Popcorn, anyone?
Fayette and Coweta residents by late 2010 will have another choice for buying a box of popcorn and settling in to watch a first-run movie.
The venue is the new NCG theaters that will bring 10-12 screens to the Fischer Crossings retail development at Ga. Highway 34 and Fischer Road in east Coweta County, less than a mile from Peachtree City.
“We’re hoping for Nov. 1, but it won’t be any later than Thanksgiving,” said Jeff Geiger, vice president of the Michigan-based Neighborhood Cinemas Group (NCG).
Geiger said his company plans to have 10 to 12 screens with a total of 2,038 seats in 40,000 square feet at Fischer Crossings. Each of the theaters will be outfitted with 100 percent digital projectors and digital sound and will come with stadium seating that includes high-back rockers. At least three of the screens will be 3-D-capable and all will feature first-run movies, he said.
Geiger said one of the theaters will include the NCG Ultra format, a company-specific design that presents first-run movies and other media on a screen approximately 50 feet wide and 30 feet in height and comes with high-end sound and seating, Geiger said.
Geiger said the arrival of NCG to the community will bring a different approach to the way movie-goers are accustomed to purchasing tickets and concessions. Rather than the usual approach of getting a ticket at the booth outside and snacks at the concession counter inside, NCG combines the two so that customers pay for the ticket and order drinks and popcorn at the same counter.
Another difference in approach comes after the purchase. Geiger said that, at Fischer Crossings, refills on sodas and popcorn will be free.
As for the selection of east Coweta to establish its second theater in Georgia, Geiger said NCG liked the demographics of the area, including that of Peachtree City.
“The demographics are ideal and this is a great location,” Geiger said of the east Coweta, west Fayette area. “There are a lot of opportunities to offer customers. They will have a place to go see a movie without having to travel 10 miles down the road.”
Peachtree City had a three-screen theater in the 1980s and ‘90s, but it went out of business more than a decade ago.
NCG operates 11 theaters in Michigan, Indiana and in Acworth in north metro Atlanta. Some of its theaters include IMAX screens.
Fischer Crossings developer Scott Seymour said the theaters will be located on the northeast corner of the large development and will be situated on the easternmost portion of the property. Moviegoers will access the theaters at the new entrance at the traffic light at Ga. Highway 54, a short distance to the east from the intersection of Fischer and Hwy. 34.
Also at the Fischer Crossing development, ground for the 136,000 Sam’s Club is being graded. The warehouse discount retailer is also expected to open in late 2010.
As for the other retailers for the 400,000 square-foot northeast portion of Fischer Crossings, Seymour said he is in negotiations now and expects more announcements in January.
The announcement may dim prospects for another, unnamed movie theater that a developer is touting for the controversial Line Creek commercial project on Hwy. 54 in Peachtree City, less than two miles from the Coweta movie site.
