Not that long ago MoviePass subscribers were living on cloud nine, able to see as many movies as they wanted as many times as they wanted with no restrictions on titles or showtimes, all for an unbelievably low price. This model drove MoviePass to incredible growth and millions of happy subscribers. But those days are long gone now. The all you can eat buffet put MoviePass into financially treacherous waters, and the service has been implementing a seemingly endless series of changes in order to stay afloat. Those changes have not been well received by MoviePass's customers, who are less satisfied with the service now than ever before.
Back in March, the National Research Group conducted a poll of MoviePass subscribers about the service, and found that 83% of them were more satisfied with MoviePass than any other subscription service they paid for (including Netflix, Hulu, etc.). Now, after MoviePass's turbulent summer, the NRG has conducted another poll of moviegoers for The Hollywood Reporter and the results are far less enthusiastic. The poll consisted of 1,558 moviegoers, 424 of whom were MoviePass subscribers and 100 of whom had cancelled their subscription. What the poll found was that that satisfaction number has now dropped to 48%, marking a 35% drop in satisfaction in less than half a year's time. Clearly MoviePass's communication, changes in service and usability are not going unnoticed by the subscriber base.
More damning than just member satisfaction is that of those MoviePass customers polled, 47% are considering cancelling their memberships, with only 37% planning to stick around and ride the wave. For those polled who already cancelled MoviePass, the reasons cited for doing so were the service's frequent rule changes and an inability to see the movie of their choice.
Even those subscribers who plan to remain have doubts about MoviePass's reliability and trustworthiness. While the exact dates of the poll weren't given. it may have been before MoviePass's most recent poorly received change, where the service migrated annual subscribers to the new monthly plan, resulting in some subscribers claiming they couldn't cancel and get their refund. It is unclear how many subscribers MoviePass has lost in recent months from its near 3 million high. The MoviePass ship may not be sinking quite yet, but there is definitely a mutiny aboard.
Although MoviePass continues to navigate stormy weather, the outlook for moviegoing subscription services in general is far more encouraging. The NRG poll found that 39% of moviegoers were definitely interested in some sort of sustainable subscription plan. While sustainability has been MoviePass's issue from the start, the concept of the service is clearly appealing and there is an opportunity in the market for a competitor or even MoviePass once the ship is righted to capitalize. To that end, 23% of the 1,558 people polled were in favor of AMC's Stubs A-List service, which has seen its subscriber number rise at a rate that has exceeded expectations.
We'll keep following the MoviePass saga as it continues. In the meantime, there are plenty of great reasons to go to the theater the rest of this year whether you use MoviePass, one of its competitors, old fashioned cash or you just sneak in. You can check them out in our release schedule.
