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Drayton Manor Park

The Brexit issue of parts taking longer to arrive could well be a factor, one which I hadn’t considered actually.

I think the biggest reason must be cuts though. As people have said, Alton Towers set the standard for other UK theme parks, just because they’re the largest and most well known UK park. When the standards are lowered at the Merlin parks it has a domino effect. Paultons seems to be the only park that looks at Merlin and says “we’re not doing that”, whereas the other UK parks seem to look up to Merlin and try to be like them, which is never going to work since they don’t have the money or resources that Merlin does. The Paultons approach of trying to be different, is a welcome change.
 
How much longer is it taking a part to get into the country compared to before Brexit? Any real world examples? I sent a 20kg package to China last week and it took 4 days to arrive at the destination, even after being held up at customs for further checks. I also received an item from China this week after a similar wait. I've had multiple items come from Europe since Brexit and I've not noticed any long delays. Have they just got it in for theme parks so are holding up their packages for a laugh? I've heard this argument before and I don't really buy it. A slight delay, maybe, sometimes, but not regular extra long wait times due to a bit of extra paper work, surely? Obviously Brexit worked out badly, but is it really an excuse for our theme parks to not run their rides reliably?
 
BarryZola said:
How much longer is it taking a part to get into the country compared to before Brexit? Any real world examples? I sent a 20kg package to China last week and it took 4 days to arrive at the destination, even after being held up at customs for further checks. I also received an item from China this week after a similar wait. I've had multiple items come from Europe since Brexit and I've not noticed any long delays. Have they just got it in for theme parks so are holding up their packages for a laugh? I've heard this argument before and I don't really buy it. A slight delay, maybe, sometimes, but not regular extra long wait times due to a bit of extra paper work, surely? Obviously Brexit worked out badly, but is it really an excuse for our theme parks to not run their rides reliably?
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We can get parts shipped almost instantly where I work too. Germany/Switzerland/USA no problems. Even sending technical kit for repair is fairly swift.
 
BarryZola said:
How much longer is it taking a part to get into the country compared to before Brexit? Any real world examples? I sent a 20kg package to China last week and it took 4 days to arrive at the destination, even after being held up at customs for further checks. I also received an item from China this week after a similar wait. I've had multiple items come from Europe since Brexit and I've not noticed any long delays. Have they just got it in for theme parks so are holding up their packages for a laugh? I've heard this argument before and I don't really buy it. A slight delay, maybe, sometimes, but not regular extra long wait times due to a bit of extra paper work, surely? Obviously Brexit worked out badly, but is it really an excuse for our theme parks to not run their rides reliably?
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Depends on how well they the shipper does their paperwork and if they are responsive to queries from the carrier, I know from work (I'm in brokerage) stuff can occasionally get held up a few days or weeks (longer is an exception), but most stuff if it's going to actually clear it's usually very quickly.
 
Please try and keep things directly related to Drayton. Suggestions of why availability is a problem is fine, but let’s not get bogged down in detailed discussion about Brexit etc. We have dedicated discussion topics for that - thanks.
 
TPWW have uploaded their vlog / footage from today (see link below).

Part of me feels sorry for the hordes of schoolchildren who would’ve been lucky to have even gotten a single ride today, due to the terrible ride availability – but then I remember how the schoolchildren ruined my day trip last year (as I detailed in this report), and so I am suddenly less sympathetic! (although – in fairness – it is probably / hopefully different children visiting the park this time around)

Not only did The Wave open late in the day, but only two of the rows were operational (in the single car that the park owns), and the queues were likely to have been large anyway, due to (A) the sheer number of other rides that were down, and (B) the large number of school children in the park.

I have no idea how the park will get through the Easter Holidays without disappointing a large number of people, unfortunately.


From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biNRf1d-sWg
 
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DiogoJ42 said:
The worst part is, there is now a whole generation of younglings who think this is normal, as they've never known anything else.
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In fairness, back in the 1990s, I thought it was normal to only get 1 or 2 rides per day at Alton Towers* - hence why I didn't visit between 1994 and 2001, and mainly just stuck to WMSP and Drayton Manor (aside from one ill-fated visit to American Adventure).

How ironic that AT is now the park with shorter queues than Drayton Manor!

(*I remember visiting AT for the first time in 16 years back in 2024 and being shocked that I managed to get 4 SRQ rides on The Smiler within only 1 hour, as I was preparing for another 90-minute wait !)
 
Secret Weapon said:
In fairness, back in the 1990s, I thought it was normal to only get 1 or 2 rides per day at Alton Towers* - hence why I didn't visit between 1994 and 2001, and mainly just stuck to WMSP and Drayton Manor (aside from one ill-fated visit to American Adventure).

How ironic that AT is now the park with shorter queues than Drayton Manor!

(*I remember visiting AT for the first time in 16 years back in 2024 and being shocked that I managed to get 4 SRQ rides on The Smiler within only 1 hour, as I was preparing for another 90-minute wait !)
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I could say similar about Chessington in the 90's. But at least we were aware that was only because we were visiting on weekends / holidays. Never had these newfangled midweek school trips in my day!
(Old man noises)
 
Secret Weapon said:
Not only did The Wave open late in the day, but only two of the rows were operational (in the single car that the park owns), and the queues were likely to have been large anyway, due to (A) the sheer number of other rides that were down, and (B) the large number of school children in the park.

I have no idea how the park will get through the Easter Holidays without disappointing a large number of people, unfortunately.
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The worst thing about it is Drayton marketing the launch of the season as “The Big Restart”:


From: https://x.com/draytonmanor/status/2031643465008763221?s=46&t=OuG-53CJRHzzDVEPmDXGSg


Putting the terrible name to one side, who would define having a huge chunk of your rides closed and others running on reduced capacity as a “big restart”?
 
The usual suspects are defending Drayton over on X. Discounted tickets, closed rides were listed in thr availability page... so what do the public expect?

They just don't see how bad it looks to the general public... who actually pay money to keep the park going. Will need to improve very soon, but looking at Shawn's video many rides look miles from being ready.
 
Quantum said:
None of these parks deserve your custom until they can get the majority of rides up and running. They have 5 years to shape up of be totally steamrolled by Universal
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My guess is that the likes of Drayton Manor and West Midlands Safari Park won't be massively affected by Universal because they are now family parks with a focus on animals, whose visitors would probably unwilling to travel as far as Bedfordshire for a day out anyway, but I definitely agree that the parks with wider catchment areas that specialise in rides (e.g. Alton Towers, Blackpool, and Thorpe Park) need to step up their game.

They already have a fight on their hands anyway, but the poor maintenance issues will only make things worse. My guess is that Universal won't have as many maintenance issues (at least to begin with) as (A) the ride hardware itself will be newer, and (B) they will probably have more money to spend on repairs etc.
 
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Secret Weapon said:
My guess is that the likes of Drayton Manor and West Midlands Safari Park won't be massively affected by Universal because they are now family parks with a focus on animals, whose visitors would probably unwilling to travel as far as Bedfordshire for a day out anyway
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Universal is not Drayton’s issue - the priority is, in a cost of living crisis with signs of families tightening belts further because of the war in the Middle East, guaranteeing customers they will at least have a decent ride offering and a basic standard of operations that was taken for granted 10 years ago.

If people are having fewer days out, they’ll want to make damn sure they’re good days out - and they’ll vote with their feet if Drayton gets into a downward spiral and it travels via word of mouth.

Of course, yesterday could just have been a bad day. The problem is, with the Looping Group, we can’t be certain of consistent standards.
 
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