B&B Theatres, the nation’s largest family-owned and operated exhibition circuit, is celebrating its centennial this year. B&B Theatres’ history dates back to cinema’s silent era, with the 1924 acquisition of the Lyric Theatre in Salisbury, Missouri, by Elmer Bill Sr., who named his company Bills Theatres. At the Lyric, Elmer met his future wife, Johnnie, who provided piano accompaniment to the silent films flickering on the screen.
In 1936, the couple welcomed a son, Elmer Bills Jr., who would later become the second generation to lead the family business. The elder Elmer Bills hired 10-year-old Sterling Bagby as a concessions clerk, a role that would ignite Sterling’s lifelong passion for the exhibition industry. Even during his time in the Navy during World War II, Sterling’s dedication to the business never wavered.
“He fell in love with the business,” says Bob Bagby, the son of Sterling and current CEO of the circuit known today as B&B Theatres. “He worked in the Navy and ran the projectors on a ship during the war. He would tell me how he would exchange reels with other ships through a makeshift rope and pulley system so they could move films from one ship to the other and have a rotation of fresh new movies. I have a letter that he wrote back home during this period, where he writes, ‘As soon as I get out, I want to start my own picture shows.’”
Upon his return from the war, Sterling married Pauline, one of the box office clerks in a cinema he had worked at in Higbee, Missouri. Together, they started the Bagby Traveling Show and set off on a tour of rural Missouri with a pack of films, a mobile projection system, seats, and a snack bar. The Bagby Traveling Picture Show screened movies in barns, schools, and parks before growing into a full-fledged circuit of drive-in and indoor theaters in Kansas.
On his end, Elmer Bills Jr. had also found love at the movies. The younger Elmer married Amy, whom he had met working at the concessions stand of one of his father’s theaters when they were both 13. After graduating from the University of Missouri in 1959, Elmer entered the family business to continue the expansion of Bills Theatres.
The Bagby and Bills families kept close ties in the ensuing decades as their circuits grew independently. This close relationship and shared passion for the industry played a significant role in the growth and success of B&B Theatres. Elmer and Amy began a family, spending the weekends raising their children while working at their theaters. “My sister, brother, and I would sit in the back row of the theater while my mom did her best to keep an eye on us as she sold tickets,” remembers their daughter, Bridget. “I have vivid memories of walking out to the lobby during The Sound of Music—I must have seen it at least seven times by then—and dancing to the songs while everyone was in the theater.”
All the Bills children began working in the theaters as soon as they could. “I had a little stool behind the concessions stand that would make me tall enough to help out,” says Bridget. “We all worked together most weekends, especially at the drive-in concessions during our all-night movie marathons. My mom and I usually flipped hamburgers, my brother made pizzas, and my sister was on popcorn. We would finish by about three or four in the morning and then drive home and sleep in as late as possible the next morning.” Drive-ins were social hubs of small towns during the era, drawing people with the concessions stand alone in some cases—accoring to Bridget, the only place in town back then where customers could find fast food, “We were there before Pizza Hut.”
Bob Bagby also spent his childhood around movie theaters. He spent the first five years of his life living in a one-bedroom apartment above the family’s drive-in theater—sharing the space with his parents, siblings, and grandparents over the course of a couple of years. Bob remembers peering out of a picture window in the living room that would look out to the drive-in screen. “You could sit on the couch, open the drapes, turn on the speakers, and watch the movie. I remember having all my birthday parties growing up at that drive-in.”
Bob started working the concessions stand as early as age 7, standing on a stool behind the counter to pass out boxes of popcorn. When it came to custodial work, his father would drop spare change on the floor and in between seats to keep the younger Bagby motivated.
Given their shared upbringing in the industry, it’s no surprise that Bob and Bridget became close friends. The Bagby and Bills families would share a big hotel suite at Show-A-Rama, the biggest industry convention of the time. Despite being close friends through high school, none of their relatives expected Bob and Bridget to wind up being a couple. “Somewhere along the line, we realized we couldn’t marry anybody else with more shared history than we had,” says Bob.
“I had two more years of college to finish, and Bob was going to move to Columbia, Missouri, where I was going to college when we decided to go ahead and get married,” remembers Bridget. “Once he moved there, a theater became available in Fulton, Missouri, and he just jumped back [into the business]. I was studying during the day, driving over, and working at the theater in the evenings.” Bob, who originally set out to have a music career before settling on an accounting degree, hadn’t planned to return to the family business either. “I thought I’d open an accounting office, and then somewhere along the line, I realized [exhibition] was in our blood,” he says. “We couldn’t leave it.”
The pair got married, and in 1980—within a year of the marriage—the Bagby and Bills families combined their respective circuits into a single company, B&B Theatres. At the time, the combined circuit represented a total of 17 screens. The newly merged circuit doubled in size in November 1982 with the acquisition of a small regional circuit in Kansas. This acquisition marked the beginning of B&B Theatres’ expansion strategy, which focused on acquiring and renovating existing theaters to modernize the moviegoing experience. Bob and Bridget moved to a one-bedroom apartment above one of the locations, starting their own journey as parents during that period. The B&B circuit grew throughout the 1980s, adding a new location around once a year, and introducing new technologies and amenities to enhance the movie experience for their patrons.
“We were building one or two theaters a year, gradually growing,” says Bob. “At that time, my dad was in charge of construction. He had a fifth-wheel trailer, and he and mom would move to a town to stay for a year and build a theater. I would do the accounting books for the construction. We’d find communities that wanted a movie theater. Sometimes, that would include local investors or incentives from the city. We were always looking at those opportunities.”
“Bridget and I were always looking to do the latest and greatest,” says Bob. “The first evolution we introduced was the transition from the big downtown theaters to multiplexes on the edge of town. That’s something Bridget and I were pushing for—it was very difficult for our parents to leave those downtown theaters—and we achieved it over a ten-year period.”
B&B Theatres kept innovating as it continued expanding. Renovations and new builds became a hallmark of the company throughout the ‘90s and 2000s, and the circuit was among the first in the nation to transition to digital projection. New concepts were introduced in 2010, including its initial foray into premium large format (Grand Screen) and in-theater dining (Marquee Suites). The biggest evolution in the company’s history came in October 2014 with the acquisition of Dickinson Theatres, which squarely positioned B&B Theatres as one of North America’s ten largest cinema chains. By then, Bob and Bridget’s children—Bobbie, Brittanie, and Brock (the family’s passion for exhibition apparently also extends to alliteration)—worked in the family business.
The fourth generation of the family had a similar upbringing to their parents. Road trips in the family motorhome to do theater runs, where the adults would check in on individual locations, would occur over the occasional weekend, sometimes with both sets of grandparents, or these runs could take up a ten-day trip over the summer.
The kids were constantly around their grandparents during their childhood. Elmer Bills would take out 35mm prints and screen them for his grandchildren, instilling an appreciation for film history. Brock, the youngest of the three children, remembers his grandfather teaching him how to play poker during one of their theater runs. During one of the road trips, Brock remembers Sterling insisting on making a detour to a 99 cent store that was having a liquidation sale and returning to the motor home with every paintbrush, roller, and construction tool he could find.
“Our grandparents and parents never shied away from talking about the business in front of us. We knew very well how a theater was doing, how grosses were that day. We would eat with my grandparents three or four days a week, sometimes more. My dad and grandpa would come home from work together and continue their conversation from the day. We got the privilege of learning a lot along the way,” says Bobbie Bagby Ford, president and chief creative officer of B&B Theatres.
The three kids didn’t take long to go from playing hide-and-seek between the rows of seats to working the concessions stand. Bobbie started working for the family business at the Lyric Theatre, the same cinema Elmer Bills Sr. acquired in 1924, becoming the fourth generation to work there.
While employment at the theaters was common in their teenage years, Bobbie and Brittanie had different professional plans when they set out for college. Like their father before them, the sisters set out for performing arts careers: Bobbie in musical theater, while Brittanie double-majored in music and business in college. They both found their way back to B&B Theatres on their own, realizing they had a deeper connection to exhibition than they first realized.
“At first, I didn’t think this would turn into a career,” admits Brittanie Bagby Baker, president and chief operations officer at B&B Theatres. “There was never an expectation for any of us to join the company. We all found our own path back to the company in different ways. Our parents encouraged us to pursue our goals, hopes, and dreams. As a result, I think we all found that passion on our own without ever feeling any pressure over it.”
Brittanie’s first formal job at the family company was at the concessions stand when she was 16 years old. Today, the general manager who mentored her in that first post works in the office next to hers at B&B’s corporate office, serving as the circuit’s chief financial officer.
While a return to the family business was a surprise to Bobbie and Brittanie, Brock, the youngest of the three children, had a more straightforward path. “Brock always knew this is what he wanted to do,” says his mother, Bridget. “He chose a college close to one of our theaters, where he could work as an assistant manager.”
“I started at 14 years old, at our Liberty location, and I was so young that I would share a register with Brittanie to make sure I didn’t screw it up,” says Brock Bagby, president and chief content, programming, and development officer. “I cleaned auditoriums, worked the concessions stand—it was a big deal when I got promoted to box office because you needed to get people through that line quickly.”
“Working at B&B Theatres was a good way for them to make some money in high school and college,” says Bob. “Brittanie helped out a lot at our office, got involved with inventory and the insurance side, and came to know the operations side very closely. Bobbie always had an interest in marketing. She was the one who suggested we change the name of our theaters to a single brand, B&B Theatres; before we used to have distinct names for each location. Bobbie revolutionized the way we approached our branding. Brock was always interested in the development and construction of our theaters—he spearheaded all the planning for one of our new builds, from blueprints to the opening, while he was still in college.”
“Bridget and I always sought to grow the company,” he continues. “Working with our parents, we found a dynamic where everyone complemented each other—and there was never any tension. Bridget’s dad always joked, ‘I can’t wait until we’re making enough money to fight over!’ Her dad was very conservative and wanted to hold the reins, which is like my daughter Brittanie. She’s very cautious and has a very good grasp of our operations. My dad was very aggressive, like my son Brock is, wanting to grow and innovate. Brock was a big reason why we converted so many of our locations to recliners as early as we did. I was always in the middle, excited to grow, but always in a sustainable way. That’s a lot like Bobbie, who has a temperament similar to mine in that way.”
The Bagby’s vision for B&B Theatres has introduced a new wave of innovations since the Dickinson acquisition in 2014. The circuit has adopted new auditorium concepts like VIP experiences (The Lyric), third-party premium formats in addition to their in-house Grand Screen offerings (ScreenX, MX4D, and 4DX), and enhanced image and sound technologies like immersive audio from DTS:X and laser projection by Barco. More recently, B&B Theatres has set out to inaugurate state-of-the-art cinema entertainment centers, including new builds like their Red Oak, Texas, location or remodels like the recently opened Macedonia, Ohio, location. Both cinemas opened earlier this year, offering a glimpse of the circuit’s ambition as it enters its second century.
“Movies will always be our bread and butter, the core of our business,” says Brittanie. “But these entertainment centers that we’ve been doing and finding success with are a big part of the future of B&B Theatres. They are a place where you can put your phone down and have a communal experience with someone—whether it’s escaping into a story together or playing a board game in a restaurant while having some cocktails. From bowling to birthday parties, it’s about finding opportunities to encourage people to come together and have a shared experience. That is the focus we have for the future of our company: creating magical experiences for our guests with movies being at the center of it all.”
“I am more bullish on the future than I have ever been my entire life,” adds Bob. “We’re doing everything in our power to improve the moviegoing experience—and we’ll continue to explore what ancillary amenities we can bring to our theaters. These amenities wouldn’t work for every location, but there are opportunities out there to bring a nice mixture of people watching movies and staying at our sites to do other things—whether that’s a game of bowling or grabbing a drink at one of our bars. In today’s marketplace, you’ve got to have a nice theater with the right amenities. You either need to remodel or close. That’s what we’ve been working on. We’re down to very few theaters, less than a handful, that haven’t been remodeled with recliners.”
B&B Theatres plays a special role in today’s film industry as a link between exhibition’s past—a multigenerational family-owned and operated circuit—and its future—an innovative national chain expanding by leveraging new amenities and experiences. Its growth from the acquisition of the Lyric Theatre in Salisbury, Missouri, in 1924 to become the fifth-largest chain in the United States (by screen count) in 2024 reflects the passion and resiliency of the families who’ve engraved their initials across the chain’s fifty-plus locations nationwide.
“We don’t have a goal of becoming the second or third largest chain in North America. We don’t care about any of that. We want to run quality theaters that innovate. Theaters we are proud of. It’s not about quantity; it’s about quality. Our future is to have a chain of profitable theaters that deliver a great experience to our guests, whether that be 10 locations or 100,” says Brock.
The impact of B&B’s circuit expands well beyond the family that runs it and the moviegoers it welcomes. The company currently employs over 1,400 employees, a figure set to grow as the chain adds more locations. The theaters are an economic driver for their communities, providing an affordable entertainment destination and dependable jobs for workers of all ages. “I don’t want to be on my deathbed and say, ‘Hey, I sold a lot of popcorn in my life.’ We are continually focusing on ways to give back to our communities and employees,” says Bobbie. “I like to talk to our managers about the special opportunity they have when welcoming a 16-year-old in their very first job at one of our theaters. Not all of them will stay and have a career at our company, though we hope some of them do. We know that many of them will go on to different jobs. We want them to remember their time with us as a reference: This is how I’m supposed to be treated as an employee, and this is the experience I’m supposed to have.”
For Bob and Bridget, the chance to have been able to spend a career working alongside their parents, grandparents, and children is a privilege they do not take for granted. “The reality of where we are now as a company has grown so much bigger than our dreams,” says Bob. “To think that we could grow from 17 screens to becoming the fifth-largest in the nation is never something we expected.”
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