The upcoming Friday has the potential to change the future of Hindi cinema if the big decison makers at multiplex chains get the picture. There is a huge price drop in ticket rate on Friday to INR 75 and it may well be that Brahmastra gets more footfalls at multiplexes on the third Friday then it did on either of its first three days.

Brahmastra is a HIT film and is pretty much an accepted film so low prices there will mean be a lot more people to watch the film but the surprise is Chup which has an advance which can actually compete with the advance of Brahmastra in terms of admits. The admits seen for Chup over the first 24 hours of advance are not far behind Brahmastra at the two biggest chains PVR and Inox over the same priod. The business is lower due to ticket rates but its still higher than it would have been on normal rates.

Chup would have struggled to get the sort of fottfalls it is going to get in advance over the whole weekend at these multiplexes. This Friday will show how the smaller and medium films and average fares can have some sort of cinema life but it will be down to multiplexes to work the correct pricing. Cinema will always be the winner over streaming and its just about the multiplexes getting it right and understanding they can do to streaming what it attempted to do to cinema during the pandemic and give such value that streaming actually becomes same as television which it actually is. But while people stay away from cinemas that will not hhappen

Obviouslly the base rate of INR 75 is probably too low but there has to be a lower base rate than what it is now to help films like Chup and so many others. The Brahmastra's, Avatar's and KGF2's can raise as they like because a premium product has demend but for the average film the base has to come down if it is to survive.

The results will be huge for Brahmastra and Chup on Friday and these will be coming without the biggest need of the hour and that is concessions to come down. The food business in india is about volume and bringing prices down here will mean more footfalls and more volume at a lower rate which can work out well. Even if leaves you a bit short at least you have increased admits and given cinema a push which is so important as Brahmastra may have done well but the situation is pretty much same for the normal film.

Hopefully there will a lot of number crunching on Friday by the multiplexes so they can get that pricing right for tickets and concessions to get the audience back from streaming and better business week in week out and not just for the premium product which is less price sensitive.

The lower rate card cant be played for one day as it is likely to affect the business on the days around it as the public goes for the lower rate day but a balance can be found after seeing the results  on Saturday. This is just a lower ticket price card at play and the results look huge and if concessions were to go down then the results will also be seen and have longer time affect.

The bottom line is thats not about where your share price is today but where its is in 3 or 5 years time for your investors and it can only improve if cinema is alive and kicking and Friday will give an idea as to how it can be made to happen.