Six Flags Over Georgia Free Admission!
It looks like a number of assumptions were made in dreaming up this promotion without considering alternative circumstances. First, it sounds like they wanted a few hundred middle to upper class professionals to "ditch work" for a day and bring their well-behaved children to the park. What they got was several thousand parents who saw this as a way to let someone else take care of their kids for the day for free. Alright, I don't have to pay for day care!
Sure, I question the lousy parenting involved with dropping your kids off on an interstate at 5 AM. But how can anyone with a brain not consider the possibility that could happen? Because Shapiro put out a few releases saying SF was going to be family-friendly from now on, everyone else would stop using them as the baby-sitting service they had been in the past?
What is the demographic of this radio station? Did SF bother to ask that? I guess they just saw the opportunity to have their name mentioned for free on a station with a large listener base-- only 3000 of which would come to the park for a freebie.
Every ambitious plan or promotion needs a Devil's Advocate to question it. Gonch, you do such a good job questioning what every other park does, why are you giving SF so much slack on this one? In fact, I think they should hire you full time.
Gonch, you do such a good job questioning what every other park does, why are you giving SF so much slack on this one
Because they didn't screw up, Q100 did. It's really not that hard.
If you really want to play devil's advocate then look at it this way - Perhaps they did have a contingency plan and it involved letting in 15,000 people assuming the worst?
If things went down as I'm guessing (assuming, suspecting) they did, then SF did nothing but agree to the cross promotion with Q100 and their end was letting 3000 people in for free.
The deal is 'we let X number of people in for the free publicity and you guys get to run one of your 'goodwill' promotions at no cost" - it's a business trade and it happens all the time.
Beyond that what did SF have to prepare for?Apparently nothing but the fact that the idiots at Q100 have no idea how to run such a promotion. SF ended up letting in 15,000 people in approximately 15 minutes - what more could they do? They didn't handle one bit of the promotion (as far as I can tell). The entire thing was handled by Q100.
If they had gone to another venue for the promotion (fill in the name Six Flags with any other area attraction - World Of Coke, Georgia Aquarium, Stone Mountain, whatever) and the outcome would have been exactly the same and it wouldn't have been a single one of theose venues faults either.
Like I tried to compare it earlier, it's the same as you asking to use my home for a party for 20 people and me agreeing. Then the big day comes and you bring 200 people. It's not my fault I can't accomodate you at that point. We agreed to one thing and you delivered another. There's nothing I can do beyond try to handle the situation that you screwed up as best I can.
I still don't see why the concept of a difference between 'event promoter' and 'event venue' is so difficult to follow.
In fact, I think they should hire you full time.
I'm flattered. I think they should hire me too. ;)
Better yet, I think some other chain should hire me first before SF snags me and I steamroll the others right out of business. :)
LOL...kidding, somewhat (what Al Franken calls it "kidding on the square")... :)
*** Edited 4/9/2007 7:08:45 PM UTC by rollergator***
Sounds good, huh?
We already have more credibility than the ASO. ;)
From the article:
Q100 is thrilled with the turn-out. Their comment regarding the crowd and chaos, "We threw a big party. How did we know everyone in Atlanta would show up?"
Yeah that pretty much sums it up, huh? :)
"This remarkable turn-out at the Q100 'Ditch Day' at Six Flags was unpredictable, and a boon for the local radio station."
Unpredictable, eh? Riiiiiight.
Q100 Ditch Day
not Six Flags Ditch Day.
I actually agree with you halltd, the response shouldn't have been too unpredictable. So why didn't Q100 take the steps needed to limit the folks coming to their promotion?
I guess you need to see my quoted comment above your post for the answer. :)
If someone wants to have a get-in-free promotion at my park, you better believe I'm going to make sure I'm going to set some sort of limit on how many people get in for free-- not just anyone who shows up within a 3 hour period. How stupid is that? You better believe I'm going to question how they intend to control crowds, prevent fights, and maintain some semblance of order. I understand the concept of fights and unruly crowds is totally foreign to Six Flags, but they're at fault for having no clue as to what they were agreeing to. Ignorance is not bliss.
Over the years, I've promoted some relatively small fry events at public venues-- mostly school auditoriums. You wouldn't believe the crap I had to go through to get approvals. I had to sign contracts, provide proof of insurance (and I mean for some big ass amounts of liability), agree to pay maintenance people, hire local electricians for stage work (requiring negotiating separate contracts), hire security and traffic control. This is for a show attended by 400 some people-- run by a non-profit organization at a venue owned by a relatively small school district.
Yet two much larger businesses felt they never had to work out (or even think about) such details for a much large promotion, at a much larger venue, with much larger crowds. Sounds like they deserve each other, actually. They should do this again next year and see if they learned anything.
If someone wants to have a get-in-free promotion at my park, you better believe I'm going to make sure I'm going to set some sort of limit on how many people get in for free-- not just anyone who shows up within a 3 hour period. How stupid is that? You better believe I'm going to question how they intend to control crowds, prevent fights, and maintain some semblance of order.
I agree entirely, but I still have no reason to believe that didn't happen.
Let's go back to the party analogy. I agree to your party, you sign a contract, present a full-blown report on your intentions, detail the crowd control and the whole shebang.
So then who is at fault when 200 people show up for our agreed upon 20 person party?
I did everything in my power to ensure things would be run to my approval, but you simply punked me out.
When I ask you what the hell happened, you reply with, "I threw a big party. How did I know everyone in town would show up?"
Now go back up four posts and look at Q100's reply to the situation.
Couldn't they say, "you know we only intend to allow 3000 people in for free (if that's indeed the magic number)-- why aren't you clearly stating that in your promos?"
Couldn't they say "how do you intend to make sure the people you're sending onto our property act responsbily and orderly. Here's 3000 comp tickets. Have a giveaway, run a contest?"
Couldn't they ask "just who is the demographic that listens to your station? Are they the family friendly kind we're claiming to attract that will spend 40 dollars a person once inside the park?"
Yes I think Six Flags is at fault for totally relinquishing control of their own property to these people. They're at fault for totally trusting the clowns at the radio station to act responsibly. And I think they're at fault for allowing themselves to be drawn into a half-assed scheme without much thought.
Even if you think they're totally innocent, they're still going to pay. When people saw the reports of fights and see the park as nothing but a baby sitting service for troublemakers, did they think "Wow, that's just the place I want to take my family this year?"
As you've said, Q-100 didn't care how many people showed up - they actually liked the mob scene. But, the point is, SF should've done something about it ahead of time so they didn't look like morons. Regardless of what you think, I'm sure a lot of the general public think less of SF now.
RGB:
Even if you think they're totally innocent, they're still going to pay. When people saw the reports of fights and see the park as nothing but a baby sitting service for troublemakers, did they think "Wow, that's just the place I want to take my family this year?"
halltd:
Regardless of what you think, I'm sure a lot of the general public think less of SF now.
You're both probably right. I've never disagreed with the fact that this looks bad for SF. Hell, I even talked about throwing staff to the press to do PR clean-up earlier in this thread. I'm with you guys there. SF will get mentioned in every negative story about the incident.
Then again, 15,000 through the gate in minutes and the highways still jammed with people clamoring to get in - I don't think there's much worry about interest in the park.
Sure they are! They threw the big-azz party, and *most* of the negative PR is headed in SF's direction. I don't necessarily agree 100% that "all publicity is good publicity"...but when you ONLY get the good press and someone ELSE takes all the heat, then it sure looks that way.
Lord Gonchar said:Then again, 15,000 through the gate in minutes and the highways still jammed with people clamoring to get in - I don't think there's much worry about interest in the park.
Except you don't see that on days where people have to pay to get in. :)
Want something bad enough and eventually you find a way to get it. :)
You give ANYTHING away for free and people will swarm - even if they don't really want it.
Some of the people that probably tried to get in have little interest in parks but they figured for free, why not?
Another example is that I am a member of a lot of bargain/deal sites most of which have free stuff forums where people post their finds for forms to fill out online for free items. A lot of times I get stuff I would never pay for but I figure for free, I'll get it and it's no loss to me. I think this promotion could be looked at in the same way. Going to Great Adventure in 2002 I knew I wasn't going to have that good of a time because of past visits but I still thought it was worth it to go for free.
Perhaps that's the real social experiment happening here?
You must be logged in to post
