Movie giant Cineworld today swallowed up arthouse group Picturehouse, owner of Brixton’s Ritzy and Notting Hill’s Gate — but its boss promised regulars: “We won’t change a thing.”
Cineworld spent £47.3 million buying Picturehouse, which has 21 sites around Britain.
Stephen Wiener, chief executive, said: “The demographic profile of people who go to the cinema is getting older, they like arthouse cinemas, and we wanted to have a piece of that — we don’t want loyal Cineworld customers to go off somewhere else at a certain age.”
But Wiener said he wasn’t changing the name or brand at any of the Picturehouse cinemas, that its management team were all staying on and that they would retain “complete autonomy on film programming”.
He added: “I don’t want to make any changes. It’s a profitable organisation and I want to leave it alone and let it continue making a profit and entertaining the public.”
There could even be hope for those who are driven to despair by the concession stands flogging sweaty hot dogs and buckets of fizzy drinks at multiplexes. Wiener said “We expect to learn from Picturehouse on food and drink.” The arthouse group’s food offering includes white chocolate-coated raspberries, wasabi peas, and lemon-salted cashews.
The acquisition sees Cineworld add Picturehouse’s 21 cinemas to its 80 sites it presently has across the country.
To help fund the deal, Cineworld is raising £16 million through a share flotation.
The deal will make the arthouse cinema chain’s co-founder Lyn Goleby a multi-millionaire.
She owned the business alongside venture capitalists Arts Alliance, and private equity group Albion Venture Capital Trust.
Goleby founded the chain with Tony Jones in 1989, when they opened the Phoenix in Oxford.
Goleby will reinvest some of her windfall by putting £1 million into Cineworld’s share placing.
Shares in Cineworld rose 2.3p to 248.6p.
