Orlando Sentinel Article ....Wild West Fans Make a Last Stand

[JessicaR]

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busi...972.story?coll=orl-business-headlines-tourism


By Todd Pack
Sentinel Staff Writer

August 25, 2003

Despite the digital cries of fans, Universal Orlando is sticking to its guns and sending its "Wild Wild Wild West" stunt show to Boot Hill.

Universal also is going through with plans to exile that cartoon cold warrior Boris Badenov to Frostbite Falls, at least for a few months.

Since Aug. 8, at least 800 people have gone to petitiononline.com/SaveUSF/petition.html to sign a virtual petition urging Universal Studios Florida to "Save the USF Characters & Actors."

"This is very saddening," the petition reads. "Since the park opening most of these characters have been pleasing tourists and locals entering in and out the park every single day, the actors bring smiles to childrens faces and keep the park go'ers entertained throughout the hot weather and the long que's."

The petition's grammar and spelling may not be perfect, but its intent is clear. Universal's decision, however, is final, spokesman Jim Canfield said.

Universal Studio's "Wild Wild Wild West" will close next month after 12 years and 17,000 performances, he said.

Universal hasn't decided how to replace the show, but "we have a couple of ideas," he said.

Universal also plans temporarily to take about a dozen costumed characters out of its parks next month because of a predicted seasonal slump in visitation, Canfield said.

Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale, the infamous box-top counterfeiters from the Bullwinkle cartoons, will be among the characters disappearing from Islands of Adventure, while a team of Men in Black agents will be going undercover at Universal Studios.

Canfield said the characters, if not necessarily the people who played them, could return as soon as the holidays, when attendance usually picks up.


On a side note I was SO happy to hear the decision to take out some of the costumed characters may only be temporary. I really hope that is the case, I miss them already

 

[Flyfly_Eclipse]

I agree. The characters really added to the whole atmosphere of the park.

Sad still to hear about WWWWSS. I was never a fan of the show, but it's too bad for those who are.

 

[SpideyHulk24]

but at least the fans tried. Let's hope that great things will result from this. It may not be that way now, but who knows.

 

[Flyfly_Eclipse]

The thing that worries me is...will Universal ever listen to it's customers/vistors?

I'm not saying that they don't care...based on the show leaving despite the fans' petition, BUT, I would like to know Universal is doing their best to please its visitors.

The group of people petitioning against WWWWSS leaving is quite a decent amount...how many does it take to show Universal they are making a mistake (this is in general, not just for this show)? Or whenever we hear about something closing, do fans never have any say? I understand that sometimes we do not understand the reasons, but then again, it is still so risky.

 

[BornABrook]

I'm not by any means an expert on the subject, but I have seen similar subjects come up often in other forums.

Online petitions are usually (never?) effective. It's a piece of cake to click on a link and type your name. You can do it without hardly even pausing what you were doing. They're also very easy to forge, so the data is more likely to be suspect.

Letter writing campaigns have a greater likelihood of being effective. If a bunch of people care enough about the issue that they're willing to set aside the time to compose a letter and use up a stamp, then they're showing that they're really serious about what they have to say. Not to mention the time invested in spreading the word and talking other people into participating. There's some rule of thumb I've heard of, which I can't remember, which says that each letter can be considered to represent a certain number of other people who felt the same way but didn't bother to write.

Who knows if it would have made a difference in this circumstance. 800 actually seems like a pretty small number to me when you consider how many people must go to the park in one day. But it's just a thought for the future.

Brook

 

[ChrisFL]

Sorry to say guys, but I understand that Universal wants to put in something new....of course it would be nice of them to actually have a plan of what they're replacing it with!

 

[JessicaR]

I have to agree Chris. This current plan to close it down with nothing in the works is nothing more than cost cutting for them. I get the feeling it will be quite a while before anything replaces it. Hope I'm wrong.

 

[Mittman]

Perhaps you guys don't realize this, but the American economy is in a major slump. The travel industry is one of the industries that has been hit the hardest. When money becomes tight, travel is the first thing people give up to save money. Universal and Disney have seen MAJOR drops in revenue and they need to cut costs in order to stay alive. In the grand plan, these cuts are not the worst thing that could have happened. They could have increased ticket prices to $60 per day, they could have ceased production on new rides, they could have closed the park completely on certain days of the year. But no ticket prices didn't skyrocket, this year alone we got 2 major rides with another on the way, and the park is still open. Instead they got rid of a handful of characters, and decided to close a show that was getting very dated, and to be honest not many people cared about before it was announced it was closing. In a perfect world Universal would be able to keep adding new rides while keeping prices low and not "trimming the fat" of the park by getting rid of old attractions. But this isn't a perfect world. Universal doesn't have an endless supply of money just like the rest of us. Can you honestly say you would be willing to give up the new Mummy ride or pay more money for a ticket just to keep around a 2nd rate show or a handful of street performers?

 

[Flyfly_Eclipse]

Originally posted by Mittman
Can you honestly say you would be willing to give up the new Mummy ride or pay more money for a ticket just to keep around a 2nd rate show or a handful of street performers?

It would depend on the street performers and show

 

[JessicaR]

I disagree that Disney and Universal have seen MAJOR drops in revenue. They run promotions which in turn stimulates business. If people werent still going I would not be having a hard time getting what I want for 2 different trips that are considered off season. That includes the air segment as well. I will agree that we "were" having a travel industry slump after 9/11 but it sure seems to have recovered to me. We did see ticket prices go UP after 9/11 and who knows they may again before the year is out.

08/27/2003 - Updated 10:29 AM ET

Travel industry sees robust July followed by busy Labor Day

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A nation that largely stayed home between the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the war in Iraq got out of the house in July, a trend that's expected to continue this Labor Day weekend.

Independence Hall saw a 48% jump in attendance last month over July 2002, and hotel occupancy was up 2.4% across the nation, the first significant increase this year. New York City and San Francisco both saw July occupancy rise more than 6% over 2002. Chicago was up 5.7%, Philadelphia 4.4%.

AAA says it expects 33.4 million Americans to travel more than 50 miles from home this holiday weekend, the most since at least 1995.

"Travel definitely has picked up," said Jennifer Busey, manager of Franklin Travel in Champaign, Ill. "The stock market goes up, people have a little more money, and they take a trip. It all goes together."

Jan Freitag, an analyst at Smith Travel Research in Henderson, Tenn., said both leisure and business travelers are helping to fill hotels. Occupancy at resort locations was up 3.4% last month over July 2002, he said.

"This probably has something to do with the fact people aren't going overseas," Freitag said. "Urban locations are also up, which to us is an indicator that people are traveling more on business."

While room occupancy is up, room prices have been flat, Freitag said, meaning hotels are discounting prices to coax travelers to leave home.

Tourists around the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia on Tuesday said those discounts influenced their travel decision.

"The discounts," said Sherry Sherman, when asked why she, her two kids and husband chose to travel from New York City. The family bought discounted Amtrak tickets and got a free night at a hotel. "The whole package was very good," she said.

Gas prices, at near record highs nationwide, have been pushed up in part because of steep demand. From July 19 to Aug. 15, Americans used 9.4 million barrels per day, the highest four-week period on record, said Doug MacIntyre, an analyst for the federal Energy Information Administration.

"If gasoline demand is up, that would lead to the conclusion that either there's more cars or they're being driven more," he said. "The assumption is that maybe due to some of the poor weather people put off their vacations until the end of summer."

Justin McNaull, a spokesman for the AAA, said higher gas prices won't deter Labor Day travelers.

"A trip of a couple hundred miles, you're going to add only $3 or $5 to the trip," he said.

Phil Sheridan, a spokesman for the National Park Service, said Philadelphia is enjoying a high number of visitors in part because some travelers are still cautious about going to New York City or Washington, D.C.

While Philadelphia last year had only one cruise originate at its port, this year it's had 17, and another nine port calls, said Cara Schneider, a spokeswoman for the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp.

July's 2.4% national occupancy increase was the first increase in 2003 since January, when occupancy was up 0.2% over the previous year, Freitag said. He said he's "cautiously optimistic" July's upward trend will continue into the fall.

"That's the question of the moment: Is this a trend or is this a blip?" Freitag said
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved


http://southflorida.bizjournals.com/southflorida/stories/2003/08/11/daily1.html

Bush: Fla. tourism up from record-setting year
Speaking to more than 800 members of Florida's tourism industry at the 36th annual Governor's Conference on Tourism last week, Gov. Jeb Bush said the state's No. 1 industry has recovered from the economic slowdown and is getting stronger every day.

Instead they got rid of a handful of characters, and decided to close a show that was getting very dated, and to be honest not many people cared about before it was announced it was closing.

So you are saying getting rid of 12 characters and more than likely just replacing them with Hulk, Jimmy Neutron, spongebob saved them money? I dont think so. And if it did was that amount in any way significant? I have no idea how often you visit Universal or what it means to you but to this girl those characters and all the others play a huge part in my overall park experience. They deserve the recognition and they deserve to know how much they will be missed.

As far as the show goes, I do understand the need to redo, revamp and replace it with something else if their statistics show it wasnt popular. I am in hopes that they have some great idea's for it. Again, I feel sad for the actors that contributed to this show for so long. I hope Universal can use their talents elsewhere.

In a perfect world Universal would be able to keep adding new rides while keeping prices low and not "trimming the fat" of the park by getting rid of old attractions. But this isn't a perfect world. Universal doesn't have an endless supply of money just like the rest of us.

I hold no false expectations for a perfect world. I also dont feel out with the old is "always" a bad thing. I do not however consider the characters they ditched to be old and actually always witnessed crowds around Dr Doom and Green Goblin and MIB agents and Doc Brown. Speak for yourself about an endless money supply just this morning I planted a $ tree Gotta go water it!

 

[RedFish123]

In the Orlando Sentinel article they do mention that the charcters may return during the X-mas season when attendance picks-up. It seems reasonable not to have as many charcters out and about during the off-season. Aren't the months of Sept.-Nov. generally so slow that everything is basically a walk-on anyway? I will def. miss Doc. Brown and the MIB agents on our trip this Oct. but in the grand scheme of things I can understand the descion to cut back on street performers.


As far as WWWSS goes I have enjoyed it, but I am really looking forward to a new show now! I imagine that the big wigs at Universal decided that since we are going into the slow season and the show will only draw about half the normal crowd, now is a good time to close it and save some $$$. Even if they aren't sure of what the will replace it with (I imagine they have a good idea by this point, but with parks being so secretive, they aren't ready to spill the beans) something is on the drawing board. Look how long after the announcement Kong was going down for good, that Universal announced the Mummy will take its place! Didn't they finally send out an official press release about the Mummy ride a few months back? It's almost been a year since Kong closed.


On the other hand, if all these off season closures never amount to anything, I'm gonna be pretty upset. Ever since 9/11 the parks (both Disney and Universal) have been cutting back on attractions (sure Triceratops encounter isn't a fan favorite, but I sure do miss seeing it) in the off season. If ever year they are going to close more and more things untill they find the publics breaking point, where they will not visit the parks in the off-season, that would be bad!!! We really don't get too much of a discount when it comes to staying in Orlando, flying there and going to the parks in the off-season, so why should we have to deal with only getting half of the park experience?

 

[Mittman]

Originally posted by JessicaR
I disagree that Disney and Universal have seen MAJOR drops in revenue. They run promotions which in turn stimulates business. If people werent still going I would not be having a hard time getting what I want for 2 different trips that are considered off season. That includes the air segment as well. I will agree that we "were" having a travel industry slump after 9/11 but it sure seems to have recovered to me. We did see ticket prices go UP after 9/11 and who knows they may again before the year is out.

My family owns a travel agency and I can speak from personal experience that the travel industry has not yet picked up to anywhere near what it was before the war and 9/11. My family's agency is doing about 1/4 of the Disney and Universal packages it was doing. Even though it did go up a little last month, the numbers were still only about 1/3 of what we were selling 3 years ago. The reason you are having trouble finding a flight is because the number of flights to Orlando has been scaled back since 9/11. Trust me, the travel industry is still in a major slump.

 

[JessicaR]

Hi Mittman,

We have a common interest! My Mom owns a travel agency and I worked as one for many years before having kids. Granted after 9/11 travel went into a major slump. The slumps travel agencies are now experiencing have very little to do with 9/11 any longer. People may not be traveling in large numbers overseas but they are absolutely traveling again as a whole domestically. Travel agencies are suffering due to the internet. They are suffering since the airlines cut out their entire comission structure. They are suffering do to the fact that many leisure travelers and even some corporate are doing their own travel. When one can book an internet only deal that a travel agency just cant match the travel agent again suffers. Major hotels and cruiselines are offering deals to deal with them directly that an agency cant offer. Unless you specialize in a product or do a huge corporate volume I cant imagine how an agency can thrive any longer. To honestly believe that bookings are down and say its because people arent traveling since 9/11 domestically is simply denial. You can thank the pricelines and the hotwires and expedias for travel agencies sluggish stature.

My family's agency is doing about 1/4 of the Disney and Universal packages it was doing. Even though it did go up a little last month, the numbers were still only about 1/3 of what we were selling 3 years ago.

You can thank the expedias, hotwires and pricelines for that. It has little to do with people not going. I tried to book Hershey park for the month of July and August ANY dates and not a room was to be found. As far as you saying there are less flights offered to Orlando from my area that just isnt true I have been going and booking my travel online for years and have taken the same flights I always have, they just arent available due to lower rates and people booking them. Wouldnt you think if a certain time period showed flights to be unavailable because they were sold out they would add more, if they could? I am in NY where I have 3 major airports and one local to me to choose from and still I am having a hard time facing sold out flights for my dates.

I wish your agency all the best and hope things continue to pick up!

 

[SpideyHulk24]

You are gem. I feel you hit the nail on the head. I don't think we are back where we were 5 years ago with travel, but we are getting there. Also, there are so many discount programs on the net, that people don't use travel agents as much, which makes me feel bad for them because a service online does not give the personalized service and expertise that an agent does. I think what also comes into play is that our world is a different place then it was just two short years ago. However, because of that people want to travel to get away and not deal with the real world, just not abroad.