Cedar Fair/Paramount Parks conference call notes posted to PointBuzz

No changes to pricing this year...that is the way I ineterpreted it.

Interesting. When I clicked the link for the story on Pointbuzz, the page had a Best Western ad - featuring the Fairly OddParents. If extending the Nickelodeon licensing to the rest of the chain isn't too expensive, I expect the Peanuts gang to go the way of the Hanna-Barbera characters at the Paramount properties.

Snoopy has been very successful at Cedar Point. They really have a nice brand awareness there. But, I could see the inclusion of some Nick stuff at Cedar Point down the road. They certainly wouldn't conflict, in my opinion. There is a lot of value with the Nick stuff.

Speaking of licensing... I wonder what they will do with the Italian Jobs rides, since Cedar Fair doesn't have rights to it. The whole point of the ride is driving around in Mini-Coopers....

I can see Nick characters showing up at the Point, there's no reason the two can't exist. Thanks to the various licensing agreements, Scooby Doo rides can be found at Paramount and Six Flags parks.

It was stated that the movie licence agreements are being looked at right now.

I'd expect to keep them. It's not like the DC/Looney Tunes licence that Six Flags had for SFWOA. This is something that can be worked out.

I would think these license agreements would be relatively easy to obtain if they really want to keep them. It is just a matter of what they are willing to pay in royalties. They may opt to retain the licenses for now and then drop them as time goes on. Or maybe they will opt to expand those licenses to other parks in the chain.

I would think dropping them would be the easier way to go. I do think, however that the Peanuts characters might be on the way out in favor of the extremely marketable Nick Toon characters.

Dropping the licenses may sound like the way to go, but The Paramount parks all have rides that are heavily themed to movies such as Tomb Raider and Top Gun. Some even have rides themed to movies like Cliffhanger and other movies. These rides are heavily themed, and removing the theming may take lots of money. It may be cheaper to pay for the license.

None of the rides at PKI had theming that couldnt be redone, rethemed easily. Except maybe IMO Tomb Raider. That ride could stand alone without theming altogether anyway but this is a really interesting thing to be happening.

Many of the Paramount themed movies are capable of keeping the name and simply losing any reference to the movie. In the other news thread several people noted that they didn't even know Drop Zone was a movie. Volcano was a Paramount movie but Vocano The Blast Coaster certainly doesn't promote that fact. The Hurlers and Flight Of Fears lost their movie tie ins years ago. Top Gun could continue with the military theme. Tomb Raider doesn't neccesarily mean the movie or the game.

The only 2 rides that comes to mind that will have problems are Borg Assimilator and Italian Job Stunt Track. Stunt Track by itself isn't a very marketable name for a new coaster and B A never really made you feel imersed in Star Trek . Note to Cedar Fair if you buy the rights to Star Trek and build futre rides around the theme it takes more than a few tv monitors showing clips of one of the movies to immerse your guests. The Borg Sphere is a nice touch though.

Any thoughts on what this announcement might mean for the Flight of Fear currently SBNO at PKD

Lastly I wouldn't expect Cedar Fair to start plopping hypers and rockets at all these parks just yet but I'd assume Carowinds, PGA, and Canada's Wonderland would be first. Cedar Point has the hyper market cornered in Ohio and with 2 near PKD I think they might wait awhile there too. Same with the rockets.

One interesting quote: no "major" cap-ex projects are currently planned for any Paramount park for '07. "Major" was defined as something on the scale of Ghostrider's $22M at KBF.

The conference call said that Star Trek The Experience was included in the deal. So wouldn't they have to keep the Star Trek Liscensing.

Star Trek Experience has to be one of my absolute favorite all time themed attractions that I have ever been to. I can't compare to Islands of Adventure since I havent been there but this was really well done. Maybe having something that well done under their belts will actually give them some ideas as to what theming can do for them.

Itailan Stunt Job:

It says that movie tie-ins are included.

This will be indeed very interesting to see it played out.

It feels (key word) that Cedar Fair has almost taken a monopoly in general area with all these parks in the mid-west & east including all the large parks in Ohio, Wonderland, Michigan's Adventure, & Great America.

One thing that may be upsetting is that for Wonderland, it's been a yearly thing that there has been a good investment made into the park put into either new rides or a major attraction. From the Mondail Psychlone to the Huss Jump2's Sledge Hammer to Tomb Raider & Italian Job to the more recent Mission: Impossible stunt theater... locals have come to expect this park to make a multi-million investment each year (and it's paid off, considering the attendance records being set).

...I just hope that there are no "transition years" like Geauga Lake had, and each Paramount park continues to invest in new attractions like normal to keep the guests flowing through the gates.

...last thing Cedar Fair wants is another Geauga Lake fiasco... but that's a completely different situation anyway (I think).

Geauga Lake could benefit from this with the addition of the Nicktoons in the old Looney Tunes Boom Toon area. It already has a cartoon 'theme'. All it needs now is the characters. Also, the old Sea World/Happy Harbor area could easily get a 'Spongebob' makeover. Of course, this is all contigent upon the licensing agreements that they hash out with CBS/Viacom.

I wonder what they will do with sob?

Hmmm...

...so is it that the Nick Toons characters will be accessable through the ENTIRE Cedar Fair chain, including Cedar Point, Geauga Lake, Knotts, & others??

I thought it was just in the current Paramount parks.

If that's true (the former, not the latter)... then I see Cedar Point the same, but Geauga Lake investing heavily on a new 'nick toons themed area as well as a couple other parks where the Peanuts didn't float as well... and maybe down the road, CP may slowly convert over, but Peanuts have been working very well with them.