Article on new owners of the sold Six Flags parks

[Browntggrr]

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dw...n1.1cbd446.html

They make all the right statments, lets see if it comes true in a few years.

[Gordon Bombay]

I think Spiegels right, it wouldnt surprise me if most, if not all, of those properties became condos particuarly Elitch Gardens prime location.

[WooferBearATL]

It's possible. They have the right idear.

I'd certainly like to see the parks succeed rather than leveled.

[Cory Butcher]

It certainly sounds like they are gonna try and run these parks the right way, aside from the whole leasing thing, and I wish them the best of luck. Maybe they will so something with the parks that becomes commonplace in the industry and make all of us "guests" very thankful!

[CoastersNSich]

Speigel is part right: yes, Six Flags Inc. wins with some income from selling off non-core, lower-growth parks, and using that income to better nurture bigger, higher-growth parks. In turn, the parks sold to PARC's Jenkins and Drew also can win with a different way of managing smaller parks. Unlike Six Flags, which is incorporating well-known brand names and a corporate mentality, these parks have an opportunity to focus on the character of each park, better market them as hometown parks.

Jenkins has a good mentality, as the original Six Flags parks under founder Angus Wynne focused heavily on themes, detail, and family entertainment, and tailored the park to the history and culture of the region of each park. After Wynne left, Six Flags got into acquiring parks, slapping the Six Flags name on, adding Looney Tunes characters, and turning the focus from themes into thrills.

[The Interpreter]

...Jenkins has a good mentality, as the original Six Flags parks under founder Angus Wynne focused heavily on themes, detail, and family entertainment, and tailored the park to the history and culture of the region of each park. After Wynne left, Six Flags got into acquiring parks, slapping the Six Flags name on, adding Looney Tunes characters, and turning the focus from themes into thrills.

As opposed to the KECO parks..which were focused heavily on themes, detail and family entertainment, with the parks tailored to the history and culture of the region of each park (Old Dominion. Old Coney, etc.). After KECO sold, Paramount slapped the Paramount name on, added Nick characters and turned the focus from themes into movies and prototype rides. Meanwhile, over at Geauga Lake, Six Flags, through its purchase of Funtime, had acquired the local well run and operated park, then acquired Sea World of Ohio, put the two together, branded it Six Flags and attempted, notoriously unsuccessfully, to run a marine/theme/waterpark complex to compete with Cedar Point. Then, Mr. Kinzel and this thrill based Cedar Point oriented company acquired Six Flags Worlds of Adventure and then the Paramount Parks and...(the rest remains to be written)

[WooferBearATL]

As opposed to the KECO parks..which were focused heavily on themes, detail and family entertainment, with the parks tailored to the history and culture of the region of each park (Old Dominion. Old Coney, etc.). After KECO sold, Paramount slapped the Paramount name on, added Nick characters and turned the focus from themes into movies and prototype rides. Meanwhile, over at Geauga Lake, Six Flags, through its purchase of Funtime, had acquired the local well run and operated park, then acquired Sea World of Ohio, put the two together, branded it Six Flags and attempted, notoriously unsuccessfully, to run a marine/theme/waterpark complex to compete with Cedar Point. Then, Mr. Kinzel and this thrill based Cedar Point oriented company acquired Six Flags Worlds of Adventure and then the Paramount Parks and...(the rest remains to be written)

That's a very nice post!

[The Interpreter]

All I did was adapt the very nice post that CoastersNSich made to the PP/SFWofA situation...

There are many parallels here. I somehow think the future of Cedar Fair looks much brighter than the future of Geauga Lake in particular...and I suspect that the Cedar Fair story will end financially well. How it will get there exactly remains to be seen. I am still astounded that the financially conservative company that Cedar Fair was paid as much as they did for Geauga Lake (it was only a bargain basement price compared to what Six Flags had poured into it), even more so that they paid $1.24 BILLION for Paramount Parks.

[RailRider]

^

Agreed, GL is at a crossroads right now. Either it will make it or Cedar Fair will kill it off. Remains to be seen, but SixFlags managed to kill a nice park when they made it SFWoA.

This will not pull CF under because they only have one park in this situation, SixFlags has many and the growing cancer that is Magic Mountain.

[Ensign Smith]

^^ I suspect that had Cedar Fair known that the Paramount chain would be up for sale in 2006, they wouldn't have bought Geauga Lake in 2004. At the time it was an apparent once-in-a-lifetime chance to snarf up an annoying but persistent competitor in their flagship's market. With ownership of KI now accomplished, GL becomes almost superfluous.

[vortexdemon05]

Six flags is going down the tube they soon will become bankrupt if they keep moving at there rate. but it is a good idea to sell the parks.

[The Interpreter]

The debt levels (and asset levels) at Six Flags and Cedar Fair are not markedly different....

The net income levels are, though!

[RailRider]

Yeah ones positive and the other is negative.

[PkiJake13]

How much did Geauga Lake cost when Cedar Fair bought it?

-Jake

[The Interpreter]

The Cedar Fair transaction was valued at approximately $145 million. Here's the original press release:

Cedar Fair, L.P. TO ACQUIRE SIX FLAGS WORLDS OF ADVENTURE

SANDUSKY, OHIO, March 10, 2004 -- Cedar Fair, L.P. (NYSE: FUN), a publicly traded partnership which owns and operates six amusement parks and five water parks, today announced that it has reached agreement in principle for the acquisition of Six Flags Worlds of Adventure, located near Cleveland, Ohio, from Six Flags, Inc. The transaction, which is valued at $145 million, involves the purchase of substantially all of the assets of the park, including the adjacent hotel and campground. Six Flags will retain ownership of all animals currently located at the park. The cash purchase is subject to a number of conditions, including the negotiation of a definitive purchase agreement, and is expected to close before the beginning of the 2004 season. Further details were not disclosed.

“This is an excellent and unique opportunity for both companies,†said Dick Kinzel, Cedar Fair’s chairman, president and chief executive officer. “With this acquisition, we have the ability to add another successful operation to the Cedar Fair family of parks in a market we already know well. The park, which will be renamed Geauga Lake beginning with the 2004 season, offers numerous marketing and operational synergies that we hope to take advantage of almost immediately.â€Â

Six Flags Worlds of Adventure is a family-oriented theme park situated on approximately 690 acres, including a 50-acre spring-fed lake. The park offers its guests a wide variety of rides and attractions, including 10 roller coasters, several children’s areas, a water park, and various live shows, and entertains more than 1.5 million guests each year, principally from the Cleveland/Akron, Youngstown and Pittsburgh markets. Although 2003 was a soft year, over the past three years the park has averaged revenues of approximately $64 million and cash operating profit of approximately $16 million. Cedar Fair’s revenues and cash operating profit for 2003 were $510 million and $176 million, respectively.

Cedar Fair’s six amusement parks are Cedar Point, located on Lake Erie between Cleveland and Toledo; Knott’s Berry Farm near Los Angeles in Buena Park, California; Dorney Park & Wildwater Kingdom near Allentown, Pennsylvania; Valleyfair near Minneapolis/St. Paul; Worlds of Fun, located in Kansas City, Missouri; and Michigan’s Adventure near Muskegon, Michigan. The Partnership’s water parks are located near San Diego and in Palm Springs, California, and adjacent to Cedar Point, Knott’s Berry Farm and Worlds of Fun. Cedar Fair also operates Camp Snoopy at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota under a management contract.

Mr. Kinzel will host a conference call to discuss the acquisition at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, March 10, 2004. The call can be accessed at 1-888-896-0863, or in “listen only†mode via the Cedar Fair web site (www.cedarfair.com). The conference call will be made available for replay starting at approximately 3:00 p.m. ET, Wednesday, March 10, 2004, until 11:59 p.m. ET, Wednesday, March 24, 2004. In order to access the replay of the conference call, please dial 1-877-519-4471 followed by the access code 4594040.