News Richard Zimmerman to Depart Six Flags by End of 2025
- Thread starter Thrills & Chills WQAQ
- Start date
Wow, I never liked Zimmerman but I'm worried we're going to have to deal with Selim now. Has he been as bad as Zimmerman with sudden ride closures?
WOW. Did not see this coming. I bet Zimmerman was done with all of the crap that has come his way in the past year.
Salim Bassoul is my current prediction for who will be the new CEO. However, that would be the absolute worst case scenario for the company’s future.
However, it seems that the chairman of the board (Basoul) has had more actual decision-making power than Zimmerman, so maybe putting a Cedar Fair alum in the board spot and moving Basoul to CEO would help the company? Kidding… get rid of them both!!
This company needs to hit the reset button ASAP. What a dumpster fire the merger has been for the company.
Edit: So many thoughts…
Salim Bassoul is my current prediction for who will be the new CEO. However, that would be the absolute worst case scenario for the company’s future.
However, it seems that the chairman of the board (Basoul) has had more actual decision-making power than Zimmerman, so maybe putting a Cedar Fair alum in the board spot and moving Basoul to CEO would help the company? Kidding… get rid of them both!!
This company needs to hit the reset button ASAP. What a dumpster fire the merger has been for the company.
Edit: So many thoughts…
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This is really going in a bad way much faster than anyone expected I feel.
Poorly announced ride closures, random ride removals, consolidating of upper level park management, the roll out of the sale, now this. Is there really anything positive for the new Six Flags to hang their hat on?
Yikes, this has me concerned. There’s been a lot of Zimmerman bashing among enthusiasts since the merger, but there’s been no proof that he himself was actually the driving force behind many of the unpopular decisions that have been made. I’ve long wondered if he had been fighting tooth and nail behind the scenes with the board and chairman to curb their aggressive expectations for the merger. I have no evidence for that either, but I know that Zimmerman had a decades long experience with Cedar Fair, and a lot of the actions taken lately fly in the face of the quality-first, people-first leadership style he touted when he was CEO of Cedar Fair. I have to wonder if he was forced to make many of the harsher business decisions of late, rather than gleefully (greedily?) making them.
Having Zimmerman as CEO was actually something of a comfort to me. It gave me some peace of mind knowing that, through all the crap involving the merger, the company was still being helmed by someone with a deep understanding of and appreciation for running solid, quality theme parks. It didn’t hurt that Zimmerman also began his career in the industry as KD’s General Manager, a role he spent almost a decade in — I always felt that the company’s leader must have had at least something of a soft spot for KD.
Who knows. Maybe I’m totally wrong. Maybe Zimmerman has always been a stone-cold business guy and the company wants a more park-focused, quality-focused leader. But I have my doubts. I worry we’ll get some former energy drink CEO or something who sees the parks as nothing but items on a spreadsheet and whose philosophy is charging more while spending less.
Waiting with bated breath.
Having Zimmerman as CEO was actually something of a comfort to me. It gave me some peace of mind knowing that, through all the crap involving the merger, the company was still being helmed by someone with a deep understanding of and appreciation for running solid, quality theme parks. It didn’t hurt that Zimmerman also began his career in the industry as KD’s General Manager, a role he spent almost a decade in — I always felt that the company’s leader must have had at least something of a soft spot for KD.
Who knows. Maybe I’m totally wrong. Maybe Zimmerman has always been a stone-cold business guy and the company wants a more park-focused, quality-focused leader. But I have my doubts. I worry we’ll get some former energy drink CEO or something who sees the parks as nothing but items on a spreadsheet and whose philosophy is charging more while spending less.
Waiting with bated breath.
Yeah I actually see this as a bad sign and possibly a very bad sign. The feeling that I have gotten from people that know things is that many of the decisions have been being forced by the board over the objections of the old CF people. Having Zimmerman resign could allow them to place someone who has similar thoughts to them in the CEO position and only speed up the moves.
Just thinking of this too:
Wasn’t a big part of this merger that more CF people were supposed to be running the show? If I’m misremembering that feel free to correct that.
This is starting to feel much more like a hostile takeover by SF than it is a friendly merger between SF and CF.
Wasn’t a big part of this merger that more CF people were supposed to be running the show? If I’m misremembering that feel free to correct that.
This is starting to feel much more like a hostile takeover by SF than it is a friendly merger between SF and CF.
soooo, are things likely to get worse with ride removals if Selim takes over? Or will it (hopefully) stay the same?
It won’t be Selim who takes over.
You are correct, he moved to Dubai and just flys in for board meetings.
I know you guys are joking, but I doubt he would be accepted at any public company again. He was kicked out of Six Flags along with the CFO for lying to shareholders on earning calls about the parks in China.
Wow, didn’t know the extent of what he did. All I knew him for was “the funny announcement video guy” and honestly I wish we brought those back. Honestly shocked he did that stuff.
Really interesting to see on twitter the reactions where it seems split 50/50 where people are saying “Zimmerman held it together” while others are saying “Zimmerman is why things went so poorly”.
Personally I’m on the side of he kept things together. He was CEO of CF from 2018 to the merger and spearheaded many of the best things CF did in getting back into theme elements, improving F&B programs, making the water parks saw investments. Likely many other things I can’t even think of right now.
I really think this past year we’ve seen a fair amount of the SF “but the books” management be the driving force, and I don’t love that at all. Sometimes a good business needs to understand that some years need to be less profitable because you are working on building out something better.
Makes me think of a course in RVA area where the parts of the course (F&B, bev cart, the shop, the restaurant) are all leased out to run by other people, and there’s also a paintball on unused property, a music school, and other classes. It’s great for ownership because their overhead stays lower and they will make their set amount regardless. But it sucks for consumers because the quality is not the same across the board, the hours of each part of the operation never jive with each other, and certain aspects just see continual turnover because the scope of the business within the business is so small it doesn’t really turn a profit.
I fear something like that is where SF’s will go to. “Hey as long as we and our share holders make money” is such a terrible way for a business to run because it’s only so long before the ‘partners’ that work in there stop showing up and the people stop coming.
Personally I’m on the side of he kept things together. He was CEO of CF from 2018 to the merger and spearheaded many of the best things CF did in getting back into theme elements, improving F&B programs, making the water parks saw investments. Likely many other things I can’t even think of right now.
I really think this past year we’ve seen a fair amount of the SF “but the books” management be the driving force, and I don’t love that at all. Sometimes a good business needs to understand that some years need to be less profitable because you are working on building out something better.
Makes me think of a course in RVA area where the parts of the course (F&B, bev cart, the shop, the restaurant) are all leased out to run by other people, and there’s also a paintball on unused property, a music school, and other classes. It’s great for ownership because their overhead stays lower and they will make their set amount regardless. But it sucks for consumers because the quality is not the same across the board, the hours of each part of the operation never jive with each other, and certain aspects just see continual turnover because the scope of the business within the business is so small it doesn’t really turn a profit.
I fear something like that is where SF’s will go to. “Hey as long as we and our share holders make money” is such a terrible way for a business to run because it’s only so long before the ‘partners’ that work in there stop showing up and the people stop coming.
At the end of the day, the CEOs job is to manage the business they have, not the one they wish they had. He may have worked well for legacy CF, but the combined company has very different needs.
The reality is the combined company lost a lot of money and is continuing to bleed. That means cutting losses, generating more revenue where possible, and structuring for going forward. From a pure business standpoint, I see wishy washy decisions on cutting losses, continuing to charge way too little for passes, and not communicating with the customer base effectively. That may have worked fine for CF, but the combined company is going to be dead in the water soon if they keep that up.
The reality is the combined company lost a lot of money and is continuing to bleed. That means cutting losses, generating more revenue where possible, and structuring for going forward. From a pure business standpoint, I see wishy washy decisions on cutting losses, continuing to charge way too little for passes, and not communicating with the customer base effectively. That may have worked fine for CF, but the combined company is going to be dead in the water soon if they keep that up.
Zimmerman went from running a limited partnership, where Cedar Fair made the decisions and investors basically believed in them and were just along for the ride, to having to answer to a board of directors. The board probably demanded all these changes, and Zimmerman probably tried his best, but the corporate structure now favors whatever investors the shareholders elected to the board. I don’t know who these people are but a lot of the time their primary focus is $$$ and sometimes they are just in it for the investment and don’t really know the ins and outs of how amusement parks work.
I wonder what John Reilly is up to...
EDIT: Apparently he's still at Parques Reunidos as Global COO, a title he had before he was CEO of Palace. Wonder if he wants to come back stateside.
EDIT: Apparently he's still at Parques Reunidos as Global COO, a title he had before he was CEO of Palace. Wonder if he wants to come back stateside.
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