Disney Just Raised Prices Across Multiple Streaming Tiers. Here’s How It Compares to Netflix and Paramount.
Key Points
Disney is raising prices on standlone streaming prices, partly in an effort to persuade more users to bundle services.
The company will soon roll out a one-app experience, allowing users to easily use all three services in one interface.
That move is part of a larger One Disney corporate strategy to unify its experiences and products business with its video entertainment.
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A date with Disney (NYSE:DIS) will cost a few more dimes.
The entertainment giant on Wednesday hiked prices for its streaming services, which include Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN.
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The price hikes are weighted toward stand-alone services, showing Disney is trying to coax subscribers to bundle their subscriptions, either with two of its services or all three.
Standalone plans for Disney+ and Hulu Premium are going up by $2.50 per month to $21.49. ESPN Unlimited prices will go up by $2 to $31.99 per month, and ESPN Select is up a $1 to $13.99.
The ad-free Disney+ and Hulu bundle will rise by $2 to $21.99, but the ad-supported bundle, including ESPN Unlimited, will remain at $35.99. Disney has said that churn is much lower on bundled streaming services, which explains the push to incentivize bundling.
Image source: Disney.
How Disney streaming prices compare to its peers
Comparing Disney to its peers isn't so easy because the company breaks up its streaming smorgasbord into three services, specializing in family entertainment (Disney+), general entertainment (Hulu), and sports (ESPN).
At $21.49, Premium Disney+, which includes 4K streaming, will cost less than Netflix's Premium plan at $26.99 and HBOMax's Premium plan at $22.99. However, Paramount+ charges just $13.99 for its Premium plan.
Ad-supported Disney+ and Hulu plans now cost $3.50 per month more than equivalent options from Netflix and Paramount+, and $1.50 more than HBOMax's.
Disney's streaming dilemma
Disney launched Disney+ nearly seven years ago, but the company still seems like it's struggling to make streaming work, and its flawed transition from linear TV to streaming, which includes overspending on the Fox acquisition, is the main reason the stock has been flat over the last decade.
Disney's streaming entertainment business, which doesn't include ESPN, is now profitable, generating $5.5 billion in revenue and $712 million in operating income in its latest quarter, which more than doubled from a year ago.
Disney is finally rolling out a one-app experience, unifying its streaming services into one menu to make it easier to use, which should alleviate some of its users' biggest frustrations.
The company, under new CEO Josh D'Amaro, is also embracing a "One Disney" operating model uniting all of its product segments into one flywheel, so, for example, a streaming customer who likes Star Wars can be sold a real-world Star Wars experience through the streaming app.
That it's taken Disney so many years to put something like this together seems to be a grave mistake, as its ability to leverage its intellectual property in so many ways is what makes the company unique.
The company sees itself as a premium brand, and it charges a premium for its products and experiences. It doesn't want to lose streaming viewers with price hikes, since that's at the top of the marketing funnel, but it makes sense for prices to be roughly in line with competitors, unlike when Disney+ first launched at a deep discount relative to peers like Netflix.
The profit growth in streaming is promising, and the One Disney plan makes sense. If the company can execute it effectively, the stock could finally escape from its decade-long doldrums.
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Jeremy Bowman has positions in Netflix and Walt Disney. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Netflix and Walt Disney. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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