Would you like to have a great seat at your local AMC to see it? Avengers: Doomsday? You better be willing to pay at least $18 a month for an AMC Stubs loyalty membership, as AMC Theaters plans to start blocking off its best seats to customers who pay a monthly fee.
Paying monthly members in AMC’s two loyalty programs — A-List and Stubs Premiere — will get priority access to the best seats, CEO Adam Aron said on an earnings call Tuesday. The program is expected to launch sometime later this year.
“AMC will offer Premium Preferred Seating, where we will block and reserve the best seats in the house in our theaters to be accessed first by our A-list and our Stubs Premiere members — that’s the two VIP tiers within our Stubs program — at no additional charge,” Aaron said. “At AMC, we will ensure that the best seats in our auditoriums are [held] — at first, anyway — to our best customers. We believe it will be very beneficial to the consumer for our repeat guests to notice and appreciate it more, increasing their brand loyalty to AMC.
Currently, A-List costs $27.99 per month, while Premiere costs $17.99 per month. While members will not have to pay additional fees to access seats, prices for the programs themselves could, in theory, change.
If this idea sounds vaguely familiar, it’s because AMC tested a similar idea three years ago. The pilot program was called Sightline and involved charging three tiers of seat prices, as at a concert venue, with prices escalating for better seats.
The concept received backlash online, including from actor Elijah Wood, who tweeted: “The movie theater is and always will be a sacred, democratic space for everyone, and this new initiative from @AMCTheatres will essentially punish people for low incomes and reward high ones.” (Wood recently criticized Alamo Drafthouse’s decision to introduce mobile ordering during its shows.)
While AMC’s new idea is somewhat similar to Sightline’s — giving better seats to customers who are likely to pay the company more money — it could easily be framed as rewarding loyal customers (rather than, say, punishing those who can’t afford the best seats). Also, for those who already tend to be members of the loyalty program — A-list members get up to four free movies a week and a free refill on large popcorn, for example — this measure could be considered exactly what the company describes as: a free perk.
