Courts, Lawyering, Society

The Popcorn Revolution

By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger

Joshua Thompson, 20-ish, of Livonia, Michigan loves the movies, but could not understand why his soda pop  and candy purchase rang up the till for another $8.00 on top of the price of admission.  In the same cinema, popcorn and a soda can run you $11.00. Rather than just griping, he filed a consumer class action suit in Wayne County (Michigan) Circuit Court on behalf of us all to get some answers.

The suit “seeks refunds for customers who were overcharged” and “a civil penalty against the theater chain.””He got tired of being taken advantage of,” said Thompson’s lawyer, Kerry Morgan of Wyandotte. “It’s hard to justify prices that are three- and four-times higher than anywhere else.”

Not so to American Multi Cinema (AMC) that operates his local theater. They had no comment on the suit, but a representative of the National Association of Theater Owners in Washington, D.C., angrily hung up the phone on a reporter from the Detroit Free Press when he simply asked about the reason for the markup on concessions.

Thompson wasn’t rash in bringing the suit, first trying to bring his own soda and candy to the theatre. AMC would have none of it and banned the profit-reducing “contraband.”

Most Michigan court watchers predict a losing effort for Thompson though. Protecting consumers is passe’ in the Republican-dominated Michigan Supreme Court. Gary Victor, an Eastern Michigan University business law professor said the case was likely a “loser.” In Michigan, theaters are a regulated business. Victor pointed to two state Supreme Court decisions in 1999 and 2007 which exempted most regulated businesses from the Michigan Consumer Protection Act. And we all know how conservatives “regulate” business. Thompson and his lawyer press on nonetheless.

Theater owners blame the high concession prices on declining ticket sales in the tight economy and rising costs. With the advent of NetFlix and other on-line movie providers, things can’t be rosy for the industry. Nationally, movie ticket sales are down — 1.2 billion tickets were sold last year compared with 1.6 billion in 2002. Still one wonders how you get gold from a throttled goose.

My last experience in a theater wasn’t pleasant. Amid the hubbub of talking teenagers, ringing cell phones, and fellow patrons snaking through the rows of seats or the aisles during most every scene of the movie, I welcomed the chance to get to the lobby to be taken advantage of by the $7.00 popcorn and $5.00 sodas.

Here’s a thought: reduce concession prices, ban ringing cell phones, police talkative patrons, and maybe the experience will be pleasant enough to bring people and their kids back from their dens and into the theaters again.

Source: Detroit Free Press

~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger

88 thoughts on “The Popcorn Revolution”

  1. Idealist707, we still have them, a realatively new shin, Sonic, only serves at the car..

    re restaurant prices, my friend owned a diner. Whenever we would go out for a meal I would ask for iced water with a slice of lemon (to make my own lemonade). She told me that at her restaurant she would have charged me 50 cents.

  2. Is anybody old enough to remember the first drive in hamburger place, like ours were. Orders, trays balanced on the car window opening, gaping at the other people, music in the loudspeaker, and the luxury of a hamburger with fries and a Coke. Heaven. Save all week to pay for it.

    Is the movie equivalent to that what you are longing after now.
    I

  3. leejcarroll/mespo,

    Yeah, I too love the theater experience (in a nice theater), but I’ve become really selective about what I go to see on the “big screen”. Not just because of the prices, but because of the quality of the films. Some films really lend themselves visually to a big screen, be it because of SFX (like “Avatar”) or scenic vistas (like “The Sheltering Sky”) or raw scale (like “Lawrence of Arabia”). I’ve also found that even though the home viewing experience is becoming more theater like (bigger screens with proper aspect ratios that in a properly setup room mimic a larger setup), it’s still not the same experience. Your eye “knows” it is being “worked around”. But the biggest deciding factor is by far the quality of the films. Just when you think Hollywood can’t do something more banal and derivative than last season’s releases, they always manage to surprise with their ability to spend lots of money repeating themselves. If I’m not going to get an experience worth getting into the car for let alone justifying paying $4 for a $1 candy bar, I’d just as soon watch it on TV at home as they tend to get annoyed when I watch a movie wearing only underwear at the local Multiplex.

  4. AY
    Only in jest, not as a snark. Really.
    “And that was a racquet all in of itself….. ” Lawn tennis or squash?

    “…restaurants charging 2.98 for a glass of iced tea…… ”

    And I, who once in dinosaur times thought 10 cents a glass was expensive.

  5. anon nurse
    1, April 7, 2012 at 11:11 am
    Woosty,

    How happy are clams?
    ———————————-

    😉

    well I’m off to see the wizard…hope you all have a safe Passover, Happy Easter, and don’t mutilate any more pickles!

  8. Mespo, if the popcorn was good, $7 for it and 44 cents for the flick might be worth the cost ((*_*))

  9. anon nurse:

    “How happy are clams?

    ******************

    Don’t know, but I never hear them complain.

  10. AY:

    That is a “Deep Breath ” decision.

    ” “corporate” sponsorship rates went up to 5 to 25 million dollars just to have a seat at the table of 25″

  11. leejcarroll:

    I agree. The last few movies I’ve seen weren’t worth the price of a postage stamp much less $15.00.

  12. I have stopped going and I love being in a movie theater, but $15.00 to see what is more often then not a movie not worth the going is, well, not worth the going.
    I understand they make most of their profit on the concession items but I have never understood thebusiness model of, no one is coming so let’s charge more to assure no one will come. Reduce the price and they will come.
    (And I remember when I lived in NYC a manager at an old run movie theater (forget what they call them, showed old, old films, silent ones, Hitchcock, Astaire etc.) ream out a little girl and her parents because the child came into the theater eating her snickers bar. He threw them out for ‘bringing in a their own candy”. Good management so he lost the price of those 3 tickets.)
    My nephew in NC goes to a $1.00 movie theater. Almost makes it worth thinking of moving there ((*_*))

  15. Woosty,

    Yes. My great escape… (A big comfy bed, Netflix, popcorn and a real Coke… and I’m happy as a clam… Oh, and butter… real butter… 🙂 )

  16. Eniobob,

    I read that…… I also heard that “corporate” sponsorship rates went up to 5 to 25 million dollars just to have a seat at the table of 25…… I can see where that might dissuade someone…..

  17. If memory serves me correctly….. The manufacturer of sodas, soft drinks etc cost is less than 3/4 of 1 cent to manufacturer……. The costs only went up because of the end of sugar subsidies…… And that was a racquet all in of itself…..

    If you want to complain about costs such as these, what about restaurants charging 2.98 for a glass of iced tea…… The whole box costs less than 5$……

  18. Frankly:

    “You may not know this but the theater gets nothing from the sale of tickets for the first week or two of a movie. So when you hear that Hunger Games had a weekend box office or 60 Bajillion dollars AMC got exactly $0 of that. It all went to the distributor, every dime.”

    ******************

    That is one funky business model.

  19. Theaters have relied on concessions for profit for decades. Still, the cost has gotten out of balance relative to ticket prices and value of the merchandise esp, at places like Regal and AMC. Part of what jacks up the price is the increasing concentration of ownership—the “right” to charge whatever is supposed to e balanced by competition. there’s always some distortion of markets, but concentration of ownership pretty much renders them useless as a tool for better products or any economic advantage to the customer. Theaters used to be small locally owned chains. The concentrated ownership came with multiplexes which are much cheaper to run than theaters with one or just a few screens. There’s also been the usual leveraged buying and selling which enriches CEOs and holders of debt.

  20. You may not know this but the theater gets nothing from the sale of tickets for the first week or two of a movie. So when you hear that Hunger Games had a weekend box office or 60 Bajillion dollars AMC got exactly $0 of that. It all went to the distributor, every dime.

    Huge hit like Games might keep 100% even longer if they have ‘legs’ others may allow the house to take 10% (80 cents!). Its not until movies have been out for weeks that the theater could actually make money just from the film & by then you can order it on Netflix.

    Those places that show movies that have been out for weeks for $2 or ‘dinner and a movie’ joints? They are called “sub-run” houses.

    I don’t have any interest in a theater but I have read about this – it why popcorn & soda costs are rediculous.

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