Bookmyshow sells record number of tickets in April
NEW DELHI: Bookmyshow sold a record 29 million tickets in April across businesses, with cinemas contributing bulk of the sales, as people returned to theatres with the pandemic appearing under control.
In comparison, the ticketing app sold 22 million tickets across verticals in the pre-pandemic month of January 2020, according to a Bookmyshow report released on Friday.
Regional language hits are driving recovery for the Indian film exhibition business after the pandemic-related lockdowns, with Kannada action-drama K.G.F: Chapter 2 having crossed 17.1 million tickets on Bookmyshow, becoming the highest seller on the platform. The film surpassed ticket sales of 2017 blockbuster Baahubali 2: The
Conclusion, also a south Indian film that had clocked in 16 million ticket sales, the company said.
Bookmyshow said S.S. Rajamouli’s period drama RRR sold 13.4 million tickets, while Hollywood superhero flick Doctor
Strange: In the Multiverse of Madness sold more than 2.5 million tickets, with the platform contributing 66% to the movie’s box office collections in the opening weekend.
Hindi language consumption of movies released in cinemas was the highest at 40% of overall sales. This, however, included films of south Indian origin that were dubbed in Hindi, such as K.G.F: Chapter 2 and RRR. Tamil and Telugu came in second, contributing about 20% each of sales.
Viewers from Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi-ncr led ticket sales for films, while tier-ii cities like Coimbatore and Kochi surpassed metros like Kolkata, Bookmyshow said. In April, the top 10 cities contributed nearly half of overall ticket sales on Bookmyshow.
“Consumption of entertainment has never been stronger, with Bookmyshow crossing 29 million tickets sold for the month led by cinemas, reinforcing India’s love for movies across formats, yet again,” Ashish Saksena, chief operating officer, cinemas, Bookmyshow, said in a statement.
Bookmyshow, which launched its pay-per-view streaming service last year, said purchases of foreign-language films in Spanish, Norwegian, Italian, Danish, German, Sanskrit and Slovak topped pay-perview transactions in April while action, thrillers, historical and period drama were the most popular movie genres. Bookmyshow’s streaming service clocked the highest sales in Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi-ncr, Pune, Kochi, Ahmedabad, Kolkata and Vijayawada.
Streaming transactions were most popular with the Gen Z segment, aged 18 to 24 years, followed by millennials, or those aged 25 to 34 years.
Originals work best on the platform, with 55% of the total transactions being for Bookmyshow Stream Originals.