Cost guide
What cinema advertising costs, and why the screen is the unit
On-screen time is sold per screen per week, so the property, the individual screen, its catchment, the format and the number of weeks set the number.
The GullySales team · Updated 21 Sept 2026 · 7 min read
Cinema advertising is bought by the screen and by the week. Not by the city, not by the chain, and not by the number of people a deck says watch films. Once you understand that the unit is one auditorium for seven days, the rest of the pricing follows. A screen with more seats, a higher ticket price and the big release scheduled into it costs more than the screen down the corridor running a fourth-week film. Both are in the same building, on the same rate card, and they are not the same buy.
What moves the number
The property and the chain. A premium multiplex in a mall, a mid-market chain and an independent single screen sell the same seconds at very different prices. They are selling different audiences, and they know it. The ticket price at the box office is the clearest signal of what you are paying for.
The individual screen. Seat count, the format of the auditorium, and which releases the property schedules into it. A four-screen property has four rates, and a seller who quotes one number for the property has averaged away the decision you were about to make.
The catchment. In Bengaluru this is the whole decision. A cinema draws from the few kilometres around it, plus whoever the mall pulls in at a weekend. That is the actual audience you are buying, and it is why location does more to the value of a booking than the chain's name does.
The format. On-screen time in the reel before the film, and everything else. A still slide and a video of ten to thirty seconds are priced differently. So are the lobby positions: standees, counter branding, a foyer kiosk, the escalator panels, the back of the ticket. In a mall the lobby usually belongs to the mall rather than to the cinema, which means a second seller, a second set of rules and frequently a deposit.
Position in the reel. People walk in late. The slots nearest the film are the ones an audience is actually seated for, and the interval position catches the crowd moving to the counter and back. Both carry a premium over the early slots, and both are worth it.
Duration. Rates come down per week as the booking lengthens, and the campaign works better at the same time, because cinema pays off on the second and third sighting. Duration is the one lever where the cheaper choice is also the more effective one.
The weeks you picked. A booking that lands on a festival release and a booking that lands on a quiet fortnight cost the same and deliver completely different halls. Read the release calendar before signing, not after.
What the property will not price in. Occupancy. A rate is quoted against a screen, never against the seats sold in it. An auditorium a fifth full costs you exactly what a full one costs. Ask the property what its average occupancy on that screen has been over the last quarter, by weekday and weekend. Some will tell you and some will not, and the ones that will are the ones worth booking with. Ask also whether a minimum number of weeks or screens is attached to the rate you were shown. A low per-week figure with a four-week floor is a different commitment from the one you were reading.
Why one multiplex can beat a city-wide buy
Most local businesses sell inside a radius. A dental practice, a gym, a coaching centre, a furniture showroom, a diagnostic lab. Their customers come from a handful of surrounding localities and will not cross a city for any of them.
A city-wide cinema package spreads the same budget across screens in catchments where you have nothing to sell. It produces a reach number for the report and very little else.
One screen in the right catchment, held for six or eight weeks, does the opposite. The same families come back. The slide is seen a second and a third time. The code on it starts getting scanned, because the business is five minutes from the mall they are already sitting in. This is the single most useful thing to understand about cinema pricing, and it is the opposite of how packages are sold.
What a quotation must break out
| Line | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| The property, and the screens by number | A property rate hides the difference between its best and worst screen |
| Seat count per screen booked | The only measure of the hall you are buying |
| The weeks, as dates | The release calendar makes two identical bookings unequal |
| Format: slide, or video at a stated length | Two different rates and two different production costs |
| Position in the reel, and the interval slot if bought | The difference between a seated audience and an empty hall |
| On-screen and lobby, separated | Different sellers in most malls, and different contracts |
| Creative delivery format and deadline | The file has to reach the property in its own specification |
| Certification of the advertisement film | Required for screening, and it takes time |
| Taxes | Stated, not implied |
What arrives later
Certification of the film, which is a real step with its own timeline for anything screened in a theatre. Making the slide or the video. Converting it to the format the property's projection system takes, and delivering it before that week's deadline. The mall's deposit and its branding rules, if you are also taking a lobby position. And the response route, a QR code or a code used only in this reel, without which you will be guessing in the review meeting.
When cinema is the wrong buy
When you sell to a trade rather than to a household. The hall is full of people, and none of them buys hydraulic hose.
When the budget is one screen for one week. That is a sighting. Nobody remembers it, and the production cost is the same as for eight weeks.
When you need enquiries counted every day. The hall reports nothing. If a channel has to be judged on daily cost per lead, buy search instead.
When the catchment does not match the business. A screen in a mall on the other side of the city has an audience. It is not yours.
What to do next
Find the two cinemas your customers actually use, and ask each property for its screen list with seat counts. Then price six to eight weeks on one screen against the city package you have been offered. Then put a code on the slide so that next time this is a measurement instead of an argument.
If you want the catchment worked out against where your enquiries and walk-ins already come from, book the free audit. Our planning fee is separate from what the property charges and from making the slide, and it is written down before anything is booked.