movie theater people
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Glad you sighed up to say THAT. I thought people would figure that there was a reason other than sheer retardation that people stayed and its because the tickets were F***ing expensive and until we left the theater we had no means of checking the time. also it wasn't two hours, I was exaggerating on the times but it felt like it. part of the tiime was because we were being told periodically the projector was being fixed blah blah blah.jaycromer said:
Though I should remember not to exaggerate times in the future because of things like this.
I concur. If I have to pay $10 just to see the movie, I don't want to pay another ten for soda and snacks when I can go to the dollar store and buy the same. And it's never just me and my need for "carrying in contraband," by the way. Often I'll have a friend go "Here, shove this in your purse," mostly because it's convenient. Don't even bring gender into it, else we'll be on another argument entirely.Saskwach said:
The reason for this is that the theater gets little or nothing from the ticket price; that money goes to the film distributor. The theater makes its money from concessions, which are hugely profitable. Last study I saw the most profitable item was a large drink, which averaged about US$3.75 and cost about ten cents to put in your hand (the cup is the most expensive thing, even more than labor) if I remember correctly. Popcorn is almost as good. We go out to dinner before we go to the movie, so usually we just share a Coke or a bottle of water.BlazeTheVampire said:
Kason, are you doing any digital format or is it all still film?
yes the cup is about $.10 or so and the pop is just like kool-aid and is pennies a glass i'd say that $3.75 usd cup of pop is about $3.50 per person profit if not a bit more. popcorn is even worse, considering a $1 bag of unpopped popcorn will make tons of popcorn. it's rather ridiculous if you ask mewerepossum said:
I worked in a movie theater as an Usher/Concessionist throughout high school, and the most irritating thing to me is when people complain to me (the concession stand worker) about the prices.
First of all, I'M A MINIMUM WAGE CONCESSION STAND WORKER. I do not have the power to change the prices for you! Complaining at me violently while you dig through your purse to find your credit card is not going to help.
Which brings me to the next point. I have actually had people stop mid-price-complaint to ask me if we accept credit cards to pay for the snacks. And you wonder how we get away with charging ridiculous prices? BECAUSE YOU STILL PAY FOR IT! Basic economics. You charge the highest price people are willing to pay.
Another pet peeve is when you get someone who has just been standing in line for 5 minutes, staring at the case with the treats in plain view, and when they finally get up to the counter they don't know what they want. What were you doing the whole time you were in line? Oh, right. You were complaining about waiting in line, because the guy in front of you couldn't decide what he wanted.
Honestly I could go on and on about stupid things people do at the movie theater, but I doubt anyone wants to read it. I really just wanted to weigh in on that pricing issue. And trust me folks, the people who work at these theaters hate the pricing system just as much as you do, so as long as you make a half-assed attempt at concealing your food, then they won't stop you from bringing in your own, reasonably priced treats. Just don't expect us to let you walk by carrying a Boston Market bag or a pizza box. Unless you're gonna give me a slice. (Seriously, I did that once.)
First of all, I'M A MINIMUM WAGE CONCESSION STAND WORKER. I do not have the power to change the prices for you! Complaining at me violently while you dig through your purse to find your credit card is not going to help.
Which brings me to the next point. I have actually had people stop mid-price-complaint to ask me if we accept credit cards to pay for the snacks. And you wonder how we get away with charging ridiculous prices? BECAUSE YOU STILL PAY FOR IT! Basic economics. You charge the highest price people are willing to pay.
Another pet peeve is when you get someone who has just been standing in line for 5 minutes, staring at the case with the treats in plain view, and when they finally get up to the counter they don't know what they want. What were you doing the whole time you were in line? Oh, right. You were complaining about waiting in line, because the guy in front of you couldn't decide what he wanted.
Honestly I could go on and on about stupid things people do at the movie theater, but I doubt anyone wants to read it. I really just wanted to weigh in on that pricing issue. And trust me folks, the people who work at these theaters hate the pricing system just as much as you do, so as long as you make a half-assed attempt at concealing your food, then they won't stop you from bringing in your own, reasonably priced treats. Just don't expect us to let you walk by carrying a Boston Market bag or a pizza box. Unless you're gonna give me a slice. (Seriously, I did that once.)
I work in a projection booth too. I started as an usher and had some weirdness happen to me, I found a knife in a theater once and another time someone tried to bribe me to get in. It's fun when the foul-mouth teenagers need to get kicked out though; sometimes I see them sneak in while looking down from the projection room.
My thearter's booth seems set up like yours Kason: veiwport, sound towers with varying levels of static, though the actual projectors may be different. The crappy thing about it is the only excitement is when something goes wrong, like when a film snap apart. I do watch the movies though, even if I can only see five minutes at a time. My theater has 10 screens and only one projectionist is working at a time.
Hey, you ever splice a nude scene into a movie? I nearly did once to prove a point to another employee, but chickened out.
My thearter's booth seems set up like yours Kason: veiwport, sound towers with varying levels of static, though the actual projectors may be different. The crappy thing about it is the only excitement is when something goes wrong, like when a film snap apart. I do watch the movies though, even if I can only see five minutes at a time. My theater has 10 screens and only one projectionist is working at a time.
Hey, you ever splice a nude scene into a movie? I nearly did once to prove a point to another employee, but chickened out.
ShyWinter said:
Kicking out obnoxious people was like, the most redeeming thing ever.
Either that or ridiculously snowy days where noone comes in and you get to play broom floor hockey in the lobby and have rolling-chair races.
As for the knife... thats far creepier than anything I ever found in a theater, but I've seen some nasty things. Namely:
-Used condom (cliche but still gross as hell.)
-A cup of vomit (yes, someone had the forethought to vomit in the cup, not on the floor, but then left the cup in the cupholder.)
and last but not least,
-a used tampon. Yes, used. No, I am not kidding.
Also, on a related note to the complaining about prices thing, there was a relatively slow day I was working and a woman came in, wanted bottled water, complained about the price, made a big scene, finally bought it and went in to her movie. I made a mental note of which movie she was in so I could check up later on and annoy her on my break. I went in to clean up the theater after the movie, and saw her leaving her seat. I look over, and what is on the floor but the bottle of water... unopened.
It's a strange system; you under price your primary product in the hopes of royally screwing your customers on your secondary products, which they can avoid whilst still enjoying the primary product. Weird.cleverlymadeup said:
On minimum wage concession stand workers: Isn't it funny how often the employees with the most contact with customers - and therefore probably most responsible for the public's opinion of, and satisfaction with, your company - are the lowest paid employees in the company?
I went to see Rush Hour 3 and for the first ten seconds there was no sound and no picture. Then the camera was put on and there was no sound for like five minutes. Everyone yelled and stuff, and we told them to fix it, but they did nothing. They gave us some refund ticket thing that I'd bet good money on no one ever used. Also, I don't work at a movie theater. But I watch movies.
it's strange economics, if the movie ticket was more then not a lot of ppl would go, i noticed places recently dropped the price of tickets but raised the cost of the concession stuff, it's a nice smoke and mirrors kinda thingwerepossum said:
that's the way it is in most placeswerepossum said:
think any customer service roll, most of them make minimum wage if not a bit above, also why customer service can really suck and you get bad service
Agreed. The only reason I make above minimum wage is that you get a raise each year and I've been with the company for two- but our minimum wage keeps rising. For example, my first raise was from $6.85 to $7.00/hr, but shortly after, minimum wage rose to $7.00/hr. Now I make $7.25/hr, but next year minimum wage is supposed to rise to that. So I may as well not even get a raise, lol.cleverlymadeup said:
I did sign up just to say that little bit. My favourite part is that in your reply you attempt to make your story actually make some sense. If you intended the two hours of the original post to come across as exaggerated you failed, if you had tossed a "like" or "what felt like" into the mix it would have made more sense. Also, you didn't mention that the staff was apparently telling you they were working on it the whole time, which means they were full on lying to you...why wouldnt that be your big complaint?The Potato Lord said:
Also, the price of tickets isn't even mentioned in the first post, so how can it be about how expensive they are? Besides that, you can always get a refund on any ticket if you walk our early enough or the projector has problems. You tried to tell a story about a bad experience, but did it poorly or lied about it all. Either way it was a bad post.
werepossum,werepossum said:
we still do film. and wow i must say you hit the nail on the head about the money from box/concession sells.
BlazeTheVampire,
i didn't mean to just single out women about sneaking in stuff...its just that we were on the topic of purses.
IrishDevil,
HELL YEAH. Thank you for pointing that stuff out.
I don't work at a movie theater, and don't wish to, no offence to those that do. I just wanted to tell of fun things that've happened at this one theater where I go:
1] Twice some kids brought in fireworks. Once, the set them all off and it was fun. Second time, the bag caught fire and exploded. Even more fun.
2] Big ass food fight during Star Wars 3. From the opening scroll to the end credits, there was always at least some popcorn flying about.
3] Half way through Harry Potter 5, the movies sound died, so me and a few others yelled out the lines till the sound came back, but then the picture went away, so we had to act it out. Fun.
4]I brought my laptop into a theater and looked up spoilers, and yelled them out every once and a while, like "That's the main villain." Five minutes into Iron Man.
5] Two words: Lazer show.
6]Bunch of nerds + plastic lightsabres = fucking hilarious.
1] Twice some kids brought in fireworks. Once, the set them all off and it was fun. Second time, the bag caught fire and exploded. Even more fun.
2] Big ass food fight during Star Wars 3. From the opening scroll to the end credits, there was always at least some popcorn flying about.
3] Half way through Harry Potter 5, the movies sound died, so me and a few others yelled out the lines till the sound came back, but then the picture went away, so we had to act it out. Fun.
4]I brought my laptop into a theater and looked up spoilers, and yelled them out every once and a while, like "That's the main villain." Five minutes into Iron Man.
5] Two words: Lazer show.
6]Bunch of nerds + plastic lightsabres = fucking hilarious.
In the late 70s a theater fairly near me did cheap midnight movies, Rocky Horror Picture Show (or sometimes a Monty Python.) We used to go once or twice a week, everybody knew the lines and shouted out certain parts, lots of people in costume or drag. (Not me, bearded man in drag is sad. Actually, non-bearded man in drag is sad too.) Then some jerks started bringing in toilet paper and toast to throw at certain parts of movie (Great Scott!), newspaper, squirt guns, etc. Suddenly there are hours of cleanup for the theater crew, so the theater started checking every bag. Then the same jerks stole all the bathroom toilet paper and threw it. So pretty soon, no more midnight movies at all.WolfMage said:
How to say this...WolfMage said:
People like you are the reason people like me hate paying $10 to go see a show. If I knew I was going to get a quality experience, I probably wouldn't mind much. The fact that I have to ream some highschooler a new one every single time I go makes me dread going. As much as I support having fun and doing random things with friends to have fun, I don't support it when that fun is ruining somebody else's time. If you want to have a lightsaber fight in the lobby, that's fine. Good for you. We choreographed an entire fight scene to be performed outside of Star Wars Episode 3. But the laptop in the movie? Shouting out spoilers? That's just going entirely too far.
I can't even continue without saying things that will get me banned. Perhaps somebody else can put things more eloquently?