August 10, 2025 • 30 mins
Six Flags posted a nearly $100 million loss in Q2—down from a $55 million profit a year ago—on 1.4 million fewer visitors, a smaller base of season passholders, and what it calls “adverse weather.” The company is looking to sell nonessential assets, while also running an aggressive August pass sale to bring in quick cash and rebuild its passholder base. Philip and Scott unpack why front-loading revenue can backfire if you can’t keep guests returning to spend in-park, and how Six Flags’ own investor day framed season passes as its growth engine. They also discuss CEO Richard Zimmerman’s decision to step down by the end of 2025 and what it signals for the post-merger strategy. Plus, why SeaWorld Orlando is riding Epic Universe’s wave to higher attendance—and what smaller operators can learn about “rising tide” tourism. Listen to weekly BONUS episodes on our Patreon.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh my goodness. From our studios in Los Angeles in Tampa.
This is green Tag Theme Park and thirty. I'm Philip
and I'm joined as always by my co host Scott
Sweinson of Scott Sweinson Creative Development. On Green Tag, we
look at the top theme park news each week and
discuss why it matters to industry professionals. And this week
there's more six Flags drama, Big six, Big six Flags,
(00:23):
Big six Flags.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Now, I just, you know, not that we are always
one hundred percent right, not that we always you know,
our interpretations are always one hundred percent accurate. But let's
let's go to the wayback machine here for just for
a hot second, and look at last week where we
were saying, boy, this is a really silly move. This
is a poor choice, this is a bad move. They
(00:45):
must really be in trouble. And in fact, I believe
I use the phrase at one point in time if
your holiday events aren't profitable, then you have a much
bigger problem. In this show, we're going to talk about
the much bigger problem apparently.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Start yeah, yes, So last week we did discuss the
big news last week, which was them kind of canceling
or shifting around operating calendars and also shifting around seasonal
events at some of their parks. But they also announced
the most Valuable Pass sale that was going on only
for this month, only for the month of August. And
(01:22):
essentially it's like, if you purchase some of the higher
level ones, you get access to every single six Lives
property for the rest of this year and for next year.
And the prices vary like here, for me at Notts,
it would be like one hundred and twenty and then
you can add a parking option, but that still covers
again your Halloween and your Christmas for two years, you know,
and then the rest in between. So it's a long
(01:43):
period of time. They're still doing them, yeah, assuming Yeah,
So it's a it's a it's a really good value.
And I think we figured out this week why they're
trying to get cash in because Scott said last week
the only reason to do a sale like this, to
do like a big flash shale, is because you need cash. Yeah,
and it looks like they do need cash.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Well, yeah, here's the report that says, hey, guess what
we need cash. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So we'll start off first the earnings. So during the
earnings call, they discussed that they lost one hundred million
for the second quarter, which is not good because last
time quarter last year they made a profit of fifty
five million. So that's a really big swing. And I'm
gonna read a few quotes here from it. So the
(02:31):
quote here is they said the company pointed to a
smaller base of seasoned pass holders heading into the final
two quarters and a volatile economy for the downgrade. They
also mentioned weather, of course, yes.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Because that never happens. Weather, just never with this whole
weather thing that's just come out of nowhere. Where did
this weather come from.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
It's you know, it's like clear skies and then suddenly
you know, you got rain. It'said prolonged rains, extreme temperatures,
severe storms across six flag sites, and months of May
and June adversely affected. And you know what, folks, we're
not even in the summer yet, so get ready for
get ready for. They didn't visit because it was too hot.
But you know, now, it's because gravity. Gravity is is
(03:13):
a big problem because we didn't expect that, you know, eh,
So there's a there was a nine percent decrease in
attendance a hunt, which is about one point four million
fewer visitors and what they're doing. Basically, they said they're
going to look to sell off land and other non
essential assets to mitigate the impact. However, as we just
(03:38):
as I just mentioned earlier, Scott and I think part
of the mitigation is also this flash sale. So they're
trying to like bring up their season pass holder base
and they're trying to bring in revenue for that. If
you can frontload your revenue, right for you, But then
the downside of that is you're front loading all your
revenue and then you have to provide reasons for them
to come back. Ideally, but your your admission revenue will
(04:00):
suffer then for next year the pan How farre you?
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And let me just clarify something. You know a lot
of people think that season pass sales will sustain a park.
It's all a balance. It's all a balance. And with
season passes, the money, the profit is not made in
selling the season passes. If you can frontload it, that's
great because that means that you're getting money ahead of time,
(04:23):
before you even have to operate the park that they're
going to visit with that pass, that's great. But where
they continue to generate revenue because I know there were
some comments on last week's shows that talked about, you know,
the seasonal episodes. It's just people you know, winding down
their season passes, and they only become profitable if you
have non pass holder guests. The truth is, what parks
(04:47):
should want to do is to get their season pass
holders to come back as often as possible, because if
they do that, they are significantly more likely to make
where they really make to suspend where they really make
their money, which is on food and beverage and concessions
and other merchandise and other special experiences or upcharge events
(05:10):
that of course they get a discount for because they're
a passholder. The passolders the money that you generated a
passholder usually does not the passholder itself does not make
a whole lot of profit. What it does is it
allows the park to then have access to the profit
they can make on all the other things that generate revenue.
So I just wanted to clarify that just right off
(05:31):
the bat. And secondly, to get this money all up front,
as Philip said to the only reason to do this,
the only business reason to do this is to improve
your cash flow and to also turn around to your
path to your board members and say, look how much
our season pass base has increased, because they won't tell
(05:52):
you it's at you know, one quarter the regular price,
but they'll just say, look how much our pass base
is increased. Look at numbers of people, not numbers of dollars.
So this is this seems to be very much an
act of desperation, just like selling off, you know, properties
(06:14):
that are are not necessarily relevant to the overall brand,
whatever that means.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
So yeah, yeah, there were a lot of comments on
our video from last week, and we just wanted to
clarify that it's we're not saying that like the events
shouldn't be stopped if there's no one there or that
operate that stuff shouldn't be trimmed, that that kind of
a thing. It's more like Scott was saying, like, if
you if you have a park and you're if you
(06:42):
can't make money during Christmas or a Christmas event, there's
a bigger problem. So maybe the bigger problem is that,
like you shouldn't be operating those days at all, right,
or you should be trimming maybe potentially even trimming the property,
you know, I mean, there's nothing wrong with evaluating properties
and being like there's not enough of a mask to
make this work, and then reinvesting or selling the assets
and reinvesting. That's basic business. It's more like if your
(07:03):
park is open and you are not doing a Christmas
event during Christmas time because it's not profitable, that's a
bigger problem because that means there's not enough demand in
that area. Maybe that means that you don't need to
be open at all, or there's too much competition, which
means it's not differentiated enough. There's a that would signify
a different thing, which is the product market fit is
not correct, right, And so that's the other problem. And
(07:26):
then to other comments we got about season pass holders
and you know they don't make money on them, blahah blah.
Here's the thing. We're the theme park business model that
six Flags talked about at their investment day, all hinges
around season pass holders. So this isn't just coming from us,
(07:47):
This is coming from six Flags of Sales during their
investor day where they talked about the whole concept that
the whole goal is to increase season pass sales and
then to get those people to come back to get
more people in the parks. So we're not like we're
not making this up. It's coming. It comes directly from
Six Flags and from their investigation. Now what we would
(08:07):
say is, I think Scott and I do agree that
that is a business model for parks, but it's not
the only business model we you know, look at Disney.
Basically Disney eliminated pass old pass members for a while. Yeah,
they eliminate passolders for a while. It's all just a
balancing act of the demand to go to the park itself,
(08:29):
Like what is the demand if the demand is high enough,
Like at Epic Universe is a good example. Right now,
the demand is so high they're not selling season passes
for that and your current season pass holders can't get
in to Epic Universe because the demand is so high.
And then for Disney, they take them on and off
of sale days because the demand is high enough where
(08:50):
they don't need them. And in that case, yes, you
can get more of your revenue from people that are
purchasing single day tickets and the purchase price is so high.
But that's it's not what Six Flags is targeting. By
their own admission, they are targeting season pass holders. That's
where they want to make their money. So we're just
saying that that's that's what's their plan is sell more
(09:14):
season passes and then monetize the season pass holders. If
we can encourage them to come in more frequently, they'll
spend more money on the in park stuff. So basically
it's a mall. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Well, and quite honestly, the season pass model we want
to increase. Our season pass model works well for local parks, it.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Works works for a lot of parks for a long time.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Yeah, for regional parks, it's great. For destination parks like
Disney's and universals, you make significantly more off of your
one two day ticket sales, so they don't need that.
The nice thing though about having the season pass model,
or finding a balance there of Bush Garden Stampa was
a great balance. We were we had one foot in
(09:57):
the local market and one foot in the destination market,
and so when like nine to eleven happened, the park
didn't have to go under. When COVID happened, the park
didn't have to go under. It was one of those
situations where they were able at those times. Things have
changed a little bit now, but at those times they
were able to lean heavily, more heavily into the either
(10:22):
the season pass base or lean more heavily into the
tourism base, depending on where you were in that pendulum
swing of travel. So yeah, it's my personal opinion, and
I'm certainly no expert, but my personal opinion based on
anecdotal information or observations and working in multiple parks in
(10:42):
different places. You kind of want to have a balance
of both because your past members will at least get
the turnstiles clicking when there's no travel, and your high
money spenders are going to be the people who travel
or on vacation in your area, and they're the ones
who you know are gonna are going to spend the
(11:03):
big bucks. They're the impressive numbers. So it kind of
depends on and every board I've ever known or been
involved with looks at things that they're pitched one of
two ways. Either here's how much money we made or
here's how many guests we've had. And you know, you
can make your guest numbers skyrocket if you take the
(11:23):
cost of admission down to virtually nothing. You can make
your finances skyrocket if you offer a product that people
are willing to pay top dollar for. So finding that
balance is the tricky part. But you know, the idea
that the only way to make money is with season
passes not particularly accurate, but finding a nice balance, that's
(11:47):
a much better approach.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
Yeah, and I also want to dovetell what Scott said too,
it's like it is a balance. And again back to
their investor talk, they did talk about that, you know,
but they also talked about how they wanted to go
in and renovate the food and beverage locations. Like there's
so much plans about renovating food and beverage and doing
(12:11):
cleaning up all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
And of course, like.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
If you just think about it, when you renovate the
food and beverage, of course the prices are probably going
to go up because that's usually what happens when you
renovate FMB location because it's better food, right, make better food.
That way, you can get higher prices, which is higher margin.
And they're basically they're paying close to the same price
and most there is a little bit of discount, but
I mean that's that's the goal, is to get more
(12:35):
people in the park and then get them spending on
more attractive items. That's their whole plan, and also to
encourage them to go to multiple. I mean, they talked
about rolling out a new app next year and rolling
out a new CRM system in twenty twenty six that
would offer incentivized offers to families based off of their
(12:56):
visiting patterns and their locations. Right, So if you just
think about it, a lot of these six Flags parks
are within driving distance. It is possible, so if they
targeted an offer to a family, they might be able
to get that family to visit multiple parks. So then
you're just this like a whole ecosystem. So it was
an interesting vision that they laid out. We're just we're
(13:17):
just kind of reporting on the vision and then talking
about it, right, we're I mean, it wasn't like our
idea that they're making money in this way.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
It's just like this is what they said. That's what
they told investors. And it's not just the thing is
it's not just six Flags either. These approaches have been
used for many, many years in many different ways. The
only reason they're the only difference now is technology makes
them easier. So you know, that's that's the thing. And
if they're going to lean in, you know, if they're
going to lean into the past member market, you darn
(13:47):
well better improve your food because that's where you're going
to make your money. After two visits. You don't make
a whole heck of a lot off of past members,
except for the fact that they pay too. If they
don't have the parking add on, they paid a park
If they, you know, are going to be there the
whole day, they're going to buy food, if they're going
to bring families and friends, then those people are going
(14:07):
to buy a ticket, buy a T shirt. You know,
the season pass holders won't buy a T shirt unless
it's a past member only thing. So they are essential
parts of this whole thing. So let's not you know,
get that wrong. But so the next thing we heard
during the investor call, which kind of I'm not sure
(14:29):
how much this changes the story it or doesn't, I'm
not sure. But so also during the investor call, the
Six Flags President and CEO Richard Dimmermann announced his plans
to step.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Down by the end of twenty twenty five. He's going
to remain in his role until a successor is found
and will continue as a board member after that, and
the board has already started a search for the next CEO,
considering internal and external candidates there is he put out
a big statement. I don't think there's anything in the
statement that is it's all it's all basic, uh, you know,
(15:03):
basic speak. But what's the most interesting to me, though,
is just all this looks pretty bad. This is all
like really bad timing. So I have noid, I don't.
I don't know if I'm obviously that the stock you know,
took hits from all of these items. Not only it,
you know, decreased attendance, decreased revenue. Also the CEO is
(15:23):
stepping down, and they just did this whole reset, like
they just finished the merger and then they made this
big reset, and the whole pitches this whole time has
been they're going to do cost saving from synergies and
then they're going to increase There's like what we've just
been saying, they're going to do cost savings from synergies.
And then when they put all this stuff together, like
a new CRM and the new renovations and then this
(15:46):
new passholder program, they're gonna be able to incentivize repeat visits,
more repeat visits from passolders, which is going to increase
their sales of F and B and all this new stuff.
They it's big, this whole big plan. So I mean,
I'm not sure if it's bad news or not. I mean,
how bad is it that the CEO is stepping down
after they've just started this plan where they haven't even
(16:09):
really finished. Im me, it doesn't matter at all, I guess.
Or since the plan's already done, maybe someone else can
just come in and follow it. But you know how
that goes if and you know, like basically, new CEOs
like to have their own vision, right, So if a
new CEO comes in, are they just going to throw
out the old plan and say no, we need to
start selling off all their land and turn everything into CityWalk.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
Well, and the funny thing is when the moment you
said he's going to stay on until they find a successor,
and the moment you said he will then continue on
as a board member, what I just heard was the
opening of a golden parachute. So it is possible, and
I'm not saying this is true. I do not know,
but it would not be out of the realm of
(16:53):
possibility that this is part of the plan because they
all knew that in doing all of these things and
doing all these reallocations after the merger, et cetera, et cetera,
et cetera, that it was going to go through some lean,
rough difficult times where things were going to be cut,
things were going to be changed, things were going to
be tweaked, things were going to be right sized to
(17:15):
fit a profitable business model, and they needed a scapegoat
to be able to be the sacrificial lamb. But how
sacrificial is it if he's staying on until they find
a successor, and if he goes and becomes a board
member after after stepping down, so he's clearly not leaving
(17:38):
in in total shame. He is, he's stepping aside saying,
you know, these not these numbers are not good. Perhaps
I'm not the right person for the job. Now I'm
going to do much less work and still get paid.
Is pretty much what I'm hearing here. So I don't
I don't know. I don't know that for a fact,
(17:58):
but it it wouldn't surprise me. I mean, you know,
we get information, We get information in many cases about
these large corporations that has been brewing for years, yes,
and you know, probably bubbling around even before the merger,
and they're talking about okay, so after we merge. We're
going to go through a rough time here because we've
(18:18):
got to get everything in line. We're going to we
have to find those opportunities for for those those cost savings.
And oh, by the way, we're also opening a new
park in the Middle East, so that's going to be
a big boost to our visibility, so that will help us. So,
you know, there's a lot of there's a lot of
(18:39):
balls in the air right now. And since he's not
leaving the park and not leaving the system, it kind
of sounds like this is a very amicable step down.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yeah, that's interesting. I didn't think of it that way,
and I didn't think also maybe it is kind of
similar to what you're saying about, like maybe like the
clustering of the bad news and the scapegoat concept, where like,
I mean there's been a lot of recent cuts. I
mean operating calendars, seasonal events. Remember the regional park managers
(19:15):
they cut those two or the sorry the not regional
park managers.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
They cut the park managers so that they would park counders,
park presidents basically.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Yeah, all the park presidents, and then they kind of
shift into regional only operations. So I mean that's kind
of a lot of you know, I mean, which is
so maybe they're even going to do some more like
cuts or some more like trimming or whatever now and
then just put everything on him and be like, oh,
(19:45):
it's all and then he can be the scapegoat, but
not really disappear because he'll just go and lurk on
the board.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
But the people won't.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Yeah, but no one looks at the board, I mean
no one ever. Everyone only blames the CEO.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
Yeah, it's a perfect it's a perfect opportunity to say, oh,
well that was during the rough years, that was during
the Zimmerman years. But he's gone now, you know, And
these were things that had to happen. I mean, I've
correct without without sharing the information that I'm not allowed
to share. I have seen people be put into positions
simply to be the hatchet person, and then they are
(20:19):
promised and they are promised something else elsewhere so that
they come in, they do their devastation. Everybody gets angry
with them, they get blamed for everything, they get a
great payout, their golden parachute opens, and they slowly and
gently fall into a new job or a new position.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
So where's my golden parish.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
So it's these things have happened before. You know. I'm
not saying that's what this is. I'm not I don't
know whether that's what this is or not, but it
has a lot of the earmarks of previous experience in
this regard.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Well, So I think where we are now is that
six Flags definitely needs to write size. Uh and like
like we had just said, maybe it is much maybe
they need to be more aggressive in their trimming of
properties or trimming of operations calendars or whatever to make
it work. And the dip in attendance is concerning. The
(21:18):
question is maybe like are they right, are they going
to write size appropriately to adjust that, or are they
going to find ways to incentivize those repeat visits like
they've been talking about or whatnot, or like how you
know that that is I think a little concerning, but
maybe like to your point, maybe it's not unexpected and
(21:38):
they kind of knew that there was going to be
these dips and then they're just going to keep trimming
until they kind of wish that equilibrium. So I mean
I wouldn't count six Flags out yet.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Basically the exact same thing I was going to say,
the exact same thing the six Flags, you know, and
I think I've alluded to this before. One of the
options that I think six Flags has, you know, I
love the idea of doing the park the park past,
where you can get in anywhere, which will which is
great for news media, it's very sexy when you talk
(22:08):
about it on the news. It will impact a minuscule
amount of park goers because most people will not travel
from you know, will not say I'm going on a
coaster road trip across the world or across the custry.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
The travel is the expensive part actually is not the
park path, right.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
But once you get the park pass, then you say, well, yeah,
now I have a reason to drive to you know,
three states over and ride the so and so coaster
and whatever. But they may also discover that they need
to lean in to the local nature your hometown park,
you know, if they were to take the we are
(22:45):
your hometown park and use the purchasing power of the
giant corporation and create a sense of local ownership. I
think that's part of the reason that six Flags Great
America in Gurnee continues to be somewhat successful. I mean,
it's not a huge it's not a great performer either.
(23:05):
But it's still around and it's celebrating its fiftieth anniversary,
you know, this next year. And I think part of
the reason is because the locals love it. I mean
a perfect example, about fifteen twenty years ago, they tried
to get rid of one of the roller coasters that
was one of the original coasters in the park, and
(23:26):
there was so much pushback from the locals saying, no, no,
we don't want anything new, we want that coaster. That's
our coaster. When you can build that kind of of commitment,
you're gonna have success. The trick is translating that into dollars.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah, so okay, well we have time to cover another story,
which is that SeaWorld is doing pretty good in comparison.
And so this is just interesting. I thought it was
interesting to have these two different perspectives. On the one hand,
we talked about this, I don't even know when, a
(24:06):
long time ago, about the idea of diversifying your risk,
and in many ways, Six Flags is the most diversified
of risk because they have places all over the country, right,
so it doesn't matter what's happening with one state or
one natural disaster or this or that. You know, there's
wildfires in California, then there's hurricanes in Florida. I mean,
(24:27):
you have stuff all over. But if you have a
park all over the parks all over the country in
smaller areas and in bigger areas, that means that you're,
in theory, you're more risk diverse. However, the downside of
that is they don't really have anything in the in
the regions of these big you know, like Orlando, So
(24:48):
when there's a big boom in one area, then you
don't you don't benefit from that. So we got some
interesting data out from the United Parks which also had
their earnings, and it seems like SeaWorld Orlando their numbers
have increased due to Epic Universe opening, which is something
(25:08):
that we talked about, right Rising Tide.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Who talked about figured except it happens every single time
a new park opens in a region.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, we did talk about this, but the thing is
a lot of people did not believe us well, and.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
The only reason it seems so duh to me is
when you look at how people vacation. You know, these
are destination parks, So when you look at how people vacation,
they travel from the Midwest they come down to Florida
and they come down to visit Epic because that's what
they're there to do. They visit Epic, they spend their
(25:46):
times out outdoors, they do all eleven rides, and then
they look for something else to do. And the next
thing they're gonna do, Oh, you know what, we've got
an extra day, let's go to SeaWorld. The more people
you can get into the region from outside the region,
the more attendance goes up for everybody. This happened with
Bush Gardens, Tampa, which is, you know, anywhere from an
(26:06):
hour and twenty minutes to four hours from Orlando, depending
on what I four is doing. And when Animal Kingdom opened,
initially all the people in the park were terrified because
they thought, well, here's Disney doing a kind of park
that we have animals and rides. Oh gosh. And it
was a phenomenal year for us. Yeah, phenomenal year for
us because like minded people came to the area and
(26:28):
we're looking for other things to do on top of
their primary reason. And we will take the writing. You know,
we were happy to take the riding on the coattails
of the of the Disney park. And that's exactly what
it sounds like SeaWorld is doing as well.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
Yeah, it was interesting because the CEO seemed to get
a little spicy in his comments. But basically, what this
has been is it's been I don't know who's driving this.
Is it regular news media or people that don't outside
the industry or whatever. People love to have this idea
of competition, like it's Disney versus Universe and then everybody
else is just terrible. You know, they love to have
(27:02):
this idea, But as Scott just said, it doesn't work
that way. It really more works in that our real
competition is you not going to Orlando. That's the real competition.
It's not between Disney Universal. It's between you staying at
home or you not booking the trip or you're not
going because as we just discussed, the major cost is
actually the travel. It's like the flight, the transport, the hotel,
(27:25):
those are usually the major costs, right, So it's really
you deciding to go into the place versus just staying home.
That's that's the real or go to a different city, right,
That's that's the real thing here. So he what he
said specifically, this was the who is this? This? This
this is a statement from the CEO during the earnings call.
(27:49):
He says he kind of reiterates all of that, we
welcome investment in the Orlando market. We believe more high
quality investment is good for the overall market and good
for our business. But then the spicy part is in
the spirit of hopefully giving clarity and some conclusion to
this open question, I will share with you all as expected,
attendts at our siegual Orlando Park has been up in
(28:10):
attendance since Epic Universe opened on May twenty second. It
was up for the full second quarter, and it was
up if you measure from the day Epic opened through
the end of the second quarter. It continues to be
up quarter to day through August sixth on a day
to day basis, and we expect attendance for the remainder
of the year at this park to be up as well.
We hope this provides helpful context to you all. We
(28:33):
have great respect for our competitors in Orlando. We welcome
and increase investment. We really don't have to discuss this
topic again. We do not plan to make it a
normal practice to discuss individual park performance in the future.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
So here's the thing as you say, Philip, everybody, it's
real easy for people who are in the industry to
look at the industry and go, well, it's these guys
against these guys. You know. To be completely honest, if
you don't think the parks are fully aware, like the
parks in Orlando, in Central Florida, we'll just say central Florida.
(29:08):
If you don't think the parks in Central Florida are
fully aware of what is going to be announced at
the other parks long before it's announced, you're you're sorely mistaken.
Perfect example is media days for the new for either
seasonal things or new attractions or whatever. The marketing departments
(29:28):
call one another. They reach out to one another and say, Hey,
we've got something coming up on October first, and we're
going to do a big blowout. Do you have anything
planned for October first? Well, no, we were doing ours
on the fifth. Great, then we won't compete. They never
want to compete for media. The same is true when
they are opening a new park. They know exactly when
(29:50):
the parks are going to open. They and what's even
more important is they know how many hotel rooms in
the area are booked, which is why here's the takeaway
for you know, people who aren't Disney and Universal folks.
Become a member of your CVB, your Convention and Visitors Bureau,
because then you can find out exactly how many hotel
rooms in your area are booked at any given time,
because that's really how they judge their success. How many
(30:13):
hotel rooms do we have booked and how many people
are in our area, so that all of the businesses,
all of the attractions in our area are going to
thrive at this time and we need to be prepped
for it. So there's there's the takeaway for people who
aren't necessarily on the top of the food chain when
it comes to the competitiveness of theme parks. Okay, this
(30:38):
was an interesting show. I really had fun today, Thank you, Philip,
but we are out of time, so on behalf of
Philipernandez with Gantam Lighting and the Haunted Attraction Network and
myself Scott Swinson with this show duh and Scott's when's
a creative development? This is Green Tag Theme Park in
thirty and we will see you next week.
Oh my goodness. From our studios in Los Angeles in Tampa.
This is green Tag Theme Park and thirty. I'm Philip
and I'm joined as always by my co host Scott
Sweinson of Scott Sweinson Creative Development. On Green Tag, we
look at the top theme park news each week and
discuss why it matters to industry professionals. And this week
there's more six Flags drama, Big six, Big six Flags,
(00:23):
Big six Flags.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Now, I just, you know, not that we are always
one hundred percent right, not that we always you know,
our interpretations are always one hundred percent accurate. But let's
let's go to the wayback machine here for just for
a hot second, and look at last week where we
were saying, boy, this is a really silly move. This
is a poor choice, this is a bad move. They
(00:45):
must really be in trouble. And in fact, I believe
I use the phrase at one point in time if
your holiday events aren't profitable, then you have a much
bigger problem. In this show, we're going to talk about
the much bigger problem apparently.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Start yeah, yes, So last week we did discuss the
big news last week, which was them kind of canceling
or shifting around operating calendars and also shifting around seasonal
events at some of their parks. But they also announced
the most Valuable Pass sale that was going on only
for this month, only for the month of August. And
(01:22):
essentially it's like, if you purchase some of the higher
level ones, you get access to every single six Lives
property for the rest of this year and for next year.
And the prices vary like here, for me at Notts,
it would be like one hundred and twenty and then
you can add a parking option, but that still covers
again your Halloween and your Christmas for two years, you know,
and then the rest in between. So it's a long
(01:43):
period of time. They're still doing them, yeah, assuming Yeah,
So it's a it's a it's a really good value.
And I think we figured out this week why they're
trying to get cash in because Scott said last week
the only reason to do a sale like this, to
do like a big flash shale, is because you need cash. Yeah,
and it looks like they do need cash.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Well, yeah, here's the report that says, hey, guess what
we need cash. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
So we'll start off first the earnings. So during the
earnings call, they discussed that they lost one hundred million
for the second quarter, which is not good because last
time quarter last year they made a profit of fifty
five million. So that's a really big swing. And I'm
gonna read a few quotes here from it. So the
(02:31):
quote here is they said the company pointed to a
smaller base of seasoned pass holders heading into the final
two quarters and a volatile economy for the downgrade. They
also mentioned weather, of course, yes.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Because that never happens. Weather, just never with this whole
weather thing that's just come out of nowhere. Where did
this weather come from.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
It's you know, it's like clear skies and then suddenly
you know, you got rain. It'said prolonged rains, extreme temperatures,
severe storms across six flag sites, and months of May
and June adversely affected. And you know what, folks, we're
not even in the summer yet, so get ready for
get ready for. They didn't visit because it was too hot.
But you know, now, it's because gravity. Gravity is is
(03:13):
a big problem because we didn't expect that, you know, eh,
So there's a there was a nine percent decrease in
attendance a hunt, which is about one point four million
fewer visitors and what they're doing. Basically, they said they're
going to look to sell off land and other non
essential assets to mitigate the impact. However, as we just
(03:38):
as I just mentioned earlier, Scott and I think part
of the mitigation is also this flash sale. So they're
trying to like bring up their season pass holder base
and they're trying to bring in revenue for that. If
you can frontload your revenue, right for you, But then
the downside of that is you're front loading all your
revenue and then you have to provide reasons for them
to come back. Ideally, but your your admission revenue will
(04:00):
suffer then for next year the pan How farre you?
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And let me just clarify something. You know a lot
of people think that season pass sales will sustain a park.
It's all a balance. It's all a balance. And with
season passes, the money, the profit is not made in
selling the season passes. If you can frontload it, that's
great because that means that you're getting money ahead of time,
(04:23):
before you even have to operate the park that they're
going to visit with that pass, that's great. But where
they continue to generate revenue because I know there were
some comments on last week's shows that talked about, you know,
the seasonal episodes. It's just people you know, winding down
their season passes, and they only become profitable if you
have non pass holder guests. The truth is, what parks
(04:47):
should want to do is to get their season pass
holders to come back as often as possible, because if
they do that, they are significantly more likely to make
where they really make to suspend where they really make
their money, which is on food and beverage and concessions
and other merchandise and other special experiences or upcharge events
(05:10):
that of course they get a discount for because they're
a passholder. The passolders the money that you generated a
passholder usually does not the passholder itself does not make
a whole lot of profit. What it does is it
allows the park to then have access to the profit
they can make on all the other things that generate revenue.
So I just wanted to clarify that just right off
(05:31):
the bat. And secondly, to get this money all up front,
as Philip said to the only reason to do this,
the only business reason to do this is to improve
your cash flow and to also turn around to your
path to your board members and say, look how much
our season pass base has increased, because they won't tell
(05:52):
you it's at you know, one quarter the regular price,
but they'll just say, look how much our pass base
is increased. Look at numbers of people, not numbers of dollars.
So this is this seems to be very much an
act of desperation, just like selling off, you know, properties
(06:14):
that are are not necessarily relevant to the overall brand,
whatever that means.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
So yeah, yeah, there were a lot of comments on
our video from last week, and we just wanted to
clarify that it's we're not saying that like the events
shouldn't be stopped if there's no one there or that
operate that stuff shouldn't be trimmed, that that kind of
a thing. It's more like Scott was saying, like, if
you if you have a park and you're if you
(06:42):
can't make money during Christmas or a Christmas event, there's
a bigger problem. So maybe the bigger problem is that,
like you shouldn't be operating those days at all, right,
or you should be trimming maybe potentially even trimming the property,
you know, I mean, there's nothing wrong with evaluating properties
and being like there's not enough of a mask to
make this work, and then reinvesting or selling the assets
and reinvesting. That's basic business. It's more like if your
(07:03):
park is open and you are not doing a Christmas
event during Christmas time because it's not profitable, that's a
bigger problem because that means there's not enough demand in
that area. Maybe that means that you don't need to
be open at all, or there's too much competition, which
means it's not differentiated enough. There's a that would signify
a different thing, which is the product market fit is
not correct, right, And so that's the other problem. And
(07:26):
then to other comments we got about season pass holders
and you know they don't make money on them, blahah blah.
Here's the thing. We're the theme park business model that
six Flags talked about at their investment day, all hinges
around season pass holders. So this isn't just coming from us,
(07:47):
This is coming from six Flags of Sales during their
investor day where they talked about the whole concept that
the whole goal is to increase season pass sales and
then to get those people to come back to get
more people in the parks. So we're not like we're
not making this up. It's coming. It comes directly from
Six Flags and from their investigation. Now what we would
(08:07):
say is, I think Scott and I do agree that
that is a business model for parks, but it's not
the only business model we you know, look at Disney.
Basically Disney eliminated pass old pass members for a while. Yeah,
they eliminate passolders for a while. It's all just a
balancing act of the demand to go to the park itself,
(08:29):
Like what is the demand if the demand is high enough,
Like at Epic Universe is a good example. Right now,
the demand is so high they're not selling season passes
for that and your current season pass holders can't get
in to Epic Universe because the demand is so high.
And then for Disney, they take them on and off
of sale days because the demand is high enough where
(08:50):
they don't need them. And in that case, yes, you
can get more of your revenue from people that are
purchasing single day tickets and the purchase price is so high.
But that's it's not what Six Flags is targeting. By
their own admission, they are targeting season pass holders. That's
where they want to make their money. So we're just
saying that that's that's what's their plan is sell more
(09:14):
season passes and then monetize the season pass holders. If
we can encourage them to come in more frequently, they'll
spend more money on the in park stuff. So basically
it's a mall. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Well, and quite honestly, the season pass model we want
to increase. Our season pass model works well for local parks, it.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Works works for a lot of parks for a long time.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Yeah, for regional parks, it's great. For destination parks like
Disney's and universals, you make significantly more off of your
one two day ticket sales, so they don't need that.
The nice thing though about having the season pass model,
or finding a balance there of Bush Garden Stampa was
a great balance. We were we had one foot in
(09:57):
the local market and one foot in the destination market,
and so when like nine to eleven happened, the park
didn't have to go under. When COVID happened, the park
didn't have to go under. It was one of those
situations where they were able at those times. Things have
changed a little bit now, but at those times they
were able to lean heavily, more heavily into the either
(10:22):
the season pass base or lean more heavily into the
tourism base, depending on where you were in that pendulum
swing of travel. So yeah, it's my personal opinion, and
I'm certainly no expert, but my personal opinion based on
anecdotal information or observations and working in multiple parks in
(10:42):
different places. You kind of want to have a balance
of both because your past members will at least get
the turnstiles clicking when there's no travel, and your high
money spenders are going to be the people who travel
or on vacation in your area, and they're the ones
who you know are gonna are going to spend the
(11:03):
big bucks. They're the impressive numbers. So it kind of
depends on and every board I've ever known or been
involved with looks at things that they're pitched one of
two ways. Either here's how much money we made or
here's how many guests we've had. And you know, you
can make your guest numbers skyrocket if you take the
(11:23):
cost of admission down to virtually nothing. You can make
your finances skyrocket if you offer a product that people
are willing to pay top dollar for. So finding that
balance is the tricky part. But you know, the idea
that the only way to make money is with season
passes not particularly accurate, but finding a nice balance, that's
(11:47):
a much better approach.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
Yeah, and I also want to dovetell what Scott said too,
it's like it is a balance. And again back to
their investor talk, they did talk about that, you know,
but they also talked about how they wanted to go
in and renovate the food and beverage locations. Like there's
so much plans about renovating food and beverage and doing
(12:11):
cleaning up all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
And of course, like.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
If you just think about it, when you renovate the
food and beverage, of course the prices are probably going
to go up because that's usually what happens when you
renovate FMB location because it's better food, right, make better food.
That way, you can get higher prices, which is higher margin.
And they're basically they're paying close to the same price
and most there is a little bit of discount, but
I mean that's that's the goal, is to get more
(12:35):
people in the park and then get them spending on
more attractive items. That's their whole plan, and also to
encourage them to go to multiple. I mean, they talked
about rolling out a new app next year and rolling
out a new CRM system in twenty twenty six that
would offer incentivized offers to families based off of their
(12:56):
visiting patterns and their locations. Right, So if you just
think about it, a lot of these six Flags parks
are within driving distance. It is possible, so if they
targeted an offer to a family, they might be able
to get that family to visit multiple parks. So then
you're just this like a whole ecosystem. So it was
an interesting vision that they laid out. We're just we're
(13:17):
just kind of reporting on the vision and then talking
about it, right, we're I mean, it wasn't like our
idea that they're making money in this way.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
It's just like this is what they said. That's what
they told investors. And it's not just the thing is
it's not just six Flags either. These approaches have been
used for many, many years in many different ways. The
only reason they're the only difference now is technology makes
them easier. So you know, that's that's the thing. And
if they're going to lean in, you know, if they're
going to lean into the past member market, you darn
(13:47):
well better improve your food because that's where you're going
to make your money. After two visits. You don't make
a whole heck of a lot off of past members,
except for the fact that they pay too. If they
don't have the parking add on, they paid a park
If they, you know, are going to be there the
whole day, they're going to buy food, if they're going
to bring families and friends, then those people are going
(14:07):
to buy a ticket, buy a T shirt. You know,
the season pass holders won't buy a T shirt unless
it's a past member only thing. So they are essential
parts of this whole thing. So let's not you know,
get that wrong. But so the next thing we heard
during the investor call, which kind of I'm not sure
(14:29):
how much this changes the story it or doesn't, I'm
not sure. But so also during the investor call, the
Six Flags President and CEO Richard Dimmermann announced his plans
to step.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Down by the end of twenty twenty five. He's going
to remain in his role until a successor is found
and will continue as a board member after that, and
the board has already started a search for the next CEO,
considering internal and external candidates there is he put out
a big statement. I don't think there's anything in the
statement that is it's all it's all basic, uh, you know,
(15:03):
basic speak. But what's the most interesting to me, though,
is just all this looks pretty bad. This is all
like really bad timing. So I have noid, I don't.
I don't know if I'm obviously that the stock you know,
took hits from all of these items. Not only it,
you know, decreased attendance, decreased revenue. Also the CEO is
(15:23):
stepping down, and they just did this whole reset, like
they just finished the merger and then they made this
big reset, and the whole pitches this whole time has
been they're going to do cost saving from synergies and
then they're going to increase There's like what we've just
been saying, they're going to do cost savings from synergies.
And then when they put all this stuff together, like
a new CRM and the new renovations and then this
(15:46):
new passholder program, they're gonna be able to incentivize repeat visits,
more repeat visits from passolders, which is going to increase
their sales of F and B and all this new stuff.
They it's big, this whole big plan. So I mean,
I'm not sure if it's bad news or not. I mean,
how bad is it that the CEO is stepping down
after they've just started this plan where they haven't even
(16:09):
really finished. Im me, it doesn't matter at all, I guess.
Or since the plan's already done, maybe someone else can
just come in and follow it. But you know how
that goes if and you know, like basically, new CEOs
like to have their own vision, right, So if a
new CEO comes in, are they just going to throw
out the old plan and say no, we need to
start selling off all their land and turn everything into CityWalk.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
Well, and the funny thing is when the moment you
said he's going to stay on until they find a successor,
and the moment you said he will then continue on
as a board member, what I just heard was the
opening of a golden parachute. So it is possible, and
I'm not saying this is true. I do not know,
but it would not be out of the realm of
(16:53):
possibility that this is part of the plan because they
all knew that in doing all of these things and
doing all these reallocations after the merger, et cetera, et cetera,
et cetera, that it was going to go through some lean,
rough difficult times where things were going to be cut,
things were going to be changed, things were going to
be tweaked, things were going to be right sized to
(17:15):
fit a profitable business model, and they needed a scapegoat
to be able to be the sacrificial lamb. But how
sacrificial is it if he's staying on until they find
a successor, and if he goes and becomes a board
member after after stepping down, so he's clearly not leaving
(17:38):
in in total shame. He is, he's stepping aside saying,
you know, these not these numbers are not good. Perhaps
I'm not the right person for the job. Now I'm
going to do much less work and still get paid.
Is pretty much what I'm hearing here. So I don't
I don't know. I don't know that for a fact,
(17:58):
but it it wouldn't surprise me. I mean, you know,
we get information, We get information in many cases about
these large corporations that has been brewing for years, yes,
and you know, probably bubbling around even before the merger,
and they're talking about okay, so after we merge. We're
going to go through a rough time here because we've
(18:18):
got to get everything in line. We're going to we
have to find those opportunities for for those those cost savings.
And oh, by the way, we're also opening a new
park in the Middle East, so that's going to be
a big boost to our visibility, so that will help us. So,
you know, there's a lot of there's a lot of
(18:39):
balls in the air right now. And since he's not
leaving the park and not leaving the system, it kind
of sounds like this is a very amicable step down.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yeah, that's interesting. I didn't think of it that way,
and I didn't think also maybe it is kind of
similar to what you're saying about, like maybe like the
clustering of the bad news and the scapegoat concept, where like,
I mean there's been a lot of recent cuts. I
mean operating calendars, seasonal events. Remember the regional park managers
(19:15):
they cut those two or the sorry the not regional
park managers.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
They cut the park managers so that they would park counders,
park presidents basically.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
Yeah, all the park presidents, and then they kind of
shift into regional only operations. So I mean that's kind
of a lot of you know, I mean, which is
so maybe they're even going to do some more like
cuts or some more like trimming or whatever now and
then just put everything on him and be like, oh,
(19:45):
it's all and then he can be the scapegoat, but
not really disappear because he'll just go and lurk on
the board.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
But the people won't.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Yeah, but no one looks at the board, I mean
no one ever. Everyone only blames the CEO.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
Yeah, it's a perfect it's a perfect opportunity to say, oh,
well that was during the rough years, that was during
the Zimmerman years. But he's gone now, you know, And
these were things that had to happen. I mean, I've
correct without without sharing the information that I'm not allowed
to share. I have seen people be put into positions
simply to be the hatchet person, and then they are
(20:19):
promised and they are promised something else elsewhere so that
they come in, they do their devastation. Everybody gets angry
with them, they get blamed for everything, they get a
great payout, their golden parachute opens, and they slowly and
gently fall into a new job or a new position.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
So where's my golden parish.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
So it's these things have happened before. You know. I'm
not saying that's what this is. I'm not I don't
know whether that's what this is or not, but it
has a lot of the earmarks of previous experience in
this regard.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Well, So I think where we are now is that
six Flags definitely needs to write size. Uh and like
like we had just said, maybe it is much maybe
they need to be more aggressive in their trimming of
properties or trimming of operations calendars or whatever to make
it work. And the dip in attendance is concerning. The
(21:18):
question is maybe like are they right, are they going
to write size appropriately to adjust that, or are they
going to find ways to incentivize those repeat visits like
they've been talking about or whatnot, or like how you
know that that is I think a little concerning, but
maybe like to your point, maybe it's not unexpected and
(21:38):
they kind of knew that there was going to be
these dips and then they're just going to keep trimming
until they kind of wish that equilibrium. So I mean
I wouldn't count six Flags out yet.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Basically the exact same thing I was going to say,
the exact same thing the six Flags, you know, and
I think I've alluded to this before. One of the
options that I think six Flags has, you know, I
love the idea of doing the park the park past,
where you can get in anywhere, which will which is
great for news media, it's very sexy when you talk
(22:08):
about it on the news. It will impact a minuscule
amount of park goers because most people will not travel
from you know, will not say I'm going on a
coaster road trip across the world or across the custry.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
The travel is the expensive part actually is not the
park path, right.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
But once you get the park pass, then you say, well, yeah,
now I have a reason to drive to you know,
three states over and ride the so and so coaster
and whatever. But they may also discover that they need
to lean in to the local nature your hometown park,
you know, if they were to take the we are
(22:45):
your hometown park and use the purchasing power of the
giant corporation and create a sense of local ownership. I
think that's part of the reason that six Flags Great
America in Gurnee continues to be somewhat successful. I mean,
it's not a huge it's not a great performer either.
(23:05):
But it's still around and it's celebrating its fiftieth anniversary,
you know, this next year. And I think part of
the reason is because the locals love it. I mean
a perfect example, about fifteen twenty years ago, they tried
to get rid of one of the roller coasters that
was one of the original coasters in the park, and
(23:26):
there was so much pushback from the locals saying, no, no,
we don't want anything new, we want that coaster. That's
our coaster. When you can build that kind of of commitment,
you're gonna have success. The trick is translating that into dollars.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah, so okay, well we have time to cover another story,
which is that SeaWorld is doing pretty good in comparison.
And so this is just interesting. I thought it was
interesting to have these two different perspectives. On the one hand,
we talked about this, I don't even know when, a
(24:06):
long time ago, about the idea of diversifying your risk,
and in many ways, Six Flags is the most diversified
of risk because they have places all over the country, right,
so it doesn't matter what's happening with one state or
one natural disaster or this or that. You know, there's
wildfires in California, then there's hurricanes in Florida. I mean,
(24:27):
you have stuff all over. But if you have a
park all over the parks all over the country in
smaller areas and in bigger areas, that means that you're,
in theory, you're more risk diverse. However, the downside of
that is they don't really have anything in the in
the regions of these big you know, like Orlando, So
(24:48):
when there's a big boom in one area, then you
don't you don't benefit from that. So we got some
interesting data out from the United Parks which also had
their earnings, and it seems like SeaWorld Orlando their numbers
have increased due to Epic Universe opening, which is something
(25:08):
that we talked about, right Rising Tide.
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Who talked about figured except it happens every single time
a new park opens in a region.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, we did talk about this, but the thing is
a lot of people did not believe us well, and.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
The only reason it seems so duh to me is
when you look at how people vacation. You know, these
are destination parks, So when you look at how people vacation,
they travel from the Midwest they come down to Florida
and they come down to visit Epic because that's what
they're there to do. They visit Epic, they spend their
(25:46):
times out outdoors, they do all eleven rides, and then
they look for something else to do. And the next
thing they're gonna do, Oh, you know what, we've got
an extra day, let's go to SeaWorld. The more people
you can get into the region from outside the region,
the more attendance goes up for everybody. This happened with
Bush Gardens, Tampa, which is, you know, anywhere from an
(26:06):
hour and twenty minutes to four hours from Orlando, depending
on what I four is doing. And when Animal Kingdom opened,
initially all the people in the park were terrified because
they thought, well, here's Disney doing a kind of park
that we have animals and rides. Oh gosh. And it
was a phenomenal year for us. Yeah, phenomenal year for
us because like minded people came to the area and
(26:28):
we're looking for other things to do on top of
their primary reason. And we will take the writing. You know,
we were happy to take the riding on the coattails
of the of the Disney park. And that's exactly what
it sounds like SeaWorld is doing as well.
Speaker 1 (26:41):
Yeah, it was interesting because the CEO seemed to get
a little spicy in his comments. But basically, what this
has been is it's been I don't know who's driving this.
Is it regular news media or people that don't outside
the industry or whatever. People love to have this idea
of competition, like it's Disney versus Universe and then everybody
else is just terrible. You know, they love to have
(27:02):
this idea, But as Scott just said, it doesn't work
that way. It really more works in that our real
competition is you not going to Orlando. That's the real competition.
It's not between Disney Universal. It's between you staying at
home or you not booking the trip or you're not
going because as we just discussed, the major cost is
actually the travel. It's like the flight, the transport, the hotel,
(27:25):
those are usually the major costs, right, So it's really
you deciding to go into the place versus just staying home.
That's that's the real or go to a different city, right,
That's that's the real thing here. So he what he
said specifically, this was the who is this? This? This
this is a statement from the CEO during the earnings call.
(27:49):
He says he kind of reiterates all of that, we
welcome investment in the Orlando market. We believe more high
quality investment is good for the overall market and good
for our business. But then the spicy part is in
the spirit of hopefully giving clarity and some conclusion to
this open question, I will share with you all as expected,
attendts at our siegual Orlando Park has been up in
(28:10):
attendance since Epic Universe opened on May twenty second. It
was up for the full second quarter, and it was
up if you measure from the day Epic opened through
the end of the second quarter. It continues to be
up quarter to day through August sixth on a day
to day basis, and we expect attendance for the remainder
of the year at this park to be up as well.
We hope this provides helpful context to you all. We
(28:33):
have great respect for our competitors in Orlando. We welcome
and increase investment. We really don't have to discuss this
topic again. We do not plan to make it a
normal practice to discuss individual park performance in the future.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
So here's the thing as you say, Philip, everybody, it's
real easy for people who are in the industry to
look at the industry and go, well, it's these guys
against these guys. You know. To be completely honest, if
you don't think the parks are fully aware, like the
parks in Orlando, in Central Florida, we'll just say central Florida.
(29:08):
If you don't think the parks in Central Florida are
fully aware of what is going to be announced at
the other parks long before it's announced, you're you're sorely mistaken.
Perfect example is media days for the new for either
seasonal things or new attractions or whatever. The marketing departments
(29:28):
call one another. They reach out to one another and say, Hey,
we've got something coming up on October first, and we're
going to do a big blowout. Do you have anything
planned for October first? Well, no, we were doing ours
on the fifth. Great, then we won't compete. They never
want to compete for media. The same is true when
they are opening a new park. They know exactly when
(29:50):
the parks are going to open. They and what's even
more important is they know how many hotel rooms in
the area are booked, which is why here's the takeaway
for you know, people who aren't Disney and Universal folks.
Become a member of your CVB, your Convention and Visitors Bureau,
because then you can find out exactly how many hotel
rooms in your area are booked at any given time,
because that's really how they judge their success. How many
(30:13):
hotel rooms do we have booked and how many people
are in our area, so that all of the businesses,
all of the attractions in our area are going to
thrive at this time and we need to be prepped
for it. So there's there's the takeaway for people who
aren't necessarily on the top of the food chain when
it comes to the competitiveness of theme parks. Okay, this
(30:38):
was an interesting show. I really had fun today, Thank you, Philip,
but we are out of time, so on behalf of
Philipernandez with Gantam Lighting and the Haunted Attraction Network and
myself Scott Swinson with this show duh and Scott's when's
a creative development? This is Green Tag Theme Park in
thirty and we will see you next week.
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