'Buying for Equality' in Kansas City: AMC Entertainment

In this installment of the Kansas City GLBT Business Examiner's "Buying for Equality" series we take a look at Kansas City based AMC Entertainment, parent company of AMC Theaters and Loews Cineplex (former parent company of famed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios).

From their website: "Traveling the Midwest in the early 1900s, three brothers were happy to invite you into their grand tent. Not for any circus acts or to sell snake oil, but for a little melodramatic entertainment. Maurice, Edward and Barney Dubinsky were actors who settled down in Kansas City, Missouri when they purchased the Regent Theatre in 1920. Changing their family name to Durwood, their company was soon known as Durwood Theatres, which Edward grew into a prosperous chain of a dozen movie houses and drive-ins. That was just the beginning."

Edward's son, Stanley Durwood, went on to revolutionize the theater industry with the creation of the first multiplex cinema, and eventually made Durwood Theaters a nationwide company with the name we know today, American Multi-Cinema, Inc. AMC then continued its innovative streak, introducing the first in-seat cup holders, stadium seating, and online ticketing.

In the Human Rights Campaign's (HRC) 2010 Buying for Equality Guide, AMC Entertainment scored a perfect 100 points for their non-discrimination policies, domestic partner benefits, transgender benefits, diversity training, external GLBT engagement (marketing), and internal GLBT employee support. These measures were a significant improvement over 2009's score of 63, marking AMC Entertainment as a progressive company intent on equality.

Keep watching this column for more from the "Buying for Equality" in Kansas City series.