You take so much for granted when you go to the movies today. But we didn’t always have stereo sound, or color, or George Clooney. And for a surprisingly long time you couldn’t buy candy.

This rundown in Slate details the history of movie theatre concessions. For the first 20 or so years of movies, theatre owners fought tooth and nail to keep food out of the auditoriums. What started them on the road to ruin?

Then came the Great Depression. Squeezed like everyone else, palace owners sought new sources of revenue… And because popcorn was so cheap—theaters could sell it for 10 cents a bag and still turn a nice profit—it was a treat that even cash-strapped Americans could manage to splurge on.

There’s oh so much more in there, including a candy history quiz, and it’s fascinating. By the way, the profit margin on a tub of popcorn is still something like 300-400%. If there’s ever a corn blight, there’s going to be a lot of big-room real estate going for cheap in this country.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 27th, 2007 at 11:51 pm and is filed under General, Marketing, Motion Pictures. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.