BRINGING BACK THE POP
THERE IS AN old saying that the best place to build a movie theatre is where the popcorn sells. But now multiplex companies PVR and INOX Leisure are taking popcorn and other food items beyond movie theatres to customers at home through online channels to beef up pandemic-ravaged revenues.
Sample this: The revenue of PVR, India’s largest multiplex chain, nosedived to ₹310 crore in FY21 from ₹3,452 crore in FY20. Rival INOX’s revenue crashed to ₹148 crore in FY21 from ₹1,915 crore in FY20. All three major sources of revenue for multiplexes—ticket sales, advertising and food & beverages (F&B)—were severely hit as months passed by with little idea of when theatres would be allowed to reopen. But F&B, their second most profitable income source, which contributes about a quarter of overall revenues, offered possibilities the others did not.
When movie theatres and their kitchens were allowed to reopen with restrictions last October, the multiplexes ran online delivery trials of popcorn—which brings in roughly 15-30 per cent of overall F&B revenues in normal times—and a few other cinema staples like colas, sandwiches and nachos. Between the two waves, PVR and
