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Thorpe Park: General Discussion

Thorpe Park

Rob said:
After reading the application, oh dear Thorpe, looks like you need to get your act together before Mr Varney intervenes! The Swarm really has been a flop for Thorpe but I'm really not sure turning it backwards and adding some additional theming is going to give the results they want. New theming is great though!

:)
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Care to share a quote? I can't find anything.
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Jared said:
Rob said:
After reading the application, oh dear Thorpe, looks like you need to get your act together before Mr Varney intervenes! The Swarm really has been a flop for Thorpe but I'm really not sure turning it backwards and adding some additional theming is going to give the results they want. New theming is great though!

:)
Click to expand...

Care to share a quote? I can't find anything.
Click to expand...

YSau1lQ.png

:)
 
Re: Thorpe Park

I can't copy text from the PDF for some reason but quotes such as "following a difficult season in a poor economic climate" and "marketing campaign for Swarm was not as successful as anticipated". They now need to "revisit the ride's image" by "increasing Swarm's thrill factor". It is "important to ensure the ride is a a success for the 2013 season" due to the investment Merlin made.

It basically reads as we messed up a little in 2012 and now we need to try and put things right as Merlin aren't happy.

:)
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Acknowledgements that Swarm failed. My word! Whatever next.
 
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In my opinion Thorpe need a massive re-brand. That would have been the perfect thing to do this year after a poor 2012.

:)
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Assuming that the Swarm campaign wasn't good enough was the reason Thorpe did poorly...

Probably nothing to do with half of London running off in Summer and the general lack of the park being any decent and making people want to return and spend money...
 
Re: Thorpe Park

AstroDan said:
Maybe it was just TOO viral...
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I see you point but surely that is the point of their marketing campaign... to reach as many people as possible no matter how? Although I can see your reasoning that perhaps there was just to much in our face marketing.
 
Thorpe Park

Hopefully this near miss will actually be a near-miss. We shall see when I head off to Thorpe for opening day next month to ride the Swarm backwards, or Mraws as I like to refer to it lol :p


Using Tapatalk...
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Will be interesting to see what they do with it, and how they cope with the back rows' demand. Mraws means Chav War.
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Themeparkmania said:
AstroDan said:
Maybe it was just TOO viral...
Click to expand...

I see you point but surely that is the point of their marketing campaign... to reach as many people as possible no matter how? Although I can see your reasoning that perhaps there was just to much in our face marketing.
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Theme Park Mania, I think you're misunderstanding why the Marketing failed. OK, so it might have reached X number of people, but at the end of the day it didn't interest enough people to buy tickets for the new ride. Obviously there were many other matters which need to be taken into account to explain why the park did so badly this year, but I know for a fact that the Marketing really didn't have an impact on my of my friends at college, and I presume most people of a similar age. It didn't really explain what the ride was!
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Quetzal said:
Themeparkmania said:
AstroDan said:
Maybe it was just TOO viral...
Click to expand...

I see you point but surely that is the point of their marketing campaign... to reach as many people as possible no matter how? Although I can see your reasoning that perhaps there was just to much in our face marketing.
Click to expand...

Theme Park Mania, I think you're misunderstanding why the Marketing failed. OK, so it might have reached X number of people, but at the end of the day it didn't interest enough people to buy tickets for the new ride. Obviously there were many other matters which need to be taken into account to explain why the park did so badly this year, but I know for a fact that the Marketing really didn't have an impact on my of my friends at college, and I presume most people of a similar age. It didn't really explain what the ride was!
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In my personal opinion I thought It was very strong, but as you said, people at colleges etc were not interested. I have just finished a marketing module in my degree and in comparison to what I had to do (market a tour for Rihanna) they ticked all the boxes. But I can understand why they are not reaching their targeted market, and in reality they have chosen one of the hardest pushed markets in recession, young adults.
 
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The marketing did fail in my eyes. As good as the viral was, I thought the tv marketing was awful, it was more about YMAS than the ride.
 
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After the name had been revealed in August, the marketing began to lose its grasp I felt. Then it descended into stupidity with stuff like the "We are all Les Coogans!!" video, not that many people would even remember that. Over half a year later when the actual ride opened, the Swarm had been long since forgotten by the general public, apparently.

It does not bode well for rides with in-house themes either. The Swarm has been the biggest proof that a theme-reliant ride does not perform well amongst the general public if it does not have a well-known IP to back it up. I of course disagree, but it is the conclusion that Merlin are likely to make, and we know they have been studying the possibilities of IPs closely. People just don't seem to have connected with the idea of an apocalyptic invasion by metallic aliens.
 
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electricBlll said:
It does not bode well for rides with in-house themes either. The Swarm has been the biggest proof that a theme-reliant ride does not perform well amongst the general public if it does not have a well-known IP to back it up. I of course disagree, but it is the conclusion that Merlin are likely to make, and we know they have been studying the possibilities of IPs closely. People just don't seem to have connected with the idea of an apocalyptic invasion by metallic aliens.
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It is very possible that Merlin do come to that conclusion, for Thorpe Park at least. I'd like to hope that they will look into the whole project in more detail before coming to any conclusions though. Big IPs such as Saw are bound to be more popular with Thorpe's target audience. It should also be remembered that their target audience have less disposable income than a few years ago. If they continue to market themselves mainly at the teen/early 20s market then they are going to suffer for a few more years. People aged over 25 are thrill seekers also, Thorpe need to understand this and adapt their marketing accordingly.

Back to Merlin and IPs, the success or failure of The Smiler will determine Merlin's overriding opinion I feel. Independent themes have always worked on projects at Towers because the public know that Alton Towers are able to provide new quality attractions. I do worry that this public perception may have suffered somewhat after Thirteen and Sub-Terra though. If The Smiler does not do as well as they anticipate then we will probably start seeing more IPs.

:)
 
Thorpe Park

What interests me is that purely looking at the teenage population of Bristol... I have met tons of people who rave about how cool 'that new one at Thorpe Park' looks. Loads of people know about it, but I haven't met a single person who's actually gone and ridden it.

I'd argue that awareness of the ride is out there, but for some reason (financial?) people aren't making the trip to ride it!
 
Re: Thorpe Park

Magrathea said:
What interests me is that purely looking at the teenage population of Bristol... I have met tons of people who rave about how cool 'that new one at Thorpe Park' looks. Loads of people know about it, but I haven't met a single person who's actually gone and ridden it.

I'd argue that awareness of the ride is out there, but for some reason (financial?) people aren't making the trip to ride it!
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I'm guessing that Bristol can cost quite a bit to travel to Thorpe Park from. It's ridiculously expensive for the target audience as they don't have a lot of money.
 
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You'd be surprised - I've just checked train tickets for a random Saturday in April and it's currently £11.20 for 2 advance singles with railcard discount. I used to make the same journey when I lived in Bristol (about 5 years ago) and the price hasn't gone up in that time.
 
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