Kings Island 2025 Special Events

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

Still no mention of a tasting card or completion card either. It works for other parks that have a Food & Wine event, so why not have it available? I don't think it would even need to be a separately paid thing — just a "passport" type option for people to check off their lists with a completion prize at the end that costs $0.30/item to make.

[CedarPointer]

I have to assume the resistance to tasting cards is that they like being able to shut the whole thing down for the day if it's not profitable enough without having to worry about pesky guests asking for refunds for the tastings they didn't get to use.

[Timchat2]

Food & Wine Festival prep:

[Skyrider]

They should follow Dollywood’s tasting pass model.  They seem to be successful with making it work.

[nhimes90]

34 minutes ago, Skyrider said:

They should follow Dollywood’s tasting pass model.  They seem to be successful with making it work.

The issue with that is that most all of F&B management have ego issues. Their ideas are always best and no one can do it better. I once pitched an idea to Mark about trying the Disney method. Having people order first then pickup their food. He literally made me feel like it was the stupidest thing I ever said. Hence why I finally left after 3 years. 

[Tr0y]

1 hour ago, nhimes90 said:

The issue with that is that most all of F&B management have ego issues. Their ideas are always best and no one can do it better. I once pitched an idea to Mark about trying the Disney method. Having people order first then pickup their food. He literally made me feel like it was the stupidest thing I ever said. Hence why I finally left after 3 years. 

I think Disney benefits from having a lot of tasting locations throughout their park. But even with that their popular tasting locations have very long lines.

Skyline in Coney mall for example is a location where you order first. And that line is typically very long and it moves very slow.

A Disney method the park should adopt in my opinion is better food presentation for its tastings. Like Chef’s plate but portioned in what would constitute as a tasting.

[BeeastFarmer]

2 hours ago, nhimes90 said:

The issue with that is that most all of F&B management have ego issues. Their ideas are always best and no one can do it better. I once pitched an idea to Mark about trying the Disney method. Having people order first then pickup their food. He literally made me feel like it was the stupidest thing I ever said. Hence why I finally left after 3 years. 

Thank you for what you did while you were there.  Ideally, your suggestion would have been great if it would have been implemented as a mobile ordering service....but we know how that goes with legacy CF.

Unfortunately, my experiences with order then pickup was not positive,like Tr0y.  IS Skyline and CM Skyline were/are terrible with this system. It can't be that hard to assemble orders because it's such a limited menu. 

However, Grain and Grill does a very good job with this. So much more efficient than Skyline was.  But they usually staff G&G better than they did IS Skyline. 

[disco2000]

4 minutes ago, BeeastFarmer said:

Thank you for what you did while you were there.  Ideally, your suggestion would have been great if it would have been implemented as a mobile ordering service....but we know how that goes with legacy CF.

Unfortunately, my experiences with order then pickup was not positive,like Tr0y.  IS Skyline and CM Skyline were/are terrible with this system. It can't be that hard to assemble orders because it's such a limited menu. 

However, Grain and Grill does a very good job with this. So much more efficient than Skyline was.  But they usually staff G&G better than they did IS Skyline. 

And Grain & Grill has you get food first then pay, so at least you can eat while waiting to pay, unlike the pay first, wait who knows how long until food comes out...

[BeeastFarmer]

7 hours ago, disco2000 said:

And Grain & Grill has you get food first then pay, so at least you can eat while waiting to pay, unlike the pay first, wait who knows how long until food comes out...

They must have changed this since December.  I wouldn't know about this season as I am doing a Kings Island gap year. 

Retraction: you do get food first then pay. I had a brain fart. But I've never had an issue with waiting to pay.  I thought it was because it's not that busy.

Edited May 26 by BeeastFarmer

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

My biggest issue (that I will keep bringing up) with places like the Skyline in Coney Mall is how they go about serving the orders at the pick-up window. Half of the times I've been there or at Potato Works it has been so hard to hear what name is called for which order, even when standing 5-10 feet away from the window. At least Skyline (if I remember correctly) doesn't have the screens between the associate and the customer that make it harder to interact. 

14 hours ago, Tr0y said:

A Disney method the park should adopt in my opinion is better food presentation for its tastings. Like Chef’s plate but portioned in what would constitute as a tasting.

100% agreed. There are a lot of easy/cheap ways to accomplish this as well. Using the food-safe newspaper underlayment adds charm, while using the normal KI paper visually lumps it into something you could get anywhere else in the park. Most of the nice plating techniques can also be boiled down to one additional lesson during associate training. A little extra TLC during plating goes a long way. 

 

What are the sheds for? They aren't labeled on the map like the red tents are. I also saw the festival tent today, and I think it looks better than I thought it would. Worse than it could have looked, but better than I thought. Random opinion: I think the park should have used the same kind of stones that are around the Grand Carousel sign planter instead of the stacked wood for the retaining walls. That would have been a nice way to tie the area together more. There also definitely should be a small fence along that curb so people don't trip down the step. 

[brenthodge]

17 hours ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

My biggest issue (that I will keep bringing up) with places like the Skyline in Coney Mall is how they go about serving the orders at the pick-up window. Half of the times I've been there or at Potato Works it has been so hard to hear what name is called for which order, even when standing 5-10 feet away from the window. At least Skyline (if I remember correctly) doesn't have the screens between the associate and the customer that make it harder to interact. 

100% agreed. There are a lot of easy/cheap ways to accomplish this as well. Using the food-safe newspaper underlayment adds charm, while using the normal KI paper visually lumps it into something you could get anywhere else in the park. Most of the nice plating techniques can also be boiled down to one additional lesson during associate training. A little extra TLC during plating goes a long way. 

 

What are the sheds for? They aren't labeled on the map like the red tents are. I also saw the festival tent today, and I think it looks better than I thought it would. Worse than it could have looked, but better than I thought. Random opinion: I think the park should have used the same kind of stones that are around the Grand Carousel sign planter instead of the stacked wood for the retaining walls. That would have been a nice way to tie the area together more. There also definitely should be a small fence along that curb so people don't trip down the step. 

I honestly don't think they give a sh!% what things look like any more to care enough about things tying together. That thing that they put up has NO relation to anything and looks like the picnic pavillion at a halfway decent suburban neighborhood park. 

[brenthodge]

Just walked by with my kid. I swear I’ve said nothing to him about it. He looks at the thing with its already puckered AstroTurf and says “why isn’t this in Camp Snoopy over Pig Pen’s tables. It looks like a camping tent.” Ahh out of the mouths of 10 year olds who get it more than those making the calls these days. 

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I have some hope for Grand Carnivale now that I know we got some of Kings Dominion's stuff from their Food & Wine Festival last year. It would not be a surprise to see even more Carnivale decorations since Kings Island is the only park having it this year. That event has also always been much bigger than the Food & Wine Festival. 

The park doesn't even need to move the festival dates if they don't want to. They just need to schedule their show times to actually alternate. There is no parade for F&W, so it's not like Winterfest where no shows can run for two hours while the parade is set up and run. I can't imagine why someone would schedule every performance to run at the same time. 

That being said, moving the festival dates toward the beginning of the season would give the park something to advertise and get guests to visit in late April/early May. 

[Tr0y]

With this new event tent / area, maybe they will take a page out of the Mickey Mouse playbook and start offering multiple festivals throughout the year.

Also, given how the Mother's Day brunch sold out with minimal marketing. It's surprising to me that they haven't started offering character dining experiences inside the Internation street restaurant. You can have a buffet and Peanuts character interactions and opportunities for photos. Then for those that purchased one of the dining experiences be provided reserved seating for a show or fireworks.

[DonHelbig]

8 hours ago, Tr0y said:

With this new event tent / area, maybe they will take a page out of the Mickey Mouse playbook and start offering multiple festivals throughout the year.

Also, given how the Mother's Day brunch sold out with minimal marketing. It's surprising to me that they haven't started offering character dining experiences inside the Internation street restaurant. You can have a buffet and Peanuts character interactions and opportunities for photos. Then for those that purchased one of the dining experiences be provided reserved seating for a show or fireworks.

The Mother’s Day brunch sold out with very few moms with their kids in the room. 

[brenthodge]

19 hours ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

I have some hope for Grand Carnivale now that I know we got some of Kings Dominion's stuff from their Food & Wine Festival last year. It would not be a surprise to see even more Carnivale decorations since Kings Island is the only park having it this year. That event has also always been much bigger than the Food & Wine Festival. 

The park doesn't even need to move the festival dates if they don't want to. They just need to schedule their show times to actually alternate. There is no parade for F&W, so it's not like Winterfest where no shows can run for two hours while the parade is set up and run. I can't imagine why someone would schedule every performance to run at the same time. 

That being said, moving the festival dates toward the beginning of the season would give the park something to advertise and get guests to visit in late April/early May. 

1) we don’t need additional decor. They don’t put out half of what they already own. Adding stuff means adding time to out it out. Time costs money- therefore stuff just sits backstage. 
2) it’s cute how you  think having something to advertise, and actually advertising it are interconnected things. They’ve got plenty to advertise that they don’t. 

[Tr0y]

4 hours ago, brenthodge said:

2) it’s cute how you  think having something to advertise, and actually advertising it are interconnected things. They’ve got plenty to advertise that they don’t. 

They advertise Silver Passes.

They really don’t need to advertise, when they have influencers doing the advertisements for them for a fraction of the cost. If not for free. Which is likely one of the reasons why the communication department/Six Flags Regional PR person for our park is no longer employed with Six Flags. Speaking for myself, I get most of my park info, including things going on at the park from here, Tower Topics and Themeparksbydon.

Kings Island has a high market penetration, I think part of that is because of the influencers, and the product they put out day to day is still good, and provides a great value for what they charge. With that being said, that could easily change with the restructuring going on at Six Flags.

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

The advertising thought was mostly just wishful thinking  

I do think we got some decor from Kings Dominion, but I agree that increasing setup time would hurt events. That's why any clearly visible "empty" building in the park is permanently used for Haunt mazes. I think the park should build more backstage/easily hidden infrastructure (like Slaughterhouse) for that purpose so we can get some additional space activation — I'm looking at you, KillMart. I also think their Grand Carnivale parade floats also went to Fiesta Texas this year since they weren't using them, though I'm less sure about that.

 

On a similar topic, I have reason to believe that both Carowinds and Canada's Wonderland are receiving their own dedicated festival areas. Carowinds already has a little astroturf area across from Thunder Striker, and it looks like a new one is going in to the left of Harmony Hall where their Snow Flake Lake usually is. I haven't seen if they're getting a tent like ours, but I'd assume it'll be similar. All of the site prep has reflected KI's so far. Wonderland seems to be getting a festival area to the left of their Moroccan Bazaar under AlpenFury's Skyflyer Loop. That one has pavers (since it is also a viewing area for AlpenFury) and a stage. I'll note that Wonderland is also hosting a Food & Wine Festival, so I'd be interested to see what happens with theirs. 

47 minutes ago, Tr0y said:

Speaking for myself, I almost get most of my park info, including things going on at the park from here, Tower Topics and Themeparksbydon.

They seem to be one of the best sources for Kings Island info! If only the park would acknowledge their existence...

[Tr0y]

1 hour ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

They seem to be one of the best sources for Kings Island info! If only the park would acknowledge their existence...

I think they do acknowledge their existence, just in a different way. I believe they like to use these sites for feedback and ideas and with that, there has been changes made at the park level.

However, I don’t think they appreciate rumors, leaks, and some of the bad actors that are always negative. Which we are all guilty of doing, including myself here. 

[Tr0y]

On 6/2/2025 at 11:35 PM, Tr0y said:

With this new event tent / area, maybe they will take a page out of the Mickey Mouse playbook and start offering multiple festivals throughout the year.

Also, given how the Mother's Day brunch sold out with minimal marketing. It's surprising to me that they haven't started offering character dining experiences inside the Internation street restaurant. You can have a buffet and Peanuts character interactions and opportunities for photos. Then for those that purchased one of the dining experiences be provided reserved seating for a show or fireworks.

To add to the dining experiences at the International Street Restaurant. They could, on the busy weekends, offer a desert buffet for the fireworks show. Similar to what Disney does. The talent working at Sweet Spot rival that of Disney in my opinion. 

[Hawaiian Coasters 325]

22 minutes ago, Tr0y said:

To add to the dining experiences at the International Street Restaurant. They could, on the busy weekends, offer a desert buffet for the fireworks show. Similar to what Disney does. The talent working at Sweet Spot rival that of Disney in my opinion. 

They did that in 2022 for the 50th year show. 

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I wonder if we'll see Kings Island's Halloween Haunt receive a sponsor this year. They've been popping up on the other Halloween Haunt events, and might be useful if they help bring in some money to improve the event. SCarowinds has also released a teaser referencing their 25 Years of Fear celebration. I hope we can also get something good and fun for Kings Island's 25th year of haunt. Haunt season will be a crucial time for season pass sales this year after what some guests have gone through with the park this summer.

The current split between sponsored/unsponsored is about as 50:50 as it can get. So far the following nighttime Halloween events have newly received a Snickers sponsorship:

• SCarowinds
• HalloWeekends @ Cedar Point
• Halloween Haunt @ Dorney Park
• Halloween Haunt @ Kings Dominion

The Haunts that remain so far unsponsored are:

• Knott's Scary Farm
• Halloween Haunt @ Canada's Wonderland
• Halloween Haunt @ Kings Island
• Halloween Haunt @ Worlds of Fun
• ValleyScare

I don't think the rest of the Legacy Cedar Fair parks have a night time Halloween event, and the only Legacy Six Flags parks that doesn't have a sponsor for Fright Fest are Frontier City, Great Escape, and Darien Lake. An interesting thing to note is that LaRonde's Fright Fest is sponsored by Fizz, not Snickers. 

[CoasterJack]

I would say it's highly likely, same with Winterfest. My prediction is Haunt will be Snickers, Tricks & Treats brought to you by either Kroger, that pretzel sponsor I can't think of the name of from years past, or M&Ms. Winterfest I'm unsure, maybe Kroger, or one I've yet to see make a return from the Paramount days is P&G.

 

It's worth noting Mars also sponsors Disney's Not So Scary Halloween event in Disney World

[DonHelbig]

WinterFest presented by Tower Topics.