ArieForce One Heads to Magic Mountain, Halloween Hangover

0:00 Hello from our studios this week in Los Angeles and Tampa. This is Greentag Theme Park in 30. I'm Philip from Gantam Lighting Controls, and I'm joined as always by my delightful co-host, Scott Swenson of Scott Swenson Creative Development. Here on Greentag, we look at the top news each week, and we try and pick the stories we think matter most to industry professionals and discuss them here on the show. This week is our Halloween hangover episode, which we're going to talk about Halloween takeaways, Halloween learnings, And before we get to the Halloween, though, we have to give updates. Six Flags gave some updates. I believe they're trying to seed updates before they have their earnings call, which is going to happen this coming week after we record this episode.

0:43 So in other words, what you're saying here is they're doing, look over there. Right. Okay, got it. They're doing the look over there, right? And the bigger look over there is that they leaked that Airy Force One is going to go to Six Flags Magic Mountain, and this comes on the heels of the X2 closure, of course, and also amid all of the controversy of the. Of the other... Well, no. We've talked about it. There's a lot of... Six Flags is having a lot of problems right now, and so I think this is coming on the heels of all that, but immediately before the earnings, and.

1:26 It has a lot of theme park fans confused. I've been browsing through all the discussions about this and a lot of people are confused about why it's going there. I feel like it's just as simple as they're taking off X2 and they want to put something else there to kind of just... I don't know, for marketing purposes, right? Ahead of their big earnings. Yeah, the park obviously has taken a negative hit from a marketing and PR standpoint. And they need to quickly move on to the next news cycle for the park. And what's better than to take a beloved coaster? And there's a good warm fuzzy that surrounds taking a beloved coaster from somewhere else.

2:16 And moving it. Um, without mentioning, you know, it's replacing the park or the, the coaster that they're taking out for, for nefarious reasons. Um, so, so there's a lot of, yeah, there's a lot of, there's a lot of. Reasons why this makes total sense to me. I don't know. It's, it's one of those, we gotta, we gotta shift the narrative. We gotta take control of the narrative again. And let's, let's praise, let's get praise for keeping a coaster. That's everyone. That's a favorite of people's, Yep. Although the amount of discussion from the fan people online is just overwhelming. Yeah, I agree. I mean, I just looked at it and I went, why is this such.

3:05 A big deal? I mean, I understand it from the corporate side. I understand why they're doing it. And honestly, all of the discussion. And comments and... Oof. Just, yeah, just overall melee that is going on is probably exactly why they, you know, it's kind of proof that this is a good thing to do. Right. I don't, I love coasters. Don't misunderstand me. And I love theme parks, but I'm not sure I understand how, you know, some people's lives have been completely shifted into turmoil because of, uh, moving a coaster from one place to another. Why is it going here? Why is it not going somewhere else? Why, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, I really just, I don't understand it. Maybe I'm just too old. I don't know, but I just don't get it.

3:54 Do you have any insight into this as to why people are just so, to me, to me, it's, I guess to sum it all up, there's an ordinate, an ordinately large amount of discussion over moving a coaster from one park to another. Right. I think it's that, uh, this coaster, uh, has a huge fan base on the East coast where it is. And that's just how it is. It's just like the same with any other major fan base, like, you know, the sports teams or where anything happens with anything. And you get a lot of the, the local people who are, you know, understandably upset about it moving. But I think that six flags knew this. And I think that you're right in that they're doing this on purpose because now the news is about this. It's not about any of the negatives. And also it's about this before their earnings, right? right?

4:41 So I, I think they're, they're sort of a very smart, I think, to kind of shift the narrative here to not being about the recent stock plummets due to their safety issues. Right. Which that was the other big thing we got to talk about is that we, we recorded before this came out last week, so we didn't mention it, but on October 23rd, the Six Flags CEO sent out a big letter and this went out to every pass holder also. So it was like emailed to every pass holder for every park. And it was also posted on their official website. And it basically was just a page and a half about how they take safety seriously. There were two nuggets that were buried in this page and a half. And one is that they are going to add seatbelts on Goliath and other coasters with similar restraints. So there's that.

5:33 And the other section that I thought didn't get enough attention, attention, probably because it was buried, is that they said, quote, we have engaged independent engineers and ride inspection specialists to comprehensively review current safety procedures across our entire portfolio of rides and attractions across all of our parks. We're committed to carefully evaluating their findings and taking appropriate action to further strengthen our standards and culture of safety. So interesting, those two things buried. I'm not sure how I feel about the seatbelt thing because, again, it goes back to what we talked about where why weren't the seatbelts then on it? It's kind of like a Catch-22 situation. It's like now the natural response is, well, why did you run these for so long without seatbelts if you think the seatbelt's necessary now? There's that. And then on the independent auditors, I always think getting independent engineers is a good thing. In general, I think that a company asking for independent help. We do this at Gantem all the time.

6:37 We get independent feedback on our products. We ask designers from all over the world to get feedback. I think this is really critical. The thing I would add here is that we don't know who these people are, and also there's no one holding Six Flags accountable for anything that these people say. So it could end up being a month later, well, we listened to them and we did what we thought was necessary, but we don't even know. So I think that's the missing piece to it. But overall, I might just be pessimistic. Overall, I do think asking independent people is a good idea. Well, and I think that you talk about the seatbelt thing. I honestly don't know whether the seatbelts make a huge amount of difference or not. I don't know.

7:26 But the perception of adding an additional safety restraint is it has good optics. You know, it looks like they're doing the right thing. It looks like they're trying to make things safer. It is an investment of money. And honestly, what they're paying, they're not really paying for the seatbelts. They're paying for the optics of having the seatbelts. And I think that's a good investment, quite honestly. And if it does provide, you know, some sort of additional layer of safety, great. But, you know, does that mean... I mean, that's sort of like saying with automobiles, you know, it's sort of like saying when they added airbags, did it really keep people from having more accidents?

8:14 No. And in fact, there have been some cases where airbags actually caused the injury. So, you know, but it's again, it's another way of saying, hey, now we've got something that makes it even safer. And that's, you know, that's great. That's great. Um, and as far as, as far as independent engineers, I mean, I'm not gonna, I'm certainly not going to, um, poopoo that idea because that's kind of my bread and butter, not from a safety standpoint, but from a product standpoint. So, um, when people need help, that's, you know, they need help deciding, gosh, you know what? We've done the same three shows, um, with different costumes, uh, for the last 20 years. Let's, let's do something new. And they don't really have anybody on their on their team that has a, uh, an outside fresh perspective. So they bring in people like me or other people who do what I do. And, um, we try to find ways to, to make it fresher.

9:09 I think I agree with you. I think the idea of bringing in outside people, um, outside consultants, outside experts is great. Um, what I'd be curious about is not so much holding, uh, you know, holding six flags responsible for their findings, My curiosity would be what if the independent experts say something different than the ride manufacturers? And that would be the challenge is to wait. Which way do we go? And correct me if I'm wrong, and I say this to you, Philip, and I also say it to our listeners. It's always been my understanding that the ride restrictions come from the manufacturers.

9:52 So that's not something that parks necessarily magically come up with on their own. Um, so i i think that having the extra information is good i am not i am skeptical that the information is going to be any different from what the the ride manufacturers would recommend um so once again is this an optics thing uh and it could be it could be. But you know, there's, is there anything wrong with it? No. Is it going to make the rides, um, nine times safer? Hmm. Yeah. Well, the only thing I could see that they could bring to the table is, is actually saying, um, look at your training, uh, look at your, your, your staffing, look at your break schedules, you know?

10:40 Yeah. Um, I'm going to, I'm even going. To throw it out there is, is there a world where someday we get to the point where ride operators must be at least 21 years of age. Yeah. Or at least 18. And I don't know whether that is true or not. And I think that probably varies from state to state, but. I don't know. That was exactly what I was thinking, that it's going to come down to the part the park can't control, which is the training and the staffing. And that was exactly what happened with Glenwood Caverns, right? I mean, just it was... it was, you know, the investigation show that was just lack of training, you know, like one, one, one day of training. And then they didn't really understand, you know, there wasn't like a test.

11:22 You know, it's like when you have a driver's test, you do have a test where you have to show you can drive and you can show that you understand all what all the symbols mean on the roads and what, you know, how to act in every situation. Um, you know, right. Operators kind of, in a way do operate, do operate things that are just as dangerous as cars in a way. Right. And so, um, there's, you know, I think that was what some of the Glenwood Cavern stuff was showing is that they just, it was one day of training was not enough and that the operator didn't know what the symbols meant. You know, the, the, the vehicle is doing what it was supposed to do and giving the appropriate warnings, but the operator didn't know what they meant. Right. And just kind of like reset it. So that's, uh, yeah, I think you, you, that could come out of it, but then that has a larger industry ramifications is like, how much do we really train right operators? And, you know, if it's, this dangerous, should it require an age restriction as you're saying, or should it require some sort of more, uh, more testing and more overall training, just like you would to drive a car? Yep.

12:23 Well, and we have to recognize that these rides are getting faster and faster and more intense and more intense. And, and does that mean, you know, has the, and I'm not saying it has or hasn't, and certainly not for six flags, but I think it is, I think it is fair to ask the question. You know, the fastest roller coaster when I was a kid was like 40, 50 miles an hour, and that's like a kiddie coaster now. So, you know, has the training for something that has become more and more potentially dangerous, has it continued to grow at the same rate as the terror and the fear that these rides can now produce? I don't know the answer to that, and I'm hoping that, you know, I'm hoping that they take that under consideration.

13:10 But I think this is a fast hit. And I think that just looking at the phraseology, they say independent engineers and ride inspection specialists. No place does it mention training. No place does it mention any of the human error, the potential human error side. And I know that human error was not a huge issue in the situation, or so we believed at the time. I don't know whether a final. report has come out on that or not but uh so again i these things are being done i i think you're right i think their timing is such that it will um. Throw throw a little throw throw the focus in a slightly different direction before the the um you know the meeting the the finance meeting so yeah we'll see where it goes as always you say it so often on the show we'll keep an eye on this Yeah, we will, yeah.

14:06 But I will say the earnings are, I don't think they're going to be good. Just, we'll wait. We'll talk about it next week, obviously. But just a little preview. We got some numbers from the TEA Global Index, and the Six Flags parks all declined. So we'll just see. We'll see how they earn it. Of course, that's a year old, and I think we kind of all knew that that was happening. But we'll see how the numbers go. I don't believe they're reporting Halloween yet because of the trailing thing. So we'll see. Right. Anyway, so... Speaking of Halloween. Speaking of Halloween, right. So Scott worked on so many shows this year and did rehearsals and launch shows and was actively working in a lot of parks, zoos actually, a lot of zoos and a lot of attractions around the country. And I went to three continents to visit all the Universal Parks and all the Disney Parks and a lot of the other parks. So I visited 13 of the top 20 theme parks in the world to kind of put together a on how Halloween is being handled worldwide. So we have two very different perspectives on Halloween. Scott, what do you want to tell me? What do you think is important that you learned from Halloween? Well, I think.

15:26 You've looked at the opposite and you've looked at the big boys in the industry and I've kind of looked at the up-and-comers or I've kind of worked with the up-and-comers. And there is from, from the preliminary information that I have received and, um, I'm not at liberty to share specific details, but from the preliminary research that I have, have received, um, the increase in attendance from previous Halloweens, um, has actually been across the board with all three of my, my zoological clients. Um, And one of them, it's my first year with them, and they had already had a very well-established trick-or-treat experience, which was basically the kids go to the zoo, they go in costume, they go to various sponsored treat stations in a row, and then they leave.

16:20 And that was pretty much it. And when they brought me on, the goal was to keep people around a little bit longer. The goal was to eventually break up so it's not just a trick-or-treat mad dash for candy that the stations get more, um, located throughout the zoo so that, you know, guests can happen upon them as they enjoy the whole zoo. So they're not just seeing the part of the zoo where the, the trick or treat stations are. Um, but before their last weekend, they were up about, um, about 10% from the previous, the previous record they were, you know, so, so they're doing well. Um, anytime, anytime we've gone in to work on a project and make it more than just some decorations and, um, animal enrichments with pumpkins, which are adorable, by the way, um, the, the zoos have seen an increase in attendance and an increase in guest satisfaction surveys. So, um, I've said it before and it's not just because I do it, but I will, I've seen it.

17:32 I've seen it happen. Um, if you're not doing a, um, playful, fanciful fantasy base, doesn't have to be scary. Although more and more zoos are going towards that. You know, we talked on the show not too long ago about adult events and, and that should be the next, you want to be on the, on the bleeding edge, be a zoo that does an adult Halloween event. Right. Could be interesting. Um, But, uh, it's, it's one of those situations where it doesn't take a whole lot of invest. I mean, it takes some investment, uh, more investment in time, but some investment in labor and some, some minor capital investment, excuse me. And you will see numbers in the first year, which is not normal in this industry.

18:17 So I think, uh, What you're saying is kind of dovetailing, I think, with the macro trends that I've noticed from the opposite end. So I've been thinking about this for a while. I think previously the big trend we were talking about was immersive. I don't even know, was that 10 years old? It's been a while. We've been talking about this concept of immersive entertainment for a while. But when you boil that down, it's basically... you know, giving the guests a role to play and having a themed environment, right? So, or that's what you and I say. And I think that is sort of where the macro Halloween shift is going.

18:59 I think it's exactly what you're saying. Like, you have to have the themed environment. You have to have decorations. You have to have the pumpkins or whatever it is, the decorations. But I think giving the guest something to do or ideally for Halloween, something to play. Like, because Halloween is really about play. And- Adults like to play. I mean, adults like to trick or treat too. They really do. You know, there's so many memes about it, but it's a real thing. And cosplay, we talked about that in a bonus episode, but cosplay is play. That's the same thing as dressing up in costumes. So that kind of sounds like what you're saying in a sense, like what I've noticed is that you need to have the themed environment, but also to give guests a way to play, or you can call it engagement if you want.

19:44 But I think of it as actually play is better. And I think that the attractions that are most successful are finding ways to do that. And that is scary and non-scary. I agree. The parks that go beyond just providing haunted houses to take the extra step to have photo ops and ideally roaming characters that do some sort of guest engagement, that's, I think that's where you're really seeing like the huge success because I don't want to downplay haunted houses. I think they're just like, in a way, I think the haunted houses are like the roller coasters of Halloween, right? We talked about that. We're like, you kind of need them as tent poles to soak up guests and to be like the quote unquote attraction for people to do. But more and more, the things that I've noticed when I went through Europe and Asia, the things that the guests really want to do is, They want to watch the Megans dance for reasons I don't understand.

20:45 And like the Megans pull them in and they dance with the Megans. Right. And then they want to practice their like eighties roller skating moves, you know, with the Mel's Diane zombies, you know, and dance to music. And they want to learn choreography on Tik TOK that they then get to do in the parks at when they do the dance off competitions. Right. They want to, I mean, I think, The parks that are most innovative on this are finding ways to make contests in the park that then they get some sort of award in the park that is tied to... So in Shanghai, they have an actual costume contest that happens with the villains where the villains go out in the audience, they choose who they think are the best dressed. So Cruella chooses... they're the most Cruella and Gaston chooses like the most fierce costume and they have them, then they actually like compete. The guests compete on stage and the guests get a prize. And that's a whole thing like dogs being allowed to dress up and, and you can bring your dog to ocean park and they have little like dog stations. I mean, there's, there's just, there's a lot of like just things that sound fun. Right. And then they, they then encourage all of the guests, adults included to participate in that fun. I think that's where we're going. And yeah, And just to.

22:06 Kind of build up on that too, in a total microcosm, one of my clients, the top three elements based on guest surveys are the two haunted houses and the dance party. Mm-hmm. And those are the top three of probably, I'd say, 15 to 17 activations. So those are the... The strolling characters are great. They get great photos. The photo ops are lovely. The lighting is nice. Yep. The, you know, they've added a lot more, um, photo ops. Yep. Uh, but you know, the dance party, this is, uh, the, at, at zoo Tampa, for example, they've, we've got the, the dancing dead, which are the 1970s disco zombies and the, the.

22:52 Colorful, the colorful nature of them, the playful nature. Of them, um, combined with, uh, the, the zombies come out and do a choreographed number, um, In the changeover, so we've got two casts who come out and do this choreographed number that pretty much takes over the whole area, and then they break it back into engaging with the guests and giving all the guests, no matter what their age, the opportunity to dance with these remarkably vibrantly colored zombies. So it is reinforcing exactly what you're saying. I think what we have to recognize is it needs to be, the entertainment needs to be The idea of having blank space, the idea of falling out of the event, that's something that we've been concerned about in pretty much every event I've ever done. And there's always the argument, well, we don't have enough budget to fill the whole park, zoo, museum, whatever.

23:54 And then my suggestion is always, well, then start smaller until you do. Right. And to bounce off that point, starting smaller, a lot of the stuff that I noticed that was working well is basic improv that any, like even a high school or college trained actor could do. This is not like, I think that it is great. Like to your point, I think guest play is a huge trend for Halloween. Good seamless entertainment is also a big trend and that can be good for your level. So it can be good, a good costume with a good improv, like a mime. How many, I've seen so many mimes that are just really good mimes, like, like taking off of the art, art, the clown thing, you know, it's just like, it's kind of like just a creepy mime and guests love them.

24:42 And that's a small scale thing that really anybody could do. But also I've noticed good, large entertainment that is tied. Like when I went to Europa park last week for, for some of their events and traumatic of there, you know, the most interesting part to me was the stage show. and how it had an emcee that tied in the theme of the event and kind of explained literally each haunted house throughout the course of a 20 minute stage show. And in a way that wasn't, that was entertaining. It was like fire dancers and aerialists and fun things, but also with a narrative tissue that kind of brought it all together. And you know what? It was literally raining.

25:24 People lined up to get a spot in the rain, stand there and watch that show. And they didn't care because it was that good. And it's that same thing I noticed with Tully's outside of London. They hired the Fuel Girls from Universal. So they went to Tully's and they built them a theater. They built a full theater for the show presented by the Fuel Girls. And it's incredible, but it also does still have a narrative. And it's kind of tied to the two haunted houses that are adjacent to the show. I think that's the thing. So you could do that if you have the money to build a custom theater. Great. But you could also have a mime.

26:06 It's interesting though because you could also have a mime that helps create connective thread through the overarching storyline. Traumatica is one of the ones that I've always wanted. To see because I was able to Years ago, I actually was, I saw a large chunk of their event when judging Brass Ring Awards. And I loved the fact that it is a park-wide story. It's an event-wide story. And I think that adding this show, as you say, is just kind of the cherry on top to something that they've already been doing. And it just helps explain it to those people who don't want to have to work to find the story connections. Just have them explain to them It gives it another level of enjoyment for a different audience.

26:56 We talked about this too, similar but smaller scale. At Halloween Horror Nights in Orlando, they have that puppet show that is a three-minute thing that happens every 15 minutes-ish with puppets, but it tells the story of this year's theme via puppets. And it's like, don't underestimate, it could just be puppets and a little fun thing, but it's something for... the guests to see and engage in and it's good and it's themed, explains everything and then, and then guests play. I mean, I just, I just think, um, to your point about connective tissue, I think too many times the default for connective tissue is we'll just throw clowns with chainsaws in, you know, and let them run around.

27:38 It's like, well, I kind of think a lot of the events of are beyond that kind of moved beyond that because. Why? And just to answer, there's so many dyed-in-the-wool or die-hard haunt guys and gals out there, people out there, who say, we don't need story, we just need to scare people. But I will tell you something that I experienced. I went to Hallow's Scream as well this season, and I haven't been back in a couple years. And I went to Hallow's Scream, and one thing I will say is because Well, first of all, the scenic was stellar this year. They did a lovely job with scenic at Busch Gardens Tampa for Hello Scream. And some of the things that they, they brought back Fiends, which was great.

28:29 But I will say one of the challenges is because they let some of the stories slide, it got to the point where every scare actor was doing exactly the same thing and it didn't matter what house they were in because they weren't reinforcing the story. The story isn't just connective tissue. It also provides the haunt performers, the haunt actors, a variety of things to play with. It gives them a variety of things to do. And, um, you know, it's like I said, fresh meat makes no sense unless it's all about butchers, you know? So, um, it's, it will, it will provide variety as well. And like, I always like to say, your job is not to scare them. It's to entertain them. And that's the biggest mistake I see with events is that they're, they think it's only about scaring. It's not, we're here to entertain people. That's what we do. And whether it's Halloween, it's Christmas, it doesn't matter. We're here to entertain. I think more and more people want to be entertained. And part of the entertainment is to have this play ability and also have entertainment they can make content with, like take pictures with it. When it's all just chainsaw people chasing you around, it's hard to have a nice picture with that or have an engagement with them. That's more interesting.

29:41 Like to your point, Scott, it's just like they have one mode instead of being more flexible characters that allow guests to have fun with them. And that's it. That's it. That's the biggest transaction. Well, and it goes back to, and it goes back to the challenge with that. And part of the reason so many people fight it is because that means you have to work harder to find the right staff. And it means you have to work harder to try to train them. Um, and this would be a perfect opportunity if I were, if I were that kind of person to throw in that I will be doing a session at IAPA this year on, uh, in Haunting Grounds about, uh, finding training and retaining haunted attraction cast members. But I would never do anything like that. Um, so if you happen to be at IAPA, come see it. Um, boy, did I sneak that in, huh? Just so subtle, super subtle.

30:22 That's okay. The show's really already over. So, um, that'll probably get edited out. Guys, thank you so much once again for being here this week on behalf of Philip Hernandez with Gantam Lighting and Control and myself, Scott Swenson, with Scott Swenson Creative Development. This has been Green Tag Theme Park in 30, and we will see each and every one of your little faces again next week.