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AMC adjusting movie ticket prices based on seat location in theaters

The Yahoo Finance Live team discusses AMC's plan to charge more for premium seat locations in theaters.

Video transcript

[AUDIO LOGO]

- Going to the movies might get a little more expensive. AMC is rolling out a new initiative where the price of a ticket will be based on seat location. Customers will have the option to pay more or less admission based on where they sit in the venue. Obviously, seats in the front will be at the lowest price level. So the question is, Jared, where do you sit in the movie theater, and what do you think of this new policy?

JARED BLIKRE: I think people are going to hate it, and it's probably going to happen. Look what happened with the airlines all those years ago. They started charging for luggage, and food, and all these extras. And now, we kind of take it as normal. I think, why not AMC?

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I usually sit somewhere in the middle. I've tried the front. It's a little bit too close, not for my taste. But would I pay a little bit more? Probably not, because I'm not paying anything for movie seats right now. That's just me.

- I happen to agree with you. And I think this is an obvious choice for them. We pay more whether it's games, or concerts. No matter what form of entertainment you go to, it's based on your view of that entertainment. So this seems obvious, but it seems like something they would have done.

And you're wondering about those shares. They were halted on volatility. It's been a wild meme trading day for all of them. But getting back to the original point here, it Seems like something they should have done 10 or 15 years ago.

Doing it now, I question the timing. It's hard to get people back to theaters. There's not many quality hit movies coming out. So to be charging people more right now is a really dangerous move. Now, to charge people less to sit in the front, I think that is a no-brainer.

I'm with you. I don't think anyone's going to pay more right now to go to a movie and sit right there in the middle. We haven't seen the pricing tiers, so maybe they're just bringing down the lowest level, and not bringing up the middle. That would be my advice.

JARED BLIKRE: Why not?

- If they're listening.

JARED BLIKRE: I mean, if they were discounting some of the seats, maybe they just make that up in the concessions anyway. We all know those $10 sodas, pops, whatever you like to call them, those can get pricey as well. But I'm thinking back to all those capital raises that AMC successfully did when they were a meme stock. I guess they still are. But the meme price of that stock was higher.

So at least they're in a better capital position having capitalized on that a couple of years ago. But yeah, a lot of these brick and mortar places, they're struggling under an old regime trying to figure out what to do in the new one. And I don't know, charging different prices for seats, probably you've shouldn't. -

- We've got give AMC credit though. They're often creative. They've been thinking of-- they've been throwing all sorts of stuff up against the wall over the last two years to see if they can turn them around.

JARED BLIKRE: The CEO is very investor friendly as well.

- He is an interesting cat.

JARED BLIKRE: An interesting cat.

Very fun to follow. We'll see how this works.