Monetizing Media

Cineplex launches $6.95/mo rewards membership

Canadian exhibitor chain Cineplex--which owns 80% of cinemas in Canada and has 1/4 of Canadian adults in its rewards program--announced a $6.95/month premium tier to its otherwise free rewards membership. 

Premium members will get 1 free ticket for every 3 they buy, dedicated lines at concessions, and a free upgrade every week to watch a film in IMAX or 3D. This is quite different from the AMC's Stubs A-List membership or the Moviepass membership, both of which offer access to a certain # of films per month for a set monthly price.

I've previously noted my skepticism in Moviepass but belief in AMC's subscription because the big exhibitor chains have an oligopoly and the advantage of vertical integration. I hoped Cineplex would follow suit with a similar membership offering and think it is missing the mark here. These are minor perks for just the most engaged customers; they won't convert the vast pool of irregular moviegoers into regular moviegoers.

The big opportunity here is to pull in a broader group and expand from a cinema membership into a membership for a whole range of live entertainment experiences. To create a bundle that is a no-brainer for anyone with an active social life to pay for ("Amazon Prime for live entertainment"). 

Cineplex is the best-positioned exhibitor chain to execute on that given its dominance of a geographic market (key for live experiences), existing CRM of consumers, and already-launched expansions into VR arcades, esports competitions, TVOD rentals, and restaurant-entertainment spaces (Dave & Busters-style). The company's management moved earlier that other exhibitors to start rethinking their identity as a "what people do on Friday nights" company, not just a "movie watching" company. But, surprisingly, they haven't been very aggressive in evolving; these expansions have each been small steps, and this rewards subscription misses the bigger opportunity in their hands.

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Stoop: "like a podcast app but for newsletters"

Stoop launched today on iOS and Android as an app for discovering, subscribing to, reading, and sharing newsletters. Inherent in the team's thesis is that newsletters are more than just emailed articles but are a content format in their own right that's seeing a surge of interest from both consumers and creators.

The obvious challenge here is to get people to leave their inbox and consume the content in another app. But the experience of easily discovering newsletters, (un)subscribing in one tap, and easily navigating archives makes life easier as someone who reads a lot of newsletters everyday.

From a newsletter author standpoint, it's also exciting to have a newsletter consumed in an environment where you can get a lot more analytics other than just open rate and click rate and where your newsletter is getting recommended to new readers based on their interests.

The company's website suggests an upcoming bundle to gain access to a range of premium (i.e. paid) newsletters for a set price, which I haven't seen tested/pulled off before. 

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