India’s PVR Inox loss more than halves as ‘F1’, other hits draw moviegoers

India’s PVR Inox reported a sharply narrower quarterly loss on Wednesday as a strong box office slate, including Hollywood hit ‘F1: The Movie’, drew more audiences to theatres and boosted ticket and food sales.

India’s largest multiplex operator, formed through the merger of PVR and Inox, reported a consolidated loss of 540 million rupees ($6.2 million) in the April-June quarter, compared with a loss of 1.79 billion rupees a year earlier.

Analysts, on an average, had expected a loss of 659.1 million rupees.

Footfalls in cinema halls have been pressured by weak urban consumption, an uneven slate of film releases and growing competition from streaming platforms.

To bring audiences back, PVR has been offering discounted weekday tickets and relaunching older movie hits.

These measures, along with the strong box office performance of Bollywood and Hollywood films such as ‘Sitaare Zameen Par’ and ‘Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning’ helped lift quarterly footfalls by 12% on-year.

Average ticket prices rose 8% to 254 rupees, while per head spending on food and beverages increased 10% to a record 148 rupees. Executive Director Sanjeev Bijli told Reuters he expects spending in these segments to grow at a similar pace in the coming quarters.

“I do see a visibility of great films all the way down to December, the end of third-quarter, and that’s what’s going to drive consumption for admissions, ticket prices, advertisement revenues and also F&B spends,” Bijli said.

He added that the company’s new cinema halls will experiment with gaming centers, co-working spaces and cafeterias inside the premises to “enhance the stickiness of the consumer”.

Revenue from operations rose 23% to 14.69 billion rupees for the quarter, topping analysts’ estimate of 14.24 billion rupees.

The results come amid growing signs of recovery in urban consumption. Consumer goods firms such as Hindustan Unilever and Britannia are signalling improving urban demand after several quarters of sluggish growth.