Britain’s largest nightclub operator, Luminar, made both a positive and negative announcement last week when it issued a warning of lower than expected profits alongside the trial of a new cross-promotional collaboration with music store operator HMV. Luminar claims that a combination of cold, wintry weather and higher unemployment rates within its primary demographics led to lower than expected profits. This comes less than a year after Luminar saw depressed market conditions as an opportunity and raised nearly $60 million toward opening 14 new venues, including several new outposts of both of its nightlife flagship brands, Oceana and Liquid.
At the same time, Luminar announced a new pilot program with retailer HMV that will start with music and entertainment cross-promotions in four nightclub venues and could expand to include using said venues as live-entertainment venues for artists and labels that HMV has relationships with. HMV had already started dipping its toe into live formatting as a way to diversify its holdings, making a $46 million bid for the MAMA Group, with whom HMV already had a joint venture that would include 11 live music venues and London’s LOVEbox Festival.