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Thorpe Park Rebrand

Thorpe now days is a 1.5 day park, there is no way you can get on all the coasters, water and flat rides in a normal mid busy day.

I still don't get this defence for chessington. It's a below average zoo mixed with a well below average theme park. The best thing that could happen to that park is for Merlin to sell it to someone who cares.

I agree about the MT thing. I don't even like the one in London so would probably not visit the rest. It was so much better when there was just the one. It was special and people came to visit.
 
Thorpe is only a 1.5 day park due to operations though surely? Although the same could be said of a lot of parks. What Thorpe needs is extended opening, they're the only park in the group where it's a real possibility.

Joey: I think a lot of it is quite simply that there isn't an infrastructure in place to allow ideas to flourish properly. If an idea happens, then immediately the questions have to be:

1. Who will have ownership of the project
2. How difficult will it be to implement with our current company structure

Usually 2. is "Very - because there isn't anyone in a position to do 1."

Everyone is working for their own little sections; their own kingdoms. Nobody will step outside of their zones, and there doesn't seem to be anyone coordinating anything and looking holistically (I know I'm repeating myself now :lol: ).

You're right Joey, the copy and paste attractions diminish visits. In Gt. Yarmouth last year, we only visited the Sea Life because we had APs. Without them, we'd have left it completely alone for other local attractions - because they would offer us something new to see. If the Sea Life centres were the most fantastic aquariums on earth and always spellbinding, I'd be more likely to visit each - but they're not. They're not even as good as their competitor's like The Deep.

However, it's cheap and it's easy. You don't need to think about who to get in to design the thing, who to build the displays, who to buy cladding off, where to get the fish, how to train the staff, how to market it. The entire process is just pulled off a shelf and ordered.

It's that short term thing, definitely. They can knock up a new SLC in the minimum time and at minimum cost and get a guaranteed return on investment rapidly. They then have another attraction in their portfolio to keep share prices high and they can flog it to death. They'll gradually lose repeat visitors over time, but they will also just have enough throughput to keep them profitable. If they don't. They can sell it on or close it, it will have paid for itself before there's an issue with visitor numbers.

Does it do their image any good? Not really, but they don't care as long as there is profit.

It's interesting looking at the gate figures thing this year. Merlin IS second only to Disney in terms of visitor numbers, but Universal isn't that far behind. How many attractions does Universal offer compared to Merlin? I'll bet Merlin has a 5:1 ratio, maybe more. When you consider they also hold the two top UK theme parks, it's not a good show at all.

They want to be Disney or Universal, but don't understand the idea of a complete, professional solution. Then again, Disney aren't shy when it comes to copy and paste attractions ;)

The point is though, a big company, making money, then works towards producing an excellent customer experience. At the moment, it's all about enticing customers and taking their cash with as few overheads as possible. Disney and Universal understand that customers aren't fools and actively offer them things that might make their visits better.
 
Yes Furie that is the problem, 09:30 until 18:00 is not enough time when it takes 60 mins to get on collie and 90 for Saw.
 
Joey said:
* On a funny side note, why the **** would anyone go to SeaLife in London if they've been to Chessington? SeaLife London relies on passing and tourist trade, that's why. But the danger is that with all your midways providing exactly the same experience and opening up the world over, eventually tourists are going to get savvy. If I'm holidaying in California, would I bother going to Madame Tussauds Hollywood, when I have the signature one in London?
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Excellent post overall but funnily enough, having been to plenty of cut'n'paste Sea-Lifes the London one is probably the most distinctive - so, naturally, it's not included in the Sea-Life Annual Pass. I have to make do with all the others, including the new one at Manchester that does look pretty much identical to the rest. Even at Blackpool they've just removed some of the the unique theming!
 
The thing about SeaLife, in general, is how painfully obvious it is that they are cheap.

If you look at London, their signature exhibit are the sand tiger sharks. A species not found at other SeaLife, because they came with the aquarium when Merlin bought it. And the same can be said for a handful of the other exhibits there.

The changes Merlin have made to the London aquarium are, on the whole, nice - but it's still far away from a good aquarium.

Those sodding tanks full of tangs! I have nothing against tangs... But Merlin must buy them in bulk. Every other tank is full of them. It's ridiculous!

The open top ray pools full of rays you can't touch piss me off. I don't so much mind not being able to touch them, I do mind when they are in a tank DESIGNED FOR TOUCHING THEM. It just creates an environment where guests feel they can't do anything, with staff continuously nagging.

The employees don't seem to know anything about the wildlife on display and their signage never list all the species in a tank.

I really like aquariums. But visiting a SeaLife is less interesting than visiting my local aquarium shop.

EDIT: I tell you where there's a **** class aquarium, Baltimore. The theming is limited, but it's spatial design is unlike any other aquarium I've been to. Plus it has a daylight australia themed section and thats just cool. There's a whale skeleton hanging in this room...

National-Aquarium.jpg


The entire industry watches Merlin and laughs at the way they do things. Their cheap, cut and paste, never outside their box approach is going to bite them in the arse eventually. They delude themselves with stuff like this "second most visited" thing, but if you've got a poorly visited attraction in every town in the **** world, you should be on top.
 
Anything being in all of them makes them bad by default.

Especially when it's something so monumentally boring to look at as a spider crab.
 
Joey said:
If you look at London, their signature exhibit are the sand tiger sharks. A species not found at other SeaLife, because they came with the aquarium when Merlin bought it.
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I remember reading somewhere that SeaLife have made a conscious decision to not to stock sand tigers - don't ask me where because I can't remember - and rightly so.

Despite being incredibly popular exhibits since they look like the ferocious monsters that people expect when they hear the word shark yet are incredibly docile and easy to manage, they don't do well in captivity. They have a tendency to develop painful spinal deformities - if you've been to many aquariums, you'll have seen the hump they develop - which ultimately leads to them being euthanised.

So yeah, absolutely no need to keep them in captivity other than for people to go "oooooohhhhh, look at the big, scary shark!"
 
Ahh, fair enough... But why the lack of any large shark species?

Tbh, I suspect they just cost a lot, and they use that as an excuse. A valid one, but, ya know?

Sealife London also has several species of large nurse sharks and large rays, which came with the aquarium that the other sealife do not have.

The priority is profit, not animal welfare.

Sent from my HTC Wildfire S A510e using Tapatalk 2
 
gavin said:
Joey said:
If you look at London, their signature exhibit are the sand tiger sharks. A species not found at other SeaLife, because they came with the aquarium when Merlin bought it.
Click to expand...

I remember reading somewhere that SeaLife have made a conscious decision to not to stock sand tigers - don't ask me where because I can't remember - and rightly so.

Despite being incredibly popular exhibits since they look like the ferocious monsters that people expect when they hear the word shark yet are incredibly docile and easy to manage, they don't do well in captivity. They have a tendency to develop painful spinal deformities - if you've been to many aquariums, you'll have seen the hump they develop - which ultimately leads to them being euthanised.

So yeah, absolutely no need to keep them in captivity other than for people to go "oooooohhhhh, look at the big, scary shark!"
Click to expand...

I believe SeaLife originally ran a campaign not to keep Sand Tigers in captivity and then they contradicted themselves by buying up the London Aquarium and keeping them! I think the campaign conveniently dissapeared after that!

Also on the note of Ray touch pools, Blue Reef also don't allow visitors to touch them, its not a SeaLife excusive thing, mostly down to 'health and safety' I think.
 
^Thinking about it, I'm pretty sure that campaign was before Merlin bought them. It was in a SeaLife Centre that I read about it, and I haven't been in one since Merlin bought them out.

They wouldn't/couldn't just get rid of them regardless. They just won't replace them when they die out, like Blackpool basically.
 
Joey said:
I want to see a shuttle bus run between the parks during peak season and a focus on "TWO PARKS!" for hotel stayers. With park tickets during the hotel stay valid for either parks and the ability to park hop. That will actually make the whole "resort" thing legit. I'd like to see Chessington get a small waterpark. I'd like to see Thorpe's dome transformed into a mini City Walk style area, extended, with bowling, dining, bars, etc for after hours chilling.

If you're going to copy Orlando parks, Merlin, do it properly.
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When Joey gets it right, he gets it RIGHT. This is exactly what needs to happen for the hotels/resort idea to be a success (although the Holiday Inn would still be overpriced for the family market IMO). They need to do something with the dome area and make better use of the space in the front of the park. Rip out the damn monstrosity of a beach area too and build a huge new complex over the lot. The dome is always popular with people milling at the end of the day but there are too many crowds, the shops are too small and there's no actual entertainment to keep people on-park.
 
I know this topics a bit old and it can be annoying to resurrect it, but I didn't know where else to post. Recently on Thorpe's Facebook page they've been showing some pics and posts of Wooden coasters. Just today they showed a pic of El Toro and with the caption "would you?". Don't know if this means anything, but do you think they're considering a wooden coaster for 2015/16 and asking for the public's views again.
 
Yeah I saw that, but was trying not to get too excited. I expect they're just batting a few ideas around in advance of the next big project. Didn't they carry out loads of market research a while back into getting a woodie and the feedback from the public was really negative (anyone have a link to that, I'd be really interested to read more?). Anyway, can't see it happening, but fingers crossed.
 
Hurrah, it's time to spend the next few months constantly looking at the Runnymede council website for planning applications <3

I really hope it's a nod towards wood. Or a hyper. Something with plenty of airtime thrills would be perfect.
 
Wow!

I went straight to look through the comments... There's a hell of a lot of obvious enthusiasts cluttering it up, but there are very, very few negative comments? There's a couple "went on one in the USA and it was horrific!" and they are totally talking about Gwazi.
 
Yeah read some to by people who said they come off the track round corners etc.

Others saying wooden coasters are old.
 
Is it just me, or are enthusiasts hastily jumping to random conclusions off the random chance that Thorpe's PR (internal or external company, whichever they use) are telling us without any shadow of a doubt (or actual confirmation) that they are getting a wooden coaster?

Besides, Intamin woodies are over-rated </3
 
^ Yes.

I don't think a park would start bleating on about a wooden coaster when they don't actually have one. It's like me saying, "What do you think of this hairstyle, do you think it would suit me?" unless I was hinting that I'm about to get a hair transplant.
 
I honestly believe a woody would be perfect for Thorpe, they just need to use landscape more with their rides. Nemesis at Alton is a great example. I think that's what make a ride good. As long as it's not a Hybrid then I'm happy, something about Hybrids ..... I just don't like them
 
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