When Entertainment Weekly named Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse the best theater in the country last year, the magazine called it “one of America’s most fanatically unique moviegoing experiences.” With imaginitive programming and innovative events, the Alamo has become a “must-see” place among Austin’s entertainment offerings.
The passion behind the moviegoing experience at the Alamo is clear, which is one reason it’s disappointing that the theater’s online face is so lacking.
Part of the issue could come from the split personality of the Alamo Drafthouse brand. Founders Tim and Karrie League own the downtown Austin Alamo, along with Alamo South Lamar and Alamo Village, but sold the franchise rights to all other locations back in 2004.
Regardless, the online experience at either originalalamo.com or alamodrafthouse.com falls far short of what you might expect from a dynamic, independent business.
With that in mind, here are top three things the Alamo should do to fix its online experience:
- Lose the frames. See how there are three distinct scrollbars on the page? Terrible experience. That type of layout was declared out of date 10 years ago. It breaks the fundamental user model of the web page and hinders bookmarking and printing.
- Fix the ticketing. The online ticketing process is clunky as it exists now, and ticket buyers can easily buy twice if they click while their first request is processing.
- Start a blog. Despite their best efforts, the local newspapers can’t cover all the great events that the Alamo brings to town. A blog of their own would allow the Alamo to interview directors, spotlight upcoming events, and get feedback and ideas from their loyal fan base.
10 responses so far ↓
1 Shannon // Jul 25, 2006 at 12:31 pm
The blog is a great idea. I rarely visit the site anymore because it’s difficult to navigate and easy to miss the special events. Plus, you have to look at three separate calendars to find out what’s going on at all the locations. I tend to use the Drafthouse’s hard-copy calendar more.
2 Will Warner // Jul 29, 2006 at 6:01 pm
I’m a regular Drafthouse customer and user of the site, which I’ve never particularly minded using. (In fact, I found this entry as I was googling for the Alamo site, to buy tickets to see Clerks II tonight, which I just did.)
You are absolutely right about the frames and the ticketing. And they’re also trying to cram too much information on each screen, I think. But I think a blog would be a knee-jerk, trendy, and incorrect solution to the problem of the three separate calendars. Posting listings, even short links, to a blog as they’re finalized and announced would result in a useless mess that wasn’t sortable by time, place, or anything else. Simply finding a way to integrate the three calendars would surely be more appropriate and effective. Maybe they could show one week at a time, with the horizontal axis being day of the week, vertical being theater, and the boxes filled with linked titles and showtimes as they are now?
3 Will Warner // Jul 29, 2006 at 6:05 pm
Hmm, I shouldn’t exactly say that I’m a “regular user of the site.” I regularly use the alamo drafthouse site to buy tickets, after I’ve already used the Austin Chronicle site to find a movie I want to see, a location, and a showtime.
The Alamo’s hard copy is indeed better.
4 Anonymous // Jul 31, 2006 at 10:56 am
I had the worst experience at the Lake Creek Drafthouse. The waitstaff was very rude (during their ‘last call’ the waiter walked around during exceedingly quiet parts of the film and spoke in a normal tone “Last call”, then proceeded to charge us 17% grat for KNOWING the people we sat next to), and the management was no help at all. The website, I don’t really have a problem with…but then again I’m no webdesigner. All I have to say is DO NOT go to the Alamo North at Lake Creek. They’re severely lacking in tact and managerial skills.
5 The Jeff Beckham Weblog » More on Drive-By Consulting: Alamo Drafthouse // Jul 31, 2006 at 11:42 am
[...] My previous post about the necessary upgrades to the Alamo Drafthouse’s online experience has drawn some interesting responses in the comments. [...]
6 Jeff // Jul 31, 2006 at 11:46 am
To Shannon and Will: I agree with your comments about the Alamo’s online calendar. I wrote an update to the post to include those thoughts. I’d love to see the calendar done in a more user-friendly format, and I’d love to see the events made available to my Google calendar or PDA or phone. How cool would that be?
To Anonymous: That does sound like a terrible experience up at the Lake Creek location. Sorry to hear about that. I know that the Lake Creek location is owned by the larger Alamo group, not the smaller set of locations owned by Tim and Karrie League. Still, I would expect service to be at a similar quality across the entire set of franchises.
7 The Jeff Beckham Weblog » From the Alamo Blog: Austin References on Veronica Mars // Jan 15, 2007 at 2:16 pm
[...] (1) that the Alamo Drafthouse has been blogging for a while. I’m glad to see this feature added to their site (although some of the fundamental challenges of their website remain) [...]
8 Tim League // Feb 10, 2007 at 6:34 pm
Hey Jeff, I just wanted to let you know that a major facelift of the originalalamo.com site is approaching. We have a beta version that we are hammering at now, plus a new ticket service that has reserved seating options. We should have these worked out within a month. I’m initially to blame for the frames. I built that site in 1997 personally and we’ve frankenstien-ed so much on to it since then, we’ve never gone back to rewrite it from scratch. I’m as happy as anyone that it’s going to be fixed very soon.
Cheers,
Tim Legaue
founder
Alamo Drafthouse
9 The Jeff Beckham Weblog » Revamp of Alamo Drafthouse Website Coming Soon // Feb 12, 2007 at 2:09 pm
[...] I can’t wait to see the new site (the originalalamo.com home page already looks slightly different) and it sounds like the improvements address the shortcomings of the original site, which Tim says he build himself in 1997 and “we’ve frankenstien-ed so much on to it since then, we’ve never gone back to rewrite it from scratch.” [...]
10 Alamo Showtimes to Go | The Jeff Beckham Weblog // Jul 19, 2007 at 5:40 pm
[...] A year ago, the Alamo Drafthouse website was stuck in the 1990s, far behind the innovative approach to moviegoing that the actual Alamo experience brings. But Tim League and crew have kicked it in gear over the past 12 months, with a new design, a blog, and added functionality. [...]
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