There’s a real life marketing nightmare going on that we all participate in. It is a case history we can all appreciate and learn from.

Statistics show that the amount of money invested in making a hit movie is way, way up, while you, me, and the rest of America have given the industry a big thumbs down. Movie theater attendance is now down for three straight years.
    Fewer ticket sales hurts the multiplex theater industry, but not so much the studios, who make more money after the movies leave the theaters and are released on DVD than they do from first-run showings. Pundits cite the increase in DVD sales, TiVo and 42 inch home theater screens as contributors to a shift in America’s entertainment habits toward staying home more.
    The strategy for fighting back seems to have backfired a bit. The movie houses are trying to fill in the revenue gap by running more and more ads, which you can’t really fast forward when you’re in the 18th row down at the Bijou. So the industry isn’t making us big fans of going out.

    Recently, after an endless stream of commercials, we heard one frustrated audience member shout out at the top of his lungs, "START THE MOVIE ALREADY." Everyone cheered and then broke into uncontrollable laughter when the next commercial came on with the background sound track of the Stones singing "You can’t always get what you wa-ant." Funny, but not funny enough to make us love the movie management.
    Also, they now crank up the sound during said commercials to head-pounding, rock concert levels to prove to advertisers that they will get through to us, whether we want it or not. Since we usually forget to bring our OSHA approved ear plugs, sitting through this is painfully reminiscent of those early psychology experiments where subjects were wired to electrodes and jolted out of their seats.
    OK, so the movie houses are losing more of us, year after year, and to make up for the losses, they are punishing those of us who still mange to drag ourselves back.

Here’s a thought: How about you movie guys making it more fun to visit you, instead of more painful. You could start by reducing the advertising and trailer sound levels to, say, no more than what you would tolerate at your own diner table. If you’re a family of eight, maybe even lower.
    Next, recognize that we paid big bucks to be here. So, replace those full production commercials with less intrusive support advertising such as we find on public television. Even after we send in our 50 bucks to PBS, we don’t really mind hearing, yet again, that Archer Daniels Midland, who subsidized our donations with their own, is breadbasket to the world.

The marketing lesson for theater owners is the same as it so for the rest of us in business. You can have your cake and eat it, too, just not all of it. Think of paying customers as business partners. They sit on our boards of directors and they vote on our every decision. Want to know what they decide? Count votes at the cash register.