While browsing through Mashable, I came across an article that spoke of bringing the Netflix model to theaters. Essentially it spoke of a new startup, MoviePass, that offerered unlimited movies at theaters for a flat monthly fee - $50 in thier case.
I thought this model would be quite interesting and tried to read up more. Sadly the model didn't kick off. The theaters in San Francisco where the beta runs were to be held said they were never informed.
I think though that there is a good market for this business. I feel that they should price more lower initially to get more people hooked on to this model, and gradually increase prices thereafer. The Future of Film has a good article about how this model can be improved with a few changes. And of course, they shouldn't forget to inform the theaters!! :)
2 comments:
The problem with this idea is that Netflix's business model is built on addressing the needs of the long-tail, meaning specialized services (movies on demand) in small quantities for a lot of people.
As far as I know movie theaters (at least the bigger ones) have a very overlapping offering (they show the same movies), thus it is the opposite of the long-tail idea.
Of course theaters specialized to niche segments (indi movies, etc) offer a wider variety of movies, but in their case the question is whether they can attract the critical mass that would be needed to such a low cost business model...
The business model of Netflix works because due to the good penetration of broadband connections it can deliver the tailored services (on demand movies) anywhere almost without any cost. Movie theaters that exist in the "meatspace" cannot avoid to incur fixed and variable costs which they have to cover from revenues. To be able to do that, they have to adjust prices to local demand and segment customers.
I don't think the offline model is very similar to online model, such as netflix. Netflix stands out because it is online and easy for people to get access to almost all different kinds of movies. For the offline theater, the flat rate is attractive, but what is more important is what kind of movies it could provide.
Post a Comment