Kings Dominion Halloween Haunt 2023
- Thread starter mtorange
- Start date
Perhaps. That still leaves me struggling to understand the decision to invest a limited event budget into a non-haunt attraction, rather than producing a new house or scare zone. Who is going to a separately-ticketed, adult Halloween event for a parade? What market are they tapping into?
Who's market? Mine. My wife's. We're geeking out over the possibility of it coming to KD, and will likely make a trip to Carowinds if it doesn't.
Well respectfully, and I’m sure others can agree…. your excitement seems to be one in a million. I’m not thrilled about a parade. They should invest into the houses that have been bare minimum for the past couple years.
A parade is a great idea for the event. I mean who doesn't want to tie up a major route around an already congested park for an hour or so. Who doesn't want to have more gatherings of over served dunk people in one place. It's not like Haunt has you know ever had a massive e braw break out or anything. Heck maybe they got the IP rights to Mad Max Thunder Road. Yep this is the best idea in a long time.
It almost makes you wonder if CF’s marketing team saw the success of parades during Carnivale and Winterfest and figured “Yup, guests just love parades at our events!” and decided to just go full-steam ahead with adding a parade to Haunt. To me, it screams:
A parade during daytime operations could be great, and a perfect fit. But a parade during Haunt sounds like a disaster in so many ways.
- Not understanding consumer segmentation and realizing that different types of people go to different events for different reasons; that the primary consumers who go to Haunt likely aren’t the ones praising CF’s other parades
- Not understanding the value proposition of your product. In this case, Haunt is the product and a dark, scary environment is the value proposition. Parades diminish that value proposition — the reason Haunt has been so popular for years in the first place
A parade during daytime operations could be great, and a perfect fit. But a parade during Haunt sounds like a disaster in so many ways.
To me it does feel a bit like a pattern we have seen primarily at BGW, but recently at KD, as well. It is reasonable to have either a dark and scary adult haunt or a boozy and loud adult Halloween party. Both parks to varying degrees have tried to have both at once.
In my opinion, the parties ruin the atmosphere of the haunt and the haunt scares many people more interested in the party. A parade seems like something that could easily fit into an adult Halloween party focused event, which is not what KD's Haunt is meant to be. So, while I would argue that it isn't entirely inappropriate for a hypothetical adult Halloween event at a park, it does seem disruptive and out of place at this particular adult Halloween event at KD.
In my opinion, the parties ruin the atmosphere of the haunt and the haunt scares many people more interested in the party. A parade seems like something that could easily fit into an adult Halloween party focused event, which is not what KD's Haunt is meant to be. So, while I would argue that it isn't entirely inappropriate for a hypothetical adult Halloween event at a park, it does seem disruptive and out of place at this particular adult Halloween event at KD.
Astaroth and the barker aren’t coming back
Wow! Very sad if true. I loved that duo.
I don’t agree simply on the fact that Carnivale exists and already heavily integrates Mardi Gras into the event. With that being said, I would love to see a small Mardi Gras event come to the park in February.
Unrelated to either quote, does anyone happen to know where I can find the song “Dracula” by Ashoxo_Stuff? Shazam recognizes the song, but I can’t seem to find the actual full song ANYWHERE. This song played during Blood Reign last season when the monster from 21 gets lit on fire at the end. I’ve attached artwork if that helps.
When you say it's a separately ticketed event, does that mean we don't get Haunt with our season passes? And in either case, does everyone have to leave the park and wait outside the gate and then go back when Haunt starts? That sounds like it would be chaos.
You get with the passes. You don't have to leave completely but will be forced to s blocked off section of International Street and will have to rescan passes there. Anyone without a pass or a double ticket for day and night will have to leave by 6 if it's a day ticket and can't enter before 7 if it's a night only ticket.
KD should encourage folks to tailgate. They could send out scarers to the parking lot. Set up small snack vendors, and those night time light up toy vendors. Could be a really cool parking lot atmosphere over those 2 hours if they played it right.
Assuming that part of the reason to make it a separately-ticketed event is to curb the rowdiness and violence seen in previous years, encouraging people to party for two hours before the event would seem to defeat the purpose. Additionally, what are the regulations and laws for tailgates? What kind of liquor license would they need and what would be their liability?
I think it makes perfect sense to keep people inside the park, where they can buy food and merch, especially given how backed up security lines get. I still haven't seen a description of how they plan to manage it, however. Wristbands? Holding areas? Something else?
I think it makes perfect sense to keep people inside the park, where they can buy food and merch, especially given how backed up security lines get. I still haven't seen a description of how they plan to manage it, however. Wristbands? Holding areas? Something else?
So they should sit and twiddle their thumbs? Gee, that sounds incredible
.If it helps to keep people from acting like jackasses in the park, yes.