Ignorance is another thing that really ****s me off
Merlin still claim to be "second only to Disney" remember? With that in mind surely they should be creating attractions better than Universal, regardless of attendance? Hell, even on par with them would be good.
You seem to be ignorant toward the way the business works.
Merlin is second to Disney in terms of the number of guests that they host. The difference of course, is that Disney hosts more people, over a smaller number of properties.
While both operators operate 11/12 parks each (including Disney's joint ventures), Merlin has over 100 midway attractions in addition to this, so the number of "park" visitors is much lower and the capex decisions are reflected in this.
In addition, Disney is a destination park where per-cap spending is infinitely higher than at a Merlin park because there is so much more to the product than the parks (hotels, water parks, dining etc) - they're true resorts at the end of the day, they attract families who are going to spunk $1000s on a holiday, whereas at Thorpe you have some kid on a school trip with a fiver in their pocket for some donuts. That's just the way it is and will continue to be so, forever.
Further - the Florida parks operate year round, whatever Merlin build sits idle for 4/5 months a year - your opportunity for ROI is reduced.
The Universal offering is somewhere in the middle, but they're still huge players in comparison.
And Transformers cost under $100m, with a much bigger building, with the ride on two floors. The scale of it is huge, where as this is quite small. If they made Transformers the size of DBGT, the cost probably wouldn't have been too much different.
Each Transformers ride cost $100m million to build, with R&D split between Singapore and the US.
That's not a slam on Merlin, quite the opposite. There are a few things that I don't like as both a visitor and as a shareholder, but one thing I will defend them on is where they spend their money - they're pretty smart most of the time. They build what a park and its market can support.
Badly financed parks, or parks that over spend on ride hardware never work out. Look at Six Flags ten years ago, or the Walibi group after they bought the SF parks, look at Geagua Lake, look at Hard Rock Park. Look at Warner Madrid. The examples of how not to do it are everywhere and for all their faults, Merlin are very safe with their investments.
Look how big Valhalla is and how much money it eats for every second that it's open and how much money it costs in maintenance every time it's closed. There's a reason we haven't seen such an elaborate ride built in this country since then.
If you spend too much money, you are going out of business or you're going to hinder your prospects for long term investment and that's just the way it is.
Here endeth the lesson. Another one same time next week.
