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Food & Beverage 2018

During busier periods last year most of the fast food outlets were closed. During the last weekend of Scarefest the park was rammed and food outlets were overflowing with queues, yet you walk into an area like Dark Forest and not a single outlet is open. Madness.

I miss Fish and Chips, they did quite nice food in there at a reasonable price.
 
I don't get it really, surely with the prices they charge they don't need to be that busy to either break even or turn a profit on the outlets in Dark Forest. Seems like they're closing them as a way to cut staff costs without thinking that "hang on they were actually profitable, so we've less money by closing them not more".

I liked them for simply getting some chips as a snack to see me through to a bigger meal, either pizza or chicken usually.
 
AstroDan said:
To be frank, the reason Alton Towers are not opening Courtyard Tavern (i.e. adding Smokehouse), not opening Ripsaw Café, not opening Towers Street Bar & Grill, not opening Wobble World Café, not opening the Dark Forest kiosk outside of summer/Scarefest, not opening Spinball Noodles and not opening Rehydrator (lower floor) is due to the dropping budgets at the park over the past few years.

Even though the number of guests in 2018 should, quite obviously, be greater than any of the past two years, the food and beverage offering will, for now at least, remain stubbornly limited.

The most worrying thing of all is that in the year that they are adding a £15m rollercoaster experience, there's nothing else that seems to be happening in terms of operations to back that up...
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That is very worrying! Can I ask where all these extra visitors go if wicker man goes down? Oh sorry guys half our other attractions are SBNO

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It’s all a bit crap really isn’t it.....

If we all chip in a few quid and join with the other forum I am sure we may be able to but the place .....

In our dreams.
 
Actually not always, sometimes it is better to have 25 people paying £10 than 50 paying a fiver, if it was a pure income thing then yes, but not when you have to account from the additional staff needed to serve 50 people -assuming of course staffing levels are scaled, not necessarily the case with Merlin.
 
Food outlets, Towers St Grill included, are closed due to staffing cut backs. It's like the strategy of the park in general, they've "adjusted the cost base" and so sacrificed volume for margin on spending inside the park. They don't care about your experience because it's too late you're already in the park.

As I've said on the AP changes and Heide thread, the strategy seems to be to lure visitation to the park via smoke and mirrors pricing offers and bargain basement passes rather than putting on a good offer. Having the likes of Towers St Grill open and the Dark Forest fast food outlets on busy days is perfectly profitable, it's just not as supremely profitable as ramming thousands of people into Skelton staffed restaurants that queue out the door. They don't care if they sacrafice a few grand in sales, the margins are too great and will end up paying for next year's cereal box offers to tempt disgruntled visitors back.

Race to the bottom.
 
matthewgcole said:
Food outlets, Towers St Grill included, are closed due to staffing cut backs. It's like the strategy of the park in general, they've "adjusted the cost base" and so sacrificed volume for margin on spending inside the park. They don't care about your experience because it's too late you're already in the park.

As I've said on the AP changes and Heide thread, the strategy seems to be to lure visitation to the park via smoke and mirrors pricing offers and bargain basement passes rather than putting on a good offer. Having the likes of Towers St Grill open and the Dark Forest fast food outlets on busy days is perfectly profitable, it's just not as supremely profitable as ramming thousands of people into Skelton staffed restaurants that queue out the door. They don't care if they sacrafice a few grand in sales, the margins are too great and will end up paying for next year's cereal box offers to tempt disgruntled visitors back.

Race to the bottom.
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I thought they were only doing this because of the losses following June 2015 and that they would reverse the decisions when park visitation returned to a reasonably normal level?
 
GaryH said:
.... probably why it closed down then!
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Towers say on Twitter ADD not available for 2018. F+B option a really poor this season. Glad we always take a picnic and a flask!
 
All Day dining is not really worth it anyway, particularly as the park isn't open past 6pm. Basically you needed to spend so much time eating to get value I wouldn't ever get it.
 
delta79 said:
August 2017 according to his profile.

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Indeed. 22nd August 2017, to be exact. Have been a full-on enthusiast since about 2014, though.

I am aware that Merlin made some cuts prior to June 2015, such as the 11am ride openings in Dark Forest and CCL. However, I don't remember major cuts, like staff being sacked, ride closures and food outlet closures occurring until 2016.
 
A few years ago I bought ADD. It was great as we had breakfast in Towers St Grill in the morning before the park opened, lunch in Burger Kitchen, a snack in the afternoon and something before we left in the evening.

Since then, there's no breakfast before park opening, a list of exclusions has been put in place that's longer than a graphic novel, the food and bev outlets have diminished in number and they've started chasing you out the park with a broom at 4pm.

So unless you choose to stuff your face rather than ride coasters in the measly 6 hours you have in the park and want fried chicken for brunch and burgers for dinner, it's useless. So getting rid of it is a good thing, at least they're being honest that it's become a con.

Shame really as their own strategy now means I stuff myself full before I even get there, spam the coasters all day in the small amount of time I'm there and grab a McDonald's at Uttoxeter on the way home and rarely spend much in the park.
 
jon81uk said:
All Day dining is not really worth it anyway, particularly as the park isn't open past 6pm. Basically you needed to spend so much time eating to get value I wouldn't ever get it.
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People clearly abused it as well which may have been more of a factor, not to mention those ADD challenges people were doing just for the fun of it even if it meant throwing the food in the bin!
 
The quality of the now entirely Merlin in-house offering is completely inadequate and lacklustre. It requires major overhaul. The start of this was the removal of 3rd party brands (such as McDonalds and Pizza Hut) which were proven, reliable and standardised food outlets.

Catering options at foreign parks are far superior in their offering compared to the mainly Merlin UK parks. This is evidenced by the food quality at Heide Park which, as of 2 years ago, was far better than anything AT can rustle up these days.

With reference to ADD: I agree with the comments above. The amount of outlets open coupled with the limited opening hours means it's a silly concept.

Who goes to a park to stuff their faces anyway? :p

:)
 
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Non riders, they have to do something whist waiting. :D

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