The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that National CineMedia (NCM) has retained legal counsel for assistance in renegotiating its debts with the company’s lenders. NCM is the world’s largest provider of in-theatre advertising programs, having exhibitor agreements to play its pre-show advertising program on over 20,000 movie screens across the US, including most theatres within the AMC, Regal, and Cinemark chains.
Unfortunately, the pandemic forced virtually all of those screens to close at one point or another, with only 35% of North American cinemas currently operating. NCM reported only $6M in revenues for Q3 2020, down a whopping 94.6% from the $110.5M it generated in the same period in 2019.
As with the rest of the industry, cinema advertising providers have been forced to bide their time and manage their finances while waiting for the public health crisis to subside and movie-goers to return to cinemas.