IAAPA: Other stuff

Churros trump everything.

Jeff:

Jesus Christ, the churro cart doesn't matter.

And a new Coasterbuzz meme was born.

Churro cart > RRR.

You mean like that?

Maybe we can have a double Christmas miracle and they'll drag Ouimet out of retirement too.

I’m glad to see a conversation about the direction things are headed at Cedar Fair with current corporate leadership. It’s disheartening.

And it's only going to get worse. They continue to lose good people where they need them.

I joked about Ouimet, but in my experience going to the big 3 parks this year (CP, KI, KD) the new management isn't having a substantial impact on guest experience. The parks were always well-staffed and operations were on point. It is sad to see so many good people leave, so you do wonder how long they will keep up the facade.

Sea World definitely shows it in my opinion. SWO feels more like a Six Flags park with fish than the third-tier (DIsney > Uni > SW) theme park it was in its prime.

And Six Flags... let's not go there.

PhantomTails:

...than the third-tier (Uni > Disney > SW)

Fixed it for you. ;)

Unless of course you are talking about the walk from the car to the rides

Is there a churro cart along the way?

No but there is a Panda Express.

Iger was pissed with where that cart was located so he unlocked the wheels and moved it himself.

Chapek turned the castle itself into a churro cart.

Churro = RRR ?!?

Ouimet picked Zimmerman as his successor. And he is still on the Cedar Fair Board of Directors. It’s not like he retired or left the company altogether. He’s still involved, to an extent.

You are totally wrong. Ouimet has been gone for years.

According to the Cedar Fair corporate site, he's still a Director. What that actually means, I have no idea.

Ouimet is still very much on the Board at Cedar Fair and Zimmerman was his hand-picked successor (in fact, one of Ouimet's first moves when he got to Cedar Fair was making Zimmerman COO and then president and then finally CEO). Which is why the total breakdown in culture at Cedar Fair is so interesting/confusing especially given many of the senior executives (CMO, CFO, Chief Strategy Officer) are still "Ouimet people".

From what I am told a lot of the problems come back to Tim Fisher who Zimmerman appointed as COO almost immediately after he was named Ouimet's successor. He had a really mixed reputation from his time at Paramount and his time at Village Roadshow was pretty much a disaster. Fisher is the driving force behind giving away the gate, stupidly cheap season passes to juice attendance and you can see what that did to Village Roadshow.

I meant he hasn't been executive chair in years, so he's not hands-on.