movie ticket, one large popcorn = $22. Now I remember why I didn't go to the movies much before MoviePass. A-list makes no sense for me living so far away, but $22 doesn't make sense either.
     
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  11. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    Before MoviePass and A-List, we used to buy discount passes at CostCo that would bring our cost to less than $8 a ticket. This was AMC (they are huge in Chicago) but they also had Regal and one other chain. And of course we track discounts, like twilight and the significant discount for showings before noon. But sometimes Bollywood films are brought in by independent exhibitors and there is no discount - my local Cinemark is $5 weekdays, but a Bollywood film will be $16!
     
  12. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    Back when I lived in Greensboro (a movie mecca compared to my current location), the Telugu and Tamil films were always more expensive than the Hindi films (sometimes as much as $20 a ticket!) Maybe I should focus on what a Netflix subscription and VPN set to India can do for me.
     
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  13. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    I've not been to it yet, but there is a theater in Niles, IL that is all Indian, and is showing six different films at the moment.

    Yeah, Chicago is awesome!
     
    RayS likes this.
  14. tomhayes

    tomhayes Senior Member

    Location:
    San Diego, Ca
    A-list makes sense to me for some months of the year - May, June, July, and August usually have more 1 than 1 film i want to go see - and A-list is cheaper than seeing 2 films (non-matinee) a month. If you could sped $100 and have you kids see films all summer I think it's a deal.
     
    Oatsdad and RayS like this.
  15. RayS

    RayS A Little Bit Older and a Little Bit Slower Thread Starter

    Location:
    Out of My Element
    Wow! As The Snowman says in "Smokey & The Bandit", "Well honey hush!" :) I'd be all over that. And I bet they actually have intermissions, instead of just having "Intermission" coming on the screen for a split second before part 2 begins.
     
    Chris DeVoe likes this.
  16. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    Maybe you're right, but I doubt it. I think they've already established a "sweet spot", and like I said, I'm betting concessions sales have shot up since A-List came into existence.

    Anecdotally, I'm as cheap as they come, but I spring for concessions every 3 screenings or so because I figure I have money to burn.

    AMC can't jack up the prices too much because people will balk - they'll be used to $20-ish and won't want to go to $30 or more.

    I think the program is doing well enough that they don't need to escalate prices too much. As I noted, they have other revenue streams, not just A-List fees, so they can keep the basic A-List fees stable.

    As for "overuse", the basic structure of the program keeps customers from going hog wild. This isn't MP, where someone could go to 30-31 movies a month.

    Yes, I'm sure AMC would prefer that A-Listers use the plan 3 times a month instead of 12, but those 12 tickets aren't gonna crush them like the 30/month killed MP, and the boost in concessions balances it out.

    I suspect the average A-Lister probably goes 3-5 times a month, not 12...
     
  17. Jrr

    Jrr Forum Resident

    My wife and I went to see Halloween a few weeks ago; I wanted to see that in a “real” theatre. I have a really nice home theatre with a 145” drop down and excellent sound system, so I don’t feel like I “have” to see most films in a theatre, and most leave so fast and then onto disc that I don’t make it anyway. At my theatre the tickets were $15.40 each; I had expected some increase because of the minimum wage issue, but geez. It was $59 for concessions for my wife and I (admittedly optional, no one is forcing you to buy popcorn etc) and the tickets. After we left it occurred to me that it’s just not worth it as I can buy the blu-ray for far less and get at least 85% of the theatre experience. For a tent pole film like Star Wars, okay. But to take a chance on a film I don’t know much about, I just wouldn’t. I think that was the great value with Movie Pass before they started with all the nonsense.

    I don’t think AMC even likes the idea of a “pass”. They hated MP and this is just a response to that product they felt pressured to do. I bet that card will turn into a convenience card, not a value card (Ie, buy from that instead of Fandango) somewhere down the road and then most will bail out of it, which is probably what AMC prefers. They could easily terminate the fees and just call it a rewards card.
     
  18. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    AMC's recent email stated A-List is a permanent feature and won't go anywhere.

    They already have a rewards program - Stubs - so they can't just morph A-List into a rewards thing.

    Publicly declaring "A-List is here forever" doesn't legally bind them to that, but it sure will make them look bad if they try to cancel it.

    I think A-List is making AMC big bucks - if not, they wouldn't have committed to it being permanent less than half a year into its existence...
     
  19. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    As I have mentioned many times in this thread, you have to check prices of different theaters. My wife and I go see first run movies in the theater all the time, and our default location is the AMC Galewood 14.

    [​IMG]

    Tonight's 7 PM screening of Bohemian Rhapsody is $7.27. This is in a perfectly fine AMC theater with their usual surround system and a 4K Sony projector. Their first show of the day on Saturday is $5.03.

    As for snacks? We always have backpacks with snacks and drinks, and have never been stopped.

    As mentioned earlier, AMC was angry because they tried to introduce their own pass system and got nowhere with the movie studios. MoviePass had to get the arrows in their back before AMC introduced A-List as a response. And also, as I have mentioned over and over again, chains in the UK and Europe have truly unlimited passes - i.e. one film every night - and most of them are charging the equivalent of $27.95 a month.
     
  20. gojikranz

    gojikranz Forum Resident

    Location:
    Sacramento
    no AMC near me so I am just waiting on regal to get on the bandwagon so I can forget about all these third party crooks.
     
  21. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.
    I definitely see a lot more similarities between MP and Sinemia than I expected. Two months ago, every article I read talked about how they were doing their program “right” compared to MP - that’s why I joined. First three films worked fine.

    But this month ... I realized they never will send the “card” and expect you to exclusively use their “cardless” option. Ok, when purchasing tix online from a Facebook link, Atom tickets waives your processing fee. So that should be good, right? Nope, now even when you say you’re using a “feeless” provider, the Sinemia app prompts you with a screen saying you have to pay the processing fee. When I first looked, Sinemia said that fee was $1.50. Last weekend, that was somehow up to $1.80 (even though my waived fee from Atom shows it would have only been $1.35).

    I have to use my 3rd and final movie option by Thursday. After that, I’m going to send them an email with screenshots showing I’m not getting charged a processing fee and they owe me $5.40 ($1.80 x 3). If they don’t agree, I’m going to take it up as a credit card dispute and see how that goes...
     
    Shawn likes this.
  22. 200 Motels

    200 Motels Forum Resident

    Location:
    Arlington,VA,USA
    I am an AMC A List subscriber since day one, but I don’t really believe all the hype from the sappy email.

    With Moviepass fading away fast no real competition exists. I can easily see A list changing or ceasing to operate.

    I’ve seen 35 movies since June at the AMC and I rarely buy concessions. Something tells me customers like me will be identified and either have to pay higher or the customers like me will make it so unprofitable to continue.
     
  23. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    So you've seen 7 movies a month, basically - not exactly bankrupting them, unlike people who saw 30 movies/month via MP.

    Why would AMC volunteer that A-List is "here to stay" if they're not committed to the program? Why set themselves up for massive criticism down the road?

    No way in hell they're gonna identify "super users" and single you out. There just aren't that many and they'd generate too much negative publicity.

    And like I said - 7 movies/month isn't that many. Heck, it's barely half of what you could see per month!

    FWIW, I've seen 24 movies under A-List over 4.5 months - and would've seen more if illness hadn't kept me out of multiplexes too much time this fall!
     
  24. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    MoviePass worked for me again today - although to be fair there was exactly one film offered at one theater I could get to. Boy Erased at the Tivoli theater in Kansas City.

    Good drama about "gay conversion therapy" with Nichole Kidman and Russell Crowe as the parents of a college-age Lucas Hedges. Better than the more recent The Miseducation of Cameron Post, but the latter was more entertaining despite it's flaws. Both are very fair minded that almost nobody is actually evil, just acting on their convictions - I just wish a few folks who cite Leviticus actually obeyed every single part of it.
     
    SuntoryTime likes this.
  25. mrjinks

    mrjinks Optimistically Challenged

    Location:
    Boise, ID.

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