Airlines transport people from A to B, but that’s not where the profit is. All the major US airlines would be operating at a loss without the revenue from their loyalty programmes: banks paying airlines a steady stream of income and in turn offering customers points when they spend.
Topsy turvy business models
Businesses have surprising revenue streams.
For every $10 that moviegoers spend on hot dogs, nachos, popcorn, and soda, AMC takes a whopping $8.16. By comparison, for every $10 that AMC takes on ticket sales, the company holds on to just $5.12 once the actual film exhibition costs are accounted for. In short, cinemas are effectively supermarkets.
Anguilla, a tiny British island territory in the Caribbean, brings in up to $30 million in revenue each year by licencing its ‘.ai’ domain name to other companies.
British Airways make a quarter of their profit (£320m) from Avios points.
It’s not just one of the world’s biggest religions – it’s also the largest non-government provider of health care services, with 18,000 clinics and 5,500 hospitals. All in all, the Church manages 26% of the world’s health care facilities.
Coca Cola doesn’t really sell soft drinks: it sells licensing to other companies who then manufacture and distribute Coca Cola.
Britain’s 35,000 corner shops offer more than cheap booze; Evri, a delivery company, now drops 180m parcels a year into shops, or 22.5% of all its deliveries; Customers of online-only banks, such as Monzo, can deposit cash wherever there is a PayPoint; And about 4 million households are on pre-payment gas and electricity meters, meaning they have to schlep to a shop whenever it runs out.
Football clubs are morphing into media companies: they now make more from sponsorship and naming rights than matchday tickets.
If you think kebabs are for nights out, then think again: only 4% of GDK’s business is done post 11pm – this has been helped by a diversified product range, including healthier options like rice bowls, and an ad campaign designed to showcase its relevance at every meal time.
The iconic Japanese toymaker is no longer just a toymaker – it’s a high-margin global licensing platform. Nearly half of its revenue now comes from royalties and IP partnerships.
The food delivery business is slowly becoming an advertising business: a quarter of its revenue comes from brands promoting on its website.
Itsu started out as a sushi restaurant, but it’s morphing into a supermarket range: close to half of its revenue now comes from grocery products.
KFC, the beloved American brand, generates 85% of its revenue from outside the US. One third of it comes from China.
Blackjack and poker might be the quintessential casino games, but they don’t drive the bottom line. 70% of Las Vegas gambling revenue is from slot machines, which brought in $10.5B last year (for comparison, the entire US box office in 2024 was $8.5B).
Lidl owner Schwarz Group has a standalone unit that offers cloud computing to corporate customers. It generated €1.9bn in annual sales in 2023, and its clients include Germany’s biggest software group SAP and the country’s most successful football club Bayern Munich.