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Jan 7, 2014
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Centreville, VA
I guess one good thing came out of the Blackfish fiasco. SeaWorld has released that they will upgrade the tanks in all three of their parks. I saw it her on Attractions Magazine. http://attractionsmagazine.com/shamu-getting-larger-home-seaworld-parks/

SeaWorld's official website for the expansion:
http://blueworldproject.seaworld.com/
 
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While I like the idea of any animal getting an upgraded habitat, the correlation between this new project and Blackfish is very bad news. I also seriously doubt it will do anything to appease anyone, since PETA has no interest in compromise.
 
Zachary said:
It's a multi-hundred million dollar expansion with no chance of a return on investment. It seems like an act of hopeless deaspiration and is, in my mind, an incredibly bad sign.

When your stock is tanking, attendance is falling, and you're probably selling the park anyway..., who really gives a shit? I GOT MONEY TO BLOWWWW
 
This is great and all, but it's going to cost so much money. This is going to put them further into debt, because like Zachary said, they're not going to get their money back from it. It's a bad move at this point.
 
This sounds like a desparate move to try to save some face. I applaud them for wanting to upgrade the habitat of the fishies but it seems like doing the right thing for the wrong reason. Besides that the cost is going to hurt them long term. It's bad enough that they have $1.6bil in debt now and this will probably add to it unless they tap their $192mil line of credit. But that carries a higher interest rate than the normal debt does and they don't have that much free cash to fund it that way and that's needed for operating expenses anyways. Add to that their stock was recently downgraded to basically Junk Bond status, which can be a buying opportunity if their outlook was healthier but that's a huge question at this point.
 
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http://consumerist.com/2014/08/15/seaworld-san-diego-pledges-to-double-the-size-of-orca-environment-spend-10m-on-research/

Shows that the GP doesn't really know about the issues and PETA'S response.
 
Alf33 said:
This sounds like a desparate move to try to save some face.  I applaud them for wanting to upgrade the habitat of the fishies but it seems like doing the right thing for the wrong reason.  Besides that the cost is going to hurt them long term.  It's bad enough that they have $1.6bil in debt now and this will probably add to it unless they tap their $192mil line of credit.  But that carries a higher interest rate than the normal debt does and they don't have that much free cash to fund it that way and that's needed for operating expenses anyways.  Add to that their stock was recently downgraded to basically Junk Bond status, which can be a buying opportunity if their outlook was healthier but that's a huge question at this point.

This.

IMO, they should be more worried about their high-interest debt. The last thing they should be doing is buying $250mil of shares back, and building larger tanks with a zero sum return.

But maybe that's why i'm not running the company...
 
Pretzel Kaiser said:
http://consumerist.com/2014/08/15/seaworld-san-diego-pledges-to-double-the-size-of-orca-environment-spend-10m-on-research/

Shows that the GP doesn't really know about the issues and PETA'S response.

That article sadly points out some truth. They did this on impulse. They did it to improve the stock. Instead of making investments in the parks that will attract money paying customers, they're doing this to ease the Blackfish up-roar. The thing is, this isn't going to ease the up-roar. They should know that these stubborn idiots who drive these Blackfish efforts will never change their minds.

This will cost so much, it will make the other parks suffer. As much as I love this project, it won't make them money, something of which they desperately need. The project won't even be done at the first park they're starting it at, until 2018. Even if this did bring in money, it won't be for 4 years. They need to invest in things that will bring in money right now. Not invest in things that will suck them dry of the money they make, while budget cutting the hell out of the rest of the company. In my eyes, it's a recipe for disaster.
 
So, thinking about what these additions will do instead of what they mean, I'm going to quote my review a bit.

One Ocean- The Orca show that causes all the controversy. Now I’m all for animals in captivity, but this show didn’t mention a single word about the whales at all. It was just the whales doing jumps and splashing people to music for a good half an hour. They could have mentioned something...anything about them and I would have been a lot happier, but this show gives the Blackfish people ammo for their cause. While there is a valid argument that just seeing the animals alone is inspirational, this show should have some education in it


There was also the fact that you could only see some animals by watching a show or doing a tour. Some people do want to see the animals simply doing their own thing.

This kind of fulfills something I thought was very lacking at the parks, a larger educational impact. While they might be a gut reaction to the park's financial situations, they will still enhance the park experience.
 
It is worth noting that BGT has cancelled its two keeper tours, both of which did excellent jobs of educating people in how they train and care for their animals. The experiences were lead by the keepers, not tour guides, who focused on the behavior mod techniques, animal enrichment activities, and daily care. I think those sorts of experiences are much better ways to combat the Blackfish nonsense.
 
Whether this was done for the wrong reasons or not, I couldn't care less. It looks like an amazing addition to the park. I will say they've been working on this project long before Blackfish. There have been rumors about the Orca treadmill mentioned in the announcement for several years, and I am sure that if they were going to put these treadmills in it would be part of a larger habitat renewal project. That being said I am sure that the project was highly influenced by all of the negative press they have gotten.
 
Shane said:
I will say they've been working on this project long before Blackfish.

Yes they have and this is the important thing to keep in mind. This is not a reaction to Blackfish in the slightest even though that crowd is loving laying claim to it.

It does make me wonder. If the gov't can ban trainers from getting in the water with 99.9% tame orcas then why did they allow someone in the water for Shark Week filming in the wild where it is MUCH more dangerous. A good thread could probably be made on that.
 
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After seeing the concept art for this new environment, I love it. It is exactly what people have been asking for. It is extremely large, and it looks like it should mimic the real world ocean very well. It will even have currents.
 
Too lazy to see if this link has been shared yet, but yikes this article is pretty harsh... http://gizmodo.com/seaworld-hopes-you-forget-about-blackfish-with-these-sh-1622685913
 
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