What's going wrong at Cedar Point?

Yes. Maverick's original minimum height requirement, as posted during the off-season prior to the start of the season and the fiasco with the track replacement, was 48". They then bumped it to 52" before the ride opened.

wahoo skipper said:

I would call Magnum innovative but I'm not sure I would put MF or Dragster in that category. Those rides were just variations on Magnum which shows how "in the box" Kinzel really is. That isn't to take away from those rides...but it does show his reluctance to change.

I don't follow how TTD could be described as a variation on Magnum. Or how it demonstrates a reluctance to change and thinking one dimensionally. Even MF for that matter, which may still just a steel coaster, has the cable lift system. Isn't that special?

Maverick was supposed to be the answer to a "family" attraction after ripping out the water ride and, while I like the ride, it didn't hit on family. And, if it turns out the height limit on the new water ride is high then he will have missed there as well. And, unless there are some real surprises left to be revealed then I'm not sure that new ride can in any way be considered innovative.

I think the thing that bothers me about criticizing Maverick is that so many were lined up to criticize when it was announced because it wasn't an "est" record breaker. People were angry about that.

So they took a different marketing approach and as it turned out, it was more exciting than it was given credit for at inception and the thrill factor did increase. Now we are criticizing that, because we wanted a family ride after all?

Edited to add: If Maverick really is an indication of managerial failure, why are the lines for it so long on any given day?

Cedar Point does one thing very well. They build great thrill rides. In just about every other category of the business they are, at best, average.

Ok, but even if that is true, why would average equate to failure?

Carrie M. said:
Edited to add: If Maverick really is an indication of managerial failure, why are the lines for it so long on any given day?

Maverick is a really exciting and great ride, that is why the lines are long. It is certainly not any type of failure as far as hitting a home run in building a roller coaster.

I think what the "managerial failure" comments mean is that management at first billed it as somewhat of a tamer ride, that would allow people who didn't want a high-intensity experience to enjoy the ride. The ride was billed as being more friendly to riders intimidated by very high rides - I think people misinterpreted "lower to the ground" as "tame" when really it just meant "lower to the ground".

Carrie M. said:
I don't follow how TTD could be described as a variation on Magnum. Or how it demonstrates a reluctance to change and thinking one dimensionally. Even MF for that matter, which may still just a steel coaster, has the cable lift system. Isn't that special?

To the average guest? I'd say no. They're just roller coasters, which is I think what Wahoo was getting at.

Perhaps, but I still don't follow the argument. What would dazzle the average guest enough in terms of park attractions to make a difference in the success vs failure of the park? Seems to me MF and TTD did just that.

With it being lower to the ground, then it was better for people that are argophobic.

With it being lower to the ground

My son (who is 9) was happy to ride Maverick, but still won't ride Magnum---precisely due to height. Anecdotally, in our family, Maverick is much more of a family ride than many others at the Point.

Back to the food issue, Carrie asked whether an $8 hamburger would cause a drop in attendance. I'd say no, but it would reduce revenue coming from food service.

I wonder whether any kind of study/survey was done to determine whether reducing food prices could cause a net increase in revenue. It's pretty basic algebra to say we have to sell x number of burgers at $6.00 to equal the revenue of selling the known number of burgers we sell at $8.00. (And it doesn't take rocket science to account for the cost of extra patties, or the extra person to flip them, or the larger freezer required to hold them, or the extra bottles of ketchup to squirt on them.)

Maybe they did study the issue, but determined that they couldn't recoup that money by reducing prices. But it seems that the cost of food in the park has been a prevalent and consistent complaint for many years. Kinzel apparently feels the answer is "they have to buy food" so let's get what we can out of them. But is he even aware, or just doesn't care, that a large percentage of people that visit his parks don't buy food there? I think the chain is leaving a lot of money in people's pockets that they could get if they didn't come off looking so badly.

The example of Holiday World was mentioned with the free soda. I think it's funny that the "ultra capitalists" here would cry foul over that. What they're doing is creating perceived value, thus getting people to want to give them money for the value they perceive they're getting. So what if they're making it up somewhere else? Suddenly that's a bad thing? This is in contrast to the perceived screwing many people think they're getting from the big boys, so they leave grumbling feeling that they over-paid and the park under-delivered. The hard numbers may even say differently, but it's what the customer perceives that counts. And I think that's a point that Kinzel and Company are missing-- at least I perceive that to be the case. :)

One of the problems with the family ride concept is actually defining it. I have seen many people who view family rides as those the entire family can ride including 2-3 year olds and grandma and grandpa. Seems to me that is a tough window to fit within for a thrill ride. And no matter what the ride, some folks do not like heights, speed, dark, getting wet, etc. And my guess that there are families who find Maverick less family friendly than other coasters because they have kids over 48" but less than 52" and those kids will ride all of the 48" rides and would ride the 52" rides if they could. Maverick does capture a group of folks not otherwise captured because I knew of several people who ride it who would never ride Magnum, MF or Dragster.

With respect to pricing decisions, businesses do that all of the time. I expect that CP/CF does that but I do not know for sure.

If there is one ride type that when done to its best is almost nearly always a good "family ride" is a dark ride. To many it is the quintessential family ride, and is something that CP has lacked for too long.

Yes, Jeff got what I was getting at it but if it makes everyone feel more comfortable I will eliminate the term "family ride" from my vocabulary. For now on I will stick with "ride not requiring pages of safety information relative to the extreme nature of the attraction."

Will that work?

Carrie, I would agree with you that the ride manufacturer's were more innovative with regards to the cable lift on MF or the launch on TTD...but the simplification of what Cedar Point did was say, "we want to go higher and faster". I don't consider that innovative...and what new segment of the market were they going after when they built those rides?

Again, I'm not taking away from either ride. They are thrilling in their own right. But, they didn't likely appeal to anyone that didn't already enjoy Magnum.

I appreciate Brian's point in regards to the height of Maverick compared to the height of those coasters I spoke to but where Maverick might have gained riders because they kept it "shorter" they likely chase away some riders with the launch and inversions. So, maybe I call that one a draw.

I like Maverick...but I don't think it was a suitable replacement for the flume ride.

In fairness, I'm sure that during the ride design process, the park has an idea of what kind of a height requirement they want for any new ride (probably 36", actually...) and in the design process works with the manufacturer to figure out what they want in a new ride. If they are billing it as an all-ages type ride, then they are probably thinking in terms of a 42"-48" height requirement. But there are a number of factors that affect the final ride restrictions. The manufacturer wants to make it restrictive in order to limit liability. The park wants to make it as accessible as possible to keep the crowds happy. Then the final word comes down from the loss management people and from the State regulators.

The park and the manufacturer know what they have in mind for the new ride. But until the State signs off on it, nobody can say for certain what the final requirement will be.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

wahoo skipper said:

Yes, Jeff got what I was getting at it but if it makes everyone feel more comfortable I will eliminate the term "family ride" from my vocabulary. For now on I will stick with "ride not requiring pages of safety information relative to the extreme nature of the attraction."Will that work?

No. ;)

It doesn't change the premise of your point at all.
What does not liking the choice of those rides have to do with the pending failure of the park? Isn't that still the point we are trying to get at?

Is the park failing and if so, why? Blaming the addition of MF, TTD, and/or Maverick as not being innovative enough (or marketed as innovative enough) doesn't make any sense to me. Innovative compared to what? What's the metric for innovation?

And adding to Dave's point about height requirements not being final until the inspections are done... doesn't that also lend itself to the idea that these additions are innovative? If they were cookie cutter additions, the height requirements wouldn't even be a question.

Kinzel himself and other Cedar Point talking heads have said several times in the past that they wanted to reenergize the "family" market for Cedar Point. I'm sure Jeff could pull up those quotes from somewhere.

So, I guess you can ask them what they meant but that...and then ask them what the did about it.

Of the littany of things we have addressed (food, hotel accommodations, pricing, new attractions, live entertainment, technological ignorance, employee recruitment/retention, etc) do any of those things on their own point to the failure at the Point? No, do they collectively point to a possible explanation that would go hand in hand with the implosion of the economy? I think so.

What is maddening to me as a former (albeit short lived) insider is that I heard many outstanding ideas that never got past they "idea" phase because of the reluctance of one person. And, many of those very creative people who pitched those terrific ideas are now gone. (And, I'm not even counting what I am sure were very capable people from Paramount.)

Add to that the ignorant statements Kinzel has made ("they have to eat"), and the borderline unethical decisions he has made in regards to staffing and I think all arrows point north.

Whether or not the Apollo deal happens, I think it is nearly criminal to not give this company a chance under new leadership. It is certainly a disservice to the shareholders and the very committed full time employee base.

I don't disagree with you. Really. It doesn't sound like the chain has great leadership and I'm not defending it. I don't know enough firsthand information to weigh in one way or the other. I'm not unlike park guests that way.

The thing I'm stuck on, though, is that just because Apollo came along and made an offer, folks are wanting to jump to the conclusion that CF is failing in operations. I don't think we have enough evidence to get there. And if we do, it hasn't been offered here.

There are bad leaders in many businesses. And those businesses, like CF, would likely do better with better leadership. But that doesn't mean that those businesses are failing...even with the bad leaders.

Setting goals and not achieving them (like you indicate the family market to be) won't even be enough to bring a business down. If enough people like what is being offered and are willing to pay for it, the place will be a success despite its leadership.

Carrie M. said:
[What does not liking the choice of those rides have to do with the pending failure of the park?

It's not about what we like, it's about the attractions that expand a market or attract a new one, as he said before. Building bigger and faster roller coasters keeps the status quo, but it doesn't change or expand the customer base. When we talk about innovation, that's what we're talking about, not technology for a ride. This is business innovation, something completely absent from the culture of this company.

Interestingly, this is exactly the kind of thing that Paramount Parks were trying to do. Granted, they had access to movie licenses that were essentially free, but they tried different things to expand their audiences. That's why you never saw a Diamondback at Kings Island. Instead, they had record attendance by breaking out. They invested heavily in a kids area and water park. They built a low impact coaster (Italian Job) that was largely panned by enthusiasts, but had plenty of smiling kids and grandmas riding it. They did upsell season passes with perks that cost them little more than minor operational overhead. They used modern IT practices to truly get a real-time pulse on the business, and could react quickly to changes. They laid the foundation for a holiday event that showed promise in the long run, even if it was expected to lose money in the short term.

So think about that... they paid a premium price for these parks, and the premium was built around all of this built-up value. They subsequently discarded this value by forcing the "Cedar Point way" on the parks and booting or chasing out all of the smart people who created that value.

I can't think of a more serious example of how they screwed up. Good executives would have recognized that what they acquired was a better way and applied it to themselves, instead of vice versa.

Jeff said:

That's why you never saw a Diamondback at Kings Island.

No, but they built Son of Beast, didn't they? Without even talking about the colossal mistake that was, I think we can both agree it had the intention of being a record breaker and drawing crowds as such.

Look, I can't really speak to the rest of your post. It sounds great. But I don't have any information to support the fact that those initiatives applied at Cedar Point would have made a difference there. They could have failed for Cedar Point just as Cedar Fair's initiatives failed at the Paramount Parks.

Besides, we all know KI is the park it is today because of the Brady Bunch! ;)

Wow, Jeff. You just blew my mind. You've been saying that for a while now, but this is the time that I really got it.

I have always loved Kings Island. Cedar Fair should have looked at not only the things of tangible value that they were buying from Paramount (things), but the ideas that Paramount held as well.

I would even venture to say that it could have had an immediate positive impact on the company.

With all we've talked about, belive (after 12 pages and over 200 posts) that most of the problems (besides Detriot's collapse) can be traced to Kinzel's mismangment of Cedar Fair and the narrowmindness of nearly all the people in the front office. They've got blinders on so tight that it would take a fleet of semi-trucks to yank them off!

Jeff said:

So think about that... they paid a premium price for these parks, and the premium was built around all of this built-up value. They subsequently discarded this value by forcing the "Cedar Point way" on the parks and booting or chasing out all of the smart people who created that value.

I can't think of a more serious example of how they screwed up. Good executives would have recognized that what they acquired was a better way and applied it to themselves, instead of vice versa.

I've always said that I wished CF had been bought by Paramount, or that they'd kept PP's model instead, but you stated it better than I ever have.