LETTERS From Chris Whitehouse, Totland Bay:
THE CP recently carried a letter (CP, 22-06-12) from a local resident regretting the decision of Cineworld to cease advertising in the County Press.
Cineworld has this week released its national figures for trading in the first half of the year, and these show a significant drop in admissions around the country, possibly linked in part to the tight economic circumstances, but also to the greater difficulty we now have in finding out what films are showing and when.
Cineworld management openly admit they balanced the shortfall from falling ticket sales by increasing average ticket prices by almost five per cent.
So, Cineworld’s decision denies the County Press advertising revenue, makes it harder for customers to find out information, and penalises loyal customers by making them bear increased ticket prices to fund the revenue gap.
Overall, Cineworld have behaved very cynically because by increasing prices for hard working customers, it has nevertheless increased its own revenues by 1.1 per cent.
All this is at a time when larger businesses, in their own interests and in the wider interests of the economy, should be doing all that they can to keep customers and support local businesses.
It is the sort of behaviour we expect of monopoly service providers, which is essentially the position Cineworld occupies in Newport and the the West Wight. Come on Cineworld, we expect better.