In his first public comments since acquiring Alamo Drafthouse, Sony Pictures Entertainment CEO Tony Vinciquerra said the cinema chain may be small, but its customer loyalty is strong.
“It’s not going to be a huge business, but it’s going to grow bit by bit,” the executive said Thursday at the Financial Times Business of Entertainment Summit.
The acquisition closed in June, and while financial details were not disclosed, sources told Deadline that the deal cost Sony around $200 million.
Vinciquerra said the specialty theater, which has 41 locations across the U.S., is “bespoke” and “unique” in the theater sector, and the company has recently demonstrated momentum by increasing market share for the 28th consecutive month.
“They have 4.5 million members in their loyalty program,” Vinciquerra said. “In our business of making TV and movies, you don’t have any direct contact with the customer,” the CEO added, calling Alamo’s tight grip on its customers particularly valuable. The company’s “net promoter score” — a metric marketers use to assess how many customers would recommend a brand to others — is about 70. “There aren’t many companies in the world that have that high a score.”
The company keeps Alamo’s operations separate from Sony Pictures’, he noted. But Alamo’s audience overlaps with that of Crunchyroll, a popular anime hub with millions of streaming subscribers and a vibrant merch and other revenue-generating activities. Vinciquerra said the company will promote Crunchyroll through Alamo’s storefronts.
As for the chain’s stores, executives noted that most are outside New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco, which have historically accounted for about 25% of box office revenue. The Alamo’s downtown Los Angeles location is “doing well, but they’re hard to find,” Vinciquerra said. “You have to be in a market with a lot of foot traffic.”
