The State of the Park: Busch Gardens Williamsburg
- Thread starter CoasterTalkBob
- Start date
For comparison: KD’s Accessibility Guide is fully updated for 2022, even accounting for the renamed Jungle X attractions. I also remember it being updated last year for the park’s new Soak City attractions.
These are the things that slip through the cracks when you’ve cut back the funding, staff, and time for a park’s team to get things done — but are legitimately crucial for many potential guests.
It really does bring up the question of why and how did those cuts happen? Did the staff get laid off? Are they getting told that there's no time to handle it? Or is it outsourced work that they just are choosing to not pay to have done yearly?
This is the most likely situation probably. From what I can tell, SEAS has massively shrunk park-level, office-type staff.
Sadly I agree. I think there was part of my that hoped it was just something they handled at a corporate office level so all parks operated the same.
I literally said exactly this. I've been brushing it off and not thinking much of it but it's really starting to get frustrating the number of times people have, in the last week or so, replied to me to correct me on something that I literally said the exact same thing.
CF has one of the best systems in place and I've had lots of experience with it when I've gone to parks with my dad. Unfortunately he hasn't gone in the last few years and he may be to a point where he won't be going to parks again but we went to parks a lot prior to that. HP had one of the worst systems but that was mainly because they gave the passes out to basically anyone that asked and it became a seriously abused issue..... In fact, it was so bad that it actually hurt my dad in a big way because he had to stand and wait for 6 ride cycles to ride Comet because of the over-utilization -- and because of that he couldn't ride the rest of the day and was in pain driving home. Hopefully that's change in the last few years.
Hershey was at least the disabled guest plus 3 but I actually think it may have been disabled guest plus 5.
See my comment above for the problem with this..... but honestly, Hershey's biggest problem was that they didn't do any kind of interview process like CF does. Basically anyone could get an alternate access pass at Hershey and plenty of people had no shame in abusing that system.
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/welcome-hidden-cost-economy-where-123000593.html
Decent article about the hidden cost economy as a whole.
Decent article about the hidden cost economy as a whole.
Good article that covers the bases but I think it also downplays the negative effect that this practice is going to have -- especially on industries that offer a service that is not considered a need. They do make a really good point about the Airbnb cleaning fee though.
Also, it looks like free guest tickets might be on the chopping block( or am I reading that wrong?):
I think exclusive guest tickets may be the new wording. Possibly lets them be a little more free with what it means though :/ Instead of 6 guaranteed they can decide to change it at any time.
It says "Exclusive Guest Ticket Discounts" though, which is not the same as free tickets at all.
Yes, yes it does. I'm battling a migraine this morning and swear it didn't say that when i looked before
I just looked at Tampas page and the 6 free guest tickets are still listed
Several years ago, I wondered why here in the USA we added sales tax on top of the price of the item, while in many other countries the "sales tax" (e.g. Value Added Tax) is built right into the total price And now on top of sales tax, we are adding all these other charges, which used to be built into the price but are now being broken out.
I also wonder what impact all of these fees are having on tipping. The increasing pleas for tips in and of itself is obnoxious (don't even get me started), but I can only imagine what all of these added charges are doing to tips.
Some of it is happening because people weren’t tipping, so to pay people a higher base pay they ”had” to take a surcharge for the value.
or you could just...yaknow...raise the price of the item. BS anyway since any old bar can charge less than $10 for a beer and somehow the dozens of shacks at SEAS parks have more overhead the means they have to charge double the normal cost *and* add a surcharge.
The tipping has gotten out of hand. Theres so many places I go now that have added a space for tips on reciepts or has tip jars is unreal. Now do I believe a true tipped position is good....yes. If I go somewhere to eat or for a service and they do a good job they deserve a good tip. If I get service above what I expected they get a great tip. Now when I go to a farmers market where I picked and bagged my own items and there is a spot on the reciept for "tips"......thats absurd. My local chinease place that I have gone to for 20 years now has a place for tips on the reciept. Nothing has changed, you call in a order, they give you a number, you tell them the number through the tiny hole in the covid plexiglass, and they hand you a bag of food. You pay for the food you recieved.....what service do they expect a tip for now? It feels like the street corner beggers have moved into other businesses now.
I hate the places where I order my food at the counter like a place like Chipotle, get my food, and go to do a digital payment and a screen pops up that says "Tip?". With different buttons 10% 15% 20% and "Custom amount" where if I want to give no tip to people who did nothing but stand there and punch buttons on a screen I have to manually type in my three zeroes. It is pure purchaser psychology as if I am in a slightly impatient mood I just mash the 10% because I don't feel like typing extra buttons to back out of a dollar or two.