Remember when "Customer comes first" was a thing?

[Bruce Cloutier]

It is my opinion that companies who are dependent upon (enslaved by) investors eventually turn their focus away from the customer having to provide some ROI or other profitable exit to the ever-circling vultures. Public companies actually have that responsibility forced on them. So, in other words, they aren't doing you any favors. Am I wrong?

You guys are Number One in our case. We don't have the burden of grumpy investors. You have my commitment to not be raising prices. Prices have a way of going up but never come down. You only have a chance of that in highly competitive markets. Not really in Automation. Without trying to make a political statement, you have to know that our margins are dwindling being basically under attack. I am directly absorbing tariff charges. I know that you all appreciate that. Without the pressure to show huge profits we have focused on customer service. Are we doing a good job? You need to tell us.

In order for us to keep it up and not succumb to the trend, we could use a little help. I need to increase business just a bit. You know, probably, that the JNIOR is used in lots of different places. You will find it in public transportation, energy and environment management/monitoring, etc. and not just Cinema. All of this is from word of mouth. We don't blow cash on marketing. We don't even employ sales or marketing people. Not since Rick left. We need to get back to exhibiting (that is pending new products). But, please know, that you are all part of what we do. An idea or two from your side might help. Got any other interests where we can help?

Anyway, while my team keeps its focus, how can we get the rest of the industry back on track? You know that acquisitions aren't moving things in the right direction. I think that products are deprecated all too quickly. In some cases after you purchase a thing and then later go back to get another, you cannot get the same thing. Now its fashionable to "end support". I don't think we had that problem with film.

I just feel like ranting. I am looking for solutions. But I suppose I shouldn't worry about things that are completely out of my control.

Do you think your patrons feel appreciated?

[Leo Enticknap]

I'm not sure that it's as simple as a private company = bad / public company = good comparison. Private companies have obligations to their owners, but so do public companies, in the form of stockholders; and furthermore, being public means that a trove of data about the health of the company is in the public domain (e.g. ours). So public companies also have to balance obligations to their customers and their owners, too, albeit in slightly different ways.

I don't know about the other industries that use JNIORs, but the movie theater industry is such a small one that building a long term relationship with customers, both big and small, is a more effective route to long term sustainability and profitability than traditional marketing and advertising (which in any case is more geared to business to consumer sales than business to business). That also, sometimes, means doing counterintuitive (for your short term bottom line) stuff, like helping a little nonprofit theater to keep obsolete Series 1 gear alive and not charging for some of the time involved, because someone on their board has connections to a wealthy college, that a year and a half later results in a $300K sale to completely reequip a big lecture theater (this is a real world example).

Shorter equipment lifecycles is not a tide that service vendors and integrators can really swim against, because the OEMs are in control of that, not the companies that sell, install, and maintain the equipment. What we can and should do is to try to educate end users about this reality, and the need to factor it in to business planning. For example, during the training/handover discussion with a customer at the end of an install, I will flag up that their new projector is designed with a realistic service life of a decade in mind, and that therefore it would be sensible to write down the asset over that period, and plan to replace it at the end of it.

But as others have opined over and over again on this forum, the two things that are really needed to get the industry back on track are better (as in, more popular) movies, not niche interest and/or politically polarized ones, and to find ways to drive the cost of moviegoing down. When I go to the local theater with my wife and son, the total cost of the visit (including concessions stuff, etc.) ends up costing between $60 and $80. That puts moviegoing out of reach of all but double earning, middle class families, and even for them, makes it a once or twice a year treat. That $80 trip to the theater is also in competition with $20 for a month of Netflix.