The biggest indicator you’ll spend money on watching movies, both at home and at the theater? Kids.
New research shared by Ampere Analysis on Tuesday shows that children — and in particular, children aged 10 and under — are the primary factor in whether a household spends on movies, topping other factors like age and household income.
A survey of 45,000 people found that 30% of Americans who had visited the cinema at least once in the past six months lived in a household with kids 10 and under, more than any other household category. And for regular moviegoers who go to the theater at least once per month, more than a third live in households with kids 10 or under.
Children were an even bigger sign a household is willing to purchase a movie to stream, with about 40% of at-home movie purchases coming from households with young kids.
courtesy of Ampere Analysis
“Children are crucial to the movie market, and those aged under 10 are particularly important in driving movie visits. Studios have long known the importance of family movies written to entertain not just children but parents too,” Ampere Analysis Director Richard Broughton said. “Our research shows that this has an effect across almost every movie distribution mechanism — households with kids are more likely to take a movie channel, buy DVDs or rent digitally — and of course go to the cinema.”
He added: “The only area of the market, which appears broadly immune to the effect, is the subscription OTT market — but this is almost certainly a consequence of the fact that SVoD services like Netflix and Amazon have diverse content offers with widespread appeal across demographic groups.”
In other words: There’s a negligible difference between households with young kids, households with older kids, and households with no kids when it comes to spending on top streaming services each month.
Kids, of course, have been a key driver of Hollywood’s success for years. But their role has been amplified of late, with services like Noggin, YouTube Kids, Roku’s “Kids and Family” channel, and, of course, Disney+, looking to pull in young viewers. Last month, Disney+ reported it had reached 28.5 million paying subscribers within its first 3 months, bringing it to about half of Netflix’s domestic customer count.
Netflix has also made an aggressive push into kids programming, with The New York Times reporting the streaming giant has “spent billions” on family-friendly content. (Netflix is expected to spend $17 billion overall on content this year.) In the last 18 months, Netflix has acquired the rights for an animated “Jurassic Park” series, as well as the rights tied to the “Chronicles of Narnia” and a reworked “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” among other youth-focused shows.
