How much will The Gravity Group woodies costs?

Compared to a CCI woodie how much will they need to charge to get business and stay profitable? Will parks like HW, IB, Silverwood still be able to afford TGG woodies. I really hope that it wasn't the affordable price that makes CCI go under. I don't want to see the small parks priced out of the woodie market to build a good mid-sized to large woodie like CCI did. I think TGG will build really good designs but the real question is: Can they afford to make the rides affordable for the small parks like CCI did?

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At this time the gravity group seems to be offering only design and engineering services, not construction services.

I heard they were offering to do work in return for alcohol and/or sexual favors (heck...wouldn't you?)

Seriously though...I'm sure those who formed this new team have taken to heart the lessons learned from watching CCI opperate. It doesn't take much business knowledge to realize that you need to charge more for rides than Denise was. GCI's are a bit more expensive and I'm sure GG can use GCI's prices as a starting point to work from.

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James Draeger
-Proud co-founder of the Coasterbuzz street team

I can imagine that the allusions to Denise's "rep" are at least to a large degree due to the fact that the company was almost always working under extremely tight budgets.....if ANYTHING went over budget or off-schedule, and in construction almost everything does BOTH, and you can't count on weather, I'll wager that every day was "pressure-filled", and about as intense as....a CCI coaster. If GG, at least for now, is sticking to design and engineering, they stay clear of those headaches...of course, there are drawbacks, too....

My concern is this: Is there a way to make woodies affordable for smaller parks anymore??

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Affordable is a relative term. I mean, if something like Raven goes for $2 million, $3 million still isn't a lot of money for a big amusement park cap ex.

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Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com, Sillynonsense.com
"Let's stop saying 'don't quote me,' because if no one quotes you, you probably haven't said a thing worth saying." - Dogma, KMFDM

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't CCI just design and engineer the rides, then have an outside contractor (or the park themselves) build the ride?

They had people managing the projects and working on-site. I know that at least two of the guys spent a great deal of time at IB earlier this year. They don't just hand over the blue prints and say "knock yourself out."

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Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com, Sillynonsense.com
"Let's stop saying 'don't quote me,' because if no one quotes you, you probably haven't said a thing worth saying." - Dogma, KMFDM

Yeah, they had a few CCI employees that oversaw construction and were basically there to work out any ad-hoc issues that would arise during construction. But, for the most part, they just basically did design and enginnering of the coasters and left the construction to a firm that was hired to do the project. They just made sure the constuction was done right.

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WCUSA-The World's largest theme park is coming!
Theme parks will NEVER be the same!

That's what I meant- that CCI oversaw the construction crews that were hired, but didn't actually employ any laborers.

::in best Doctor Evil voice::

"One Million Dollars!"

::snickers all around::

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Bob Hansen

A proud CoasterBuzz Member

"So you think your'e really brave, gonna see the DEMONS cave.
You silly dude, your'e only food, for the DEMON"

Jeff you're right that $3 million isn't much but GCI charges $10 million for Roars which is slightly smaller than Legend. I think if a Shivering Timbers clone could still be built for under $7 million with improved construction quality and if they can build a good 90-100 foot tall woodie with 3000-3500 feet of track for under $5 million I'd call that affordable and still a good deal. Keeping a major ride IMHO under $5 million would prevents small parks in the same league as HW, IB or Silverwood from being priced out of the market. GCI would only sell you one that is a kidde or junior sized coaster in that price range.

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Gjostrider was the most expensive CCI project, costing 24 million. That's about as much as a giga, so not all CCI's are cheap.

We need to be careful when throwing around these "price" figures.....the park quotes often/normally include all asssociated costs of the "expansion", whereas the manufacturer only sees the cost of the ride itself....(less, of course, their expenses)....

But Ghostrider cost is due to crossing the street, labor costs heavy theming and the insane amount of wood use to make the structure earthquake proof.

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Roar cost $10 million? Where did that come from? I do not know how much it cost, but that sounds like an awful lot.

esp. considering Gwazi, with two tracks, was listed as $10M....based on that I'd *expect* a Roar to come in at about $5-6M....of course, the park has those "associated costs"....

edit....$M, not just $.....shoot, if I could get a CCI for ten bucks, I'd have a *collection* by now...:)

*** This post was edited by rollergator on 8/20/2002. ***

I thought CCI was like a general contractor. They designed and engineered the rides and then had to contract out all of the construction labor. They still had to pay the contractors, so when things go over the budget it came out of their pocket. It seems to me that the new company will just design and engineer the rides & let the park contract all the labor.

I saw that figure for Roar in either ACE news or Rollercoaster magazine.

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