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Merlin Entertainments: General Discussion

I think Merlin are financially in the poo poo. Years of misman
John_P said:
Only renewed my Merlin Pass this week and now the only places I use it outside of the theme parks will no longer be valid from 1st January 2026.

Hadn't realised but Merlin had handed operating control of the Sandcastle back to Blackpool Council quite recently as well.
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If you bought it online you should be able to cancel within 14 days
 
Jb85 said:
Seems like something you would do when you are preparing to float. Or split the business up
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I can't see them floating Merlin, especially as they not long took it private because they had less control over business (which all three current owners had large stakes in anyway). I do think however that splitting the business up isn't entirely of the cards, I don't think it's something that'll happen instantly but I could see them split into two different companies.
Structure would be something like
A business with a name like Lego attractions group - take all the LEGOLAND parks, LEGO discovery centre's and a the chunk of Merlin magic making that designs stuff for Lego parks. This part is the bit I assume Kirkbi would take, and I imagine is close, if not, 50% of profit out of Merlin.
And then perhaps the other part that may stay called Merlin or they may rename (bring back the Tussauds group name maybe?), I assume the other owners would take this part, perhaps bringing another owner onboard to help finance. This would be everything else.
This honestly wouldn't surprise me, and this shedding of loss making attractions and franchising names could all be part of a long term strategy to head in this direction.
 
Why would you want to buy the theme parks, isn’t the land under Alton, Chessington and Thorpe owned by a 3rd party?

A bit like buying a football club and not owning the ground. Utter madness.
 
Ash said:
A bit like buying a football club and not owning the ground. Utter madness.
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With all due respect, it's the norm with ice hockey with the team renting ice time at a ice rink which I know sounds mad but there you go.
 
Ash said:
Why would you want to buy the theme parks, isn’t the land under Alton, Chessington and Thorpe owned by a 3rd party?

A bit like buying a football club and not owning the ground. Utter madness.
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A bit like Wimbledon?
A lot of american football teams have jumped grounds as well, it happens, renting!
I think Tesco did very well out of renting early on as well, frees up capital for other things.
 
rob666 said:
A bit like Wimbledon?
A lot of american football teams have jumped grounds as well, it happens, renting!
I think Tesco did very well out of renting early on as well, frees up capital for other things.
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Not to mention a good portion of the British population buy houses/flats etc that they lease the ground of.
 
The difference is that most of those situations are part of the deal. You buy your property knowing it’s leasehold or you finance your new stadium in a similar way. Merlin used to own the freeholds to that land. They went to the trouble of actively pursuing selling it off to release capital and now operate on medium term leases.

Since they’ve already sold off that family silver, they seem to have needed to move to even more radical options to how generate more capital, ie the Sealife sell off.
 
venny said:
Since they’ve already sold off that family silver, they seem to have needed to move to even more radical options to how generate more capital, ie the Sealife sell off.
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Sea-Life centres and Midway hub attractions were a Varney legacy and always a bit of a distraction, with Merlin themselves getting their start in aquariums and dungeons.

Varney famously challenged people to walk out of his midway attractions not having already bought tickets to visit the others in some sort of bundle deal. He saw the midways as the true profit spinners, with the resorts as handy anchors. A proliferation of many acceptable attractions, rather than a few dazzling ones. The reverse appears to be true for Merlin Entertainments now, they aspire to be a destinations company.

Attractions like The Bear Grylls Adventure are likely never to have turned a profit. In the actual case of Bear Grylls, it was built at the behest of Blackstone who had then recently acquired The NEC Group, to attempt to encourage day time, regular, family visits to the NEC. If it weren't for the pandemic, I'm sure that this offering would have been shored up by a small Sea-Life Centre and one other attraction on the same site. It is no coincidence that the Birmingham Legoland Discovery Centre, which also opened in 2018, was built into another NEC Group owned property (the NIA).

The Midways experiment is coming to an end. I don't know what is next. I'm hoping a focus on destinations and resorts, time will tell.
 
GooseOnTheLoose said:
Attractions like The Bear Grylls Adventure are likely never to have turned a profit. In the actual case of Bear Grylls, it was built at the behest of Blackstone who had then recently acquired The NEC Group, to attempt to encourage day time, regular, family visits to the NEC. If it weren't for the pandemic, I'm sure that this offering would have been shored up by a small Sea-Life Centre and one other attraction on the same site. It is no coincidence that the Birmingham Legoland Discovery Centre, which also opened in 2018, was built into another NEC Group owned property (the NIA).
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I swear Bear Grylls was planned and built during the period of time after Blackstone had divested after making Merlin go public, and before they would later re-acquire them to take them private again in 2019.
 
AT86 said:
I would imagine the 2019 buyout which added £2billion of new debt, doubling Merlin’s overall debt is likely more of a driver to them wanting to generate more capital than the Tussauds leaseback deal.
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The leaseback deal was also Merlin. It was pretty much the first thing they did, in order to finance the purchase of Tussauds.
 
This feels to me very much like Merlin is going to splinter into two companies, with all the Legolands under one group which will be fully owned by Kirkbi.

I can see the second company then either being fully taken over by a rival operator (Six Flags, Loopings, etc) or the individual parks and attractions sold off to different interests.
 
Squiggs said:
The leaseback deal was also Merlin. It was pretty much the first thing they did, in order to finance the purchase of Tussauds.
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Yes sorry that was clumsy wording by me. By Tussauds leaseback deal I meant the leaseback was initiated by Merlin to facilitate the purchase of The Tussaud’s Group :)
 
havaska said:
This feels to me very much like Merlin is going to splinter into two companies, with all the Legolands under one group which will be fully owned by Kirkbi.

I can see the second company then either being fully taken over by a rival operator (Six Flags, Loopings, etc) or the individual parks and attractions sold off to different interests.
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Agreed if definitely feels like a break up of the group as we see it
 
Just a general observation/thought.

I find my enthusiasm & excitement curbed for particularly Thorpe Park (but also the rest of Merlin). It’s just simply “open”, no new things to do, no events to change things up every few months, no dramas or issues.

No 2025 TV advert, no real advertisement. No communication from parks e.g passholder page.

Simply there’s nothing going on and nothing going to happen in the near future (excluding Halloween). There’s no evolving, it’s a difficult one as we had a period of investment and events. To simply going back to basics and providing what they have already.

This is my first season since becoming a passholder which there has been no events or new attraction to keep it entertaining. I suppose what I’m asking, is this normal? Down periods in years gone by, with not much happening.
 
I'm increasingly seeing this season as a "fallow season", or a "rest season" if you like, while Merlin gets its house in order, financially or otherwise. As far as entertainment in parks goes, I expect to see entertainment (whether that's a revival of previous events such as Oktoberfest or new events) ramp up next season now that RWS Global are onboard.
 
The big new ride is the event this year.
The Octoberfest event last year was a shambles in my eyes, laughably poor.
Season passes do seem to take some of the fun out of visiting though...very normal to be a little less impressed with operations once you have been a few times.

It could be much worse for you though, you could have a Blackpool pass, where half the rides are routinely closed.
At least Thorpe has reasonable operations on most rides, if not the new headliner.
 
Looks like Merlin have launched ‘3 month passes’ across their 4 UK theme parks today.

£59pp, valid for one park for 3 months (with a couple of exclusion dates in late August and peak October).

Available until 31st July.

Wonder if they are seeing a drop in renewals and hoping to catch folks wanting days out over the summer?
 
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