Benjamin22
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Posts posted by Benjamin22
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That concludes the longest ownership tenure of the park. It’ll be interesting to see how things shake up. I’m guessing it’ll take 2-4 years for things to be really harmonized across the new company.
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There is almost 0 chance they rename any of the big 5 parks to Six Flags _____, the whole strategy under Cedar Fair management was focus on locality to appeal to guest. Renaming the parks to a bland corporate name would be a MAJOR set back to that imo. That being said the smaller parks would benefit more with the Six Flags compared to the larger parks.
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Yikes not a good look for the park. The approach to down play an incident like this is kind of bizarre especially when the park clearly isn’t at fault for what happened.
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Considering Paramount is on the brink of total collapse and is ran by the same incompetent family as it was in the 1990s and 2000s I shutter at the thought. The parks likely would have been sold off in the past few years as Paramount is desperate for money ATM.
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1 hour ago, DiamondbackFan said:
With a new waterpark addition coming in 2025, it might be a good time to rebrand the waterpark to Hurricane Harbor.
Please no, just let the water park have its own unique branding. The Hurricane Harbor brand isn’t strong or notable.
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Dive coaster seems like the best option, I figured someone was going to ignore the first page of the survey that said to NOT post this lol
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Cool they’re serving more cocktails but I wasn’t really all that impressed with the alcohol stand they added to Rivertown. Hopefully this one is better.
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Merger will go through almost certainly, this over zealous DOJ hasn't been very effective in all there attempted anti trust measures.
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Yikes, terrible sign for the future of the park. Grateful I grew up going to the park pre-covid so I got to experience that Version rather then whatever this is.
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So happy it didn’t renew my pass, no way is it worth $1300 anymore.
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2 hours ago, Timchat2 said:
The WinterFest show page for Carowinds has been updated for 2023. The parade will return at Carowinds even though it apparently will not return to Kings Dominion.
Shows from 2022 that are no longer listed (and assumed to be cut) include Holly Jolly Trolley, Sparkle City Swing Machine, the Yule Logs, Tree-ditions, Christmas Bluegrass, Fezzywigs Brass Band, Four Drummers Drumming and the Mistletones.
But But... Six Flags sucks and has a bunch of budget cuts!!!! Cedar Fair is no longer the brand it was pre-pandemic. In 2019 they had several high quality seasonal events that are now shells of their former selves. Exactly why I don't care about this merger going through since there isn't much more that this park can sink.
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42 minutes ago, Tr0y said:
I don’t think having DC integrated at Kings Island is a bad thing.
The only bad that can come from this, is if they did what Paramount did and plop themed rides down in areas it doesn’t fit.
Action Zone is a perfect candidate for a DC re theme. That area has no theming cohesion, and would benefit greatly from such.
Like others have said in regards to Action Zone, it really can’t be worse.
Renaming Banshee to some tacky DC name would make the area worse imo.
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1 minute ago, KIBeast said:
At the same time, we have no information that indicates any parks will be sold off. They may feel all of them can be managed under one umbrella, although none of us would be surprised if they did.
Based off the wording during the Q&A they immediately don't seem to have any plans to sell off any of the parks, as Richard mentioned it's hard to grow your revenue when you sell off parks. That being said, if there certain parks that don't integrate well for whatever or suddenly just don't make sense in the long term vision of the chain then I suppose they could be sold off. However the mentality seems to be that each park is a unique, irreplaceable asset that they would like to keep.
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7 minutes ago, KIghostguy said:
I thought this was an interesting Richard Zimmerman quote from the conference call transcript at https://seekingalpha.com/article/4647047-cedar-fair-l-p-fun-six-flags-mergers-of-equals-conference-transcript.
"One of the things that excites me is somebody who came into the Cedar Fair organization from the Paramount side understanding the movie studio and the drive for exploiting IP and enhancing that along with Six Flags. Looking at the Warner Brothers, we have – as we have said on prepared remarks, really three powerful IPs that we can think about how best fit within the portfolio Peanuts, DC Comics and of course the Warner Brothers connection. I am so excited to think about how we could potentially roll out and enhance the guest experience in all our regions and rethink how we use IP. IP is incredibly important, differentiator in the minds of our consumers and I think our ability to unlock how we look at that in the future gets me really excited and I know for our internal design staff on both sides. As we think about how to plot and plan the guest experience going forward, I think our challenge is working close – is to work more closely with the holders of the IP and think about how we might both benefit from a closer association."
Unfortunately, this seems like we will likely see DC implemented eventually at the legacy Cedar Fair parks.
Welp, all I can say is that fans need to be vocal about if they want that tacky carnival super hero crap in their parks or not. I for one will NOT go to the park if they have a DC themed area.
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2 minutes ago, disco2000 said:
GE is another. They sold off their profitable appliance division many years ago. So while you can still buy a GE appliance, it is actually built by someone else and the terms of the sale allowed them to continue to use the GE name for X number of years. GE is currently going through another restructuring and will be selling off their profitable healthcare line.
TBF GE was a total house of cards that NEVER deserved the reputation it had in the late 90's and early 2000s. But yes I agree, I foresee there to potentially be some issues trying to steer this larger company. One of the easiest ways to get around this will be to get rid of assets that don't align with the companies future.
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Okay so after thinking this over for a bit here are my overall thoughts on what the next 5 years will likely look like:
- I don't think we're going to see any dramatic changes the first 2ish years as most of the companies efforts will be spent on consolidating corporate operations. I.e only having one pass system, consolidating park apps, switching over all of the parks to a single IT system, consolidating account ect. This is where most of the cost savings from the merger will be coming from. I'd assume that they'll be no major new rides the next two years UNLESS they're already being planned (I.e Canada's wonderland B&M).
- The price of season passes will not change that much. People have this very strong misconception that regional parks compete against other regional parks, this isn't really true for the most. Most regional parks competition is local entertainment options. Would I rather go to haunt or a night out in OTR etc that kind of thing. The chains are already struggling to attract customers from pre covid, raising prices will only turn more people away.
- For the next 4-5 years I expect most of the Capex to be focused on the Six Flags chain. We saw this with the Paramount Parks deal where the Paramount Parks tended to get the major Capex (The 3 B&M hypers, KD Giga etc) for the first few years after the merger. Although I expect most of these investments to be in a little "boring" but important areas such as improving food operations. Food and seasonal events have been a MAJOR part of Cedar Fairs strategy so I expect them to immediately turn their focus on investing in these areas for the Six Flags Parks.
- I think they'll be a reevaluation in what parks are getting the major CAPEX. It's been no secret that in the past few years parks like Carowinds & Canadas Wonderland have been the focus for the chain. However given their struggles this season I can easily see Cedar Fair Focusing their attention on some of the newer Six Flags parks that they view to have more potential. I can easily see large investments coming to some of the southern parks who might actually be able to succeed year around while Carowinds failed to do so. For parks like KI, CP & Knott's I don't see the investment strategy changing all that much long term, just that for the next few years I foresee smaller then we're used to investments.
Overall this deal makes sense and I don't think it'll be the end of the world. The biggest thing Im curious about is the chains integration of the DC theme. Cedar Fair has emphasized themed local or unique experiences (I.e Redwood themed area for CGA, Frontier Canada) DC is very unlike that imo. It feels like cheap tacky carnival crap. My assumption is it'll be up to the parks on if they want to pull the trigger on that. Another big thing I wonder is how much autonomy the parks will be getting. Under current Cedar Fair operations large parks like KI, CP etc got a lot of leeway with how their ran their parks and what types of investments they're looking for. I can see both the benefits and the downsides to this approach for this new larger mega chain.
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I really hope that tacky theme doesn’t come to Kings Island.
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1 minute ago, DJSkyFoxx said:
As someone who always tries to be optimistic in cloudy situations, this is one I simply CANNOT feel optimistic about. I have never been a fan of SIX and their way of running their parks. Too shady and too greedy. Granted my experience as a guest on their properties is limited, I don't have a lot of great memories as a whole. And from what others have said throughout the various park pages I follow, I haven't heard very many good things from folks when it comes to SIX parks and their experiences with their properties.
I get that at the end of the day, business is business and these two companies are always going to be about the bottom line/dollar, but this is a sad sad day for myself and many others. I really do hope that good things will emerge from this, I truly do, But I fear this situation is going to end up in many parks getting dumped off on the side of the road GL, KK and SFNO style. Maybe that is a dramatic reaction, but seeing as how SIX seems to dump properties like kittens at a pound...I cannot help but be scared of what they might have the power to do in this situation. I get it, they don't own the entire merger, but depending on how the lead heads in charge duke it out...well...we will see.
I am sad. That is all I can say.
Don't worry, Im sure Richard will make sure the combined companies synergies will unlock new opportunities to bait and switch pass holders
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8 minutes ago, RollerColt said:
Monopolies are never a good thing for the consumer. This is a win for Cedar Fair but a loss for us.
How is this a monopoly? Regional amusement parks are peanuts compared to the larger destination entertainment providers. Also throwing around monopoly doesn’t really make sense in this context given for the most these parks aren’t near eachother.
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Wouldn’t surprise me if it actually went through this time, Cedar Fair is a shell of its former self and this could maybe give the chain an opportunity to course correct with a new stronger company.
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11 minutes ago, jsus said:
Note that number is an estimate from SimplyHired.com. It is not supplied by CFEC/KI and thus is not terribly useful in determining the budget for this position.
Glassdoor seems to show manager salaries at CedarFair are similar to what’s posted on this job listing. Cedar Fair in general is not a very high paying company for most positions.
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1 hour ago, BoddaH1994 said:
The job that was held by Don Helbig has been posted. More information at the link below.
Oh, the original description says it’s at Kings Island but the title says Schlitterbahn. The correct information is it’s for Kings Island. #KIComms
https://www.simplyhired.com/job/l75_IFKIyYH8mLjf1Ef6gCliaPfxmjzwf3PWvvcetIG2b4R_9j0U3A
Here is a better link for anyone honestly interested in applying:
https://jobs.cedarfair.com/job/mason/manager-digital-marketing/42509/55301330848
That’s terrible pay ngl. Especially for 3 years experience what a joke.
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- Prestige pass is not really worth the cost. Lack of soft drinks were a major bummer.
- The season long dining plan isn’t really worth it considering how much worse the food was this season.
- Thematically the park is doing a great job with how nice the new area looks. Hopefully future additions to the park are themed as well.
- Seasonal events continue to get worse
Overall what could have been a great season for the park turned out to be extremely mediocre at best.
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Had the La Larona fries today, extremely mediocre and disappointing dish. There was no crema on my order which pretty much ruined the dish considering how dry the pork was. Additionally for a dish being based around al pastor you would think they would have more then 4 tiny pineapple chunks in the whole order. Glad to the see park is being consistent with its bad seasonal dishes.
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Six Flags and Cedar Fair Merge
in Kings Island Central Newsroom
Posted
I swear if they ditch the Fastlane name for flash pass I’ll be ****ed