No CommentsMovieTickets.com is reporting that its embrace of bitcoin is leading to increased sales, visibility, and community good will. When the company first decided to accept bitcoin there were some trepidations, but the all-digital currency is turning out to be a boon for the online ticket selling site. With consumers constantly demanding more ways to quickly and easily pay for goods online, bitcoin is emerging as an increasingly popular transaction method, and one that is helping MovieTickets.com sell its goods.
Movie-goers can now use bitcoin to buy tickets for approximately 900 movie theaters in the United States. MovieTickets.com only started accepting bitcoin back in June but the program is showing early signs of success. Already, MovieTickets claims that its acceptance of bitcoin is increasing its visibility and profile. Best of all, the company is reporting hundreds of purchases via bitcoin so far.
When MovieTickets decided to accept bitcoin, it wasn’t driven by any “libertarian views” (like Overstock) or any type of larger philosophy. Instead, it was driven by a pragmatic embrace of business principles and the desire to create publicity and increase ticket sales. So far bitcoin is delivering on both fronts.
MovieTickets is one of the larger companies to accept bitcoin as payment. The website, which was founded in 2000, has agreements with approximately 240 movie theater chains in the United States and is one of the largest online retailers for movie tickets. Now, it’s one of the largest companies to official accept bitcoin as a payment. WordPress, Subway, Target, Zynga, and other major companies have set up ways to accept bitcoin as a payment, often by using a middle man service that quickly converts bitcoin into cash.
In MovieTickets’ case the payments are facilitated by GoCoin, which is one of the hottest bitcoin startups in the market right now. GoCoin makes it easy for any business to accept bitcoins (and other digital currencies, such as dogecoin and litecoin) by converting digital currencies into the cold, hard cash that businesses crave. GoCoin was funded, in part, through crowdsourcing.
So long as a movie theater allows ticket purchasers to use MovieTickets payment processing service, they can use bitcoin as a payment service. Not all movie theaters on MovieTickets.com, however, use the company’s payment processing service, so users can’t buy tickets with bitcoins from all of the theaters. Still, nearly a thousand movie theaters are already accepting bitcoin, and MovieTickets continues to add new theaters to its network.
The company’s CEO cites a lack of education as the biggest hurdle between bitcoin as a niche payment and investment vehicle, and as a widely-circulated and in-use currency. This lack of education can impact both customers, some of whom simply don’t know what bitcoin is and how to use it, and also businesses. Many businesses simply don’t know how to accept bitcoin and how payments can be processed and converted into traditional cash.
MovieTicket’s adoption of bitcoin marks another major advance for the all-digital currency. For bitcoin to establish itself as a fully-fledged currency, it will need to become a widely used and easily accepted payment option. Overstock.com MovieTickets.com, and other businesses are helping to spread awareness of bitcoin, which should ultimately increase the bitcoin community’s size. For now, at least bitcoin users have an option for purchasing movie tickets and catching up on the latest flicks.
