MoviePass sounds too good to be true. Is it?

Channels with Peter Kafka

Vox Media Podcast Network

Business News, News, Tv & Film, Technology

4.4 • 585 Ratings

🗓️ 8 February 2018

⏱️ 40 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

MoviePass CEO Mitch Lowe talks with Recode's Peter Kafka about how he's trying to make a profitable business out of charging $10/month for nearly unlimited visits to the movie theater. Lowe says MoviePass now has more than 1.5 million paying subscribers, who see twice as many films in the theater as non-subscribers. He also talks about the company's risky public feud with the large theater chain AMC, which he says is due to AMC's unwillingness to share the profits of all the new business it is getting. Plus: What Lowe learned as an early Netflix exec from CEO Reed Hastings. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Recode Media with Peter Kafka. That's me. I am part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm here at Vox Media Headquarters in New York City. In a couple days, I'm going to be at Huntington Beach for the Code Media Conference, February 12th and 13th. You probably bought your ticket. If you haven't bought your ticket, it may be too late, but you can still check by going to recode.net. It's going to be a great
0:21.7	event. If you are not there in person, we will tell you about it later. It's like this podcast on my live. That is the future. Today is the present. I am here in New York City with Mitch Lowe, CEO of Movie Pass. Before Mitch introduces himself, I'm going to share a reader email from Colin. I don't know if Colin learned to use his last name, so we'll go with Colin for now.
0:39.9	He has a guest request. I'd going to share a reader email from Colin. I don't know if Colin learned us use his last name, so we'll go with Colin for now. He has a guest request. I'd love to hear your talk with Mitch Lowe, the MoviePass CEO. That's such a weird business that I don't understand. And you're good at probing people who have weird business models. Mitch Lowe, welcome to the show.
0:55.0	Let's talk about your weird business model.
0:56.0	Thank you.
0:57.0	Yeah.
0:58.0	It's actually pretty simple.
1:00.0	It's not, I don't find it weird.
1:02.0	People are fascinated with your company, by the way.
1:04.0	It's, you know, it is, it's actually, it's very cool.
1:08.0	You know, I love movies.
1:10.0	I kind of grew up as a latchkey kid.
1:13.1	My brother and I bought our first beta player.
1:16.8	It was so heavy, like it took two of us to carry it.
1:20.2	So for me, what's like really, really exciting is how people are actually going back to the movie theater when many people said it was on the way out.
1:29.6	Describe what movie pass is.
1:31.2	There are a million and a half subscribers, so a million and a half people know what it is.
1:33.7	For those who haven't got a subscription, it's $10 a month or $90 a year?
1:37.6	It's $9.95 a month.
1:39.8	From time to time, we'll run specials for annual programs.
1:44.4	But essentially, it's like Netflix for the movie theater.
1:48.8	You pay one flat fee, that's $9.95, and you can go to about 91% of the movie theaters across the country and go to essentially a movie a day.
	...

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