Kennywood announces Kennywood Junction for 2025

The theme park world is littered with the carcasses of former Thomas Towns.

It's only a matter of time before the Peppa Pig Worlds become Porky Pig Worlds. Or maybe Babe Worlds?

Pour one out for Yogi's Sky Tours/Lazy Town Sporticopters.

I imagine this makes Sir Topham Hatt cross.

I have to wonder if this may start some form of a trend. I'm sure that someone thought by buying / leasing Thomas IP, there might be an increase in "Thomas" merchandise sold and visits because it was Thomas. But, was there enough of an increase to justify the extra expense for the IP?

Put another way, did the Thomas plush toys sell that many more than the Kenny Kangaroo plush toys? The licensing fee for Kenny Kangaroo is pretty much zero. That's not the case for Thomas.

If I’m not mistaken this decision on Thomas Town was made when Parques initially took ownership of Kennywood and don’t think it ever worked out the way they thought it would. They didn’t understand the market. This is a better direction IMO.

Pour one out for Wiggles World…..

eightdotthree:

If I’m not mistaken this decision on Thomas Town was made when Parques initially took ownership of Kennywood and don’t think it ever worked out the way they thought it would. They didn’t understand the market. This is a better direction IMO.

Parques bought the park in 2007. Thomas Town opened in 2018.

While the park has been continuously owned by Palace/Parques, Parques itself has gone through several changes to investors and owners over the years. It was privately held, then went public, then went private to EQT Group. The people in charge during the public years were gung ho on third party IP and that's why we got Thomas Town and Steelers Country. When Parques went private and they moved Palace to Pittsburgh with John Reilly in charge, they were against IP. They put the kibosh on the Steelers Experience building (even though it was almost done inside) and wanted to get rid of Thomas Town as soon as the could get out of the contract.

Has it been that long? Jeez.

I didn't know they were owned by private equity (subtle name), but that's rarely good for the quality of any business.

"for now"

The Thomas Land at Drayton Manor is the best one I think, it works as a mini park within a park and almost all of the park's junior rides are in there ... a train, a coaster, tower ride, water ride, veteran cars, monorail ... and pretty much one of everything from the Zamperla catalogue.

They open it outside of the full park being open and have Thomas themed hotel rooms. All the other Thomas Lands that I've seen felt like a handful of rides that weren't really prominent enough to make a difference, on their own.

kpjb:

"for now"

👀