Harkins Amusement Enterprises, Inc.: Information from Answers.com

Company Perspectives
Harkins Theatres is over 300 screens strong and growing. With annual attendance exceeding the capacity of Arizona's top 25 venues combined, Harkins is the Southwest's first choice for entertainment.
Key Dates
1933: Dwight "Red" Harkins begins managing the State Theatre in Tempe, Arizona.
1940: College Theatre, with numerous Harkins technical innovations, opens in Tempe.
1948: Saguaro Theatre is added in Wickenburg, Arizona.
1973: Camelview 3 opens in Scottsdale, Arizona.
1974: Red Harkins dies at 59; 21-year-old Dan Harkins takes control of firm.
1977: Harkins sues eight distributors and three exhibitors, alleging film booking collusion.
1988: New eight-screen multiplex opens in Scottsdale; company takes over the historic Cine Capri.
1991: Out-of-court settlement is reached in legal battle with film distributors.
1993: Seven theaters with 41 screens are bought from the Mann chain.
1995: Harkins buys three theaters from General Cinema, adding 21 screens.
1997: Firm opens a 25-screen theater, at the time the largest in the United States.
2004: Harkins' first out-of-state theater opens in Oklahoma City.
2006: New theaters are added in Colorado, California, and Texas.

Type: Private Company
Address: 7511 East McDonald Drive, Scottsdale, Arizona, 85250, U.S.A.
Telephone: (480) 627-7777
Web: http://www.harkinstheatres.com
Employees: 2,100
Sales: $79 million (2003 est.)
Incorporated: 1933
NAIC: 512131 Motion Picture Theaters (Except Drive-Ins)
SIC: 7832 Motion Picture Theaters Except Drive-In

Harkins Amusement Enterprises, Inc., operates Harkins Theatres, the biggest chain of movie theaters in Arizona. The firm has more than 400 screens at over 30 locations, most in its home state, with others located in California, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Texas. Harkins theaters are distinguished by their neon-decorated lobbies, chiropractor-designed seats, wide range of concession-stand offerings, and high-quality image and sound. A growing number of locations also offer supervised play areas that enable parents of young children to attend movies without hiring a babysitter.

Early Years

Harkins Theatres traces its beginnings to September 1933, when Dwight "Red" Harkins took over management of the State Theatre in Tempe, Arizona. Born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, Harkins had founded a small printing business as a teen and used the proceeds to buy a Model "A" Ford. At the age of 16 he decided to trade the car for a Harley-Davidson motorcycle and run away to Hollywood, but his plan fizzled when he ran out of money in Arizona. Settling in the small town of Tempe, just east of Phoenix, he began fronting a dance band called Einstein and the Eight Atoms, for whom he played violin and sang through a self-built public address system.

In 1933 the 18-year-old Harkins heard about a movie theater that had been shuttered by a local bank because its owner could not keep up with loans for equipment to play the new talking pictures. With $50 saved from his band earnings and the backing of area theater magnate Harry Nace, he leased it from the bank. A few months later he also established an outdoor movie theater at Tempe Beach; it was damaged by storms and shut down after one season.

Movies were a tonic to many during the Great Depression, and Harkins' business was successful enough that in the late 1930s he built a new theater called the College, located around the corner from the State. Opened on November 20, 1940, it featured a number of innovative ideas of Harkins' own devising including glow-in-the-dark carpeting; photocell-activated drinking fountains; color-changing, dimmable wall sconces; and amplified headphones for the hearing-impaired. Like many theaters of the era, it incorporated an apartment where Harkins lived. Several years later, the State Theatre was closed.

Red Harkins believed that business was not just about making money, and he followed three guiding principles. The first was that a sense of achievement was more important than financial success; the second, that the firm should be run in a democratic, rather than an autocratic, fashion; and the last, that he and his employees were the servants of the moviegoer.

Saguaro Theatre Opens in 1948

In 1948 Harkins opened the Saguaro Theatre in the town of Wickenburg. During the 1950s he also turned his attention to broadcasting, operating a radio station and serving as general manager of the Phoenix area's second television station, which was owned by Harry Nace. During this period the inventive Harkins developed a system for multiplex FM stereo broadcasting that was used to simulcast the television station's sound. He also installed stereo audio equipment and other new technology in the theaters as they became available.

In the early 1960s the College Theatre was sold (and later renamed the Valley Art Theatre by its new owners), and in 1973 Harkins opened the Camelview, a three-screen theater. The following April Red Harkins died suddenly at the age of 59. His son Dan, a 21-year-old prelaw student at Arizona State University who was the company's general manager, ignored the advice of bankers to sell the debt-laden firm, and decided to honor his beloved father's memory by keeping it solvent. He had grown up in the movie business, working every job from janitor to projectionist, and like his father before him was starting out as the youngest theater owner in the country.

During the mid-1970s Dan Harkins followed in his father's entrepreneurial footsteps, becoming one of the first to install video-game machines in the lobby of his theaters, and introducing a low-priced children's frequent filmgoer program and "gourmet" snack bar items that included baked goods and ice cream. To maximize ticket sales Harkins promoted his films creatively, turning titles like Monty Python and the Holy Grail into regional hits where other exhibitors had given up on them after short runs. Harkins Amusement, as the company was known, had begun bringing such foreign and "art" movies to its theaters in large part because of difficulties in landing top Hollywood titles.

Lawsuit Filed in 1977

In 1977 Harkins Amusement filed suit against a group of eight film distribution companies and three larger exhibitors, alleging that they had conspired to create a business monopoly which shut it out of booking many top first-run Hollywood titles. The firm sought $3 million in damages. The case dragged on for a decade until a summary motion for dismissal was granted.

The company had struggled to turn a profit during the 1970s and early '80s, but the 1982 reissue of the Walt Disney animated classic Fantasia was a turning point. Dan Harkins' careful marketing of the film as a special event brought in moviegoers, and the firm's profits grew steadily afterward, helped as well by the rapid growth of the Phoenix area.

In 1988 Harkins took over management of the 22-year-old Cine Capri in Phoenix, which had become a local landmark to moviegoers for its sleek styling, huge curved screen, and powerful sound system. On December 25 the firm also opened its biggest theater to date, the luxurious $2.4 million Arcadia 8 in Scottsdale. Its lobby featured extensive use of neon, a design element that would become a Harkins trademark. The company by this time employed about 150.

By this time the hardworking Dan Harkins had found time to get married, tying the knot at the last theater his father had built, the Camelview. His wife, Karen, was a chiropractor and nutritionist by trade, and she soon began to offer suggestions for improvements to the company's theaters. In addition to upgrading the concession stand to offer healthier snack products like juices, bottled water, yogurt, and diet foods, she also spurred the firm to begin cooking popcorn in heart-friendly canola oil and helped design wider, more comfortable theater seats that had a higher back and a cup-holder arm.

In 1990 Harkins expanded the Camelview from three to five screens, and the next year a new seven-screen theater opened in the Fashion Square Mall, which like the Arcadia 8 had a neon-decorated lobby and other distinctive touches. In 1991 the company also bought back the Valley Art Theatre, which had opened in the 1930s as the College Theatre, and leased it to former Harkins employee Krista Griffin, who would show foreign and independent films there.

In the late 1980s, with film studios legally able to buy stakes in theater chains, Harkins tried again to stop the booking practices that kept prime Hollywood titles from him. He sought redress under the Sherman Antitrust Act and with additional suits against distributors, which were settled out of court in 1991 for an undisclosed amount that was substantial enough to help fund new expansion.

Acquisitions Bring Growth

In May 1993 the firm bought seven Phoenix-area theaters with 41 screens from the larger Mann Theatres chain. The purchase more than doubled the number of Harkins' screens, which until then comprised 26 at five first-run multiplexes, one single-screen first-run theater, and three multiscreen "dollar movie" houses. The company soon began a program to upgrade the former Mann sites to feature Dolby stereo sound and better seating, spending about $100,000 per screen on audio and $150,000 to $200,000 per screen to upgrade seats. The price of first-run movies was dropped from $6 to the Harkins standard of $5.50, while concession prices fell about 20 percent, with the firm's wider range of snacks added. In the months after the acquisition ticket sales at the former Mann sites more than doubled.

Shortly after the Mann acquisition Harkins also opened a new theater of its own adjacent to the Valley Art in downtown Tempe. The $5.2 million, two-story, 11-screen Centerpoint Cinemas was touted as the largest theater complex in the state. Its presence also helped boost the business of restaurants and stores nearby.

In April 1995 the firm acquired three more Phoenix-area theaters with 21 screens from the General Cinema chain. In September, the Shea 14 opened in Scottsdale, replacing the closed Shea Plaza. It was followed in January 1996 by a six-screen facility in the town of Sedona, Harkins' first location outside greater Phoenix.

In early 1996, as national chain AMC Entertainment opened a new 20-plus screen "megaplex" in Phoenix, Harkins announced plans to add 111 screens in the metro area by 1998. Although competition from national concerns like United Artists and AMC was fierce, Phoenix native Dan Harkins felt his company was up to the challenge. With Americans increasingly turning to watching films on home video systems, Harkins believed that new, more attractive and luxurious theaters increased frequency of moviegoing, noting that in Sedona the typical person was spending $110 at the box office each year, compared to the national average of just $22.

To maintain its high standards of quality the firm inaugurated a "mystery shopper" program in which each theater was visited anonymously weekly to check cleanliness, projection quality, and customer service. Employee pay and bonuses were tied to theaters' performance at these inspections.

Harkins Opens Megaplexes

Though the firm had typically relied on developers to build its facilities, and then rented them back, in 1997 it began to do this in-house to take full ownership of more theaters. In July of that year, after months of construction delays, another outlying theater was opened, an 11-screen multiplex in Flagstaff. October and November saw the debuts of the first two Harkins megaplexes, a 25-screen site in Superstition Springs and a 24-screen facility in Arizona Mills.

Built at a cost of $15 million, the Superstition Springs 25 was then the largest theater in the United States and featured 4,500 seats, four concession stands, and a 10-window ticket booth. The large number of auditoriums allowed the projection of hit movies on multiple screens, with showtimes staggered so that patrons would have only a short wait until the next start time. The theater was later recognized as "Best Designed Building" by the Arizona chapter of the American Institute of Architects. Owner Dan Harkins had also been honored numerous times by a leading exhibitors' organization as its "Showman of the Year." In addition to looking after patrons' comfort, the firm also gave as much as $800,000 per year to local charitable organizations in the form of on-screen ads and giveaways for fund-raising events.

With the concession stand providing more income than ticket sales (which distributors took the bulk of), Harkins began seeking other types of revenue. One successful method was to rent its theaters to business and community groups during the day, when fewer patrons attended films, as well as showing ads before movies.

At the start of 1999 the company took over the Valley Art Theatre when its tenant declared bankruptcy, and Dan Harkins began a thorough updating of the facility's seating and projection systems while retaining as much historic detail as possible in tribute to his father's original vision. In the spring of 1999 another new theater, the Metro 12, was opened, and during the year the company also moved to new, larger headquarters in Scottsdale; launched a frequent moviegoer program that gave customers a free ticket after buying ten via the MovieFone reservation service; and installed a new digital projection system on one screen. Harkins Amusement had always been an early adopter of new technologies like digital sound, and it was one of the first exhibitors in the United States to purchase the expensive new equipment, which was slated to eventually replace film with a high-definition video format.

Though plans were announced in 2000 to add nearly 200 screens over two years, including theaters in California and New Mexico, growth was soon scaled back as the U.S. economy stumbled and many national exhibition chains consolidated or filed for bankruptcy, the result of aggressive overbuilding. A surge of megaplex construction had increased the number of U.S. screens from 27,000 to 37,000 between 1995 and 1999.

Expansion in the 21st Century

Harkins added another theater in the metropolitan Phoenix area in 2000, the Arrowhead 18, which was followed by three in 2001: the Prescott Valley 14, the North Valley 16, and the Chandler Fashion Mall 20. The latter featured the firm's first in-house childcare facility, which enabled parents to drop their child off during a film for about the price of an admission ticket.

In the fall of 2002 the company added another 18-screen theater, and in 2003 Harkins secured a new $65 million line of credit from a consortium of banks to ramp up the pace of expansion. During the year a new Phoenix-area multiplex, the Scottsdale 101, was also opened, which included a 600-seat recreation of the beloved Cine Capri, which had been demolished in 1998 despite an aggressive local campaign to save it.

The fall of 2004 saw the company open a new theater in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, its first outside Arizona. During the year Harkins also bought more than 200 Kodak Digital Cinema projection systems for its theaters as the industry moved closer to implementing the new format.

In 2005 the firm announced plans to add as many as 14 theaters over two years including ones in California, Texas, and Colorado. The first in the latter state, an 18-screen, $17 million facility, opened near Denver in April 2006, and it was quickly followed by the company's first California theater in Moreno Valley, and one near Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas.

In September 2006 Mike Bowers was named president and chief operating officer of Harkins Amusement Enterprises, with Dan Harkins remaining CEO. Bowers had served as vice-president since 1996. In December the State of Arizona filed suit against the company, alleging that it had failed to provide accommodations for hearing- and vision-impaired patrons at the 262 movie screens it operated in the state. Arizona had also filed suit against national chain AMC.

In the summer of 2007 it was announced that the Centerpoint development in downtown Tempe would be razed and replaced by condominiums. The firm's theater there would close, although its patrons would continue to be served by newer Harkins facilities nearby. During the year the company opened six new theaters including ones in Tucson, Mesa, and Pinal County, Arizona. More were on the drawing board for 2008.

After three-quarters of a century in business, Harkins Amusement Enterprises, Inc., had become the dominant movie exhibitor in the Phoenix area, and was branching out to serve the rest of Arizona and other states. Under the leadership of CEO Dan Harkins, the firm continued to follow the principles of showmanship, respect for audiences, and technical innovation set by his father, Dwight "Red" Harkins.

Principal Subsidiaries

Harkins Enterprises, Inc.; Harkins Camelview Theatres, Inc.; Harkins Theatres, Inc.; Harkins Centerpoint, Inc.; Harkins Shea Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Sedona Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Arizona Mills Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Metro Center Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Phoenix Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Chandler Fashion Center Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Scottsdale 101 Cinemas, LLC; Harkins Yuma Palms, LLC; Harkins Tempe Marketplace LLC; Harkins Administrative Services, Inc.; Red's Moviola I, LLC; Red's Moviola, Inc.; Harkins Spectrum, LLC; Harkins Casa Grande, LLC; Harkins Investments, LLC; Harkins Parke West, LLC; Harkins Reel Deals, LLC; Harkins Santan Village, LLC; Harkins Tucson Spectrum, LLC; Harkins Chandler Crossroads, LLC; Harkins Norterra, LLC.

Principal Competitors

Regal Entertainment Group; AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.; Cinemark Holdings, Inc.; Starplex Operating L.P.

	Does Marvel Enterprises Inc do Star Wars comics? Read answer...
	When can't you locate Stone Lake Enterprises inc? Read answer...
	What is an 'enterpriser'? Read answer...

	WwwBig horn Enterprises inc?
	Where is Dyrdek enterprise inc?
	Where is Marvel Enterprises Inc?