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STARZ has announced that with the June billing cycle, subscribers will see an increase in their monthly rate. It’s going up by a buck, to $9.99 per month. And it comes just in time for the new season of Outlander. It’s unclear if that is the reason for the increase or not, but it’s pretty likely.
It’s not a huge increase, but that is about $12 more per year if you[‘re on the monthly plan. That’s a whole other streaming service, when you think about it. STARZ does not offer an ad-supported tier of their service, so comparing it to Disney+ ad-free is appropriate here, and it’s still cheaper. Albeit by a buck. It’s also far cheaper than HBO MAX’s ad-free tier.
STARZ’s problem is their catalog
STARZ doesn’t have a lot of original content, with its biggest original title being Outlander. It instead, licenses a lot of shows and movies for its service. Which can be taken away pretty quickly. STARZ had been the home for Sony’s movies, like Spider-Man and Jumanji. However, Sony has recently entered into a deal with Netflix to put its movies onto Netflix instead.
The back catalog for STARZ is pretty lacking, and at $8.99 per month, it wasn’t too bad. It does have a ton of movies and series available, but if they raise prices much more, it’s going to be a tough sell. As most of their movies now are from Lionsgate.
So why raise the price now? Well, Outlander is their most popular series. And by raising prices just in time for the next season, it means that STARZ will get an infusion of cash, and it will also raise their average revenue per user. To help when it comes to announcing earnings. Outlander will premiere its first part of Season 7 on June 16. However, Season 7 is being split up into two parts, about eight episodes each. And the second part won’t air until 2024.
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