Geauga Lake 2007 Opening Date May 27th

Yes the sad news is in. According to the Geauga Lake website's scrolling news bar, opening day next year will be Saturday May 27th! This is not good news at all...

With that opening date, they might as well just say they are a waterpark.

Its the 26th of May actually but still that is a bit late, considering it opened two weeks earlier this year. THis is not very good news for the people who see this parks demise coming slowly. I know you have to acclimate you other parks, ie kings island, but this park seems like its gonna get the axe sooner rather than later.

Makes sense to me. They're tuned on being a water park with after-dark stuff to do.

Look, I love Geauga Lake, I loved Sea World, and I visited and tolerated Worlds of Adventure, and made the best of it.

However, in reality, Cedar Point IS Cedar Fair. The shots are called in Sandusky by Kinzel, Falfas, Hildebrandt, etc. These guys worked together for decades, and know what to do, and who to do it too.

They love Cedar Point, not Geauga Lake. They did not ruin Geauga Lake, Premier Parks did. It started with the name change, then carried over when Sea World closed, and a chain of events made a mid sized picnic park into a mega-themer, which it never was built to be.

It will take years to rebuild the business into profit. Now they are trying to control losses, and rebuild a tarnished reputation. Added, there will never be a ride or attraction that will compete with Cedar Point built, to give it the quick fix it may need to bring back the lost Western Pa markets that dried up when the animals left.

The reality is Cedar Point is a better park, and if rides is what you want, you drive there. If you want to sit on the lake and get drunk, well, its way cheaper to do that at Conneaut Lake. Is Idlewild better for kids? Yes. Does Kennywood handle picnics better? Yes.

We will have this same discussion 5 years from now, and we will all say "Man, what a banging waterpark. Remember those coasters that Six Flags built? wonder where they went. Lets catch the next boat and ride the Dipper and Double Loop, then hit the Oktoberfest.

That is Geauga Lake.

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Agent Johnson said:

However, in reality, Cedar Point IS Cedar Fair. The shots are called in Sandusky by Kinzel, Falfas, Hildebrandt, etc. These guys worked together for decades, and know what to do, and who to do it too.

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...or another way of putting it -- This is what happens when Wall Street and quarterly earnings reports drive how parks operate. It's a shame that the world works this way, but it is what it is... As long as Wall Street is involved, you are going to see more and more of this...

^Please, this is first and foremost a business to make money. If they aren't making money then something has to be done.

Unfortunately Geauga Lake is not JUST a water park even though that is the big draw. 2007 will be the park's 119th season and yet something tells me GL, as a ride park, won't be around by 2015. Better start saying my goodbyes soon.

X Factor

Why is this a bad thing at all? They're not going to waste money on being open when there's no one in the park and no real draw to the park. The only days this year that the place was somewhere between busy and packed and that was hot days in the waterpark and Oktoberfest. So, seriously, why open any days other than waterpark days and Oktoberfest? For the 15 people who want to just come to ride the rides side of the park? Brilliant move on the part of the park in my opinion. They'll post a profit this year, and people will have a VERY positive impression of the park.

Look at Dorney, it's nothing more than a waterpark with some after-dark activities ... I don't think I've ever waited more than 30 minutes for a ride at that park ... EVER, and it's certainly not regarded as a failure. Consider that Geauga sits in about 25% of the market in terms of total population and a shorter operating season makes perfect sense.

For those of us who have GL as a home park, cutting back on the operating schedule isn't exactly giving a positive impression. It's one thing to end the season early by eliminating the Haunt but to wait until Memorial Weekend to open isn't smart considering all of GL's other competition, sans CP, is already open by that time.

This is enough incentive for Kennywood to start advertising in the Cleveland market earlier than they did this past year, which was surprisingly quite a bold move for them with the commercials and billboards in the region.

By the way, they did raise admission to $26.95, junior and senior admission is $11.95 and for what? Usually when a park raises their admission there is at least something new at the park to justify it. So far not a peep out of Aurora.....yet.

I just found out the monorail is no longer listed on the main site. Not a surprise there as it was closed for majority of the summer. Looks like another ride gone with nothing to replace it.

This opening day date comes as no surprise for me.

Geauga Lake has suffered an Idenity Crisis for about a decade. Funtime knew the park was in no way a competitor to CP or could ever come close. They delt with more picnic and lower income families and those who couldn't drive an hour away to hit CP.

I'm looking forward to seeing the numbers, there were definatly more people there last season.

Remember back to a long, long time ago...
Parks opened Memorial Day Weekend and closed Labor Day weekend... many still do. Geaga Lake is no exception.

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X Factor said:
Unfortunately Geauga Lake is not JUST a water park even though that is the big draw. 2007 will be the park's 119th season and yet something tells me GL, as a ride park, won't be around by 2015. Better start saying my goodbyes soon.

X Factor

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Just because the ride park isn't viewed as a big enough attraction to justify opening the park just for it doesn't mean it isn't a valued part of the park. CF has invested heavily in finally fixing RWB and the Villain is next. Thunderhawk got new paint and that side of the park is rumored to get a new restaurant this year. I'd say that means CF isn't going to remove the rides anytime soon.

Corporate at it's best.

They're just afraid to admitt loosing seaworld was a huge mistake.

You have no idea what you're talking about. SF didn't do very well at all when they had SW, and it costs a fortune to maintain an animal park. The reason they've had lower attendance is because of the infinite number of bad experiences people had at the park before CF took over.

Folks lets look at this objectivly, the park is half waterpark. Why in the world would you open your half waterpark/half theme park so early that half of your attractions werent open? Its good business, I know it sucks to be a GL homeparker that your off season will last 7 weeks (4 in Oct, 3 in May) longer but this is just a good business decision.

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Charles Nungester said:
They're just afraid to admitt loosing seaworld was a huge mistake.

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Actually, I believe Dick Kinzel told us that very thing last year when we did the podcast with him.

^Exactly, so I don't understand when someone brings it up in a topic like this, another person knocks them down saying that wasn't the case for lower attendance. SF is the sole cause, blah, blah, blah.

Kinzel himself said this so why do people have to continue saying that isn't the reason.

Face it. The Sea World side was a draw for SFWoA. Obviously not to the point that SF would have liked, but it did play a role. It was a unique park in the midwest.

CF has owned this park now for 3 seasons. How long do they need to bring the people back with their product?

The attraction to the animals was underestimated, but this doesn't factor in cost. It may be hurting the attendance figures now, but in the long run I am glad they chose not to take on those costs.

Even if you could argue that the animals were worth the cost in order to keep a portion of visitors coming back, it wasn't as bad as the bad impression people got of the park. If you look at the attendance figures starting when SF took over, the drop off after 2000 is unbelievable. Clearly the animals were not helping them then.

CF has owned the park for less than three years, and the first operating season should not be considered. Two seasons is not a lot of time to get things turned around, especially considering the economic state of NE Ohio and the kind of people GL aims to attract (in my opinion, lower income than CP). However, their marketing has been a little suspect and hopefully that will get turned around this year. *** Edited 10/17/2006 6:59:08 AM UTC by lettuce***

I visited three times. Twice after they bought sea world.

Only once did I have any issues with the way things were run there and that was 2001.

I got two waterparks in my back yard. Sure the waterpark is great for clevelanders.

Shamu is 900 miles away. Geauga was 150.

Chuck

If you ran a park, and it's focus was on lower-income families with a reduced price and combined water park, why wouldn't you try to stay open just in the critical summer months? It's very simple.

Once the park returns a profit, then I imagine the hours will expand.