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2024: General Discussion
- Thread starter Craig
- Start date
Matt N
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Shambhala (PortAventura Park)
I think that was just a marketing slogan. Any park manager will always say that it’s “the best season ever” regardless of the actual state of play.Anyone else thinking back to that cringe video at the start of the season claiming it'll be the best season yet?
As honest and open as Bianca’s approach to communications has been, her job is ultimately still to encourage people to visit. Bianca wouldn’t exactly be encouraging people to visit if she said “this season’s going to be a bit mediocre”, would she?
In terms of this Scarefest opening hours decision; each to their own, but I’m a little surprised at the sheer backlash surrounding it. The park will be quieter midweek outside of half term, so surely it makes sense from their standpoint to have reduced hours? It will still be going dark long before 8pm by October, so people will still get night rides, and the queues will probably be shorter for said night rides due to the park being quieter. Tickets are also cheaper on these days due to the new surge pricing model, so surely having marginally reduced hours is a worthy trade off for reduced crowds and a reduced ticket price?
The way I see it is that it’s a better alternative than not having Scarefest midweek at all and the park closing at 4pm or 5pm on those days like it would have done otherwise (and indeed, has done in previous years). Admittedly, they could perhaps have gone back to a reduced number of weeks if they wanted the event running on every day of the week, but I think 8pm openings midweek is still preferable to not having Scarefest at all midweek, which is what they have done before.
Maybe I don’t get it, and I apologise if I’m missing something. I’m not a Scarefest person at all and avoid the whole Halloween season at the parks like the plague. That’s just my two pence on the whole situation.
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It’s an exercise in PR ultimately, as even though there are more dates than last season, it presently looks like something is being taken away, which inevitably leaves people to question and speculate as to why. Had they first announced the calendar with these times, nobody would’ve batted too much of an eyelid.
Hopefully Scarefest is still a great event and a step up in quality on previous years, we can but hope.
Hopefully Scarefest is still a great event and a step up in quality on previous years, we can but hope.
Bowser
TS Member
I imagine this was discussed at length at the time but reading Tales from the Towers and it's eerie how similar the Mouse and Smiler crashes were!
There's also mention of a girl breaking both her wrists on Rita, is there any information on this and how it supposedly happened?
There's also mention of a girl breaking both her wrists on Rita, is there any information on this and how it supposedly happened?
Anyone else thinking back to that cringe video at the start of the season claiming it'll be the best season yet?
Drayton did the same to be fair and they have only managed to turn it round at the end with Gold rush now open and the wave again.
However they definitely get less scrutiny having a smaller fan base as opposed to seriously passionate enthusiast community for the epic Towers.
Actually Thorpe also said biggest year ever and they had several downtime and problems with Hyperia and mixed messages announcements.
Matt N
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Shambhala (PortAventura Park)
I don’t think any park will ever have a perfect season, and in Drayton and Thorpe’s cases, I don’t think issues with their new rides can be blamed on them.
And as I said, I think the “best season ever” line shouldn’t be taken too seriously, as I’d guess that it’s just a PR line to encourage people to come. Any park manager wanting to encourage people to visit will always say that the current season is “the best ever”.
It does seem as though Alton Towers have had a surprisingly weak season, however. Many (myself included) thought that Nemesis reopening would give them a bit of a boost this year, but that doesn’t seem to have materialised.
Interestingly, it also seems as though this weak performance is somewhat isolated to Alton Towers rather than being Merlin-wide. Thorpe Park appears to be having a strong season, with crowd levels seemingly reasonably decent and them even trialling extended hours at points over the summer! Legoland Windsor doesn’t appear to be having an overly poor season either, with their summer hours seemingly holding strong at 6pm.
Matt N
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Shambhala (PortAventura Park)
What difference does Thorpe and Legoland being in the South make, out of interest?
Steve74
TS Member
If that is the case - and as we don't have access to attendance figures - I suspect this is could be down to staffing issues at Towers. Who knows if they are short staffed, but its well known that the London parks will usually be able to employ the number of people they require whereas Towers almost certainly will struggle due to location. Throw into the mix poor wages and this may even have something to do with the shortened hours we're seeing across the season and Scarefest. Don't forget the law states all employees have to have 11 hours between shifts (12hrs if under 18) which means if they don't finish until after 9pm then they can't start until at least 8 or 9am the following day. And every 7 days employees have to have at least 1 unbroken 24hr period of rest. I have no idea how strict these laws are enforced by the authorities but if there aren't enough staff to cover for that on a rota system then they'll struggle and maybe this is why we're seeing 8pm closures over some of Scarefest?
But as others have said, I'd rather see an 11am opening than an 8pm close.
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jon81uk
TS Member
I think the issue is that to a lot of people Nemesis isn't new, its still pretty much the same ride as was there a few years ago, just now a different colour.
They could even do CBeebies Land 10am to 7pm (maybe with a final show at or just after 7pm) and the rest of the park 11am to 9pm. Just clearly show on the hours page the two seperate hours.
Jb85
TS Member
Nail on the head here.
Nemesis - geeks will flock, but to the GP nothing is new. Essentially the ride is the same.
This is why the fad around The Curse has died down so it’s now walk on.
The park desperately need new additions.
Matt.GC
TS Member
I expect we'll have an armchair autopsy at the end of the season. None of us know for sure exactly why this season has been so bad, but I bet it'll be a mixture of reasons.
We can only speculate of course. It seems there was a genuine intention to have the Sky Ride and Hex open at some point during the season. Technical services seem very stretched for whatever reason, and I doubt very much that was intended. I think it's safe to acknowledge that the park's ageing infrastructure and attraction lineup has been significantly under invested in for many years and that this takes time and money to remedy.
But with that said, I also can't accept this notion that everything we've seen this season is some old regimes fault on top of the long lists of excuses I've seen being presented as arguments to defend them. Some of the decision making may have been well intended, but hasn't focused on the customer in the here and now. I would be interested to know how many rides per guest they've achieved this season, a key focus for them coming out of covid, because I would imagine it's been very low. Possibly some of the worst performance in its modern history.
It's all very well having Alton Manor, a pretty looking Nemesis station, some nice stuff coming over the hill for Hex, a new posh flat on its way, some signs promising a revitalised Skyride and extra stuff for Scarefest. But when you turn up and you're offered the park as it's been this year as an experience, none of that matters.
We can only speculate of course. It seems there was a genuine intention to have the Sky Ride and Hex open at some point during the season. Technical services seem very stretched for whatever reason, and I doubt very much that was intended. I think it's safe to acknowledge that the park's ageing infrastructure and attraction lineup has been significantly under invested in for many years and that this takes time and money to remedy.
But with that said, I also can't accept this notion that everything we've seen this season is some old regimes fault on top of the long lists of excuses I've seen being presented as arguments to defend them. Some of the decision making may have been well intended, but hasn't focused on the customer in the here and now. I would be interested to know how many rides per guest they've achieved this season, a key focus for them coming out of covid, because I would imagine it's been very low. Possibly some of the worst performance in its modern history.
It's all very well having Alton Manor, a pretty looking Nemesis station, some nice stuff coming over the hill for Hex, a new posh flat on its way, some signs promising a revitalised Skyride and extra stuff for Scarefest. But when you turn up and you're offered the park as it's been this year as an experience, none of that matters.
jon81uk
TS Member
I think that Alton do need to consider if they need to raise prices to be able to raise staff wages, especially for technical services. As discussed about Paultons where they charge £43.50 all season, higher than most days at AT and only have peak/off-peak pricing for annual passes.
Did seem like they were moving away from super cheap tickets and although the dynamic pricing allowed for them as low as £29 on quiet days, they had plenty of busier ones at £37. But now Merlin brought in 25% off with Kellogg's pushing the price down below the old 2for1 price!
AT probably would benefit from slightly fewer guests on busier days, but paying higher prices than they do now with better paid, happier staff. Then still having lower off-peak pricing to encourage people to come on quiet days.
Did seem like they were moving away from super cheap tickets and although the dynamic pricing allowed for them as low as £29 on quiet days, they had plenty of busier ones at £37. But now Merlin brought in 25% off with Kellogg's pushing the price down below the old 2for1 price!
AT probably would benefit from slightly fewer guests on busier days, but paying higher prices than they do now with better paid, happier staff. Then still having lower off-peak pricing to encourage people to come on quiet days.
BarryZola
TS Member
It looks like due to lower visitor numbers they've had to cut budgets or have had budgets cut for them from above. It looks to be industry wide and more due to the economy and is not just limited to the UK. Disney parks have not been having a great time either and their shares are really struggling this year (although obviously their business is not only the theme park division). People have just been tightening their belts and have been more choosy about how they spend their decreasing amounts of expendable income.
But yeah, don't cut the best hours of Scarefest, that's just annoying and bad customer service.
But yeah, don't cut the best hours of Scarefest, that's just annoying and bad customer service.
jon81uk
TS Member
Don't think its that high, on peak days I expect more than 50% are paying something to get in, off-peak might be different.
But also within the passholders there is a huge spectrum of uses, some people might get 20 visits to attractions in a year, others might only go four times and barely break even on the cost of the pass. Of those not visiting often, its likely without the pass they would have only gone once or twice.
So (just thinking of the single attraction gold pass at £139), if they do five visits, weekday £29, weekend, £34, Oktoberfest £34, Scarefest £37 and they want to do fireworks (extra cost to passholder of £25) £47 = Total value of visits is £181 and the pass plus the firework fee is £164. Pass only saved them £17. Could have saved more with Kellogg's vouchers. Although there is the 20% off food and free carparking too.
If they didn't have the pass, maybe they would have only thought to visit twice (weekday and scarefest) anyway at a cost of £66.
So for those visiting around four or five times on a gold pass, the park is still getting a similar income than they would with day tickets, but the fact it feels cheaper encourages more visits. I think the people visiting 10+ times are in the minority really.
To add, at Paulton the top pass with no blocked dates is £270 so seven visits needed to be cheaper than day tickets, compared to the 4-5 at Alton Towers.
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Well being a-lot more accessible close to the highest populated area in the uk? They will always get the numbers even if it’s a pile of crap and nothing new to offer. Tourists come to London and go to the nearest most accessible Theme-parks feel that goes for most capitals around the world, Luna park in Sydney is awful for the price but you would still pay and go just because.
Either to get to from London or travelling through to Europe it’s an easy stop over especially as an enthusiast. So in this bases u feel it’s hard to compare?
Do we actually have any concrete data that shows Alton’s towers numbers are low or is this hearsay? As there ride Que times are ridiculous at the moment, yes there are a few rides closed but there are still a lot of rides open in comparison to other parks.
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Bowser
TS Member
Yep. As much as people are disappointed in Hex not reopening, other than a marginal impact on queue times elsewhere it will also have no appeal to the general public when it's yet another ride from 25 years ago.