Spend per head (SPH)

Roughly half of ticket revenue leaves for the distributor. None of concession revenue does. That single asymmetry is why a cinema with mediocre admissions and strong spend per head can out-earn a busier one, and why concessions deserve more management attention than they usually get.

It also reframes pricing. Raising ticket prices raises the amount you hand over. Raising spend per head does not. If you have one initiative's worth of effort available, it is better spent on attach than on a price rise of equivalent value.

Spend per head is the product of two numbers that respond to completely different interventions, and averaging them together hides which one is broken.

Attach rate is the share of customers who buy anything at all. It is lost at the point of friction: a queue that is too long before a show that is about to start, a counter that is closed, a customer who does not want to lose their place. The fixes are operational and structural — more service points, pre-ordering in the app, collection at the door, order-to-seat.

Basket size is what a buying customer spends. It responds to merchandising, combos, sizing and prompts — and pre-ordering helps here too, because a customer choosing calmly on a phone the night before buys differently from one choosing under time pressure with a queue behind them.

Measure them separately. A site with high attach and small baskets needs a menu change; one with big baskets and low attach needs to remove a queue.