WTF BPB?

[Coaster]

I think the issue with Amanda's comments on season passholders is that the majority of issues with BPB are directly caused by the way the business is run.

So many times this year, Blackpool was heaving with holidaymakers yet BPB was quiet. Having the latest opening time during the illuminations season as 6pm is bonkers; at a time where parks across the country are thriving with late opening and Halloween events, Pleasure Beach, the park with the most potential to make money out of opening late due to its location, is sat empty because they turn those people away.

That's masses of lost potential income, and then we're told that they don't have the money to fix things, or paint things. That's the director's fault! That's because the business is squandering the money they could be making.

Lack of resources is cited, but the thing is, if you create a toxic environment where staff are treated badly, you can't then expect people to want to work for you. The onus is on the director to make the park an appealing place to work.

Ultimately PB miss opportunity after opportunity to make money, and then lash out at guests for noticing issues rather than fixing the business and making enough money to fix these things.

 

[RevolutionRuleZ]

Something seems to be happening with Beach Amusments, the arcade the faces the prom and backs onto the entrance plaza. The arcade is being gutted.

 

[Rob Coasters]

Hearing that the last day of the 2024 season is November 30th which is a Saturday, odd that they're not doing Sunday too. Is it a thing they have to abide by that they can't be open in December?

 

[RevolutionRuleZ]

Hearing that the last day of the 2024 season is November 30th which is a Saturday, odd that they're not doing Sunday too. Is it a thing they have to abide by that they can't be open in December?

No such rule that I know of, they have opened in December in years gone by.

Last time I checked 2024 looked like weekends only throughout the entire year so I took that with a bucket full of salt and ignored it.

 

[Dar]

Something seems to be happening with Beach Amusments, the arcade the faces the prom and backs onto the entrance plaza. The arcade is being gutted.

Fingers crossed they knock it down and move the sculpture garden outside the park. Then they can combine that space with the ice blast area for something imposing and eye-catching.

 

[Graeme]

Am I right in thinking there were marks on the ground in the Ocean Boulevard car park as well? If you plot from Ice Blast to Beach Amusements to Ocean Boulevard, that makes a large triangle or L-shape, with the unused Trauma Towers space available as part of it as well. Very interesting...

 

[Matt N]

On a note that may possibly be of interest for this thread (based on previous profit-related discussions), Pleasure Beach released its accounts covering the financial year to March 2023 (aka the 2022 season) yesterday: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/document-api-images-live.ch.gov.uk/docs/UgALXPYbVhlrdWjvOFdkNRF0G6VdPpmEc6PMDH7L46M/application-pdf?X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=ASIAWRGBDBV3ADAPIDXP/20231231/eu-west-2/s3/aws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20231231T224944Z&X-Amz-Expires=60&X-Amz-Security-Token=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&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&response-content-disposition=inline;filename="companies_house_document.pdf"&X-Amz-Signature=63b4eeb628121966bc167f9e44f25e999875e764d39969d434dcbcf8e4ff7027

In terms of notable points:

• Visitor numbers were 20% lower in 2022 than in 2021.
• Turnover fell from £39m to £32m.
• The company made an overall loss of £522,000, compared to an £8.6m profit in 2021.
• Utility bills were 44% higher in 2022 than in 2021, indicating that the park experienced a lethal combination of lower guest figures and higher overhead costs.

So overall, then, it does seem as though 2021's profit was a bit of a false dawn for Blackpool Pleasure Beach, as 2022 returned us to the status quo of losses, and guest figures were also notably reduced...

 

[Eyebrows]

https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/document-api-images-live.ch.gov.uk/docs/UgALXPYbVhlrdWjvOFdkNRF0G6VdPpmEc6PMDH7L46M/application-pdf?X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=ASIAWRGBDBV3ADAPIDXP/20231231/eu-west-2/s3/aws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20231231T224944Z&X-Amz-Expires=60&X-Amz-Security-Token=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&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&response-content-disposition=inline;filename="companies_house_document.pdf"&X-Amz-Signature=63b4eeb628121966bc167f9e44f25e999875e764d39969d434dcbcf8e4ff7027

Holy mother of hyperlink…

 

[Nicky Borrill]

On a note that may possibly be of interest for this thread (based on previous profit-related discussions), Pleasure Beach released its accounts covering the financial year to March 2023 (aka the 2022 season) yesterday: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/document-api-images-live.ch.gov.uk/docs/UgALXPYbVhlrdWjvOFdkNRF0G6VdPpmEc6PMDH7L46M/application-pdf?X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=ASIAWRGBDBV3ADAPIDXP/20231231/eu-west-2/s3/aws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20231231T224944Z&X-Amz-Expires=60&X-Amz-Security-Token=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&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&response-content-disposition=inline;filename="companies_house_document.pdf"&X-Amz-Signature=63b4eeb628121966bc167f9e44f25e999875e764d39969d434dcbcf8e4ff7027

In terms of notable points:

• Visitor numbers were 20% lower in 2022 than in 2021.
• Turnover fell from £39m to £32m.
• The company made an overall loss of £522,000, compared to an £8.6m profit in 2021.
• Utility bills were 44% higher in 2022 than in 2021, indicating that the park experienced a lethal combination of lower guest figures and higher overhead costs.

So overall, then, it does seem as though 2021's profit was a bit of a false dawn for Blackpool Pleasure Beach, as 2022 returned us to the status quo of losses, and guest figures were also notably reduced...

Those energy prices ‘should’ have stabilised a little in 2023. A 44% increase in 2022 was not actually too bad. We saw some of our gas bills go from their usual £1-2k per month up to £8k per month for some months!!! It was absolutely crippling. But they’re back down now to around £2k. (We also signed a new ‘fixed rather than market tracking’ contract as soon as they came back down in the summer!!!)

 

[RevolutionRuleZ]

It seems the park are attempting to sell themselves as a resort now...this will not end well...!

I dont understand this obsession with trying to be something you aren't. If you are the best seaside amusement park in the country, you need to operate they rides accordingly, open into the dark, and do what you do best, not try pretend to be a theme park, adopt a business model that doesn't work for you and record losses almost constantly.

Continued support for this park is become ever more tedious and challenging.

 

[Themeparknewbie01]

Having been to opening day... i think this thread needs bumping to the top. Shockingly bad. So many rides closed, breaking, being evac'd.

Awful! Awful! Awful!

 

[Sandman]

Having been to opening day... i think this thread needs bumping to the top. Shockingly bad. So many rides closed, breaking, being evac'd.

Awful! Awful! Awful!

Just another opening weekend at BPB then?

 

[JoshC.]

It sounds like there was some, at best, pretty terrible customer service and, at worst, some very questionable procedures, during the day.

There's reports of 1 train's worth of people being let into Infusion's queue line. The ride hadn't opened at first due to 'restraint issues'. Staff were telling guests they were 'testing the restraints were working with a full train of people'. After that ride with people, staff then had to manually release restraints on the train, and were shouting out which ones were flagged up as a problem.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1764004772095393797

I read somewhere that a staff member said that the ride and restraints were fine when empty, but when it was loaded, issues were occurring, hence the want to 'test'.

Of course, if the restraints aren't locked, the ride shouldn't be able to be dispatched. And engineers wouldn't sign off the ride if it isn't safe to run. I don't believe that the ride was unsafe to run. But it certainly sounds like the ride had issues unlocking restraints, which is an issue.

Certainly, no one should be told they're being used / have been used as a test subject effectively, nor should that happen with members of the public. And if the plan when something like this happens is to just get a train-full of people on ride, that sounds...very not right.

There's also people saying staff had told guests 'they didn't know how to evacuate guests'...during an evac:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1763992608978706676

Obviously this is all 'someone said that someone else said this'.


But yeah, in my opinion, whilst the park obviously won't be using people as guinea pigs and everything was safe, there's definitely something off either with customer service, or with their operational procedures.

 

[Matt N]

It would appear that some seats also broke on Grand National:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1763931694921367976

It doesn’t sound like it’s been a terribly good day for Blackpool… hopefully this is just start-of-season teething problems.

 

[Nicky Borrill]

It sounds like there was some, at best, pretty terrible customer service and, at worst, some very questionable procedures, during the day.

There's reports of 1 train's worth of people being let into Infusion's queue line. The ride hadn't opened at first due to 'restraint issues'. Staff were telling guests they were 'testing the restraints were working with a full train of people'. After that ride with people, staff then had to manually release restraints on the train, and were shouting out which ones were flagged up as a problem.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1764004772095393797

I read somewhere that a staff member said that the ride and restraints were fine when empty, but when it was loaded, issues were occurring, hence the want to 'test'.

Of course, if the restraints aren't locked, the ride shouldn't be able to be dispatched. And engineers wouldn't sign off the ride if it isn't safe to run. I don't believe that the ride was unsafe to run. But it certainly sounds like the ride had issues unlocking restraints, which is an issue.

Certainly, no one should be told they're being used / have been used as a test subject effectively, nor should that happen with members of the public. And if the plan when something like this happens is to just get a train-full of people on ride, that sounds...very not right.

There's also people saying staff had told guests 'they didn't know how to evacuate guests'...during an evac:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1763992608978706676

Obviously this is all 'someone said that someone else said this'. But really feels like something ain't right there.

I think the issue is releasing the restraints after the ride, hence the risks were assessed as basically zero, as they know they have the manual release. And the problem only occurs when the restraint is not pushed 100% down, or in other words, when there's a person being restrained, hence the need to check with people. It's a common issue on SLC's.

I'm not saying that it's right to tell people they're test subjects, or even that it's right to test with the public and not staff in the first place. But if I'm right, and I think I am, then it's being blown out of proportion. They operate the ride with restraints behaving in this way all of the time, just not usually all of them. (Air / Galactica often operates with seats that need a manual release each time too.)

As for the ops on opening day... You just have to accept that it'll be like that, new staff, old staff out of practice, unforseen hardware issues after servicing... Yadda yadda yadda... As mentioned in the other thread, expect the same on the 16th.

 

[AidanCKY]

I think the issue is releasing the restraints after the ride, hence the risks were assessed as basically zero, as they know they have the manual release. And the problem only occurs when the restraint is not pushed 100% down, or in other words, when there's a person being restrained, hence the need to check with people. It's a common issue on SLC's.

I'm not saying that it's right to tell people they're test subjects, or even that it's right to test with the public and not staff in the first place. But if I'm right, and I think I am, then it's being blown out of proportion. They operate the ride with restraints behaving in this way all of the time, just not usually all of them. (Air / Galactica often operates with seats that need a manual release each time too.)

As for the ops on opening day... You just have to accept that it'll be like that, new staff, old staff out of practice, unforseen hardware issues after servicing... Yadda yadda yadda... As mentioned in the other thread, expect the same on the 16th.

Yeah I was going to say, i've seen all the young enthusiasts getting all riled up about this on Twitter but it sounds like the release part is the dodgy bit and they know its unrelated to the actual safety/locking of the restraints.

Still extremely unprofessional to be telling people worrying things - We're putting our lives in their hands at these places, there's no room for jokes.

 

[JoshC.]

Agreed. I should stress that it obviously wasn't unsafe, nor do I think it was.

It seems like there's been some decision to get one train's worth of people on the ride to identify which restraints were having the manual release issue.
Not sure I agree with that. If it was one or two restraints, fine, fix the problem, and then monitor it. But a whole train's worth? I dunno. Obviously as someone with no engineering knowledge, and conjecturing what the actual reasoning was for just letting in 1 train's worth of people into the queue, my opinion means nothing, but it just feels a bit off.

 

[AidanCKY]

It would appear that some seats also broke on Grand National:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1763931694921367976

It doesn’t sound like it’s been a terribly good day for Blackpool… hopefully this is just start-of-season teething problems.

If its like any of the other woodies at BPB, I think the cushions, seat bases easily pull out on all of them.
You'd think they would think of a way to stop this happening randomly though.

 

[Nicky Borrill]

Sort of random, off topic-ish post... But this IS a spoof account right?

https://twitter.com/MandsThompson

 

[Matt N]

Sort of random, off topic-ish post... But this IS a spoof account right?

https://twitter.com/MandsThompson

No, that is Amanda Thompson’s real Twitter account, as far as I can tell…