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Blackpool Pleasure Beach: 2023 Discussion

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When we went to make use of our MAPs for a few hours at the Merlin attractions, we finished earlier than expected and intended to go the Pleasure Beach. After looking at the on the gate price, it was a firm no - this was as two single friends with good incomes and no dependents. I think it can therefore be expected the current set up would deter a good number of people, particularly in the current economic climate.

We just went to one of the piers instead.


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It's the same stories time after time, we'll gain nothing from discussing it.

Blackpool Pleasure Beach Resort don't want to know.
 
rob666 said:
You can't simply keep blaming the marketing.
The choice for non riders used to be ten pounds.
It moved to 30 to 50 overnight due to covid.
There is now no second option.
Large numbers of groups no longer go because of the "one price doesn't fit all" policy, which would be fine if the park was busy, but it really isn't.
I know, because I have been a member of the "No options, we aren't going" groups on four occasions over the last two seasons, friends, family, and now even thoosie group visits not happening.
Groups of six, eight and eight not visiting because two non riders would not pay thirty quid to wander piles of steel and pink concrete that smells of wee.
So we all didn't go.

Offer good value for a reasonable product, and the punters would come.
One size does not suit all, and it shows.
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I disagree with you completely. Blackpool Pleasure Beach made a fundamental change to their entry costs/ requirements but done absolutely nothing to change people's perception of the park. I made the comment previously that when Merlin took over the running of the tower they changed their entrance model to have individual charged attractions instead of the Pay One Price 'Tower World' - they done a phenomenal amount of brand work and marketing to maintain/ encourage visitors and it worked. It is the perfect case study of what should be done. Pleasure Beach done nothing and still to this day have people turning up at the gate expecting free entry.

People talk about groups of people not willing to pay full price to get in. When it is mentioned that other large parks don't have this model and it is accepted, people say "BPB is different". But why should it be? I accept that the current offering in terms of entertainment needs to be improved, but it really is no worse than that offered by Towers or Thorpe on a standard day.

@rob666 you say that large numbers no longer go because the "one price fits all policy" doesn't fit all. I'm sure this effects some, but I put to you the absolutely dier marketing over the last few years is much more to blame. Just look at last season - the TV advert was for Valhalla. It didn't tell you what the ride actually was, and unless you got a magnifying glass out you wouldn't know where it was (take a look:
From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8Dh9xFz34Y
). The park had a few bus shelter adverts around - they were literally a picture of people standing on-top of PMBO (not in the train and not evident that it was in the park) with the tagline "This should be you"?! It makes no sense. If you search Blackpool Pleasure Beach on socials you rarely get anything official or complimentary. My #1 hit is Scott from Your Experience Guide rubbing his chin and complaining about stuff. Marketing is meant to enthuse people to visit, nothing released by the park in the last 4 or 5 years has done this.

I could also go on about brand recognition too, but I'm sure you are bored enough with what I have written!
 
Thing is people visit the main theme parks as a specific day out, people visit blackpool 80% of the time as part of a bigger trip or day trip as such families days will in general not want to spend the whole day at the pleasure beach, the demographic and make up of visitors to Blackpool is simply different to say people visiting towers.
They are literally alienating the market on the doorstep.

There are so many ways the pleasure beach could tap into this market.

1h ride eticket £10 2h ride e-ticket £15 3h £20 etc

with access to the park for the day and ride time from when the 1st attraction is used were in a digital age where this is practical.

Thus becoming inclusive for the market in which they operate.
 
ScottishChris said:
I disagree with you completely. Blackpool Pleasure Beach made a fundamental change to their entry costs/ requirements but done absolutely nothing to change people's perception of the park. I made the comment previously that when Merlin took over the running of the tower they changed their entrance model to have individual charged attractions instead of the Pay One Price 'Tower World' - they done a phenomenal amount of brand work and marketing to maintain/ encourage visitors and it worked. It is the perfect case study of what should be done. Pleasure Beach done nothing and still to this day have people turning up at the gate expecting free entry.

People talk about groups of people not willing to pay full price to get in. When it is mentioned that other large parks don't have this model and it is accepted, people say "BPB is different". But why should it be? I accept that the current offering in terms of entertainment needs to be improved, but it really is no worse than that offered by Towers or Thorpe on a standard day.

@rob666 you say that large numbers no longer go because the "one price fits all policy" doesn't fit all. I'm sure this effects some, but I put to you the absolutely dier marketing over the last few years is much more to blame. Just look at last season - the TV advert was for Valhalla. It didn't tell you what the ride actually was, and unless you got a magnifying glass out you wouldn't know where it was (take a look:
From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8Dh9xFz34Y
). The park had a few bus shelter adverts around - they were literally a picture of people standing on-top of PMBO (not in the train and not evident that it was in the park) with the tagline "This should be you"?! It makes no sense. If you search Blackpool Pleasure Beach on socials you rarely get anything official or complimentary. My #1 hit is Scott from Your Experience Guide rubbing his chin and complaining about stuff. Marketing is meant to enthuse people to visit, nothing released by the park in the last 4 or 5 years has done this.

I could also go on about brand recognition too, but I'm sure you are bored enough with what I have written!
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While I don't disagree that Blackpool Pleasure Beach could do with some brand work to change the park's image, I do disagree that pay-one-price only is right for Blackpool just because it works for other theme parks in the UK.

As much as you dismiss the "BPB is different" rhetoric, I'd personally argue that it is different, and as said before, that is entirely down to its location and typical clientele. Unlike other theme parks in the UK, Blackpool Pleasure Beach is located right in the centre of a massive holiday resort town where it may attract considerable passing traffic and may be considered more of a constituent part of a wider package of attractions rather than an attraction in its own right. Lots of families will probably leave their holiday cottage, B&B or whatever and want to spend a day on the Blackpool seafront doing a wide variety of different attractions as a wide family unit, and a trip to Blackpool Pleasure Beach for a casual ride or two may be part of that day. However, it may not be the whole day; a family might also want to spend time on the beach, go to one of the piers, go to Sandcastle Waterpark, go to the Tower and the Merlin attractions or do something else entirely.

The typical crowd in Blackpool will also be a lot more multi-generational. Lots of families might bring grandparents along to Blackpool with them, and these grandparents will probably want to spend as much time with their children and grandchildren as possible during the holiday. These grandparents may not necessarily want to pay £40 to get into BPB and not ride anything, but the younger members of the family may not want to leave the grandparents back at the B&B or holiday cottage just to visit BPB, so in that scenario, Pleasure Beach miss out on both the primary spend from the whole family's admission fees and the potential secondary spend of the grandparents possibly buying things like food & drink.

As much as the park's ride lineup may match that of Alton Towers or Thorpe Park on paper, that doesn't really matter to your average multi-generational family holidaying in Blackpool or going for a summer day out. Visitors to Blackpool are likely to view Pleasure Beach as merely one part of the wider Blackpool experience, and these people may not want to spend a whole day at the Pleasure Beach and pay £40 for a full theme park day. People who visit Alton Towers, Thorpe Park, Chessington et al are most likely going out of their way to visit these parks as attractions in their own right. Alton, Staines and Kingston-upon-Thames are not multi-attraction family holiday resorts, and the locations of the theme parks within them are within suburbs or villages rather than the busy, built-up town centres. You have to make an effort to go to these parks as attractions in their own right, whereas if you're staying in Blackpool, the Pleasure Beach is right on your doorstep, right in the centre of Blackpool, which allows for far more opportunity for it to be integrated into a day of numerous Blackpool attractions.

Anecdotally, I can personally raise the example of my aunt, uncle and young cousins. A couple of years back (I think it was 2022, possibly?), they went on holiday to Blackpool for a week or so. They took my aunt's parents with them, they stayed in a hotel for the week, and they did loads of the Blackpool attractions; things like the Tower, the piers, and the Merlin attractions, amongst others, were all visited during their holiday. My aunt said to me that they considered going to Blackpool Pleasure Beach while they were there, but were put off by it being "ridiculously expensive" for all six of them to go in when her parents wouldn't ride anything. They are the sort of group who might have been tempted by a walk-around pass, and they are exactly the sort of custom that Blackpool Pleasure Beach is missing out on while they pursue sole pay-per-ride.

In terms of why the Merlin attractions changing pricing model has not generated the same discontent; I'd argue that changing to a model of individually paid-for attractions actually suits the average Blackpool visitor better than the previous pricing model, as having individual attraction prices cooperates very nicely with those families who may want to experience a wide variety of different attractions during a day or holiday in Blackpool. Merlin actually made things more appealing for the average Blackpool visitor in that regard. Whereas I'd argue that Blackpool Pleasure Beach's pay-one-price only model is making things less appealing for the average Blackpool visitor.

I'm not advocating for a return to "the good old days" of the 90s, when the park had free entry and sole pay-per-ride, as I think that an all-guns-blazing return to the entry policy of that era would be problematic for different reasons. However, I would absolutely advocate for the return of a walk-around pass for a small fee and a form of pay-per-ride coexisting alongside the pay-one-price wristbands, as I think that this would be a more attractive proposition for the average clientele in Blackpool.
 
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Matt N said:
In terms of why the Merlin attractions changing pricing model has not generated the same discontent
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And that is 100% my point. Merlin fundamentally changed what the Tower was, and as a result massively increased the price, but this was managed well by them which ultimately reduced the volume of discontent. BPB fundamentally changed the way people would enter the park - it was not managed and therefore we now have the discontent we see regularly.

Matt N said:
As much as the park's ride lineup may match that of Alton Towers or Thorpe Park on paper, that doesn't really matter to your average multi-generational family holidaying in Blackpool or going for a summer day out.
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The concept of "multi generational families" holidaying in Blackpool being the core target demographic for BPB is an interesting one. I would argue that the core demographic for BPB is families with children aged 5 - 16.

Matt N said:
My aunt said to me that they considered going to Blackpool Pleasure Beach while they were there, but were put off by it being "ridiculously expensive" for all six of them to go in when her parents wouldn't ride anything
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This is also a fundamental part of my point. When they moved to the POP entry system they needed to 'up their game' in terms of a non-ride offering (ie. entertainment) and use this to aid the mindset change to make the perceived value worth it.

I think if you look at the economics of running a park like BPB, and the changes and challenges a town like Blackpool has - the sensible thing for the park to do is to market the place as a destination park. I know a lot of people that detest Blackpool as a town, but visit BPB. I would suggest there is a really strong business case to change the mindset that you go to Blackpool and then visit BPB to you book to go to BPB which just happens to be in Blackpool. I can see elements of them trying do do this, but they are doing a really bad job of it.
 
I know an awful lot of people that hate Blackpool, and never visit the Beach.
A lot of it is down to class, Blackpool is seen as a cheap, beery, working class resort, it always has been.
The affluent working class went off to Spain and never came back.
Middle class northerners just will not be seen in the place.
No point in advertising to them, they won't come regardless.
Lytham St Annes, and Thornton Cleveleys possibly, but Blackpool, never.
I know lots and lots of them.
 
rob666 said:
I know an awful lot of people that hate Blackpool, and never visit the Beach.
A lot of it is down to class, Blackpool is seen as a cheap, beery, working class resort, it always has been.
The affluent working class went off to Spain and never came back.
Middle class northerners just will not be seen in the place.
No point in advertising to them, they won't come regardless.
Lytham St Annes, and Thornton Cleveleys possibly, but Blackpool, never.
I know lots and lots of them.
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This middle class, John Lewis & Waitrose Partnership shopping, goose was pleasantly surprised when we visited Blackpool this August. We visited the day after seeing Oppenheimer in IMAX, we stayed over in Manchester. We expected trash and scruffiness and we're pleasantly surprised. Actually we really like the place and definitely plan to make a return visit this season.

Caveat, we like theme parks and rollercoasters, so we were always predisposed to a visit anyway.
 
Sorry Goosey, I don't want to appear speciesist, but I did mean humans.
Bernard on the FY4 bar has a real gull hate as well....go have a word on your next visit.
I would guess that of the fifty or so customers in the Ribble Valley (Booths, not Waitrose) of mine, one or two have been to the Beach, once or twice, with either the cubs or brownies.
Towers has a very broad middle class streak, the Beach has always been a very much working class park.
The gating and paid entry got rid of much of the lower order rabble, but as long as I buy a season pass they still let me in.
 
rob666 said:
Towers has a very broad middle class streak, the Beach has always been a very much working class park.
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You are right. But it's a bit bizarre when you look at some of the facilities BPB have implemented (the new shop in the casino building as an example) - it does look like they are going after that Booths audience more than the Aldi one. They just seem to be a very confused place at the moment with absolutely no clear strategy.
 
That is because a single unaccountable individual calls all the shots.
In simple terms, a very large number of people in the north west would not be seen dead at the Beach, whatever they do to it.
Blackpool and the Beach have had a reputation for cheap and cheesy since the second world war, it hasn't changed any.
Often discussed with many of my punters, almost on a daily basis sometimes, they love my trip reports.
Naked man cling filmed to a lamp post by the Tower...more than once, rubber men (with wristband) queueing up for the big one, men in gimp suits being fed breakfast beer through a straw on the Velvet frontage, young ladies "phone number pegging" the backs of shirts of young men...that Blackpool fashion was quite amusing...all decent stuff.
It has been scrubbed up nicely in parts, but there are large doses of rot...the train "scenery" comes to mind by the hotels for example.
The whole area could be improved for literally a few thousand quid.
They have tried to go upmarket, but most of the locals know better apparently.
 
rob666 said:
I know an awful lot of people that hate Blackpool, and never visit the Beach.
A lot of it is down to class, Blackpool is seen as a cheap, beery, working class resort, it always has been.
The affluent working class went off to Spain and never came back.
Middle class northerners just will not be seen in the place.
No point in advertising to them, they won't come regardless.
Lytham St Annes, and Thornton Cleveleys possibly, but Blackpool, never.
I know lots and lots of them.
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Is this maybe the reasoning for dropping Blackpool from the branding? ;)
 
Very fair point.
Their main catchment is Lancashire, Yorks (god bless em) and the Mcr/Liverpool conurbations.
In most of those areas, Blackpool is seen as a bit of a hole, so dropping the actual word from the ads might be a good thing.
 
rob666 said:
Very fair point.
Their main catchment is Lancashire, Yorks (god bless em) and the Mcr/Liverpool conurbations.
In most of those areas, Blackpool is seen as a bit of a hole, so dropping the actual word from the ads might be a good thing.
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They used to attract alot of folks from Scotland as well back in the 90s. I've no idea if this is still the case as Flamingo Land is closer and has a solid offering these days.
 
They still do suffer the tartan invasion in most of the Scottish school holidays, but they aren't really the main catchment.
The mighty tartan invasions are usually a couple of weeks before the English equivalents.
 
Relife said:
They used to attract alot of folks from Scotland as well back in the 90s. I've no idea if this is still the case as Flamingo Land is closer and has a solid offering these days.
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I’m not sure if Flamingo Land is actually closer.

Google maps shows that from Glasgow it’s 3hr 10m to Pleasure Beach compared to 4hr to Flamingo Land.

Edinburgh to PB is 3hr 44m and to FL it’s 4hr 14m. But I think the important thing is that if you are driving that distance to go to a park there’s much more at Blackpool to make a weekend of it, there’s a range of hotels in the area, other attractions, and the town feels more like a destination to visit, whereas Flamingo Land feels more like an isolated park.
 
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