Cedar Point 2016 Talk

[malem]

Ejecting from the park anyone who attempts to refill a stolen cup would probably help.

[jcgoble3]

But how does a food service employee determine that the cup is stolen?

[malem]

Looking up the barcode (via season pass/online order/credit card/receipt) when a cup is reported stolen would be one way. Thinking it through, though, ejecting from the park would be a bad idea since one could grab the wrong identical orange bottle by mistake. Simply denying refills on stolen bottles would reduce their theft appeal.

Perhaps treating it like a season pass would be a good operations/customer service balance. Let a stolen drink bottle be replaced once (with receipt or order lookup) for ~$5. Lose it a second time, or pay in cash without keeping your receipt, and you get to buy a new one.

[TombRaiderFTW]

Perhaps treating it like a season pass would be a good operations/customer service balance.

"Sir, the last time you refilled your 2016 souvenir cup was August 23, 1992..."

(I realize what you meant... I just had to make the joke.)

[King Ding Dong]

Ejecting from the park anyone who attempts to refill a stolen cup would probably help.

Ejecting people based off information supplied by CF IT systems is a really bad idea.

Paper cups is extremely expensive and a would be a huge problem in waste management.

Lockers is the best solution but CF's insistence on making a huge profit off them is the problem. It could cost upwards of $30 or more a day in fees, plus all the wasted time at the kiosks.

$10 a day for a roaming code I could use anywhere in the park is something I could stomach or another $30 for a season pass roaming code.

[The Interpreter]

Supply and demand.

Lockers cost what they do as OTHER people are willing to pay that.

See also Fast Lane, admissions prices, season passes, etc.

SIX Gold passes can often be had for $55. FUN Platinum starts at 180+. Supply and demand.

[Creed Bratton]

 

Ejecting from the park anyone who attempts to refill a stolen cup would probably help.

Paper cups is extremely expensive and a would be a huge problem in waste management.

 

 

Are they really that expensive? You would think with an exclusive contract there would be some sort of deal on cups and supplies. Maybe if the parks would ramp up recycling of the paper cups too would help in cost.

[The Interpreter]

These days, paper recycling costs.

You do it because it is the right thing to do, not to make money.

And cups and other food papers have not been accepted for recycling.

[MDMC01]

That article Chugh posted mentioned a "silent disco" where listeners pick their own music, interesting...

[Creed Bratton]

Could be fun to watch! lol

[PhantomTheater]

https://www.cedarpoint.com/blog-article/online-fun/Iron-Dragon-in-Virtual-Reality

 

For those who want to experience Iron Dragon VR.

[purdude86]

They can be kind of interesting to see. They had one at the adults only night at the Children's Museum in Indianapolis this year. was pretty fun and nice a way to have the club type music but not have it affect or bother anyone that doenst' want to listen to it.

[VekomaRulz]

I didn't buy a Cedar Fair refillable cup this year and even with getting the equivalent of the orange bottle free from Six Flags with the dining pass purchase, I still don't carry it with me when I go to a Six Flags park because I know it will probably get stolen (especially at rides where you leave the cup in a holder at the entrance) or someone will tamper with it. One suggestion I heard was if you have a bottle from past years, put the lid of that bottle on the top of the cup and get a cup holder that covers most of the cup except for the lid and that way it looks like you have an old cup that is less likely to get stolen. I can't find a picture of it online but it is a neoprene holder with a neck strap that is specifically designed to fit the souvenir cup.

 

I would gladly pay for an all season locker at either Six Flags or Cedar Fair parks. At least Six Flags is somewhat reasonable with $1 for 2 hours at each ride or pay $8 to transfer the locker access from ride to ride all day. At Dorney, the price was recently raised from $2 per hour to $5 per hour for the lockers that aren't all day (all day are $20 - $35). I just drink water while in the parks and wait until I leave the park if I want something else.

[King Ding Dong]

^ I wonder if you cut the barcode off cup and then glued it to an old SF or Zoo cup if they would accept that.

I suspect you could get away with it most of the time, but if the trick caught on CF crack down.

[Magenta Lizard]

Simple solution: keep cups exactly as they are now except for one small change. Rather than a barcode on the cup, a barcode on a small plastic card that fits in a wallet, which is scanned to fill the cup. Stealing the cup just gets you a cup, not season-long discounted or free drinks. I doubt anyone would steal cups anymore.

[Honorarius]

^^^ Even without personal gain, you'd still have some (insert pejorative of your choice) out there who just goes around grabbing every bottle he can and tossing them in the garbage just because he knows it'll grind the owners gears...

[The Interpreter]

And ONE card could be passed amongst 254 park guests?

not.gonna.happen

[IBEW_Sparky]

Not to mention, producing the card equals less $$$$ for the parks, which is totally counter productive to the concept of removing bins from ride platforms and adding rows of lockers.

 

Have the computer that prints passes also print a barcode that matches the one on a person's pass, and have said passholder place the sticker on their drink cup if they choose to buy one.  The sticker MUST be attached to a cup to be valid, to eliminate passing of the sticker to others.  Scan pass, scan drink cup, the computer will block if codes dont match.

[Creed Bratton]

I still think they just need to put all season drink on passes.

Sent from the cellphone Zach Morris used in Saved By The Bell using Tapatalk

[Oldiesmann]

That wouldn't work too well for families (one person refilling cups for the entire family or parents refilling cups for their kids) and still doesn't solve the problem for those who don't have passes (since all-season cups are available to everyone, not just passholders).

[Creed Bratton]

I'm not talking just about the plastic cups though.

[TTD-120-420]

@rcwizard13 who asked "Is Brand S SIX or SEAS?" Yes. Both do [use secret shoppers].

I was one at Busch for part of our internship. That was a fun day!

 

Any word on the Mean Streak rumors? Haven't heard about that in a long time.

[Creed Bratton]

Still just rumors. 

It's the middle of July and there hasn't been any word or indication the ride will be close at all this month.

[dragsterguy21]

Put a 4 digit pin on the cup when you buy it. 

[King Ding Dong]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/norovirus-republican-national-convention-225819?lo=ap_b3

11 California delegates quarantined at Kalahari with possible norovirus.

Kind of far from Cleveland for a hotel room. I suspect they were planning on riding some real coasters,

[The Interpreter]

Nope.

This is where the California delegation was assigned. Many were already not at all happy about it.

[King Ding Dong]

Who did the assigning?

[jcgoble3]

Obviously, someone that the California delegation no longer likes.

[rcwizard13]

Rob Decker gave a recent interview to The A.V. Club.

http://www.avclub.com/article/what-happens-roller-coaster-once-its-over-hill-239738?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=SocialMarketing&utm_campaign=Main:1:Default

Regarding the "Cedar Point is not out of room" talk, I found this quote particularly interesting:

AVC: With Cedar Point, for instance, you’re on a spit of land and you’re limited by space. How do you decide where to put a new thing, what to get rid of, or what to move around?

RD: We are out on a peninsula, and the land and the space is all fully developed, really. If you fly over the top, it’s 364 acres of either parking, attractions, or resorts.

What I like to say is that guests tend to vote with their feet. We keep a good sense of how people are using the park, experiencing the park, and what their tendencies are. We get a little bit critical about that, because if there are rides that cost us a lot of maintenance money and the ridership is very low, that’s a pretty easy formula.

He pretty much sums up my thoughts whenever I read someone claiming CP is not out of room. Very few of their recent additions did not require the removal of some other building or attraction. Excluding 2015 as it was a makeover of an existing ride, I believe 2011 was the last year nothing was removed. I'm not sure about 2014's additions, though. But still, that'd be 3 of the last 4 additions requiring the removal of something existing. And with the removal of the Go Karts and Skyscraper, that would seem likely to become 4 out of 5 with next season's likely Soak City expansion.

[Browntggrr]

Developed does not necessarily mean out of room.

 

He was very clear that high cost and low ridership have tremendous influence on the decisions being made.