Agreed. It's stuff like that which turned Busch from a theme park to more of an amusement park.
50th Anniversary Celebration
- Thread starter Zachary
- Start date
Anybody see this?
Direct Link to Embedded Media Source
Direct Link to Embedded Media Source
Sidenote: GA from 1975 would be about less than $40 today... I think we're getting robbed lol
Direct Link to Embedded Media Source
Direct Link to Embedded Media Source
Sidenote: GA from 1975 would be about less than $40 today... I think we're getting robbed lol
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TheCoasterNerd
HAPPY PRIDE! Have I told y'all I'm nonbinary?
Excited for tonight. I'm at school until 2... and I'm leaving my stuff in the car and heading straight to the park after. Can't afford another absence, so this is the best outcome. Will be documenting the 50th panel at the Globe, BBW, and more. Happy 50th y'all
I, unfortunately, have to live vicariously through YouTube and this forum... If I leave now, I might make it in time for tomorrow nights' ERT lol
Any solo people going tonight that would maybe wanna meet up and 1st time it together? Or a group if us? Would make the wait a little better and Id love to meet some people i see in here all the time
@Zachary and I will be at the 3:30 Starlight Orchestra performance. Feel free to stop by.
Challenge: reverse engineer our location, based on the photos we post on BlueSky.
Or message me.
Challenge: reverse engineer our location, based on the photos we post on BlueSky.
Or message me.
I’m honestly shocked that Kevin gave a shoutout to Vincent Price and Dana Carvey for their help in “opening” new attractions but neglected to mention Fabio?!?!?
The running joke for Vincent Price and Dana Carvey seemed to be that their respective rides weren't ready on their media days so they just sat in the vehicles and took pictures. I was so waiting for Kevin to mention Fabio and wryly comment that maybe that time the ride shouldn't have been ready. Honestly though its probably a case of just wanting to forget that that incident ever happened 
I guess it's just me but since yesterday was supposed to be their "big" 50th anniversary celebration, I didn't see anything out of the ordinary. We got there at park opening and left at 3. The only thing we saw were student groups and the stealing taking place by some of the students. When we brought it to the attention of a supervisor standing there with us, he just looked like we had inconvenienced him and shrugged his shoulders and walked the other way.
You would have thought that since the day was supposed to be "special" they would have put a limit on the number of school groups for the 50th anniversary celebration. I guess since there was no recognition until at least 6 they just looked at the bottom line and the money they made odd of most of the students. As we left and drove up 60 the number of buses in the overflow lot was the usual 100+. Oh well, just another Friday at Busch Gardens!
You would have thought that since the day was supposed to be "special" they would have put a limit on the number of school groups for the 50th anniversary celebration. I guess since there was no recognition until at least 6 they just looked at the bottom line and the money they made odd of most of the students. As we left and drove up 60 the number of buses in the overflow lot was the usual 100+. Oh well, just another Friday at Busch Gardens!
Nothing really happened until 7 pm when they had a 2-hour dance party
Yeah, I wonder if BGW has been advised to stay mum on the incident by legal, even though it’s part of pop culture and and is still periodically referenced in popular shows like SNL and GhostsThe running joke for Vincent Price and Dana Carvey seemed to be that their respective rides weren't ready on their media days so they just sat in the vehicles and took pictures. I was so waiting for Kevin to mention Fabio and wryly comment that maybe that time the ride shouldn't have been ready. Honestly though its probably a case of just wanting to forget that that incident ever happened
Honestly I am a bit avoid with the park. I saw TONS of school groups, corporate groups, and ACE is being spring conference as well as media events for Wolf's Revenge opening. Staff seemed to be pulled every which direction taking care of this special group or that an the general guests seemed to be heavily neglected in the whole process. The 50th in my opinion should have been a celebration of an for the guests not an opportunity to book special groups at premium. One key example i highlighted earlier was the Globe being filled up but not making any effort to inform the guests standing outside in as it was starting to rain that the building was full.
Riddle me this:
Is it worse not to understand the interest among your guest base in your 50th anniversary and your new nostalgia-soaked coaster;
Or
To understand perfectly well and invite a ton of school groups and run media and ACE events at the same time anyway?
Although the fact that we were in an immediately standing room only Globe Theater for Kevin's presentation leads me to believe that they really have no idea what their pass members care about.
Snark aside, what happened yesterday was just bizarre.
Despite its being the 50th and ostensibly the day the park planned to celebrate its anniversary, BGW’s attention seemed to be elsewhere.
When we arrived at 9:30 am the park was already filling as if it was a Saturday in the middle of the summer. Apparently, on the day when we would have expected resources to be focused on 50th anniversary activities, BGW decided to host multiple school groups, stage a massive ACE event, and run the media for its new coaster. Really, why did they decide to open Big Bad Two this weekend anyway? It clearly wasn’t even ready, given the construction work we saw Thursday night and the amount of down time it had during the media and pass members events.
The whole day felt incredibly poorly organized and managed. As an example, the 50th anniversary presentation (unaccountably in the Globe Theater) was listed as starting at 6pm. While we were standing in the line that started forming on its own at 4:30, we overheard someone from the park telling the single person in front of us that the 5:30 Starlight Orchestra show would be the intro for Kevin Lembke’s presentation. As far as I know, that was never officially announced. So, people had no idea that they had to arrive in time for the 5:30 event, not the 6pm time listed on the website. To add to the chaos, there was also a VIP event going on in the lobby of the Globe prior to the event. We heard that people who arrived after 5:30 couldn’t get in, and there wasn’t enough room for everyone who did make it through the door.
I do not believe that there is an excuse for this level of mismanagement at a major regional theme park. It didn’t feel as if any deconfliction across departments had taken place or really much event level planning. The result were competing and conflicting priorities and unnecessarily large crowds.
I appreciate the efforts to mark the 50th and the focus of theming and storytelling for Big Bad Two, but those great choices do not excuse the chaos at BGW yesterday.
Is it worse not to understand the interest among your guest base in your 50th anniversary and your new nostalgia-soaked coaster;
Or
To understand perfectly well and invite a ton of school groups and run media and ACE events at the same time anyway?
Although the fact that we were in an immediately standing room only Globe Theater for Kevin's presentation leads me to believe that they really have no idea what their pass members care about.
Snark aside, what happened yesterday was just bizarre.
Despite its being the 50th and ostensibly the day the park planned to celebrate its anniversary, BGW’s attention seemed to be elsewhere.
When we arrived at 9:30 am the park was already filling as if it was a Saturday in the middle of the summer. Apparently, on the day when we would have expected resources to be focused on 50th anniversary activities, BGW decided to host multiple school groups, stage a massive ACE event, and run the media for its new coaster. Really, why did they decide to open Big Bad Two this weekend anyway? It clearly wasn’t even ready, given the construction work we saw Thursday night and the amount of down time it had during the media and pass members events.
The whole day felt incredibly poorly organized and managed. As an example, the 50th anniversary presentation (unaccountably in the Globe Theater) was listed as starting at 6pm. While we were standing in the line that started forming on its own at 4:30, we overheard someone from the park telling the single person in front of us that the 5:30 Starlight Orchestra show would be the intro for Kevin Lembke’s presentation. As far as I know, that was never officially announced. So, people had no idea that they had to arrive in time for the 5:30 event, not the 6pm time listed on the website. To add to the chaos, there was also a VIP event going on in the lobby of the Globe prior to the event. We heard that people who arrived after 5:30 couldn’t get in, and there wasn’t enough room for everyone who did make it through the door.
I do not believe that there is an excuse for this level of mismanagement at a major regional theme park. It didn’t feel as if any deconfliction across departments had taken place or really much event level planning. The result were competing and conflicting priorities and unnecessarily large crowds.
I appreciate the efforts to mark the 50th and the focus of theming and storytelling for Big Bad Two, but those great choices do not excuse the chaos at BGW yesterday.
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So haven’t posted here in a while and came today just to see what others were saying about the shit show of a “ride preview” event it was. We went to the wolf around 8:15 and the ride was down, we were told it was because of fireworks so instead of standing there for a hour, because the line was short at that time we went and found a seat and watched the fireworks. As soon as they were over we went back to find the end of the line almost to the kettle corn stand. This was at 9:20pm. About 10
people
later and a group
of TMs showed up looking confused and started turning people with wristbands
away at 9:22pm. There was one particularly rude TM who began screaming at the crowd that the line was 5 hours and we wouldn’t ride till after midnight. After that he frantically walked back and forth making phone calls until about 6 security officers arrived who took over blocking the end of the line. Here’s the thing, they know the hourly capacity of that ride, they know how many wrist bands they handed out, the event was planned to start at 9:30 to 11pm. How were they surprised? And why did the TMs take it out on guests? Even before we got to the park today I expected to be there till midnight. We go on the train at 11:33 and when we go off there were no more people
in the station.
Now back to the Presentation….we headed to the globe at 4ish to try and find out what time Starlight was playing if at all the rest of the night….no one seemed to know. Within a couple
minutes the line was huge. We were right by the globe exit doors. I guess around 5:15ish the line started moving and then the exit doors opened and they told
us to come
in that way…..so
much for a line it turned into a free for all.
people
later and a group
of TMs showed up looking confused and started turning people with wristbands
away at 9:22pm. There was one particularly rude TM who began screaming at the crowd that the line was 5 hours and we wouldn’t ride till after midnight. After that he frantically walked back and forth making phone calls until about 6 security officers arrived who took over blocking the end of the line. Here’s the thing, they know the hourly capacity of that ride, they know how many wrist bands they handed out, the event was planned to start at 9:30 to 11pm. How were they surprised? And why did the TMs take it out on guests? Even before we got to the park today I expected to be there till midnight. We go on the train at 11:33 and when we go off there were no more people
in the station.
Now back to the Presentation….we headed to the globe at 4ish to try and find out what time Starlight was playing if at all the rest of the night….no one seemed to know. Within a couple
minutes the line was huge. We were right by the globe exit doors. I guess around 5:15ish the line started moving and then the exit doors opened and they told
us to come
in that way…..so
much for a line it turned into a free for all.
I nearly forgot to mention that at the end of the presentation m Kenvin announced that pass member ride ERT would start at 7pm, instead of 9:30. So, if you didn’t get into the Globe, you might not have known the reason behind the stampede of people across the park at about 6:45. Turning the soft open into ERT meant that the line for BB2 was already out to the Herbal Infusion kiosk by 9pm, before the even was publicized as starting.
To add to the chaos, when we got to the entrance, I overheard ride ops telling people that they didn’t need a wristband until 9:30, so there were a lot of people inside only using their passes. I assume that prevented them from managing the number of people. Although, I have no idea if they were limiting the number of wristbands or prepared for the crowd levels. I believe they expected people to show up over the 3 days of ERT, not all at once.
To add to the chaos, when we got to the entrance, I overheard ride ops telling people that they didn’t need a wristband until 9:30, so there were a lot of people inside only using their passes. I assume that prevented them from managing the number of people. Although, I have no idea if they were limiting the number of wristbands or prepared for the crowd levels. I believe they expected people to show up over the 3 days of ERT, not all at once.
At 8:15 ish there was almost no line. We were inside the actual queue past the first turn. During Kevin’s speech at the end when he mentioned the ERT didn’t he also mention Alpie and another ride that would be open? Were they? Or did I misunderstand what he was saying. As far as wrist bands, they messed up. They should have given just as many as the ride could handle in 90
minutes and that should have been known ahead of time. They also should have required you to give up your wristband as you got off the ride so there were no rerides making the like longer. I still had fun, and got to ride front row. Just the comedy of BGW operations is entertainment.
minutes and that should have been known ahead of time. They also should have required you to give up your wristband as you got off the ride so there were no rerides making the like longer. I still had fun, and got to ride front row. Just the comedy of BGW operations is entertainment.
Wasn’t last night just for members and today and tomorrow it’s just soft open for everyone? Either way they should have known that last nights crowd was going to be huge with the day being what it was.
Yeah my thoughts on the combination of the Starlight Orchestra Tribute at 5:30pm, Kevin's session at 6pm, and the VIP thing are not printable in a user friendly forum like this - but relying on the guests to read show schedules and figure out things is NOT the best way to deal with this - it should have been made clearer that the 5:30 Starlight Orchestra Tribute was actually the lead in to Kevin's 6pm session and that you needed to aim for the 5:30 show not the 6pm time. I arrived around 5pmish because I did note the schedule and suspected as much - the combination of all of the events was somewhat chaotic at best. At least I got into the Globe however...
I suspect the combination of events at the park was to some degree just a combination of everything - the park probably doesn't have much control over the timing of the student groups for instance.... And the VIP thing (which I assume was part of the media for the coaster) was probably also unavoidable in the context of things. And from a publicity viewpoint having the ACE event also kinda makes sense, even if we wish it could have been timed differently. The sad result is that the 50th anniversary did seem to be an afterthought at best
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