Continued: Cedar Fair announces Geauga Lake will be water park only

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Jeff said:

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enfynet said:
Actually, I've spoke with quite a few locals who are unhappy with this move. The people least upset seem to be thrill-loving teenagers and operaters of Cedar Point sites.

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Nice. Because Geauga Lake closing is going to make me and Walt rich!

Locals, as in people near the park, yeah, I'm sure they'll be distraught. (Look how they flocked to the Bainbridge meeting last night.) But Northeast Ohioans in general? Meh. Perhaps it's not the most appropriate metric, but the local media doesn't seem to think the story touches enough people to sell newspapers/gain viewers.

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I wasn't even directly referring to you guys, but thanks for playing.

As for local media not pursuing the story, it's a shame. Several people I've spoken to have no idea the rides are closed. Announcing it after the end of the season prevents any real "public outcry" in general.

And as Kinzel stated, no amount of petitioning will change their decision. So why bother? The company doesn't care what the public thinks anyways.

I always love it when companies take that "we don't care what you think" approach. ;)

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Is that why they bought Michigan's Adventure? That was family owned. They cleaned up the place, priced it right, boosted picnic sales, and experienced double-digit growth. Massive success compared to Geauga Lake. I don't know where you get this corporate mind reading ability of what they're interested in.

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MIA doesn't have the competition that GL had. GL was surrounded by parks both in Ohio and surrounding states. Cedar Fair really hasn’t done much for GL. Yea you could say they painted ThunderHawk and Texas Twister. Cedar Fair painted Sea Dragon, Corkscrew, Giant Gondola Wheel, Board Walk arcade, added Tents to the slides, added Funnel of Fear and Grand Rapids, Put in shops and Restaurants and made new midways. Cedar Fair never really gave GL a chance, like they did with the other parks.

The "locals" weren't the target market either because they aren't spending money when they do go.

You know what Geauga Lake was to many, many people in that area of the world? A cheap summer camp program. When I was old enough to drive my mom bought three season passes (one for each of the kids) and had me take my siblings almost every day of the summer.

That was a heck of a lot cheaper than sending us to an 8-10 week summer camp. Sure, she might have to fork over a few bucks so we could rent a locker and buy lunch...but mostly we brought food in the car.

The fact that many adults are losing that cheap daycare service might be just as upsetting to them as seeing the rides side closed.

but they are'nt losing the cheap daycare service, the water park is still there.

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enfynet said:
The company doesn't care what the public thinks anyways.

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Rob Ascough said:
I always love it when companies take that "we don't care what you think" approach.

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Am I missing something, or does a group other than "the public" contribute to what is known in the biz as "attendance?"

I thought it was "nice" that they spent the 41-cents to tell me about the closing today even though I live in the Baltimore area (this is where I bought my Maxx Pass). The one thing they don't tell you on the website was this "However, we expect our calendar to reflect the traditional Memorial Day to Labor Day water park season."

I hope they can make enough money in that time-period.

Soak City is open no longer than that...and for good reason. The weather is too iffy before Memorial Day and after Labor Day. Even if they could staff it during those times there wouldn't be enough guests in the park to justify the expense of running it.

Heck, even down here in South Florida the waterparks are open limited hours outside of the summer time.

Even after Memorial Day, the weather can be iffy. My wife doesn't consider anything before late June to be waterpark weather up here.

There's no doubt that Memorial Day into the first several weeks can be cold, but on the Labor Day onwards side it can be still hot enough to at least be open on weekends. For example, in Baltimore it hit 93 degrees today. I know my parent's private pool that they go to stayed open two-weeks beyond Labor Day on a weekends-only schedule.

But after Labor Day you aren't going to get the kind of attendance at a water park during the week that would they'd normally get when kids are not in school.

It's possible they could remain open for a couple of weekends, but warm enough temps after Labor Day are still iffy.

Of equal importance is the difficult getting certified lifeguards before school gets out or after school goes back into session.

Getting ride operators for the shoulder seasons is no picnic. Getting lifeguards is even a greater challenge.

I didn't want to start a whole new thread for this. I spoke with a Sandusky local who owns CF stock today. (He wishes to remain anonymous.) The rumor going around the stockholders in Sandusky (and there are a lot, apparently) is that Cedar Fair is indeed looking to be acquired by a P/E firm. It wasn't that long ago Kinzel shot down this rumor, and that seemed to shut up the talk at the time. Given CF's duplicitious handling of the Geauga Lake closing, I attach less weight to his statements than I used to.

I'm sure at least some people will charge me with making this up. That's fine. But given the possibility that this might be true, I wonder what significance the GL closing would have. Would closing the (allegedly) least profitable unit in the chain make the company more desirable a target to be acquired?

I've been hearing stuff from various people (not Screamscape!) that this is becoming more and more likely.

a little off topic... but for all the conspiracy theorists out there... please note that

http://www1.cedarfair.com/

STILL links to a Paramount Parks website.

I don't think they're that smart.

I totally agree that the lifeguard situation would be the hardest obstace to overcome in staying open any later than Labor Day. Heck, it's even bad before Labor Day due to schools starting earlier than ever before.

^^

I'm sure that's a referring situation where they can still link from the old Paramount Park sites over to CF's sites.

Locals also said they were building a 500-foot coaster in 2006.

Private equity would have to shell out some pretty ridiculous cash to even match what the company was worth six months ago.

Just because they half-closed a park doesn't suddenly make the company have a smaller debt load or drastically increase cash flow.

A PE shelled out billions for Chrysler a few months ago. There are quite a few that have it.

Chrysler isn't Cedar Fair, is it?