Indiana Beach Sold

I am amazed at the sale of IB. I can't understand why they would sell the park. My only guess is they were just tired of running it and the offer to purchase the park was very good. The extended season will be great.

Although a sale of HW is not far-fetched. Will is still young, vibrant, and excited about being in charge now at HW and excited about each new season. I think that makes a big difference. Well that's just my impression anyway.

I can't understand why they would sell the park.

My guess: the younger generation in the Spackman family are less involved than their parents and grandparents, who opened the park. Isn't that the same reason the Kenny family sold Kennywood?

I think it's interesting how enthusiasts seem more likely than just about any other group I can think of to expect things to never change.

Just an observation.

^^Henningers, but yeah, that was my thinking..... ;)

Gonch: you should see the Disney freaks who still think World of Boredom, er, Motion should never have been replaced by Test Track...

^^I think many of the ones, on the boards anyway, may be too young to remember that change can be good actually. ACE was formed at the end of the 70's when a LOT of coasters had been or were were being dozed. We are still in a new golden age. Arguably a bigger one than the first one. I don't have the figures, but I'll wager there are more coasters being built these days...and this has been going on longer (I think).

When the same family owns a park for 82 years you kind of get comfortable thinking that things will never change. I always pictured the younger generation taking over someday.

I guess if they were all getting $60,000 a year after all the expenses and they could all get $60 million in a lump sum, the older generation is ready to call it quits, they ask the kids if they are interested in taking over operations and they all just shrug their shoulders and say "I don't know", then maybe I could understand selling the park.

Yes if that was the case it was probably a good move. But you'll never see me at IB again after this year. I went a little crazy earlier and ripped down my IB poster, ripped the head off of my IB crow bobble head and I drank my IB collectors Coke bottle and threw the bottle in the trash can.

^ I really hope your joking.

If not, at least recycle :).

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Mamoosh said:

My guess: the younger generation in the Spackman family are less involved than their parents and grandparents, who opened the park. quote]

No, Moosh, no!

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I think that there are some that are spending a bit too much time overthinking things and that there will not be any major changes to IB any time soon. (I cannot find two pennies in my pocket, so I figured this would work.)

Screamscape says that it is rumored that Rick McCurley was hired to management Indiana Beach and it does not bode well for Indiana Beach fans.

Who is Rick McCurley and why does he bode disaster for IB fans?

I don't know. I read it on screamscape.

And how does one "management"?

-Tambo

^^^From Screamscape article:

" From what our sources tell us Rick was actually fired from his previous posts at Six Flags and Cypress Gardens which doesn’t bode well for Indiana Beach. Anyone know more?"

I only knew about SF, didn't have any idea he was at all involved in Cypress...

Fired, or laid-off?

^Didn't find that info, but a quick Googling of his name left me with the employment pit-stops: SFWoA, SFGAdv, and WA.

Does that bode well to any of YOU? ;)

Well if you're worried about him bringing "SF-style" maintenance to IB's three wooden coasters let's keep in mind that maintenance budgets were set by SF Corp, who by the time Shapiro showed up had slashed them to pre-1997 levels desipte continually adding rides. Methinks with the skimpy budgers its a problem of "couldn't" maintain versus "didn't know how."

I'd still like to know more about this guy and what he did at those three parks before worrying.

*** Edited 2/22/2008 7:49:47 PM UTC by Mamoosh***

Rick McCurley was one of the first people out the door when Snyder and Shapiro came in. I think his last gig with the company was running Great Adventure in 2004-2005, when things at that plac were about as bad as they ever got as I remember it. I only actually met the man once and heard him speak one other time. I can say from what I heard, he has a rather vulgar mouth.

John Collins, the other experienced SF exec who's being brought into IB, was the GM of The Great Escape. While operation of the park under his watch is open to many interpretations, he was the man at the top whose decision-making led to the Comet being desecrated by the flattening-out reprofile of the second return run and the retracking with cheap pine. He said it had to be done to ensure a long life for the coaster and safety for its riders. Now he'll be responsible for three wooden coasters at IB.

More bad news is in the works here guys. The new management fired all of it's employees, even people who have been there over 20-30 years. They wanted the entire employee staff to take pay cuts and work for minimum wage (there plan to do with all employees this season as well). The employees were mad about it and the original Spackman family was mad about it so the new management's idea of solving the issues was firing everyone. The new management are in for a real surprise because people who even worked out there for say 15+ years were only making 7-9 dollars top an hour anyways, except some maintenance guys, who were all fired too. You can obviously see where this is going folks. They expect to pay all of their employees minimum wage. The park already has had problems of finding people to work for them and for the entire summer because of the pay rate. There were times during the year that the park didn't even have enough employees to run the rides so they just shut some rides down and tell people they were being fixed/etc when the true fact was that they didn't have enough people to work. They are in for a real surprise when they start hiring people within this next month only to realize most people aren't going to work for a low pay rate and then the ones that will are teenagers/college students who will be going back to school leaving the park 3 weeks left with no employees at all to operate the rides. It's very sad to say at the least. If you guys plan on going to IB this year be sure to tip the workers because they are working their butts off for 5-6.00 an hour tops!!!! Even the ones that have worked there for years!!!!! NO RESPECT!!