• ℹ️ Heads up...

    This is a popular topic that is fast moving Guest - before posting, please ensure that you check out the first post in the topic for a quick reminder of guidelines, and importantly a summary of the known facts and information so far. Thanks.

What changes to operations should we expect post Covid-19?

So this article from Blooloop on measures being put in place at Chinese parks that’s are re-opening states:

Several theme parks in China have also begun to reopen. Many Fantawild Holdings theme parks have now reopened with heightened safety measures in place. Fantawild Oriental Heritage in Jingzhou and Xiamen and Silk Road Dreamland in Jiayuguan are some of the parks that have reopened.

Temperature checks are in place at all entrances, and the visitor numbers will also be capped at 30%. All cleaning procedures have increased, and restaurants are providing single-use plastic cutlery in the restaurants.

Social distancing will be encouraged throughout the parks, with signs reminding guests to stay apart. Visitors will be seated in every other row on rides.
Click to expand...

Theoretically applying that to Alton Towers you are looking at a cap of what 7,500 guests based on a 25,000 park capacity? Still seems quite high to me though but that could well be tweaked. Even in the realms of 5,000 you are in profit making territory for the park.

Encouraging people to bring their own food might also help but of course means less revenue.

Rides wise you would be looking at halving capacity by using every other row.

https://blooloop.com/news/attractions-reopen-hubei-province-china-coronavirus/
 
Last edited:
It might be slightly more than half, simply as they will dispatch faster but yes throughput will be horrendous. Smiler for example will be shocking, the queue will be enormous as everyone is spaced etc.
 
In terms of getting food, surely opening food stands would be no worse than what many restaurants are doing now and offering a takeaway service?

Out of interest, how full does the park have to be to make a profit?
 
Matt N said:
In terms of getting food, surely opening food stands would be no worse than what many restaurants are doing now and offering a takeaway service?
Click to expand...

Maybe so. I was thinking along the lines that plonking yourself down on the lawns and spacing groups out eating their own food would help limit the amount of people you would come in contact with and take the pressure off the queues at food outlets.

Don’t forget you have to account for those pass holders / anyone else who spend zero on a visit - you may even find more people will spend less or nothing as they may bring their own food and drink in order to minimise the risk.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. The new strategy of ‘get them in the park cheap so they will spend on food, merch etc’ is the exact opposite of what they would need to achieve with this social distancing type of approach. Spend on food and shopping would probably be way down.
 
AT86 said:
So this article from Blooloop on measures being put in place at Chinese parks that’s are re-opening states:



Theoretically applying that to Alton Towers you are looking at a cap of what 7,500 guests based on a 25,000 park capacity? Still seems quite high to me though but that could well be tweaked. Even in the realms of 5,000 you are in profit making territory for the park.

Encouraging people to bring their own food might also help but of course means less revenue.

Rides wise you would be looking at halving capacity by using every other row.

https://blooloop.com/news/attractions-reopen-hubei-province-china-coronavirus/
Click to expand...

I don't think Asian parks can be compared to anything in the West in terms of costs.

The whole reason the west makes everything in China is because of the much lower cost. Those same economic conditions would extend to anything dealing with money, including themeparks.
 
One of the major issues they would face with limiting capacity is the fact that Merlin/Towers have many pass holders. I would imagine they would need to get pass holders to reserve an entry slot online, and limit these at somewhere up to 50% of whatever the capacity is depending on how other ticket sales go.

Otherwise with say a capacity of 7,500 you could get 5,000 people book tickets online and 5,000 pass holders turn up. People would be turned away and it would be a guest relations nightmare!
 
It is, yes. So they already have a system there that they could implement. Although unless they charge you did risk passholders reserving a spot for a day and not turning up, which is not ideal. I suppose they could charge you £5 to reserve an entry place, and then you get a voucher for £5 off any purchase in the park that day.
 
If I was Merlin I would take a slightly different approach of adding +1 year to existing MAPs and suspending the use of MAPs in 2020. So everyone who does go this year will be a paying customer and it will likely put off a number of MAP holders, if it doesn't then great they are still paying customers.

It's a bit of a blow to loyal customers but to be honest most people will see the bigger picture and will be lucky to get more than visit this year.

Make next year a party year (Oktoberfest everyweek!) and hopefully benefit not leaving blighty next year.
 
As an AT season pass holder, if I was told I couldn't visit this year I would want my season pass money back. I understand the circumstances, I really do and I don't want to sound like a Karen, but I think after I've paid £70 for a pass for 2020 I would want that money back to spend it on two day tickets.
I agree with the idea of pass holders paying to reserve tickets into the park, I would happily pay £5. We at least buy drinks on park and a bottle of pop is £2.50 so two drinks and we've broken even.
 
There are other ways to work around it without having to charge Passholders which I hope they would explore.

If it is free to book then yes you will always get people booking a ticket and then not turning up, but you just need to account for that in the ticket allocation.

Merlin will have data from Chessington and Thorpe Park preview days going back years where people have needed a pre-allocated ticket. They will have data on how this usually plays out.

I am sure they already give out more tickets knowing that not everyone will turn up. If history tells you that for example 10% are no shows, then you can offer out 10% more tickets. Or if you want to be cautious 8%, knowing that on the day you aren’t going to be over capacity.

I think the idea of not letting Passholders in at all would be a no go. Someone mentioned that Passholders would take it quite well. If you have ever spent any time in that Facebook group for Passholders I would argue otherwise!
 
AT86 said:
There are other ways to work around it without having to charge Passholders which I hope they would explore.

If it is free to book then yes you will always get people booking a ticket and then not turning up, but you just need to account for that in the ticket allocation.

Merlin will have data from Chessington and Thorpe Park preview days going back years where people have needed a pre-allocated ticket. They will have data on how this usually plays out.

I am sure they already give out more tickets knowing that not everyone will turn up. If history tells you that for example 10% are no shows, then you can offer out 10% more tickets. Or if you want to be cautious 8%, knowing that on the day you aren’t going to be over capacity.

I think the idea of not letting Passholders in at all would be a no go. Someone mentioned that Passholders would take it quite well. If you have ever spent any time in that Facebook group for Passholders I would argue otherwise!
Click to expand...

Drop out rates on free tickets are really hard to predict and vary wildly particular if there is changes in the weather and stuff. If it was free for passholders to reserve a place many may just reserve the next four weekends and only attend on the sunny one, or if they are all sunny they might turn up for all of them, in which case the park needs to turn people away again.
 
Mr Pearse said:
Unless my memory is playing tricks didn’t they make pass holders pay for fireworks event one year and it went crazy.
Click to expand...

No memory tricks. It was £5 for passholders to reserve a place to guarantee entry on fireworks days. The Saturday sold out to park capacity in advance through both passholders & advance day-ticket sales.
 
Proposed (NOT confirmed) guidelines for Floridian theme parks reopening:

11fae2ddcb8ebed85ad1b97621fad8ee.jpg



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Islander said:
Proposed (NOT confirmed) guidelines for Floridian theme parks reopening:

11fae2ddcb8ebed85ad1b97621fad8ee.jpg



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Wow, thanks for this Mark. If they went ahead with these guidelines it might not have such a massive impact on enjoyment of the park. 50% and 75% capacity seems reasonable, although on a busy summers' day, what sort of percentage would they expect normally? Surely not 100%?

Also interesting that it doesn't mention anything about riders being separated/leaving seats empty.
 
They won't. The world for the next 12 months will consist of thousands of companies telling the government that they have strict guidelines in place that they will follow in order to be allowed to open, then not following through with them all. The government will also have no way of keeping a check on things and will also not even be that a***d as long as it looks like they're advising firms to do the right thing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top