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Blackpool Pleasure Beach: 2021 Discussion

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It's sad to say but my visit planned for October is only happening due to Clubcard. I've been to many UK parks this year, ranging from the dreadful (Barry Island and Drayton Manor) to the good (Towers and Paultons) and I cannot see, like @AstroDan said, how they can charge so much. I'm paying less per day for a 3 day ticket to Europa Park.
 
Poisson said:
It's sad to say but my visit planned for October is only happening due to Clubcard. I've been to many UK parks this year, ranging from the dreadful (Barry Island and Drayton Manor) to the good (Towers and Paultons) and I cannot see, like @AstroDan said, how they can charge so much. I'm paying less per day for a 3 day ticket to Europa Park.
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I know they must be really struggling financially. The thing is I wouldn't want them to sell it. It's the last big family owned park and I really wouldn't want to loose that.
 
Poisson said:
I'd rather they sell it instead of run it into the ground.
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Can't think of anyone who'd want to buy it. It would be great if it would be like lisaberg and be owned by the state or even the council. Although they'd probably do an awful job. It'd be politicised. 'The Boris Big One'.
 
Poisson said:
I'd rather they sell it instead of run it into the ground.
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Which would likely result in someone else running it into the ground.

Although the £42 for six hours price is crazy, I think £30-39 for a full 8 hour day is still pretty good. Just because Merlin partner with Kelloggs to offer tickets for £25 doesn't make that the price a full theme/amusement park is worth.
 
As a first time visitor to Pleasure Beach I thought I’d leave a review.
1. Did I enjoy the place - Yes
2. Am I in a rush to return- No
3. Favourite ride - Icon (by some margin)
Now my reasonings for the above. I very much enjoyed my visit, but feel it would need another big investment for me to return anytime soon to justify a 3 hour drive there and back. Icon is a fantastic ride and one of my favourite rides in the country. Really enjoyed the Wallace and Gromit dark ride again probably my favourite dark ride in the country. The woodies were fun and not as uncomfortable as I was expecting. Pleasantly surprised with the food options.
Now for the slight negatives. I can’t start to imagine how rough the Big one was before its re-tracking but by god I found it rough, don’t get me wrong I enjoyed it but never have I seen so many incidents of people needing first aid after riding, two of the incidents were where the people concerned somehow head butted the seat in front and one had blood visibly poring from her mouth!
Not sure if the 45 minute queue for the ghost train helped but thought it has been over hyped by some. I get it’s old but found the ride very boring as I did the river caves!
Like I said I did enjoy the park but a 3 hour drive to essentially ride Icon! Well it’s just not for me. If I lived closer yes I’d probably enjoy it more but unfortunately I don’t. I could go on about the other rides but none stood out enough to comment on.
 
Glad you had an enjoyable visit!

If you thought Big One was rough, I dread to think what you thought of Infusion…

With the Big One, though; I’m not sure if any of the BPB regulars would agree, but having done it on two separate visits (1 ride in August 2018, 2 rides in August 2019), I’d say it seems to be quite a temperamental coaster. It blows hot and cold, both in terms of roughness and in terms of speed. On the two visits I’ve done it on, I’ve certainly had two very different experiences.

The first time I rode it in August 2018, it was quite a cold, overcast day, and the ride was, to put it frankly, not running very well at all. Excruciatingly rough, and crawling over the elements, with very little speed to speak of after the first drop; that experience would have had it as one of my least favourite coasters at BPB (from memory, I think it was my 8th favourite coaster at BPB based on the initial 2018 visit, and I ranked only Infusion and Steeplechase lower?).

The second time I rode it in August 2019 was quite a different story, however. This was a much hotter day, nearing 30 degrees at points, and I had 2 rides on the coaster, one towards the front and one towards the back. It was running much better this day; while I still certainly wouldn’t have said it was comfortable or smooth by any means, the ride didn’t seem quite as rough as it did the first time, and it ran much faster, with a fair bit of intent through much of the course. Sure, the Big One isn’t the most relentlessly paced or thrilling coaster aside from the first drop, by virtue of its layout, but it was running fairly fast and packed reasonably good pace compared to my last ride!

I should clarify that I haven’t done it post-retrack, however (my last BPB visit was in 2019), so it may differ a bit now.
 
In all fairness to the Big One not all our party found it as rough as I did one even rated it higher than Icon! Which in someways proves we all have different tastes and tolerances.
 
coastinginlife said:
In all fairness to the Big One not all our party found it as rough as I did one even rated it higher than Icon! Which in someways proves we all have different tastes and tolerances.
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That’s very true! I’m actually in a minority with the Big One within my party, as both my parents absolutely love it, as well as the notoriously rough Grand National, whereas I’m not a huge fan of Big One and rate Grand National down there as one of my personal least favourites! They are also decidedly apathetic towards Icon, which I absolutely love and hold as my favourite UK coaster; I seem to remember my dad’s exact words being “watching the baggage system was the most exciting part”…

I don’t particularly like rides that are too rough myself; I ride for fun factor and rerideability, which roughness and pain hugely inhibit for me. My dad, however, says that I “need to stop being such a jessie, and accept that rides like Grand National and Big One are great because being beaten up and bruised is all part of the fun”.

Am I the only one who thinks like this? Do you agree with my dad, or are you more along my wavelength?
rob666 said:
Double poster.
Whip him quick.
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Sorry Rob… I was having a few technical difficulties earlier on. Sorry about earlier on, everyone; it was just one of those things where the software just wouldn’t play ball!
 
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AstroDan said:
I haven't been to BPB this season and won't be.

It's just a rip off for what it is. It is simply not appropriate for the place to be charging more than Alton Towers given the market they operate in! The price rises are absurd since 2019.
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I disagree, the market that they are operating in is responding pretty positively, the place has been an absolute zoo during July & August and that's a core part of the test of appropriateness. If anything, folks have been complaining that it is too busy at that price. Why would you sell your product for less if you're selling out on a random Tuesday in July.

I still think Alton is underselling itself on its gate price, especially with the voucher schemes, but I think that's on the back of them not wanting to jeopardise their ability to extract money out of you once you're in the park, rather than them concluding that the price is about right - it's a very calculated manoeuvre. The Pleasure Beach have found it much harder to do that, not least because they operate in a market where their competitors have free run of their guests when it comes to parking and catering.

I've avoided the park for much of the summer due to how busy it is, but anecdotally from friends and colleagues who have been, they've largely had a good time.
 
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Rick said:
I disagree, the market that they are operating in is responding pretty positively, the place has been an absolute zoo during July & August and that's a core part of the test of appropriateness. If anything, folks have been complaining that it is too busy at that price. Why would you sell your product for less if you're selling out on a random Tuesday in July.

I still think Alton is underselling itself on its gate price, especially with the voucher schemes, but I think that's on the back of them not wanting to jeopardise their ability to extract money out of you once you're in the park, rather than them concluding that the price is about right - it's a very calculated manoeuvre. The Pleasure Beach have found it much harder to do that, not least because they operate in a market where their competitors have free run of their guests when it comes to parking and catering.

I've avoided the park for much of the summer due to how busy it is, but anecdotally from friends and colleagues who have been, they've largely had a good time.
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I think there is a likelihood that Alton/Merlin while slowly faze out the vouchers on packets. Tey need to do it slow as not to pull attention to it in the media. i agree Alton is underselling itself but pleasure beach is over selling itself. Yeah they've got some good rides but can they really justy the price? I get it's been busy but I would think if the price was lower then it would be even busier. I bet there a decent group of people who've been to blackpool for there stay-cation who were planning to go the pleasure beach and then not decided to because of the price.
 
It has already been too busy.
Even busier would just cause more problems, complaints and bad reviews.
Capacity issues can be managed by increasing price.
People pay more, but the park is generally less crowded, queues are not as bad, satisfaction rates higher.
 
JAperson said:
Yeah they've got some good rides but can they really justy the price? I get it's been busy but I would think if the price was lower then it would be even busier. I bet there a decent group of people who've been to blackpool for there stay-cation who were planning to go the pleasure beach and then not decided to because of the price.
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At the risk of repeating myself, people are going in huge numbers. If you're arguing that they should reduce the price so more people will go, I am not sure that has a happy ending, given the capacity headaches that they are faced with. @shakey waited 2 hours or something for some rides, that's absolutely unheard of at the Pleasure Beach. It's busier than Snorecons opening season, that's for sure.

In terms of people sacking it off on price, possibly, but if you're in Blackpool for 3, 5 or 7 nights, I don't buy that you remove the Pleasure Beach from your itinerary because it's £5 more than it was last year. That doesn't make any sense to me, surely you bin off something else costing £5 and find a way to visit the park, if that's your thing. Not least because, if you opted for The Dungeon & The Tower, for example, that's £25 for a couple of hours entertainment, 3 hours in the Sandcastle is £22. Pleasure Beach isn't operating in a vacuum.

I need someone to suggest bringing back PPR for a Full House on my bingo card.
 
Well, no problem then. I'll not be going. £40+ for that place is a joke in my eyes; it wouldn't be so bad if I saw some sparkling new ride or whatever.

*grumbles*
 
The park simply can't handle the number of guests they would need to be profitable if they're charging £25 each, not with current ride throughputs anyway. Apparently earlier this season guest numbers were capped at around 8.5k, barely half of what Alton Towers will pull in on a properly busy day.

Whether or not this is sustainable remains to be seen - are the people who queued 90min for Ghost Train or 2 hours for Grand Prix likely to rush back?
 
When I took my son and his mate recently, his mate paid £32 (maybe £33) for the day (pre booked). This was for a day during the school holidays.

Just checked the website and all dates up to the end of the main season are now at least £40. This includes midweek off peak days.
(winter weekends are £39)

Saturdays are now £44!!

I am sure this is a very recent price hike the park have decided to go with.

I have booked towers for Thursday via Carex website. Total price when you add in parking is £32.50 (would be under £30 if sharing a car)

So towers is now considerably cheaper than pleasure beach.

EDIT: I reckon that makes pleasure beach the most expensive park in the country.


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Gosh, I'm quite shocked that BPB's capacity is only 8,500; I know that's probably a bit of a reduction compared to usual due to COVID, but I would have pegged it at way higher given that the park has more rides than any other UK park, including 10 roller coasters/12 credits, and frequently pulled in excess of 5 million guests during its heyday! Are ride throughputs at the park generally not that high compared to other UK parks or something?
 
Matt N said:
Gosh, I'm quite shocked that BPB's capacity is only 8,500; I know that's probably a bit of a reduction compared to usual due to COVID, but I would have pegged it at way higher given that the park has more rides than any other UK park, including 10 roller coasters/12 credits, and frequently pulled in excess of 5 million guests during its heyday! Are ride throughputs at the park generally not that high compared to other UK parks or something?
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As John mentioned this was earlier in the season when capacity limits were put onto attractions pre lockdown restrictions lifted, so not necessarily now. Aside from that, whilst the park has lots of rides, their capacity and throughput is substantially reduced from back in the day. The pathways around the park are also smaller than a theme parks too. As for the 5 million figure, that's also from back in the day when they had free entry, pay per ride and Blackpool was far more popular too, so not comparable to these days!
 
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