With video games one of the key competitors to movie theaters, as they cater to the same demographic of teens and young males, National Amusements is looking to draw them back to theaters by focusing on their gaming behaviors.
The theater chain is bringing a live video gaming tournament to a Los Angeles theater this weekend in a move to see if it will work on filling up a lot of their empty seats. The tournaments will be held in a building next to the theaters called CyGamZ.
The tournament will be sponsored by News Corp. (NWS-A) through BSkyB, STAR and DirecTV Group. News Corp. owns STAR outright, and has about a 40 percent stake in DirecTV Group and BSkyB.
Some big companies have come together to form a new professional gaming league called Championship Gaming Series (CGS), which will qualify gamers for its first draft of professional gaming teams.
Founding companies of the league are Microsoft's (MSFT) Xbox, IGN Entertainment and Pepsico's (PBG) Mountain Dew. Through News Corps.'s cable and satellite stations the league will be seen in over 100 million households around the world.
National Amusements president Shari Redstone has been very proactive and creative in looking for new ways to create revenue at theaters. She said concerning the new initiative: "I want to be (a) community entertainment destination. I believe it will grow my core business and assist in growing revenue."
Some of the other things she's done to increase attendance has been to broadcast live baseball games at theaters, live entertainment, music and even have people serving guests with food.
I really like what she says about stressing niches rather than general audiences: "One of the things I'm trying to do is really have niche demographic programming. I think we can no longer look at moviegoing as a generic experience."
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