Animal Kingdom's declinig attendence article....

[ncligs]

This was in todays Orlando paper..(4-21)

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busi...1,0,4778532.story?coll=orl-business-headlines

 

[d-r]

"declining attendance article"

Man, it is all about perspective - I thought that this was an article previewing tomorrow's announcement of the Everest attraction - let's see, what is tomorrow's date again?

 

[DoeWDW]

Thanks for the link to the article, ncligs!! I didn't realize that Animal Kingdom, for all the complaints I see about it on these boards, still has higher attendance than Universal or Islands of Adventure!

Interesting!

 

[tfc3rid]

Tomorrow is the day...

We find out (for certain) how grand scale this will be. Tomorrow could be a banner day for DAK...or...it could be another band aid for the parks.

Here is hoping its the start of a Renaissance.

 

[jlambrig]

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by d-r

"declining attendance article"

Man, it is all about perspective - I thought that this was an article previewing tomorrow's announcement of the Everest attraction
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Is the car half full or half empty?

 

[All Aboard]

d-r, I'd say that it is an article about the announcement of an attraction that WDW hopes will help heal AK's declining attendance. The author spent as much newsprint and ink on woes as he did on the attraction.

 

[d-r]

Yes, but is that what you get out of the subject line?

Screamscape has linked to a picture of an early model; it looks like the pictures that Fab had posted earlier:

http://craphound.com/images/forbiddenmt01.jpg

 

[KNWVIKING]

I'm curious to know if WDW is considering a way to allow the ride portion of the park to remain open after the animal portions have closed. I think this would add a great deal to the entertainment value of AK, make it good way to end say a day at the waterpark. I know MK has a whole different feel to it at night, I'm sure AK would too.

 

[Another Voice]

Animal Kingdom was originally designed to have “normal” operating hours just like all the other parks. They even ran tests with nighttime safari (hidden lights and lights on the trucks). But these hours were scrapped very early on when attendance was drastically lower than projected. Since attendance has fallen even since then, after dark operations aren’t even being considered at the moment (they’re barely in place at Magic Kingdom).

The whole line about “giving the animals a rest” is about as close to a lie as spin can get. The vast majority of the animal species at the park are far more active at night; the biggest problem Disney has is getting them up and moving in the day so the tourists can see them. And the San Diego Zoo (which has an infinitely more experience with these things than Disney) runs an entire “Zoo After Dark” marketing campaign all summer long – complete with noisy entertainment and special events.

Animal Kingdom could stay open as late as it wanted to. They just don’t want to.

 

[KNWVIKING]

"But these hours were scrapped very early on when attendance was drastically lower than projected. "

I thought opening year attendance figure were pretty much on target for AK, the declines came afterwards. If they had intended to try this,you'd think early on would have been the time to do it.

 

[C.Ann]

I was not impressed with Animal Kingdom at all - and now I'm even LESS impressed since they installed the "pay-to-play" games.. That is SOOOOO beneath Disney standards - you get that sort of thing at a traveling carnival.. And guess what? You don't have to PAY to get INTO the carnival!

I don't see how one new ride is going to keep people in the park for more than half a day (unless of course they spend the OTHER half of the day WAITING in line to get on it) - but desperate times call for desperate measures.. Only time will tell..

I sure wish they would ditch that tacky carnival section though!!

 

[KNWVIKING]

"I was not impressed with Animal Kingdom at all - and now I'm even LESS impressed since they installed the "pay-to-play" games.. That is SOOOOO beneath Disney standards - you get that sort of thing at a traveling carnival.."

The carny games don't bother me, I think some are fun, but I'm not disputing your opinion or displeasure with them. What I will say though is that when we were there in early Nov and then later in Dec, those corny carny games were very busy, as was the new coaster & spinner ride. Disney "elitist" (for lack of a better word) may not approve of them, but until people stop paying to play these games,I don't see them going away. And who am I to say the people playing them are wrong ?

 

[C.Ann]

Originally posted by KNWVIKING
"I was not impressed with Animal Kingdom at all - and now I'm even LESS impressed since they installed the "pay-to-play" games.. That is SOOOOO beneath Disney standards - you get that sort of thing at a traveling carnival.."

The carny games don't bother me, I think some are fun, but I'm not disputing your opinion or displeasure with them. What I will say though is that when we were there in early Nov and then later in Dec, those corny carny games were very busy, as was the new coaster & spinner ride. Disney "elitist" (for lack of a better word) may not approve of them, but until people stop paying to play these games,I don't see them going away. And who am I to say the people playing them are wrong ?

---------------------

Nor am I saying the people who play them are wrong. But certainly you can agree that it's WAY below Disney standards - don't you think? What if they instituted "pay-for-rides" - in addition to your fee to get into the parks? Would that be acceptable as well? After all - there's lots of things to "see" without ever getting on a "ride".. I still think it's tacky - and it still reminds me of a carnival.. I think it kind of gives Disney a black eye... Just my opinion though........

 

[Douglas Dubh]

What if they instituted "pay-for-rides" - in addition to your fee to get into the parks?

You know, that is the way it used to be. And actually, still is. Even after they got rid of the ticket books, there were still things that cost extra, like shooting and video arcades. The "pay to play" games in AK don't bother me any more than the remote controlled boats in Adventureland.

 

[EUROPA]

Originally posted by DoeWDW
Thanks for the link to the article, ncligs!! I didn't realize that Animal Kingdom, for all the complaints I see about it on these boards, still has higher attendance than Universal or Islands of Adventure!

Interesting!

Well the fact that neither of the companies release those actual numbers makes me wonder???

 

[Robinrs]

Originally posted by DoeWDW
Thanks for the link to the article, ncligs!! I didn't realize that Animal Kingdom, for all the complaints I see about it on these boards, still has higher attendance than Universal or Islands of Adventure!

Interesting!

Since the OP took time out to join the USF forum to let us all know this, I thought I'd journey over here with my two cents...

This doesn't surprise me due to the fact that the Animal Kingdom is included in with the Disney Park Hopper. Anyone on earth knows about Disneyworld, even I didn't have much knowledge of the "other" parks until 1999.

I wonder how it would do if the tickets were to be bought just based on the merits of that park?

The Orlando Sentinel posted the 2002 attendance records as follows:

1. Magic Kingdom; 14 million, down 5%
2. Disneyland; 12.7 million, UP 3%
3. Epcot; 8.3 million, down 8%
4. MGM Studios, 8 million, down 4%
5. Animal Kingdom, 7.3 million, down 6%
6. Universal Studios Florida, 6.9 million, down 6%
7. Islands of Adventure, 6.1 million, UP 10%
8. Universal Studios Hollywood, 5.2 million, UP 10%
9. Sea World Orlando, 5 million, down 2%
10. California Adventure, 4.7 million, down 6%

IOA is the only Orlando park that posted UP attendance. I think without the Walt Disney legacy, the absolutely loyal childhood memory folks and with no pixie dust or magic, that says aLOT for that park.

 

[YoHo]

Robinrs


Those numbers are interesting. I've never seen anything ANYWHERE that has suggested that WDW's Magic Kingdom has a higher attendence then Disneyland. In fact, Disneyland is widely touted as the most visited amusment park in the United States. IF those numbers are relativly accurate then that says a whole lot more about Disneyland then any Florida theme park.

Of course, since none of those companies actually release attendence figures, the numbers could be complete bull.

 

[KNWVIKING]

Isn't the drop in US and the increase in IOA mostly due to IOA getting the Halloween party instead of US. Didn't they basically just break even when comparing last years two park total ?

 

[Planogirl]

Originally posted by KNWVIKING
Isn't the drop in US and the increase in IOA mostly due to IOA getting the Halloween party instead of US. Didn't they basically just break even when comparing last years two park total ?

Maybe they only broke even but that is still better than a decline. I'm not surprised that AK's attendance is still better than Universal's either. After all, those visitors to the Magic Kingdom with hoppers and LOS passes (whatever they're called now) will likely visit Animal Kingdom at some point. I would love to see a breakdown of time spent at each of the parks because I suspect that Animal Kingdom's would be very low while the Magic Kingdom would blow all of the other theme parks away. The figure that surprises me is Epcot's attendance since it seems to have the atmosphere of a ghost town lately.

Universal is still building its attendance and the results of this effort won't be shown clearly until people start traveling again in my opinion. And that is true for all of the parks.

 

[Another Voice]

The 'Amusement Business' numbers are...well...amusing.

They are estimated based on last's year's estimates and adjusted by "talking" to people in nearby hotels and general travel industry buzz. They are accurate only in so far as trends go (sort of) and can be substainly off (we're talking in the millions here).

But much like television ratings, they are the only numbers out there so everyone uses them.

There are also significant problems with the way the numbers are collected. At Disney, a guest "counts" only for the first park they enter. So if someone runs to Animal Kingdom because it's the first park that opens, spends three hours there - and then park hops over to Epcot for the next eight hours, AK gets the count and Epcot doesn't.

Does that really reflect what's going on?

And Mr. KNWVIKING - the numbers for Animal Kingdom disappointed Disney months before the park even opened. Disney had expected both an increase in the number of guests coming and the length of their stay. The only thing that happened was that people simply spent a few hours at AK and a few less hours at AK. And the park has never come close to hitting its pre-opening (and financial) projections. Why do you think it took them five years to add two carnival rides, some carny games and a store-bought rollercoaster.