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Park Hours: Updates and Discussion

Ethan said:
Completely pointless being open until 5 today so doesn't make much sense from a business point of view
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You could probably get all the rides done today by 1pm if you really wanted to and hammered it. Does that mean they should close at 1pm? That’s an extension of your logic.

Pleased to see the 5pm closes instead of 4pm. No other major park in the world closes as early as 4pm so it’s great to see they have realised that it’s not really acceptable.
 
Ethan said:
Completely pointless being open until 5 today so doesn't make much sense from a business point of view
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It must make sense from a business point of view else they wouldn't have extended it. Maybe the decision was taken based on the [high] number of pre-books they had for today?
 
MakoMania said:
Pleased to see the 5pm closes instead of 4pm. No other major park in the world closes as early as 4pm so it’s great to see they have realised that it’s not really acceptable.
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From a customer point of view, 5pm is great. Finish last rides after 5pm, catch the last mono-rail and drive out the park at 6pm, to avoid the JCB and McDonalds Uttoxeter roundabout traffic.

/aside/ What a place to build a Mcd [from a traffic point of view]. How on earth did they get planning permission for that?
 
Steve74 said:
It must make sense from a business point of view else they wouldn't have extended it. Maybe the decision was taken based on the [high] number of pre-books they had for today?
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I would expect it could be to do with local/area traffic congestion since it always seems to come up on planning applications (try & keep in the good books of locals/council). Then again, could be complete wrong.
 
Ethan said:
Completely pointless being open until 5 today so doesn't make much sense from a business point of view
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How doesnt it?

I assume you are referring to a monitairy point of view.

You could make the same argument for most shops and supermarkets. Which have plenty of times they are dead. I have never seen a single supermarket with more than a few people in at night. Yet alot open 24 hours or 7 days a week. By your logic that would not make sense either from a business perspective.

While Towers is not open 24 hours, customer satisfaction, availability and perceived value are very important from a business perspective. In which, having the park open until 5, plays massively on.

So no, I would argue it makes perfect sense from a business perspective.
 
Yup a business perspective isn’t looking at it flatly from a staffing cost point of view. Whilst paying staff an hour’s less pay is great on the face of it, there’s a lot more to consider:

- People travelling a distance to the park aren’t as keen to visit on a 4pm day. I wouldn’t bother visiting for a 10-4 on account of the fact that my travel time is longer than the park’s hours. I’d imagine a substantial number of others would feel the same.
- Closing at 4 risks people wanting to get on the road and get out of there to try and beat the traffic. People may be less likely to bother with another bit of food, or to buy anything from Towers Trading at the end of the day. With lower capacities at present, spend per guest is a big deal and anything that can help that along such as extended hours is a good thing.
- As others have mentioned, keep guests happy now and they’re more likely to visit in future. With an extended calendar thanks to winter opening, this is even more important now.

You’ve also got more consistent forecasts thanks to prebooking and the increase in ticket pricing, which have both likely led to the park being able to make decisions on park hours with much more confidence than before. What looks to have been a relatively successful summer season has probably make them less likely to keep as tight a hold of those purse strings at the back end of the season too!
 
As much as I understand why the hours are fluctuating a lot this season, I do wonder if the staff are finding it a bit annoying? Surely it's annoying not knowing what time your going to finish because the park keep changing the opening hours? I know there's lots of workplaces that are like that but you'd think a place with set opening and closing time wouldn't be one of them. I'd like to think next year that they'd do the hours well in advance both for the benefit of the staff as well as the guests.
 
JAperson said:
As much as I understand why the hours are fluctuating a lot this season, I do wonder if the staff are finding it a bit annoying? Surely it's annoying not knowing what time your going to finish because the park keep changing the opening hours? I know there's lots of workplaces that are like that but you'd think a place with set opening and closing time wouldn't be one of them. I'd like to think next year that they'd do the hours well in advance both for the benefit of the staff as well as the guests.
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It’s actually better than it used to be when park hours were often extended on the day, and again prebooks are to thank for the park being able to have an early view of crowds these days. The nature of the leisure industry does mean that opening hours can chop and change though, and that’s fully explained to the staff during the recruitment process, so whilst it might be a bit of an inconvenience it is something that comes with the job.
 
Craig said:
t’s actually better than it used to be when park hours were often extended on the day, and again prebooks are to thank for the park being able to have an early view of crowds these days.
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I didn't think of it this way but it makes perfect sense. I suppose I thought that all the chopping and changing would be annoying but actually @Craig is right. The times would change on the day far more frequently than they do post-covid. So realistically opening times could hinge on whether they decide to continue pre-booking next year.
 
Also I would expect staff to be on the rota til at least an hour after closing anyway for litter pick and other tasks, so might not need everyone to be extended anyway.
 
jon81uk said:
Also I would expect staff to be on the rota til at least an hour after closing anyway for litter pick and other tasks, so might not need everyone to be extended anyway.
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If anything like Thorpe you would work until your ride is clear of guests, clean and then head to the next ride in your area until all are clean then you would be released there was no fixed finish times….
 
Craig said:
Yup a business perspective isn’t looking at it flatly from a staffing cost point of view. Whilst paying staff an hour’s less pay is great on the face of it, there’s a lot more to consider:

- People travelling a distance to the park aren’t as keen to visit on a 4pm day. I wouldn’t bother visiting for a 10-4 on account of the fact that my travel time is longer than the park’s hours. I’d imagine a substantial number of others would feel the same.
- Closing at 4 risks people wanting to get on the road and get out of there to try and beat the traffic. People may be less likely to bother with another bit of food, or to buy anything from Towers Trading at the end of the day. With lower capacities at present, spend per guest is a big deal and anything that can help that along such as extended hours is a good thing.
- As others have mentioned, keep guests happy now and they’re more likely to visit in future. With an extended calendar thanks to winter opening, this is even more important now.

You’ve also got more consistent forecasts thanks to prebooking and the increase in ticket pricing, which have both likely led to the park being able to make decisions on park hours with much more confidence than before. What looks to have been a relatively successful summer season has probably make them less likely to keep as tight a hold of those purse strings at the back end of the season too!
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Have seen this referred to a couple of times and feel like I'm missing something. Wouldn't a 4pm finish very much allow people to beat the traffic whereas a 5pm close mean guests leaving the park head out just as peak rush hour is starting, therefore increasing the chances that they'll head out earlier in that scenario?
 
Ally said:
Have seen this referred to a couple of times and feel like I'm missing something. Wouldn't a 4pm finish very much allow people to beat the traffic whereas a 5pm close mean guests leaving the park head out just as peak rush hour is starting, therefore increasing the chances that they'll head out earlier in that scenario?
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Remember 5pm is ride close, not park close. Factor in the time it takes to get a ride done/pop into Towers Trading, get back to cars, get out and then onto the main roads where rush hour traffic would be. You're looking at getting on for well after 6pm and the worst of the traffic is likely over. A 4pm finish means you'll pretty much hit slap bang in the middle of rush hour. People will be more keen to get going as they know they're almost certain to get stuck at least once on the way home.
 
Ally said:
Have seen this referred to a couple of times and feel like I'm missing something. Wouldn't a 4pm finish very much allow people to beat the traffic whereas a 5pm close mean guests leaving the park head out just as peak rush hour is starting, therefore increasing the chances that they'll head out earlier in that scenario?
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A 4pm finish would be acceptable if the park was in Stoke...it is a thirty minute drive from the motorway, so by the time you leave the park, you hit the traffic peak.
5pm ride close, you leave the park around 5.30, and Stoke congestion is easing by the time you get there.
 
Park was open until 5pm last Thursday and it made complete sense. The traffic has been mentioned already but as someone who has to travel M6 then M5 southbound to get home through some of the most congested parts of the UK motorway network, it was pretty much a breeze all the way. Many visitors will have similar journeys.

But 5pm also meant I could slow down a bit, enjoy my day, watch a show, browse and spend £70 in Towers Trading and generally left happier feeling I'd had a decent day out and thus more likely to return.

Why do we keep going back to discussion about seeing the park as a ride tick box excercise?
 
4pm closures - everyone slates the park
5pm closures - everyone slates the park

What on earth is wrong with getting an extra hour of ride time for no extra money?

I think we’re missing the point here. If you want to leave at 4pm, you’re more than welcome to do so regardless of when the park closes.
 
There’s certainly been times this season where, despite the massive improvement over previous years, the later hours have been totally unnecessary (we seem to have gone from one extreme to another a couple of times. 9pm in March?!). Oktoberfest for instance, based on the three weekends I’ve experienced, I feel like the park would have been much better closing at 5pm or 6pm on the Friday and running until perhaps 8pm on the Saturdays.

However, no one should be bemoaning the fact that 4pms have become 5pms. 4s do not belong on the opening calendar at all, and as others have said, cause other problems for guests traveling besides the rides per head. It’s easy for us as enthusiasts to look at it from a ride count perspective, but as always we are not all truly reflective of the average visitor.

It needs to be a fine balancing act at the moment. With the recruitment challenges faced across the hospitality sector it’s not as easy as it will have been historically to manage shift patterns and rotations to ensure staff don’t get completely burnt out from the extra hours, especially as we come out of Oktoberfest with later hours and straight into Scarefest with 9pms stretching more or less through to November now, save a few 5pms.

It’s the first time in a long time though we’ve seen hours like this season. I don’t doubt the park have been experimenting throughout the year to get back into this new mindset and try to find the sweet spot.
 
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