robintodd

Not sure what happened, but yesterday I took my 2 grandkids and went to the Ice Cream in Planet Snoopy. I ordered 2 regular cones with sprinkles and 1 without, the casher rang it up and upon giving us the ice cream said "You don't have to pay." I insisted (I can afford the $22 dollars) and he let me pay for my purchase. I observed a different cashier and that group got 2 ice creams and 2 paper cup refils. I can't be certain but I think the cashier just scanned for the paper cup purchases. Do they give away ice cream when it get's above a certain temperature/humidity? I didn't report it to HR, but it is concerning that if this is happening alot it could mean less budget and less employees having jobs. Wondering if anyone else has experienced this.

Just got back from CP and had a great trip. Despite the call for 40% rain it only rained Friday Night (after park close) and about an hour Saturday at 8pm (our party was at Tomo's during that time). Anyway, rode Sirens twice and it is a FANTASTIC coaster. Way better than expected. The sound helps so much to create an immersive experience and the lights on the train at night are incredible. Never saw an issue with the tilt and the first time I rode it got last row and it was INTENSE. Such a great ride. It exceeded my expectation just like Mystic Timbers did when it first opened. Waited 1.5 hours around 11am on Saturday and got in like at 10:30pm and waited an hour. The line keep moving only to be delayed by people who had metal on them and had to be wanded after the detectors, despite the repeated announcements. Fantastic addition, congrats to all involved as well as the ride ops! In an interesting note, it's been noted the several paintings of snakes and sunflowers around the old Snake River Falls site. Could it stand for S&S??

After thinking about it, you can only physically be at one park. The old way if you didn't have the all park passport and were near another park you probably wouldn't go in, but with the early purchase deal you would and be more likely to boost attendance at all parks, therefore increasing spend at the parks. The bigger picture is if more people are going to the different properties, you'll get more reviews/word of mouth so you better be on your best behavior. Being a former platinum/current passport holder, this is great news personally. That money I'm saving on the all park passport will end up being spent in the parks. As far as "giving away the gate" it seems that it may be a reversing trend in attendance if it keeps declining. Alot of people have been laid off and things are getting more expensive and with insurance preminums increasing and the cuts in federal programs people will start having less to spend. The reduction in attendance is not just a KI thing, it seems to be industry wide.

I would expect the roamers and the scare zones to still be around.

I always thought it would be ideal to have three categories, an Entree, a Side and a Desert. That way the prices would be consistent and you could "make your own meal" from different offerings of different countries.

True, also as is any of us being here for next yeaar. Which is why I enjoy it while it's here now. I'm more thankful for having Phantom Theatre Encore alebeit for 2 years in my lifetime than for not to have had it.

Went to Grand Carnivale last night. Having no tasting cards is definitely a miss for the park and I fear they may never come back. I always got one (or two) but after a 2 year hiatus I don't ever see them returning. I do, however, continue to be amazed by not just the parade, but those involved in it. There are just as many as I remember and EVERYONE did a fantastic job. The crowd was light but the energy from the performers and everyone in the parade (drivers included) were smiling and giving 110%. It really helps the energy and the enjoyment and everyone watching was having a great time as well. After all the years I've seen it I'm still not bored with it. This parade is a very special and we should consider ourselves lucky to have it. For that half hour it truely to me transforms KI into the happiest place on Earth. Well done KI!

I'm assuming no tasting cards?

The main reason I enjoy Haunt is The Beast night rides. That alone is worth the price of a gold pass in my opinion!

The other benefit I could see is it may stop the hoards of children and adults pulling kids in wagons thorugh the mazes. If charging keeps so many kids who just giggle and run through the mazes only to bump in to an adult pulling two toddlers in a large red wagon, I'm all for it. It puts the scareactors at a disadvantage because who can do a proper scare job under those cirmumstances. I'll hold off judgement until I experience it. Another thing I've noticed is (I didn't check them all) that at Kings Dominion Cedar Point Magic Mountain Six Flags over Georgia Six Flags Great America Six Flags over Texas Six Flags Fiesta Texas All have their halloween events presented by Snickers. Kings Island Knots Berry Farm Valleyfair Darian Lake Canada's Wonderland Don't have it. Probably just haven't updated the websites yet, but I found it interesting.

The lockers outside of TT2 are free, (at least last time I was there this year) You also have to go thorugh a metal detector for TT2.

Resistence???? They ARE speaking their minds. Guess you only want to hear what they have to say when you agree with it. As far as twitter goes, I've never had a twitter account nor will I. I could care less what happens on twitter. The only thing worse than being a shill for the the park is being the anti-shill for the park. Why must everything be one extreme or the other? I've listened to every episode and was getting tired of the constant negativity. Go up around where Geauga Lake was and ask them if they miss having a park, no matter how poorly run. Consistantly amazes me the "entitlement" of some people. Not only do they expect and amusement park nearby, but it must have the biggest coasters, best drinks, coldest ice, manageable crowds, cheap merchandise and friendly employees to cater to THEIR needs reguardless of anyone else on the planet. Most of the time when I have gone (I've been over 20 times) things have been fine. I have noticed an uptick in not only more trash cans (they don't even have branding on them) but haven't noticed any overflowing since it was brought up on the podcast. As for the ice I can't tell you how many times I've went and seen a mountain of ice under the dispenser where people have gotten "too much" and then dumped some out wasting ice. Sometimes you can't even get a cup under there. That along with people who come through the exits to refill really messes up the count of how many cups have been sold so they can't even go by how many drinks have been sold to get a guess when to refill the machines. Every year they have to learn from scratch. In my opinion, with 4 drink stations you shouldn't have to have 1 full time employee manning the ice at one location because of the lack of common sense and following the rules of others who waste ice and circumvent lines. Bottom line: There are about 8.2 billion people on the planet (it was 3.7 billion in 1970!) About 1.5-2.5 billion people live within a two hour drive an amusement park. In my opinion, having a park to shill or non-shill about is a privledge, not a right. One that I'm very greatful for and consider myself to be part of the 20-30% of the population to be within a 2 hour drive of an amusement park. It's a shame that some people can't be happy with what they have before missing what they no longer have. As far as the podcast goes, I'll keep listening no matter what. I find it entertaining and whereas I may not always agree with the views I'm open minded enough to allow them their opinion and the way in which to express it rather than labeling them. The podscape is a much better with their show than it was without it. Keep up the work gentlemen, some of us out here appreciate it and won't look a gift horse in the mouth. Just my 2 cents.

The Hotel Breakers, while a little pricey, is in my opinion the ONLY place to stay while going to CP. The staff is always very helpful and does their best to make your experience the best it can be. The time saved alone in getting on and off the causeway is worth it in my opinion, not to mention walkable access to your room. We always go up and take some "adult beverages" and once we park in the Breakers parking lot, we don't drive again until we are ready to leave. One big tip on the Breakers is to take a small kurieg coffee maker as there are none in the room. You also get easy access to the early entry at the rear of the park near Magnum which gives easy fast access to Steel Vengence and Maverick if they are offered as early rides. Another bonus is the ability to go to the room and leave any "loose objects" when planing to ride the bigger rides and to go back and get them after the ride, taking away the need for the pay or free lockers. You also can go to the room, change and go to the beach easily. One of my favorite things to do is get up at dawn and watch the sunrise over the lake and take a walk to see the park "wake up" especially walking down the boardwalk toward the parking lot to see GateKeeper get started up. There is a breakfast offering on the dining plan at the Grand Pavilion, The Farmhouse is also fantastic. Tomo's inside the Hotel Breakers is a fantastic hibatchi grill that is reasonably priced and a blast. For a little higher dining experience Bay Harbor Inn is a favorite of my wife and myself (we go to CP 3 times a year). And, of course Famous Daves BBQ is off property and is now located at Castaway Bay. It's good, but not worth leaving the property in my opinion. Don't miss the shows (especially the Red Garter rock show). The rock show is consistently the best show in the park in my opinion, such great talent. All in all it's a great park. One thing to know is that most of the rides are people movers, meaning that the line may look long but they do move quickly. Take note of all the signage around the park telling you about the history and make sure to take time yourself to enjoy the beauty of the park and the beach that people have been enjoying for over 150 years. Have a great trip, and let us know how it was!

I believe the only thing the park can do is raise the price of season passes. Giving away the gate may have something to do with what you experienced. The amount of entitlement of people is just unbelieveable. It's definitely a sign of the times that civility seems to have taken a break in our current climate. In my humble opinion, just as it comes from parents, it comes from the top. Just my 2 cents.

I'ts now actually a quarter pound hot dog, back to the normal hot dog size, but bigger diameter. The best footlongs in the park are at Brewhouse (the Big Dog) or a plan footlong can still be found at Soak City's Coconut Cove Cafe (although no relish at that location )

Ryan's latest video did say it was indeed a crack in the structure that needed repaired.

If this is true the Ryan the Ride Mechanic may have diagnosed it correctly. Seems as though there was a cable on the spike used for safety for the person inspecting the spike every morning that was damaged/broken. Something like that would just need to have a new cable secured before daily inspections could resume and would not require a new round of testing of the ride since the cable wasn't part of the ride experience itself.

Funny you should point that out. I filled out a survey and selected the water coaster even though I had never been to Holiday World nor ever ridden a water coaster. My reasoning was the wet side needed some attention since it had been a while since something new was added there and to give me the ability to ride one. I believe RR is a good choice given the space, and taking into consideration the number of riders it can accomodate. Again, I would argue that Soak City has no issue with attracting people to the wet side of the park. I've seen it absolutely packed and feel the needed the new shade/chairs than they did a larger water coaster.

If you haven't been told your work is appreciated. I thought about looking for a thread for the review. Thanks again for your work on keeping us inmates in line and the site organized. I know it's not easy.

I do agree as I was the president of a childrens sports league about too many emails/texts tend to have people turn them off or ignore them. I was always very selective on how many I sent out. Then again we only had about 1,000 kids in the league but your point does scale. I've always noticed extensions an there may be more this year but remember that it's not just CF running the show. There is a massive debt and I think the extensions are mostly show for the stockholders so the company can say "look we've done alot to try and increase our stock price." I've always wanted to see a world without the stock market. As I've said before the biggest problem with the stock market is that people who run a company don't base their decisions on the customer, the employees or a combination of both. They cater to the stock holders who may be neither a customer or employee and that is no way to run a business in my opinion because the only winners are the stock holders at the expense fo the customers and the employees.

Not sure how carrying your own raft makes the line faster. Everytime I've seen the line I've never seen someone climbing all the way up at once without stopping for the line before getting to the top. Also Tropical Plunge has tube slides that they have to carry up their own tube and I believe it's taller than River Racers. Again I don't believe that KI needs a "world class water coaster" to bring people to a water park that is so busy during peak season. I looked up some stats on chatgpt about how many people live withing a half our from a couple of parks and was actually surprised by the results: Holiday World: appoximately 50,000 to 100,000 Cedar Point: approximately 170,000 Kings Island: approximately 500,000 to 1 million. This is the reason KI has such great attendance and why an increase of $20 on a gold pass happens there rather than CP. In my opinion HW needs the big draws to get people to the park where KI doesn't have that problem. The more people, the more children which is why KI is more of a family park that the other two. The more people that live near a park, the higher the attendance, the higher the attendance the more people have likes/dislikes about the park but at the same time the less need for large scale additions to "draw" people to it. Just my two cents.

I've found that with the quality of the food I'm spending more at the park now than I ever have. I used to stop by outside the park before/after or leave in the middle of the day. Now with the meal plan I eat at the park and will sometimes add a side for extra. Also with knowing the quality of the food I'm more likely to pay for things like food & wine like my wife and I did last Saturday. There is also the word of mouth when it comes to the food. I imagine KI makes more profit off of their own offerings over Graders, LaRosas, Skyline, etc. I've also fallen victim to the "The dining plan is such a great value that I can afford to spend extra on Blue Ice Cream, fudge, extra sides, etc". We've seen prices go up on gold passes yet not much on the drink/food plan. If they were loosing money on the dining plan they would have upped the price on it as well. "giving away the gate" is one thing but giving away food is another. Trust me if there is one thing we have learned recently it's that the company at this time is driven more by profit than ever. I'm sure the dining plan, no matter how used, is profitable. Finally there is the perception of the lines for the food. People who don't visit the park often and don't have a season pass or dining plan look and go "wow, that place must be good with a line like that" not realizing how many people are in line with the plan. From what I've noticed about 30-40% of the people are pulling out a credit card as opposed to a season pass during the busy days.

The only think I could think of is by sending out the silver pass messages is that it spreads by word of mouth. I may already have a gold pass but if I get this email it may remind me to tell someone I know who doesn't have a pass but is thinking about it that they could get one. It may not be effecient, but considering they don't have phone/emails of those without passes I could see it as effective. I've been receiving emails like this ever since I've had a pass. I only get like 1 or 2 every year so it's never bothered me much at all. Finally there may be more expense in changing the algorithm (someone would have to go in and change the programming/logic) than to just let it be (all be it a small expense). So maybe it's just not in the budget or there are bigger problems that we don't know about to take care of.

My wife and I went last Saturday for the Food and Wine and had a FANTASTIC time. We are both wine drinkers and found the selections held a wide variety. We got the wine flight. As far as food goes the "new" tasting cards are an interesting idea. The way it works is if you purchase 5 food items you get a special dessert at the sweet spot for free. It just about figures out the same as the old tasting cards, kind of a 6 for the price of 5 deal. You can use the tasting card throughout the run of the event. The one advantage of this over the old way is that if you only want 3 and you have a friend who wants 2 you could give them your card to use and score the dessert. Anyway, the food was an improvement over last year especially in the variety of offerings. We had 6 of them and they were all good. I would suggest though that if the queso with the pork rinds would have been serverd with chips it would have made it a vegetarian offering of which they only had one, the fondue. I'm not a vegetarian but think the simple switching of something other than pork rinds may have made a couple more sales. The entertainment was good. Hi-Fi and River City always bring the goods. Having the horn section of River City play seperately in the new area was a treat. My wife and I split our time between two music offerings. While at the one in tower gardens she felt like she was in a wooded area in Paris. She should know we have been. I didn't find the other music to be distracting at all when sitting in each area. I think I would have liked to see a violin player walking around the main part of tower gardens or if he was there we missed him. The only thing I found odd was the games. I know people have kids, etc. but this is an event geared toward adults. I think maybe 2-3 craft vendors All in all the event is fantastic and something my wife and I will go back to over the next couple of weeks.

If they had went with a longer version the dispatch times would be even longer. Soak City is one of the busiest areas of the park in the summer, it could be argued that this new addition won't affect attendance of an already crowded area at all.