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MoviePass Limiting Subscribers To 3 Movies Per Month
MoviePass will no longer increase the price of its monthly subscription plan, but it is limiting users to just 3 movies per month. It was only a year ago the company radically altered their business model, giving people the opportunity to see a film in theaters daily for the small cost of $9.95 per month. As great as this sounded on-paper, there were concerns about the sustainability of the strategy (since MoviePass was covering the full cost of all tickets). Now, they've been hit by troubled times.
After running out of money and suffering an outage, MoviePass has spent the past week working on new ways to ensure profitability moving forward. Among the changes they're implementing are a two-week block on major studio releases. MoviePass also toyed with the idea of raising their price to $14.95 a month, but they've instead opted to go in a different direction.
According to Variety, MoviePass will restrict subscribers to only 3 movies a month, beginning on August 15. It's worth noting that annual subscribers won't be subject to the new terms until their next renewal date. MoviePass is also offering a $5 discount for any other movie tickets customers purchase after using up their 3 movies.
In a press release, MoviePass cited statistics that indicated only 15 percent of their users saw four or more movies in a month, so they expect this shift will have "no impact whatsoever" on a majority of their membership base. Still, they could be in danger of losing most (if not all) of that 15 percent, which approximately accounts for 450,000 users. Die-hard cinephiles now have all the more reason to switch to the AMC Stubs A-List, which allows users to see 3 movies per week. It wouldn't be surprising if the theater chain saw more people flock to their service, boosting their already impressive numbers. Not everyone in America lives nearby an AMC theater, but it is the largest chain in the world, with 661 locations in North America. Odds are, more than a few MoviePass users have a local AMC they can go to.
It'll be interesting to see if MoviePass' new strategies can help the company stay afloat moving forward. People have become quite dissatisfied with the service recently, but there's a chance this was the low point and it'll rebound as things stabilize. Of course, MoviePass' future may be decided by how reliable it is in the coming months. If there's spotty service or another widespread outage again, then even those in the 85 percent may decide to look elsewhere. Saving money on movie tickets is a wonderful luxury, but people would prefer if it worked all the time.
