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Drayton Manor Park

Can someone explain to me why the Bryan’s financial affairs were so bad in the last ten years?

From what I could see it wasn’t an issue with attendance as the park, although not rammed, always felt like it had enough people to keep it ticking over- more people than at Paultons for example.

It must have been another reason. Is anyone able elaborate on this?
 
Enter Valhalla said:
Can someone explain to me why the Bryan’s financial affairs were so bad in the last ten years?

From what I could see it wasn’t an issue with attendance as the park, although not rammed, always felt like it had enough people to keep it ticking over- more people than at Paultons for example.

It must have been another reason. Is anyone able elaborate on this?
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It's an enigma for sure, but I've heard suggestions that the construction of the hotel financially crippled the park due to the demand not being high enough to justify the investment. I've also heard it said that the investment into what is now Accelerator was not as successful as they'd hoped, which stimulated their decision to mostly focus on Thomas Land.

I think the thing that ultimately sealed their fate was the Splash Canyon incident, though. Before that, I think it would be fair to say that the park was ticking over. Perhaps not thriving or doing anything particularly exciting, but certainly surviving and managing to exist, stay afloat and maintain a consistent offering from one year to the next. I apologise if this sounds unduly harsh, but I'd say that most non-Merlin parks in the UK, aside from a few exceptions, were and in many cases still are in the same boat, so until that incident, I wouldn't have said that Drayton's predicament appeared markedly negative compared to other parks in the UK.
 
Yeah seemed to be a build up with the final straws being the flooding in 2020 which damaged buildings and left them unable to open in February half term.

Then the pandemic were unlike a lot of parks they couldn't just furlough everyone as they needed staff to keep the zoo animals looked after, and no doubt animal food and any vets bills wouldn't have been cheap.
 
DistortAMG said:
Sorry mate. Don't take it personally. The hosts are excellent. You guys are just hamstrung by the powers that be.
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No need to apologise, you did nothing wrong :), anyway, back onto the Discussion now. I wonder if they'll do anything to Sheriffs Showdowns exterior since it's not looking great this year ever since the top section of theming was removed.
 
Enter Valhalla said:
Can someone explain to me why the Bryan’s financial affairs were so bad in the last ten years?

From what I could see it wasn’t an issue with attendance as the park, although not rammed, always felt like it had enough people to keep it ticking over- more people than at Paultons for example.

It must have been another reason. Is anyone able elaborate on this?
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I've been stumped by this the past day but since the hotel has just been mentioned the park's decline has clicked with me again.

The hotel was Drayton's largest single investment back in 2011, a sensible move after Thomas Land proved to be popular. However it took a while for the park to repay the loans for the hotel leading to low investment in the park, which led to the development of 2015 and 2017 into Thomas Land, low CapEx but reliable returns.

There then were the plans for a replacement for Buffalo in 2018 with an S&S family suspended coaster. But I'm guessing it was cancelled in large part due to the incident with Splash Canyon in 2017, which caused financial difficulties for the park.

Then the park had to contend with Storm Dennis in February of 2020 that damaged many of the park assets, yet more money down the drain. Setting up the inevitable when the country went into lockdown stopping nearly all cashflow into the business with considerable debts to repay...

Leading Drayton into administration. A business that didn't have the backing to take the financial hit. All UK parks were severely harmed in the lockdowns of 2020, just that the events predating the pandemic left Drayton Manor in such a precarious situation.
 
It seems that it was a series of unfortunate events which led to what happened. Certainly from 2012 to 2020, it felt pretty dire with rides closing with no replacements, maintenance clearly being neglected and a general lack of atmosphere.

It perhaps explains Paultons’ reluctance to build a hotel, as that seems to be where things started to go wrong for the Bryans.
 
With the rides open currently at weekends to 9pm on Saturdays and 8pm on Sunday’s the ride availability is the worst I ever seen at the park.
Starting with Thomas land
James and the red Balloon
EC8669BA-CDE0-4079-9B39-11746E27EFC6.jpeg
Blue Mountain Engines
E4BB8048-D8A7-421B-A06D-6EE60CBD3245.jpeg
Then 1 member of staff was rotating every hour from Cranky and rocking Bulstrode
1EC7B575-1A02-412B-8895-0948E70C845A.jpeg
EE1C478E-7C97-4C65-A474-28EC1A000364.jpeg
Rapids is still closed
31974EA3-1A55-4F69-A1BA-F95ADCA9C787.jpeg5FABCE85-53A4-4E4A-AC5D-9965828FA769.jpeg
Also the train
B15AD038-5D60-4150-8235-03EE6B493960.jpeg
Loki
AC416029-2D61-4688-B54D-590012621749.jpeg
Dodgems
E21A4EA7-1EE3-484D-95A9-443378C0D6A2.jpeg
Only plus point Flying Dutchman been fixed today and was testing
213EE4E0-CC13-4E21-BCF4-7DFE7F3650F1.jpeg
 
With the labour-intensive Rapids being shut and one ride operator alternating between two rides as if it's some fairground definitely makes it look like staffing issues.

Whereas it looks the first image is down to mechanical issues. Still considering Summer is Drayton's peak trading season, you'd think they would been more on it with ride availability. Not a good sign if their planning their Halloween offerings this year when staffing levels will be even lower...
 
There was 4 maintenance men working on the Flying Dutchman
F8515782-C53A-4543-BA90-608AEFC3B72E.jpeg
Then when they were testing it just the bloke to the left testing it.
The worst thing the rapids have been shut at for 3 weeks.
I think it must be staffing issues as guests are happy the park is open 10am and by the time they cleared all the queue lines and emptied the park it must be 10pm on a Saturday and 9pm on a Sunday and some staff wouldn’t get home much before 11pm on Saturday and 10pm on Sunday and all for minimum wage.
 
BigShadowtinytree said:
I saw that, the person posted anonymously and said under the new ownership many staff are losing their motivation and have low morale. Most on zero hour contracts too..
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By “new ownership”, do you mean the recent buyout of the Looping Group or the Looping Group in general?

Sorry if this seems like a random question, but on an unrelated note, did DMP recently introduce Fastrack? Or did I make that up?
 
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