Memberships

It appears that (at least some of the) Cedar Fair parks are adopting the Membership model from Six Flags. KI, KD, Dorney, and Carowinds, among others, are advertising monthly Membership plans.

The only parks not doing this (at this time) are Cedar Point, Canada's Wonderland, and Knotts.

Thoughts?

I've never even understood what that's supposed to mean. How is it different than having a pass on a payment plan, with various options?

One difference: You have to explicitly renew a season pass, but have to explictly cancel a membership. My guess is that the membership is "stickier," and so probably marginally more profitable for the park.

The membership plans have also replaced the old season pass payment plans.

Another example of "I thought the new chain was supposed to be a continuation of Cedar Fair, but with the Six Flags name" rather than the continuation of Legacy Six Flags stuff.

Memberships are very popular. See them for an increasing number of services. Can get them for car washes. And benefit to the company is they renew towards the horizon until you cancel it. Common for people to live paying "monthly payments."

I think from the parks standpoint, the "memberships" may help them to even out cash flow. I'm not an accountant, but if you buy a pass, there's a lot of money that comes in at that time and then nothing for the next year until you renew (not quite true, as pass holders do spend on food and drink and souvenirs at the parks, but you get the picture). With a membership, you have a much more constant income stream.

For the purposes of e.g. quarterly results, pass revenue is recognized over the course of the year, not all at once. I don't remember the details, but this has been discussed several times in the past few years.

Cash flow and revenue recognition aren't the same thing. With seasons pass products where people pay for all of it up front, parks receive the cash all at once. They can use that cash however they want at that point. But they recognize the revenue over time. Six Flags indicates in its Revenue Recognition footnote in its financial statements that it recognizes revenue from multi-use products based on the expected number of uses. They do not specify the expected uses for any given products. But say they expect season passes to be used 5x in a season. They would recognize 20% of the amount paid for the pass as revenue for each visit. After 5 visits, the park recognizes no further (gate) revenue with further visits. And if the season ends and a given passholder hasn't visited the park 5x, the park recognizes the remaining revenue in the last quarter of that year.

Footnote indicates they recognize revenue with respect to memberships the same way (based on the expected number of uses) for the first 12 months. Thereafter, they recognize income on a straight line basis (each month, they recognize one month's revenue (doesn't matter if the subscriber visits 30x, 5x, 1x or not at all).

If they go to a membership model for everything, revenue recognition will be the same for the first year. Thereafter, revenue recognition would be even over the year (though single day tickets/food/etc. would still skew revenue towards the peak operating season).

From the 2025 SF footnote:

Most revenues are recognized on a daily basis based on actual guest spend at the properties.
Revenues from multi-use products, including season-long products for admission, dining, beverage and other products
and the first 12-month non-cancelable period for membership products, are recognized over the estimated number of
uses expected for each type of product. The estimated number of uses is reviewed and may be updated periodically
during the operating season prior to the ticket or product expiration. The number of uses is estimated based on historical
usage adjusted for current period trends. Membership products beginning with the 13th month following purchase are
recognized straight-line. For any bundled products that include multiple performance obligations, revenue is allocated
using the retail price of each distinct performance obligation and any inherent discounts are allocated based on the gross
margin and expected redemption of each performance obligation.