COVID-19 & Coasters: Coronavirus Impacts on the Amusement Industry

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Right....and if you cant claim those friends and family tickets till day of how can you even make a reservation to come to the park.I really dont see BGW doing this, they will just turn people away at the gate, they have done it for years and never seem to care to try and fix it.
 
WDWRLD said:
Not sure that even is comperable, in that instance a hard ticked event was canceled by the supplier and a alternate date was offered as so you would not lose the cost of your ticket, a alternate date was not suitable and a refund was given once asked for.

I dont know of any park or venue that sells a season admission pass some with no blackout days then on top of that requires a no show deposit on top of that on days you would like to use said admission. The only close example I can think of, and this does not even happen is if Disney charged a deposit per fastpass booked. So when you make a fastpass Disney charged you a deposit then on that day if you rode the ride you were refunded the deposit amount but if for some reason you didnt make that fastpass window or decided you didnt want to ride you lost your deposit.
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I think you completely skipped dover a few things.

Firstly, it is comparable. Hard ticket event or not, it is still park admission. She very clearly stated that yes an alternate date was offered, but if you couldn't change your date, they would not offer a refund (that she is aware of). They were kind enough to apply the amount as credit towards another admission product, but they didn't just hand people back their money. Maybe I got that wrong, but I'm pretty sure that is what she was getting at?

Secondly, yes there is no park that offers a pass with no blackout days that requires a no show deposit. You know why? Because this is an entirely new situation and a chain of parks has decided to try something new. *Gasp* It's new ... something that has never happened before. I know it is scary stuff. But guess what, maybe this will be necessary for their operations to work smoothly? Clearly, someone who works for a theme park chain thought, this might be a good idea to help with social distancing. That said, Six Flags hasn't said if they are requiring deposits for reservations.

So yeah, this is a new situation and parks are going to get creative on how they handle admission especially with such restrictions. Right now, there is very little information because this is still an active situation and closure for parks. Things haven't been fully announced, and things are still fairly fluid until they are announced. All this talk is solely about concepts, and shouldn't be taken as definite information.
 
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There are alternatives to cash deposits that can drive desired behavior of maximizing utilization of the park:
  • A waiting period for anyone that no-shows (i.e. doesn't cancel their reservation) - say 7-10 days before a new reservation can be made
  • Allow stand-by reservations for day-of attendance to fill in for any cancellations
  • Not allowing reservations ahead of time for guests that have three or more no-shows
  • Reservation windows for different classes of users - e.g.
    • Members in good standing - 21 days out
    • General public in good standing - 14 days out
    • Members previously no-showing - 7 days out
    • General public previously no-showing - 4 days out
 
VonDerrick said:
I think you completely skipped dover a few things.

Firstly, it is comparable. Hard ticket event or not, it is still park admission. She very clearly stated that yes an alternate date was offered, but if you couldn't change your date, they would not offer a refund (that she is aware of). They were kind enough to apply the amount as credit towards another admission product, but they didn't just hand people back their money. Maybe I got that wrong, but I'm pretty sure that is what she was getting at?

Secondly, yes there is no park that offers a pass with no blackout days that requires a no show deposit. You know why? Because this is an entirely new situation and a chain of parks has decided to try something new. *Gasp* It's new ... something that has never happened before. I know it is scary stuff. But guess what, maybe this will be necessary for their operations to work smoothly? Clearly, someone who works for a theme park chain thought, this might be a good idea to help with social distancing. That said, Six Flags hasn't said if they are requiring deposits for reservations.

So yeah, this is a new situation and parks are going to get creative on how they handle admission especially with such restrictions. Right now, there is very little information because this is still an active situation and closure for parks. Things haven't been fully announced, and things are still fairly fluid until they are announced. All this talk is solely about concepts, and shouldn't be taken as definite information.
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I think you need to go back and read what she said....she applied the hard ticked event ticket cost toward the price of a water park annual pass.
 
Those all seem reasonable things to do as they move forward with opening. Today at Home Depot at the self checkouts they were handing each person checking out a Purell cleaning cloth, Some people were using ti to clean their own hands some were using tit to wipe registers. This made me think what if the parks did this, kinda like Disney Cruise Lines does before you enter a dining location you clean your hands with a wipe. Or even more they give you a wipe to ckean your own table before sitting at the Festhause. What if some of the burdon of cleaning is pushed onto guests.
 
Posted in the Disney Company thread (with their second quarter results) Shanghai Disneyland opens next week. Attached is the full press release in what they be doing. Some appears to be Chinese government requirements but here's some highlights that might make it to the West...

* Purchase dated admission tickets for Shanghai Disneyland prior to their arrival, as on-site sales will not be available. Annual Pass holders must make a reservation for their visit date and time through Shanghai Disney Resort’s official online channels before their visit to the park. During this “Advanced Reservation Period,” General Admission tickets for Shanghai Disneyland will not be accepted;**

* Undergo temperature screening procedures upon arrival.

* Wear an approved mask during the entire visit to the resort except when dining.

So, it appears Disney is going with an advanced reservation system as well.

More of Disney Corporate-wide efforts from Disney's Chief Medical Officer-

download_20200505_180039.jpg

disneyparks.disney.go.com

A Message about Disney Parks from Chief Medical Officer Dr. Pamela Hymel

As you may have heard at Disney’s Q2 FY20 Earnings Results Webcast, our CEO Bob Chapek announced that Shanghai Disney Resort will begin the phased reopening of Shanghai Disneyland on May 11 – an encouraging sign for Disney parks and retail
disneyparks.disney.go.com
 

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Just to add from the Disney earnings call -

Chapek said they will not open any park unless they can add to the profit level. (In other words, they're not opening to just break even).

Face characters will not wear masks, but will be only seen from afar.

From my post above - Chapek says procedures used at Shanghai isn't necessarily what they'll use domestically.

Shanghai capacity is 80,000. Government wants to limit admissions to 25,000. Chapek says they'll be below that at first.
 
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GrandpaD said:
Just to add from the Disney earnings call -

Face characters will not wear masks, but will be only seen from afar.
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I’ve been wondering about this! The costumed characters that walk around the park are one of my my favorite parts of the special events that KD does, and I feel like some of the magic would be taken away if these characters started roaming around with masks. Photo-ops might be a bit challenging, but I’m happy to see that they’re doing this. I hope Cedar Fair considers doing something similar.

Though I say this, I do realize that Disney does not do scary Halloween events and both Cedar Fair and Seaworld have to decide how to address the “masks or no masks” situation when thinking about the monsters.

EDIT: I forgot to distinguish that by “costumed characters”, I was talking about characters outside of the Peanuts characters. Oops!
 
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mtorange said:
I’ve been wondering about this! The costumed characters that walk around the park are one of my my favorite parts of the special events that KD does, and I feel like some of the magic would be taken away if these characters started roaming around with masks. Photo-ops might be a bit challenging, but I’m happy to see that they’re doing this. I hope Cedar Fair considers doing something similar.

Though I say this, I do realize that Disney does not do scary Halloween events and both Cedar Fair and Seaworld have to decide how to address the “masks or no masks” situation when thinking about the monsters.
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So I've been thinking about that too....and I got some ideas:
~Some characters can be done with photo ops using the distancing guidelines to make some really cool forced perspective pictures. Picture a Pooh picture where instead of being as tall as you, Pooh is like waist high. GotG where it looks like Rocket is on your shoulder or you are holding Baby Groot. Buzz and Woody on your shoulders.
~Some characters with 'powers' can do some really cool things. Like a photo meet and greet with Elsa where they can make it look like she's making it snow over top of you. Or stand on your toes on a box so it could look like Vader is 'force choking' you.
~I think some areas they should do a really cool backdrop, no character, and just a really nice location picture. Like a really nice Pandora set and find a way to make it really special. Make a "Temple of Doom" set where it could look like you are running away from the boulder.

I'm tapped out past that.
 
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So I’m seeing a lot of comments on various fan pages saying that Virginia will not open their theme parks until Phase 3 of the reopening plan, yet I listened to Northam’s entire reopening briefing and this was not said once. I even looked back at the transcript and there is nothing to back this claim up with. Has anyone seen anything that would suggest this to be true in Virginia?
 
mtorange said:
So I’m seeing a lot of comments on various fan pages saying that Virginia will not open their theme parks until Phase 3 of the reopening plan, yet I listened to Northam’s entire reopening briefing and this was not said once. I even looked back at the transcript and there is nothing to back this claim up with. Has anyone seen anything that would suggest this to be true in Virginia?
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I think that’s when group restrictions are lifted and I imagine that people saying that are assuming that the entire park is what the count would be based on.
 
GrandpaD said:
Uhm....
View attachment 20508
FACE Characters

View attachment 20509
COSTUMED Characters

I'm tapped out ??
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Oops, I originally meant to put a disclaimer in my post that by “costumed characters”, I meant the ones that walk around the park during special events (ex. Mimes at Grand Carnivale, Scrooge and the ghosts at WinterFest, etc.) and that I didn’t want to confuse them with the Peanuts or Sesame Street characters. My bad!
 
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I think, while amusement parks aren't specially mentioned, I think @warfelg is correct about lifting group restrictions.

This article has Phase 2 saying "No social gatherings of more than 50 individuals" whereas Phase 3 "Remove capacity limits in establishments". Note that each Phase "Could last two to four weeks or longer.

www.richmond.com

Gov. Northam's bullet points on the three phases of reopening Virginia

Phase I looks like this:
www.richmond.com www.richmond.com

No worries @mtorange my "clarification" wasn't a jab... Just pointing out what the difference is. The costumed folks will probably be masked, but I bet still maintain some distance.
 
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I would imagine any type of wandering costumed character would be shelved for the time being. Meet and greet type stations are very easy to control the interactions. Wandering characters is much harder.
 
Unrelated, I find it interesting that both Six Flags and now Disney are saying there's going to be a reservation, both have mentioned limited daily tickets along with a reservation system for passes, but have not indicated how that reservation system will work. Not saying it's good or bad, just rather interesting that they wouldn't want to communicate how you would go about making the reservation.
 
Nicole said:
It is possible that the details of how it will have not been finalized. In fact, there might be software that has to be adapted or purchased and tested.
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Fair enough retort, and I should have been more clear, that I was thinking it's strange not to hint at restrictions other than number of people that will be in the park. Disney Shanghai's opening is in 5 days (and taking the reservations in 2), so if the details aren't finalized, I feel that's sort of an issue. To not hint at restrictions that may exist when they reopen feels like something is being hidden or they are trying to drive attendance. And I do understand that the quick press blurbs won't cover all of it, but usually the more detailed page will have something more in depth and it doesn't.
 
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