Kings Island Fast Lane

Ensign Smith said:
So, essentially, the park is dividing the customer base into two tiers. The upper tier (admission and VQ) gets a better deal. How then is it possible to deny that the lower tier (admission only) gets a correspondingly worse deal?

But the "lower tier" isn't getting a correspondingly worse deal; they continue to get the same exact deal as before. Admission to the park for a specified price.

Riiiiight. And the specified price isn't based on customer expectations of being able to experience the various rides and attractions offered at the park. Oh, wait. It is.

So, essentially, the park is dividing the customer base into two tiers. The upper tier (admission and VQ) gets a better deal. How then is it possible to deny that the lower tier (admission only) gets a correspondingly worse deal?

*puts on my Devil's advocate costume*

I don't think anyone is denying it, in fact you are correct. But you seem to be operating under the assumption that the park owes all their guests a "fair" experience once they enter the gate. They don't owe anyone anything.

How did I get drawn into a Fast Pass discussion, anyway? I usually avoid these things like the plague. ;)

Ensign Smith said:
And the specified price isn't based on customer expectations of being able to experience the various rides and attractions offered at the park. Oh, wait. It is.

And everyone who pays gate admission gets exactly that: to experience the various rides and attractions offered at the park.

Ensign Smith said:

GoBucks89 said:
But as already noted, they are taking a little from a large number of people and giving a lot to a small number of people.

Ah, that's why I'm so instinctively opposed to the practice. It's an inherently Republican idea... ;)

Maybe if half Kings Island's customers were getting in for free....

Uh oh, we're not going to end up talking about gay Muslim breastfeeding Democrats eating pancakes on Maverick, are we??

Speaking of, remember yesterday at CP when... I mean, yeah, let's avoid that one, and keep talking about hotels.

Speaking of which, you know there's not enough people to sustain a hotel at Six Flags Great Adventure.

birdhombre said:
Uh oh, we're not going to end up talking about gay Muslim breastfeeding Democrats eating pancakes on Maverick, are we??

Do they get head of line privileges?

Put in a Fast Lane system and they will be able to build two hotels by the end of next season.

No, they won't, because there's obviously not a need for the hotels or else they'd already be there.

Fast Lane will generate the need. Kings Island will probably be looking at a new hotel by the end of this season.

No way. King's island is too close to several major metropolitan areas. Nobody travels to KI from more than 2 hours away, and if they can't handle a 2 hour drive at the end of the day, they're weak.

^ Hell, I know people in their late 20s who can't even handle a simple walk across a sandy beach!

But Fast Lane folks are weak. Otherwise they wouldn't have to cut in line, right? They may need to build hotels at the exit of each of the Fast Lane rides with shuttle service to the other rides. Shuttles will probably be pulled by standby line folks.

birdhombre said:
^ Hell, I know people in their late 20s who can't even handle a simple walk across a sandy beach!

If I remember correctly, one of them was actually 30. :) Second, that sand is deep and covered in seagull crap.

...until you realize that the price to attend an amusement park has been going up, not down.

Funny. I know I remember bringing up the (6, by the way) Disney parks in the US that give away front of the line access for 'free'. As long as you're willing to pay almost double for a one day ticket to a Disney Park as you would Kings Island.

The people not VQing, or not cutting in line in this case, are not saving any money, because the regular price never went down.

Ahhh...but like Gonch said, you have no idea how much they'd have to charge if they weren't making money off of this. A La Disney prices. Disney one day tickets are nearly DOUBLED when you look at how much it costs to get in the park without the pay to cut perks. Add in Pay to Cut, and you get in to the park, and have access to pay to cut systems. Goes back to Holiday World giving 'free' parking and soda and sun screen. You're paying for it up front, like you are at Disney. Other parks just haven't started doing that yet, and may never do it quite like that.

If a businesses main function is to make money, it wouldn't make sense to lower the admission price if a profitable new product was just introduced.

But you're still not figuring in the fact that as prices go up, businesses often find other ways of charging for something else in order to make money so that they don't have to charge more to everyone, just more to those that decide to spend more, who are then treated to perks that other people didn't dish out to pay.

Assuming rides are running at full capacity, any extra rides awarded to VQ-users must come at the expense of the remaining customers, who collectively will have their total rides reduced to compensate.

Very true, but going to a park on a busy day (Say a day the park is at capacity), where in this particular case the park may not offer Fast Lane, is going to make total rides available reduced to compensate.

Instead of 'taking away from one to give to the other', since this is a luxury, it's more like 'giving someone better access because they paid for it, while giving basic access to someone who chose not to pay for it'.

It's hardly taking something away from someone when, as I stated earlier, the someones didn't have any 'rights' to said thing (number of rides on a ride) to begin with. No park has ever guaranteed any amount of rides, not even to the people who pay extra. You simply have a better shot at riding.

P.S. as to the 'customer pays admission for...' comments, that's not really true. Customers pay admission to enter the park and have all of the park's available offerings available to them. Any number of things could happen that could keep you from seeing any or all of the attractions at a park.

I'm sure the people at Disneyland on 9/11/01 paid their money without expecting those parks to close, but the parks closed to everyone, who had no guarantee of being able to do anything other than have access for the amount of time the park sees fit. The park saw fit to close the park (for obvious reasons), which demonstrates that you're paying for potential access that could, for any reason, be revoked.

Granted, maybe the park gives the people a refund or raincheck because of that, its up to the park. But time and unforeseen occurrences could cause you to pay your money and not get access to a single ride or attraction. It doesn't happen often, and the park doesn't want it to happen, nor do the visitors. But simply paying for admission doesn't guarantee anything.