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UPDATE, 2:20 PM: This is what Lionsgate just advised me about reporting this weekend’s box office grosses with the The Lincoln Lawyer ticket deep discount which the studio is funding: “When any discount or coupon is used at a theater the exhibitors still report gross receipts based on the value of the tickets sold. There is also no necessity or guarantee that the tickets purchased with Groupons will be redeemed this weekend. The box office reporting for this weekend will reflect only the number of people who saw The Lincoln Lawyer this weekend and the ticket value at the specific time and place they saw it, like it always does. This is like if people used gift cards that were purchased from a theater chain to buy their tickets – the receipts always go toward the value of and towards the receipts for the particular show they redeem it for.” Do you agree?
12:45 PM: Let me say right now that Deadline’s weekend box office coverage of The Lincoln Lawyer‘s opening grosses will come with a big asterisk. Because they’ll be artifically inflated. Lionsgate’s deal with Groupon to sell $6 movie tickets for the pic through the big online ticketseller Fandango is even more ridiculous than Deadline previously reported. That’s because I’ve just discovered there’s also a $5 coupon so the price of one movie ticket comes down to $1. That’s right, go see the brand new movie starring Matthew McConaughey and based on Michael Connelly’s bestselling novel for any showing for a buck.
Summit Entertainment On Living Social — Offering Discounted Movie Tickets For Films
(“Get this deal for only $1! Use this promotional code and get $5 off the listed price at checkout: kb9d35nfjqtxf68pca3e.” For new Groupon customers only. Limit of all the discounted tickets is 2 per person, plus 2 additional bought as gifts. The $1 ticket offer is limited to 1 ticket, and $6 for the other 3. Not valid for IMAX or 3D showings.) I hear exhibitors have mixed feelings about the promotion – some like the extra biz but others abide by the movie industry’s cardinal rule to never discount the ticket price of a new release. This is a huge slippery slope because what happens when consumers decide $11 bucks is now too much to pay for any new movie? Now the exhibs do get reimbursed for the full ticket price. But, tell me, what’s the dollar figure that Lionsgate is going to report to me for grosses this weekend? From a marketing perspective, Lionsgate might think this is a smart move but is this really is this a good way to portray your movie on opening weekend? With box office down considerably this year, Hollywood is looking desperate.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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someone’s got a blank up her blank over something so unimportant
Ba dump CHING!
Obviously you people live in a different Universe from me. This offer only goes to new people that sign onto Groupon. Groupon is a disease. Many sights BAN groupon members from their site because Groupon steals your e-mail addresses and SPAMS ALL THE PEOPLE in your email addressbook. Groupon just bought ALL the addresses in one million new address books. Not only that, Groupon doesn’t spam your friends just once, They are persistent!
Perhaps they have changed, but from their Privacy Policy (partially quoted below) I doubt it.
“We may share your information with Authorized Third Party Service Providers. We provide services and products through third parties. These “Third Party Service Providers” perform functions on our behalf, like sending out and distributing our administrative and promotional emails. We may share your Personally Identifiable Information with such Service Providers to fulfill orders, deliver packages, send postal or email, administer contests or sweepstakes, remove repetitive information on customer lists, analyze data, provide marketing assistance, provide search results and links, process credit card payments, operate the Website, troubleshoot, and provide customer service. We may also collect personal information from individuals and companies (“Affiliates”) with whom we have business relationships and may share your information with Service Providers to accomplish our administrative tasks. For example, when you order a service, we release your credit card information to the card-issuing bank to confirm payment for the service and, if applicable, release your address to the delivery service to deliver the service. Likewise, we may release an Affiliate’s information to our bank to send out a payment. We encourage Groupon Merchants and Third Party Service Providers to adopt and post privacy policies. However, the use of your Personally Identifiable Information by such parties is governed by the privacy policies of such parties and is not subject to our control.
We may remarket your information. Remarketing is a way for us to connect with users, based upon your past interactions with the Groupon website. Third-party marketing vendors may be hired by Groupon to perform remarketing services. As a result, third-party vendors, including Google, may show Groupon ads on sites on the internet. Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on a user’s prior visits to Groupon’s website. Users may opt out of Google’s use of cookies by visiting the Google advertising opt-out page at http://www.google.com/privacy_ads.html. This information is used only for remarketing purposes and will not be used by them for any other purpose.”
wish you had posted this earlier, gonna check it out…
I’m betting that this story will not end timidly. And I don’t believe that the broken Box Office Reporting is going to be the headline.
Wow how can this website be so popular and you not know how the Box Office works. $1 paid, $1 earned.
I never read books about lawyuhs nor movies or TV shows about ‘em.
Real lawyuhs are scum.
* (I go to 2-3 movies per week and have been getting discount tickets for 3 years from COSTCO)
Does anyone remember all the “sold out” screenings of AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH to help get people to see the movie? Silicon Valley, LA and NYC had many sold out shows that were close to empty.
FULL DISCLAIMER:
* I see 2-3 movies per week and for the last 3 years I purchase discount tickets from COSTCO.
I feel much better now.
Guess Nikki is so young (ahem) she does not remember double features or “dollar Tuesdays” or “one-car, one-price” drive-ins. Trying something different with pricing is a great idea that doesn’t artificially inflate the take any more than DVRs impact TV. Stop acting like this is the end of the world; now that Groupon and Fandango have helped ensure a solid opening for the film, you can expect to see MANY more promotions like it in copy-cat-driven Hollywood. It was a terrific idea, though. Your implication it means something is wrong with the movievis ridiculous.
Hollywood should pay people $10 to watch their movies.
I received a $25 gift card to the movies. I’ve yet to find one movie that I want to see in the theater. It’s almost April and I still haven’t used it. It’s all been crap and sequels. I’m waiting for something original and good and it looks like I’ll be waiting a while. Where is the next Inception?
$11 for 2 hours of entertainment is a steal. People need to stop being so stingy or start making more money. Jeez, how do you cheap people even afford computers and afford the time to go online and cry about $11?
Was NTGUILTY the license plate in the book?
That’s hilarious. If there’s any plate that would invite getting pulled over by the cops that would be it. Sounds like an idiot of a lawyer.
Anyway, why not work some Trader Joes deal where you get some of that $2 wine with the deal & change the plate to:
$2CHUCK
The key with all this is how much is a distributor traditionally willing to pay to acquire a movie goer in the first place. And then, how much would they be willing to pay for the exposure to 4 million people that the Groupon email has achieved – the CPM would have to be high as people actually take note of the Groupon emails.
Yes this is a GREAT deal for Groupon (and many buyers wouldn’t have got the extra discount anyway) – BUT, I don’t think this is a crazy experiment for Lions Gate. Sure it might not make total financial sense as a stand alone but when the figures are run it should give a better idea of how online promotions can be used to increase customer acquisition and how the traditional P&A budget can be adjusted in keeping with the enormous changes we are seeing in distribution. I certainly don’t think we’ll be seeing many of these deals with Groupon in the future, but at least Lions Gate is open to trying something like this so they can analyze the data.
Incidentally, I saw the movie today at the 2.05 screening at Rave 18 (trying to stay away from the LA Marathon) and paid $9. The theater was at 70% capacity. I really enjoyed the movie.
I’m a film publicist and I’ve never seen it so bad.
I think Hollywood has to ‘re-create’ more feel-good movies, inspirational movies, and even faith-based movies to survive.
People can only take so much violence, sex, and mean-spiritedness.