HogansHero said: "@bdn, your analyst skills seems as weak as your spelling skills (which are atrocious). Stats incidentally are tools, not analysis. Let me learn you something about analyzing theatre: when a show is a success, as BOM obviously is, there are two modes of moving forward once the zeitgeist as you call it ends. The first is called maintenance mode, and the second is called burnout mode. As an investor, you want the former. That's the sweet spot BOM has maneuvered into. That is a "decline" only to a number cruncher who lacks the sophistication to appreciate strategy. (There is no strategy in statistics.)
Theatre productions are quite different from the typical corporate investment because that are ad-hoc rather than on-going as enterprises. They are also closed systems-no new money is sought or accepted, and investments are not commodities. The first thing that happens in a successful show is that the investor recoups his or her investment. From that point the ROI is in effect ∞ -- something that is meaningless to a statistician. Were we to try to compare the process to a conventional enterprise, we'd want to look at a company like Levi Strauss: it blazed onto the market and settled into maintenance mode where it has been happy for over a century and a half. Many jeans have come on the market in the interim, but except for the couple of competitors that have basically done what they do, we know laugh at the jeans we bought 10, 20 or more years ago. But Levi's investors don't want it to be Saint Laurent, a company that must endlessly reinvent itself. And neither do BOM investors.
I hope this helps you understand why people are disparaging what you have said.
"
Alright, let's not get nasty here, ladies. BDN is right in saying that BOM is in a downward trend. Every single week, year to date, has reflected ~100k less gross than the same week the year before. This is a trend that has been observed at least since 2013. In fact, Year-on-Year (YoY), BOM is down an average of 100k/week every year. It is obviously nowhere close to being in trouble, but BDN is right in saying that sales are slowing.
Compare this to some of the other long running musicals - Wicked demonstrates nearly the same sales YoY, and the Lion King actually appears to be growing. Jersey Boys and Kinky Boots are two others that are showing declines (albeit, more precipitously)
Hamilton, for the record, also does not have a downward trend, as it is going from $1.7m in January to $2.0m+ today.
Again, not saying BOM is in trouble - just trying to defend BDN's original claim (analyst or not). BOM's annual ROI is in fact declining, but still wonderfully profitable and will continue to make money for investors for years
Click below to access all the grosses from all the shows for the week ending 7/3/2016 in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.
