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Blackpool Pleasure Beach: 2023 Discussion

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Matt N said:
One question I have is; why can’t Blackpool function with both pay per ride and wristbands?

Many seaside parks in the UK do, and places like the Fun Spot parks in Orlando do as well, and I’d argue this could offer the best of both worlds. Those who want a fuller theme park day could still buy a wristband, whereas those who only want a couple of rides could still only do a couple of rides, and both pricing models could exist in harmony!

Admittedly, I think this would require some pricing changes for both models, but I think it could work!
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It could, it used to for a while. The trouble was they priced pay per ride out of the market with ridiculous prices.

They have the scanners in place so it would be easy enough to implement some kind of electronic token system . Charge a tenner to get in for those that don't want a wristband but give them £10 in ride tokens.

But it will only work if the pay per ride price is affordable. It would be difficult to get the balance right but I am sure a hybrid system would work if they could get the pricing structure right.
 
jon81uk said:
But if offered in addition to wristbands (as BPB used to) it can increase value for money. If you only want to do one or two rides then you could be £35-44 for a wristband, or £20 just to do a few rides, before you walk up the prom and do something else in Blackpool.

Or for your Winter Wonderland example, many people would do one ride, some ice skating, maybe watch the circus and then go along to the shops on Oxford St. If you were forced to pay £40 just to enter winter wonderland many people wouldn't do the ice skating or circus, or they might not go at all as the price is too high.

I went to Adventure Island at Southend a few months ago. Its £25 for a wristband, or free entry and (and this isn't properly mentioned on the website) £2.50 per ride. We only wanted to do one coaster, so £2.50 each for a wander round and a ride on Rage. If the only option (like at BPB) was a wristband, we wouldn't have even entered the park (and we also spent £2 on doughnuts).
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I think that Fantasy Island have a system that may well suit some better. Free entry to the park for everyone and there are different types of wristband available for riders, ranging from the Little Explorer wristband for small kids, the Discovery wristband which gives access to the family rides only, and the Adventurer wristband which gives access to the all rides including the family ones and the thrill ones. The wrist bands are all priced accordingly so you can pay which type you want and they also offer a pay per ride system as well I believe.

Recently I watched the old BBC documentary on Blackpool from the 1997 season I think it was, and what struck me the most was the sheer amount of drunks and troublemakers they used to have when the park was free entry to visit. I guess that having an entry price helps keep out some of the rowdy and troublemaking groups but it seems that Pleasure Beach need to find a balance in making the park a more attractive option to those visiting the area and may make a spontaneous visit. The very high on the gate entry price must make a hell of a lot of people turn around and think “sod that”.
 
Shaggy_Dog_ said:
I think that Fantasy Island have a system that may well suit some better. Free entry to the park for everyone and there are different types of wristband available for riders, ranging from the Little Explorer wristband for small kids, the Discovery wristband which gives access to the family rides only, and the Adventurer wristband which gives access to the all rides including the family ones and the thrill ones. The wrist bands are all priced accordingly so you can pay which type you want and they also offer a pay per ride system as well I believe.

Recently I watched the old BBC documentary on Blackpool from the 1997 season I think it was, and what struck me the most was the sheer amount of drunks and troublemakers they used to have when the park was free entry to visit. I guess that having an entry price helps keep out some of the rowdy and troublemaking groups but it seems that Pleasure Beach need to find a balance in making the park a more attractive option to those visiting the area and may make a spontaneous visit. The very high on the gate entry price must make a hell of a lot of people turn around and think “sod that”.
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Before the pandemic BPB was already charging £10 entry to keep the trouble makers out. It’s possible to do a reasonable price for entry and pay per ride on top of that.

They also used to have childrens wristbands for access only for rides under a certain height restriction as you mentioned.
 
I wonder if an oyster card style system could work? You have your wristband or e-ticket, link it to your credit/ debit card, pay per ride up to a price cap and anything above that is free.
 
Matt N said:
One question I have is; why can’t Blackpool function with both pay per ride and wristbands?

Many seaside parks in the UK do, and places like the Fun Spot parks in Orlando do as well, and I’d argue this could offer the best of both worlds. Those who want a fuller theme park day could still buy a wristband, whereas those who only want a couple of rides could still only do a couple of rides, and both pricing models could exist in harmony!

Admittedly, I think this would require some pricing changes for both models, but I think it could work!
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One question, two linked answers.
Fraud by staff regarding ticket "abuse".
Push two kids through the turnstile together, pocket one ticket for resale via mates in Velvet.
Fraud by punters/local conners on the prom.
Photocopied/desktopped tickets with duplicate barcodes, some worked, some didn't...but the local conners had their money anyway.
I have seen both over the years.
Would love a return to a ppr option, I actually miss taking my wife round the rides, it is something we have done together for forty bloody years.
A book of white knuckle tickets in your wallet made you feel like a millionaire!
 
Zipperdipper said:
I wonder if an oyster card style system could work? You have your wristband or e-ticket, link it to your credit/ debit card, pay per ride up to a price cap and anything above that is free.
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Dreamland in Margate used a barcoded plastic card which the tickets are loaded onto.

I think this also stops the staff stealing the tickets as @rob666 discusses above, because the guest just retains the card.
 
I think Southport pleasure land used something similar until COVID, I do wonder if they will go back to that. Anyway I think it's something Blackpool should look at but I don't think they will.
 
Were looking far to deep here… were ina world with apple pay/ wallet it can easily be an app operated system with a Qr code / barcode or just contactless payment options at ride entrances… no cash no tickets no fraud
 
Rob F said:
Were looking far to deep here… were ina world with apple pay/ wallet it can easily be an app operated system with a Qr code / barcode or just contactless payment options at ride entrances… no cash no tickets no fraud
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Well, the Beach recently went cashless...
 
Rob F said:
Were looking far to deep here… were ina world with apple pay/ wallet it can easily be an app operated system with a Qr code / barcode or just contactless payment options at ride entrances… no cash no tickets no fraud
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The current BPB “wristband” is a ticket in Apple Wallet.
 
Skyscraper said:
Well, the Beach recently went cashless...
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You obviously haven't been recently...large numbers of shops, bars, arcades, stalls and a certain seafood bar are still more than happy to accept cold, hard, cash.
Reports of the Beach being dead yesterday...a sunny Friday at the end of June.
Something wrong with their pricing policy perhaps.
 
Lots going on in this topic !

@Plastic Person - I do agree each of those examples that you posted are different, but irrespective of their differences, the fact that they all compete for leisure spend makes them bedfellows in the simplest of terms.

shakey said:
If a family goes to something like go ape for example, they will be entertained for the entire time they are there (most likely), and not all family members need to take part. Some will be happy to watch and it costs them nothing. They will also possibly turn it into a day out by doing other free stuff like taking a picnic or enjoying nearby countryside.

A theme park is not a full days entertainment if it is busy. It is a day of standing in queues, interrupted with the occasional 2 minute ride.
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Are people so clinical about reviewing the time they spend on park like that? When we (literally meaning us) visit the park, it's not just about rides - we walk past rides with no queues to find more beer ... It's about spending time with your friends. Queues are part of the experience, no one goes expecting there not be any ... although more than possible at PB at the moment ! I know we tend to go on quieter days, but our long breaks from rides in Crevettes would be spent in queues on more normal attendance days, chatting about whatnot. A 30 minute queue for Ice Blast is nowhere near as toxic for the once a year crowd as it is to us veterans. It's a time to chat to your friends, hell ... even share some anticipation about shooting 200ft in the air at the speed of a wounded express elevator.

Your Go Ape experience jars with every time I've done it. Unless you're the first group out, the whole thing is marred by 50% of your day being spent hanging around at the bottom of trees making small talk with strangers, whilst drinking odd tasting water out of paper cones ... whilst some fat apathetic teenager spends far too long climbing a rope ladder. The zip lines are the 'signature' of those courses and the 3 or 4 of those collectively last perhaps 2 minutes.

The park certainly was quiet yesterday. So much so that Big Pizza didn't start making food until gone 1300 because they didn't have any customers. The 1100 opening probably doesn't help them on that front, but it was pretty odd to see. Everything seemed to be running, no waits of any kind really. Valhalla was testing pretty consistently.

Is pricing a factor ? Potentially ... I do think that what they have is perhaps the least worst option - sometimes you have to pick that. We've done POP vs. PPR or a hybrid of the two so many times, I don't have anything new to say. I think the main danger with a switch back to PPR is that your per cap spend would reduce, but the number of caps would not increase sufficiently to make more money.

@jon81uk It's a fair point that Adventure Island makes a hybrid of the two work, even if it is a stealth option. I do think it would be harder to achieve at the Pleasure Beach though, because the scale (value) of your smallest ride vs. your largest ride is so much different, so having a flat fee applied to the Bus in Nick Land and Valhalla is tricky. Furthermore, if you make the Bus cheap and Valhalla expensive, you run the risk of a family opting for a kid to do 5 cheap rides and a teenager doing 2 white knuckle rides ... which both al-a-carte options costing less than POP/wristband.

@rob666 I am not unsympathetic to the non-rider thing, I just think they're struggling to find a solution for it that doesn't cause them other problems. Again, I think it's a calculated bet.

For example ... If you have a family of four with grandma in tow, I think this is the thinking:

Currently
Scenario 1 - family of four go into the park, grandma goes on the pier and meets them at Pablo's later ... ~£180 revenue
Scenario 2 - family of four go into the park, they suck it up and grandma gets a wristband but doesn't ride much ... ~£220 revenue

What is being suggested / proposed
Scenario 3 - family of four go into the park to ride, grandma gets a £10 'no rides' option ... ~£190 revenue

The unintended consequence of the above which I think the park are nervous about
Scenario 4 - family of four go into the park, kids ride with dad, but mum & grandma get a £10 'no rides' option ... ~£140 revenue
Scenario 5 - family of four go into the park, kids ride, but mum, dad & grandma get a £10 'no rides' option ... ~£110 revenue

... and if I wasn't so hungover I would show the above for PPR. It's similar, a variation on a theme.

At the moment, Pleasure Beach are betting on the fact that people will spend ~£40 on POP because it's the only option and they work on the basis that if you only offer POP you will make more money with less people over an al-a-carte system whereby you get lots more people, but more than half of them are finding a way to consume and spend less. The danger is that you get more, but not sufficiently more to make up the gap, irrespective of secondary spend.

It's hard to know how effective that strategy is without knowing how many people look at it but ultimately don't pay it. The park have instrumentation on the website to understand their conversion rate and abandoned baskets, I am sure (hoping) that they use it.

I don't usually slag them off too much on the closing time changes, but what they have done with LNR this evening is absolutely disgraceful and someone should be shot on the Grand National steps at dawn. We can only hope @Coaster was planning to attend and will be delivering both barrels.

Now you all know what things would look like if @Matt N hacked my account.
 
Rick said:
Currently
Scenario 1 - family of four go into the park, grandma goes on the pier and meets them at Pablo's later ... ~£180 revenue
Scenario 2 - family of four go into the park, they suck it up and grandma gets a wristband
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Trouble is I suspect what’s happening is scenario 3: family don’t want to leave gran on the pier for 8 hours, don’t have the desire to pay full price for her as she won’t ride anything so don’t go in - £0 revenue.
 
Dave said:
Trouble is I suspect what’s happening is scenario 3: family don’t want to leave gran on the pier for 8 hours, don’t have the desire to pay full price for her as she won’t ride anything so don’t go in - £0 revenue.
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Quite possibly so ... But the volume that happens in is so important to understand the overall impact, it's really tricky to say. There are so many iterations of that too, it's not a binary thing.

As outlined in my scenario 4 and 5, creating a scenario for the above to work for grandma potentially creates space for mum and dad to take advantage of the same rate and your admission revenue for that family is decimated. None of the scenarios happen in isolation, it's a complicated model.

Nor does this happen only within the context of the Pleasure Beach. It's increasingly shifting into the same space as other attractions of this type. If it's a day family day trip (rather than a day visit whilst you're in town for the week), you probably can leave grandma at home watching Bargain Hunt.

I still think that they quite rightly assume that for families on holiday who are doing various things throughout their week, if the Pleasure Beach is your thing, you make it work with the options that you are presented with, rather than missing out.
 
Just on the off chance here, BPB should offer a 1h and 2h ticket activated as they ho through, it could work exactly the same as a full day band but just have a validity period, that way catching the tourist trade who dont want a full day out
 
Rob F said:
Just on the off chance here, BPB should offer a 1h and 2h ticket activated as they ho through, it could work exactly the same as a full day band but just have a validity period, that way catching the tourist trade who dont want a full day out
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Imagine how annoyed people would be if they bought a 1hr ticket and then found that it’s a busy day and after queuing up they only get to go on one or two rides. Timed tickets work for things like entry to a soft play park, not a theme park where queues and the amount of actual rides you could go on would be very unpredictable.
 
Yeah but if its an on the day ticket, times would be displayed before purchase… were talking about how off peak the park can tempt more people in and increase revenue.

And say were talking £10 for 1-2h i think it’s reasonable
 
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