Popcorn for You
AMC unveilved a rewards program for shareholders, most poignantly captured by the offering of a free popcorn. AMC proceeded to in the following weeks to sell shares to raise capital. Correlation is not causation of course, but clearly the shareholder reward program did not hurt the situation. One could argue that it did help, creating a media cycle and improving mind share/net promoter score. Therein lies the question, why are not more companies engaged with such shareholder engagement?
Other Styles
AMC is not alone in this shareholder benefit model. Ford has a reduced car price offering, Berkshire offers discounted Geico insurance (which coincidentally provides Berkshire’s capital position). Could more companies not offer such? Apple can provide shareholders with special product events, etc. Perhaps a business to business entity would struggle with such, as a Salesforce software demo is arguably not that engaging. But surely for any consumer facing entity, the opportunity is there. Blackrock, Vanguard, and hedge funds would not care about a free popcorn, but regular investors do to some degree. Regular investors are likely going to own more as time continues. Therefore, why not try to preempt, incentivize, and accelerate that structure for a public company?