Cedar Point guests experience traffic jams, complain on the Internet

RCMAC said:

...customer satisfaction while maintaining profitability, two crucial components to staying in business.

This!

• You can't keep the gates open without money.
• You can't get money without guest satisfaction.

Raising the gate for this event increases both.

No other solution offered seems to satisfy both criteria quite the same way.

That.
Even if it's for this one lousy weekend.
Note that nowhere in that mission statement do the words cheap, economical, low cost, or inexpensive appear in their list of values.

I just now thought of another good example that points to dynamic pricing as a sign of the times. Our OSU football tickets carried a higher price this season for what was designated as a "Premier Game", OSU vs. Wisconsin. Regular single tickets at The Shoe are 79 bucks face value, and that game went up to 110 a seat.

As an alternative, season ticket holders may list their tickets for re-sale at the Buckeyes Ticket Exchange where the seller sets the asking price. Hmmmmm...

Hotels, including those at Cedar Point, have been for all time pricing their rooms according to demand. Why not do the same at the gate?

Using flexible pricing to governor attendance essentially makes events like this into private parties that only the rich and nerdy end up attending.

If they do have large crowds, they make a ton of money, rather than pocket it, they need to spend more of it on traffic control than they did last week.

SnoopyDoo said:

Using flexible pricing to governor attendance essentially makes events like this into private parties that only the rich and nerdy end up attending.

Capitalism, isn't it wonderful. (and that's not snark)

SnoopyDoo said:

Using flexible pricing to governor attendance essentially makes events like this into private parties that only the rich and nerdy end up attending.

Unless it rains--then only the rich and nerdy can afford to get wet. :)

Or balance those days against days when attendance doesn't meet operating expenses.
Hey, I know. They could take all that extra money out of their pockets and helicopter everyone in and out.

Oldest and tiredest argument against dynamic pricing ever. Like with all things in life, if you can afford to go, go. If you can't, stay home. Or find a cheaper slternative. You can go to the movie in the afternoon and sit with retirees, and in any row you like, for cheap. Or you can wait and go on Saturday night with the hip kids when it's busy. You can go to Cedar Point on a weekday in May when it's slow and cheaper or you can go when the value of Halloweekends is thrown in, but beware: it's gonna be busy.

I'm glad we could still go to the Wisconsin game, but at no time did I feel like we were at a nerd party. Instead we were at the first conference game of the season and a night time game as well. And I suppose there were a lot of people who sat at home wishing they could be there but I can't worry about that.

I doubt there are many (if any) days CP doesn't at least break even. While weather may weaken the profit margin, it's not like they are discounting prices because rides like Skyhawk, STR, or Windseeker are unavailable either.

SnoopyDoo said:

Using flexible pricing to governor attendance essentially makes events like this into private parties that only the rich and nerdy end up attending.

And? We're talking about an amusement park here. Not food. Not housing. Not clothing. Not electricity.

If you can't afford the price of admission to an amusement park, then you don't get to go to the amusement park.

As noted above: welcome to capitalism.

CreditWh0re said:
However, given the schedule at CP for Halloweekends, why would I invest in that expense, when the Saturday is a complete no-go?

Just because one particular Saturday is historically busy doesn't make Saturday's a "no-go." I've been there countless times on September and October and had a great time.

I don't understand the reality that people come from when they show up here to bitch and moan about "greedy" theme parks and proclaim they're destined for failure. It has been going on for almost 14 years now around here. I also don't understand why people put so much energy into said moaning. Sure, we've all criticized various parks at different times for doing colossally stupid things (especially Cedar Point), but at least it's grounded in some reality that acknowledges that these are businesses and not charities.

Here is a totally opposite experience at Fright Fest caused by weather forecasts.

Saturday October 5th all Chicago weathermen called for: Severe Thunder Storms, Baseball Size Hail, Tree uprooting winds, Flooding Rains, and even Likely Tornado's due to an afternoon passing cold front.

We arrived at a sunny Great America and parked in the front row. The longest we ever waited for anything was one haunt at 12 minutes. The Demon's wait sign said 0 wait from this point...we walked right into a waiting train.

At 2:15 waiting only 6 minutes for Raging Bull a security friend of ours asked us how we where enjoying a day with less then 9,700 in the whole park. Keep in mind yes a few building clouds, a humid day for October still no signs of the doom that was predicted. At the top of Raging Bull we could see the front parking lot was 2/3rd's full, nobody parked in the back lot all day.

Did storms come? We at 4:oo a band of heavy rain moved through. No lightning, hail, or wind. Then the next round hit again heavy rain only around 5:30 it was all over by 6:45. Gurnee reported 1.1 inches of rain but we never would have guessed.

As we left at 11:00 we stopped and talked to Hank Salemi who was grateful the season pass holders ignored the grim forecasts and showed up. They ended up with just over 10,000 guests on a Fright Fest Saturday.

Now if all of the season pass holders had been blacked out, what crowd would they have had? 1000 people?

I just honestly wanted to show the other side of the Perfect Storm that never happened. But most regular guests choose to stay away from the forecasts.

We all just need to live with this popular season and sometimes fate tosses us a curve ball extra good or bad.

Happy Halloween

Jeff the point is that the customer has absolutely no other recourse than to bitch if they get treated in a way they feel short changed.
CP constantly brags about being the best amusement park and tease us with their various announcements and offerings. Then they post growth numbers and profits yet we constantly find lead attractions down indefinitely and problems like last weekend without even an acknowledgement from management.
Simply staying away shortchanges everyone and never will fix the real problem.

Ron Witrzek said:

Saturday October 5th all Chicago weathermen called for: Severe Thunder Storms, Baseball Size Hail, Tree uprooting winds, Flooding Rains, and even Likely Tornado's due to an afternoon passing cold front.

Did they also predict a flurry of unnecessary capitalizations?

SnoopyDoo said:

Jeff the point is that the customer has absolutely no other recourse than to bitch if they get treated in a way they feel short changed.

They weren't "treated" in any way, they showed up on a busy holiday weekend with good weather. No one was treated poorly.

Every post you've made here is to bitch and moan. Seriously, if you hate it that much, don't go. Find a hobby.

Ron Witrzek said:

Now if all of the season pass holders had been blacked out, what crowd would they have had? 1000 people?

Who knows? Any guess is just that - a guess. How do the parks that already blackout passholders manage? It seems to work for them.

My guess is the fact that it's a separate ticket more than makes up (in a revenue sense) for the odd night like you describe.

Disney does Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween, not included with annual passes. Same for Howl-O-Scream at BGT, and of course HHN and Universal. One could EASILY argue that all "included" Halloween events are too busy.

In a market economy, that means the pricing is too cheap.

Knotts' is also a hard-ticket event. Passholders get a discount, but admission is not part of the pass.

Yeah, I used Knott's as an example earlier as it sets precedent within Cedar Fair. Could certainly see that approach being adopted elsewhere within the chain.

rollergator said:

One could EASILY argue that all "included" Halloween events are too busy.

In a market economy, that means the pricing is too cheap.

I've been trying for 6 pages now. Maybe yours will stick? :)

But I wanna get in for free!

I've never been to Knott's Halloween event. But I hear it's very well done, and worth the price of a separate admission.

Cedar Point's Halloweekends, while lots of fun, are nowhere near the level of Knott's. We try to go every Friday night during HW and have a great time, but in no way would I pay extra for them. Knotts, I would, simply because I know so many people who have been and told me it's worth the extra $.

As for the issue of Season Pass holders on beautiful Indian summer holiday weekends... most of us know better than to even think about it. Like I said above, we go on Friday nights and leave Saturdays to the people who are driving in for a weekend getaway. You would never catch me there on such a day. If I had friends visiting from out of town who wanted to go, I would talk them out of it. My non-coastertool friends would trust my judgement well enough to believe me.