Cinépolis is planning to reach the milestone of 400 screens by 2018, a senior executive has said.
The brand – which has pan-India expansion plans – will be soon opening new screens in cities like Guwahati, Muzzafarpur, Delhi-NCR, Hyderabad and Bengaluru.
In an exclusive interview with Indiaretailing, Managing Director, Cinépolis India, Javier Sotomayor said, “Cinepolis is very happy with the growth that we have been able to achieve. We are the fastest growing company in the industry. As of now, we have 300 screens, we opened the first one seven years back. So, in seven years, we have been able to achieve this landmark of 300 screens. By 2022 we expect to have 600 screens in total.”
“However, the growth of the whole industry has been much slower than what it should had been. In total in India there are 2,000 multiplex screens. We see a very bright future from the industry and believe that the pace of growth will increase in the years to come,” he added.
Cinépolis is also going to launch a megaplex in Bengaluru which will be functional in a couple of years.
Apart from this, Cinépolis is looking forward to expand its presence in Tier III, Tier IV cities but the main problem that the brand is facing is the cost of land. Hence, Cinépolis has not been able to find a business model that is viable for the brand in these areas.
Explaining further, he said, “However, we believe that Tier III and IV people are eager to get movies in a better setup like multiplexes and we will continue to find out how. We also will have to be adaptable and flexible to give them that experience and at the same time be profitable to our investors.”
“To further develop our capacity of adaptability or flexibility, we need to embrace technology to understand our customer needs. In the end, all of our decisions have to be thinking on how to deliver a better customer experience to our patrons, how would we evolve just trying to be sensitive of their needs, keep our eyes wide open on what the new technology trends are there so that we can offer more things to them in an agile way,” he further revealed.
In future, Cinépolis is expecting the direct interaction with their customers through mobiles. They already have an app where customers can book tickets, FnB etc.
“The brand is also investing a lot in R&D to understand how can they interact with the customers through their smartphones,” he told Indiaretailing Bureau.
Cinépolis which is 15 per cent of the total screens in India, generates overall 16 per cent of the tickets and 17 per cent of the box-office revenues. Going further, it is expecting 25 per cent growth in terms of tickets sold.
In future, Cinepolis is expecting the direct interaction with their customers through mobiles
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