Two lucky guests will win a ~$39 Airbnb stay in an opulent box-turned-bedroom at the Palais Garnier, the Parisian opera house that inspired The Phantom of the Opera.
In today’s email:
Movie theaters: They’re getting smaller… and bigger.
Chart: Dude Perfect’s next trick.
Digits: Freezers, Pokémon, and more news numbers.
Around the Web: Mall smells ranked, the benefits of “third spaces,” a capybara pal, and more cool internet finds.
🎧 On the go? Listen to today’s podcast to hear about the future of the movie theater business, and a quick-hitting news rundown to start your week.
The big idea
Fewer movie screens, more fun stuff
Movie theaters are ditching screens in favor of activities that lure viewers away from streaming.
2023-02-27T00:00:00Z
Juliet Bennett Ryla
Movie theater screens are disappearing — but it’s not a bad thing.
Rolando Rodriguez, chairman of the National Association of Theatre Owners, toldCNBC that the 30-screen megaplex is out. Instead, new theaters have 12-16 screens, while old ones are converting space into arcades, bowling alleys, and bars.
Why? We can watch almost anything we want at home in our pajamas now. Consumers need more incentive than mediocre, overpriced popcorn.
Like what?
Better sound and visuals, comfier seating, elevated food menus, and cocktails help. In 2022, 15% of domestic ticket sales were for premium screenings.
A Chicago-area theater is building a “Super EMX” auditorium featuring a 96-foot-wide screen and heated recliners so you can really be blown away by Avatar 3.
But successful programming…
… doesn’t have to include visually spectacular blockbusters — it just needs to be social and fun:
Warehouse Cinemas sold 1.4k $5 tickets to a “pajamas and popcorn” screening of 1988’s The Land Before Time.
Alamo Drafthouse’s Cocaine Bearparty featured an agility course and themed food. (BTW, Cocaine Bear earned $28.4m opening weekend on a ~$35m budget.)
An Edinburgh theater held a Magic Mike screening with scantily clad butlers serving prosecco.
Meanwhile, Secret Cinema, known for immersive screenings, was acquired last year for $100m+ by TodayTix Groups to expand its offerings.
It’s like malls…
… elevating food courts and adding experiential “shoptainment” offerings to compete with hassle-free online shopping.
Placier.ai found visits to a Pennsylvania mall in 2021 increased 31%+ compared to 2018 after it turned a Sears into a casino.
BTW: A recent 25th anniversary screening of Titanic in Rio de Janeiro went viral after the theater flooded. While it may have been immersive, it was not intentional.
TRENDING
Po-po-po-poker face. A woman who was arrested in connection to the 2021 robbery of Lady Gaga’s French bulldogs, Koji and Gustav, and eventually returned them, is suing Gaga for “defrauding” her out of a $500k reward.
SNIPPETS
Tweet tweet: Twitter reportedly laid off 50+ people, including prominent product leader Esther Crawford and Martijn de Kuijper, founder of the Revue newsletter service that Twitter acquired in 2021.
Faster… and faster. Amazon plans to expand to 150+ same-day delivery centers in the coming years, which focus on delivering the site’s top 100k items.
The phone company? Nokia, which hasn’t made mobile phones for ~10 years and now develops 5G equipment, reworked its logo to reduce its public perception as a mobile phone company.
The FDAapproved the first at-home combo test for covid and the flu. But it took so long that manufacturer Lucira Health has filed for bankruptcy.
Drama: Warner Bros. Discovery. is suing Paramount Global, MTV, and South Park Digital Studios for $200m+, alleging they conspired to use “South Park” content to bolster Paramount+, despite HBO’s exclusive streaming rights.
Post Holdings is introducing Sweet Dreams, a bedtime cereal designed to promote melatonin production.
“Dilbert,” a long-running comic strip about office life, was dropped by multiple newspapers after creator Scott Adams made racist comments on his YouTube channel.
Telecom company Ericsson plans to lay off ~8.5k employees in an effort to cut costs by $859m by year-end.
BBC News presenters can relax their dress code as viewers find “sweaty and dirty” journalists more trustworthy, per the outlet’s director of digital Naja Nielsen.
Manager burnout: Managers are people too, and being in charge is taxing. Here’s how to reduce burnout so you can take care of yourself and your team.
CHART
Singdhi Sokpo
From backyard trick shots to a $100m theme park
Dude Perfect’s next act: building a theme park.
2023-02-27T00:00:00Z
Jacob Cohen
A fundamental truth of life is that people like trick shots.
Dude Perfect, a group whose origins span back to a single backyard video from April 2009, has built a remarkably successful brand around this idea.
Since that clip, the group has continued posting videos of increasingly wild, record-breaking stunts that have garnered 15B+ views on YouTube.
The group, now a company with 20+ employees, has no formal CEO.
Last year, it brought in ~$25m in revenue, up from ~$20m in 2021, per The Wall Street Journal.
Over the years, Dude Perfect has ventured into branded clothing and sporting goods; built partnerships with Nerf, Columbia Sportswear, and a canned bean company; hosted a TV show on Nickelodeon and “Thursday Night Football” for Amazon; and launched mobile games that have seen 50m+ downloads.
The group’s next trick: Pulling off a $100m+, 30-acre theme park and HQ — called Dude Perfect World — featuring robotic goalies, spinning hoops, and an ultra-tall tower for launching basketballs.
Architect Bryan Trubey, who also designed LA’s $5B SoFi Stadium, projects the park will see 1m+ visitors annually.
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Plus: Wild stats about snow, crypto, and semiconductors.
2023-02-27T00:00:00Z
Jacob Cohen
1) Unilever, the parent of ice cream giants like Ben & Jerry’s and Magnum, owns most of the 3m freezer chests in stores around the world that keep its ice cream at zero degrees Fahrenheit. The chests make up ~10% of the company’s carbon footprint; now its testing product performance at 10 degrees, which would reduce emission by 20%-30%.
2) Blake Martinez went from being a linebacker for the New York Giants to launching a company called Blake’s Breaks, primarily a Pokémon card reselling business, that’s brought in $5m+ in revenue in the last seven months.
3) In the last year, $200m+ in cryptocurrency has been raised for pro-Ukraine causes, with $80m+ distributed directly to the Ukrainian government. In total, the value of crypto fundraised for Ukraine is 44x greater than that of Russia.
4) Over the last decade, the French ski resort industry has spent $42m-$69m every year on artificial snowmaking. Around the world, 95% of ski resorts rely on man-made pow to improve conditions or to prolong the season.
5) Globally, ~69.2k semiconductor patents were filed in 2022, up 59% from five years ago. The industry is forecast to be worth $1T by 2030, up from $590B in 2021.
AROUND THE WEB
🎉 On this day: In 1827, a group of students kicked off New Orleans’ first Mardi Gras celebration, a French tradition previously banned by Spanish governors.
👓 Read: Growth Daily is “The WSJ for marketers” covering the news, tips, and tools marketers and growth-minded founders need to crush their day.
🧑💼 How to: Harvard Business Reviewfound that “third spaces,” such as coworking spots and hotel lobbies, can benefit employees. Here’s how companies can encourage their use.
