Matt N
CF Legend
Hi guys. In my years as an enthusiast, I’ve noticed that there seems to be a big love for family-owned parks from enthusiasts. Over the years, I’ve noticed that there seems to be a prevailing opinion among enthusiasts that “family-owned is good and corporate is bad” when it comes to park ownership and management styles. However, I sometimes wonder if there is more nuance to the issue than is sometimes implied. With that in mind, I’d be interested to know; in your opinion, are family-owned parks always superior to corporate parks?
Personally, I think the answer is no, family-owned parks are not always superior to corporate parks. I think there is far more nuance to the issue than that, and I think that both types of park ownership have their pros and cons.
One notable pro of family-owned parks, in my view, is that they can do whatever they want with no corporate strings attached. Arguably one of the biggest family-owned park success stories is Europa Park in Germany. That park has been run by the Mack family since 1975, and it has gained truly revered status and a reputation for quality and widespread brilliant experiences. Having been to the park myself last year, I believe that the park deserves all of the praise it gets; it’s a brilliant product throughout! In terms of how Europa links into this point; one of the things that many people seem to believe makes Europa great are the finer touches of the experience, such as the quirky sideline dark rides and other sideline attractions. Many of these quirky sideline projects embarked upon by Europa Park are a true labour of love, and I can sense that many of them would not necessarily have been approved under corporate ownership. I don’t sense that the average corporate owner would necessarily have approved projects like Madame Freudenreich’s Curiosities or Snorri Touren, and many other aspects of Europa Park have a distinctly wholesome feel to them that I don’t think would necessarily be replicated by a corporate park.
One notable con of family-owned parks, however, is that they can sometimes lack expertise in certain areas compared to corporate parks. For instance, I’ve noticed that family-owned parks can sometimes appear to lack the refined project management of corporate parks; I’ve noticed that family-owned parks seem to be far more prone to having projects that get delayed repeatedly and run for years and years than corporate parks. I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen in corporate parks, but it seems more common in family-owned parks. For instance, I don’t think that Blackpool Pleasure Beach’s Valhalla refurbishment would necessarily have gone on for 4 years in a corporate park. Rookburgh at Phantasialand was constructed for nearly 5 years, and there was hot debate during the construction phase about whether the park even had a schedule. Lagoon have been constructing Primordial for what feels like about 5 years; it was originally intended for 2020, but has now become a 2024 project. Knoebels built Flying Turns for over 5 years before it opened. For whatever reason, it does seem like projects at family-owned parks are sometimes more prone to getting delayed and running for very long periods of time than projects at corporate parks. Family-owned parks can also sometimes lack marketing expertise compared to corporate parks; for instance, take the somewhat weakly received marketing campaign for Icon at Blackpool Pleasure Beach compared to the much more strongly received marketing campaign for Wicker Man at Alton Towers, another coaster investment of similar scale in the same year.
So overall, I think that the debate is much more nuanced than “family-owned good, corporate bad”, personally, and I feel that both family-owned and corporate parks have their pros and cons. But I’d be interested to know; do you think that family-owned parks are always superior to corporate parks?
Personally, I think the answer is no, family-owned parks are not always superior to corporate parks. I think there is far more nuance to the issue than that, and I think that both types of park ownership have their pros and cons.
One notable pro of family-owned parks, in my view, is that they can do whatever they want with no corporate strings attached. Arguably one of the biggest family-owned park success stories is Europa Park in Germany. That park has been run by the Mack family since 1975, and it has gained truly revered status and a reputation for quality and widespread brilliant experiences. Having been to the park myself last year, I believe that the park deserves all of the praise it gets; it’s a brilliant product throughout! In terms of how Europa links into this point; one of the things that many people seem to believe makes Europa great are the finer touches of the experience, such as the quirky sideline dark rides and other sideline attractions. Many of these quirky sideline projects embarked upon by Europa Park are a true labour of love, and I can sense that many of them would not necessarily have been approved under corporate ownership. I don’t sense that the average corporate owner would necessarily have approved projects like Madame Freudenreich’s Curiosities or Snorri Touren, and many other aspects of Europa Park have a distinctly wholesome feel to them that I don’t think would necessarily be replicated by a corporate park.
One notable con of family-owned parks, however, is that they can sometimes lack expertise in certain areas compared to corporate parks. For instance, I’ve noticed that family-owned parks can sometimes appear to lack the refined project management of corporate parks; I’ve noticed that family-owned parks seem to be far more prone to having projects that get delayed repeatedly and run for years and years than corporate parks. I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen in corporate parks, but it seems more common in family-owned parks. For instance, I don’t think that Blackpool Pleasure Beach’s Valhalla refurbishment would necessarily have gone on for 4 years in a corporate park. Rookburgh at Phantasialand was constructed for nearly 5 years, and there was hot debate during the construction phase about whether the park even had a schedule. Lagoon have been constructing Primordial for what feels like about 5 years; it was originally intended for 2020, but has now become a 2024 project. Knoebels built Flying Turns for over 5 years before it opened. For whatever reason, it does seem like projects at family-owned parks are sometimes more prone to getting delayed and running for very long periods of time than projects at corporate parks. Family-owned parks can also sometimes lack marketing expertise compared to corporate parks; for instance, take the somewhat weakly received marketing campaign for Icon at Blackpool Pleasure Beach compared to the much more strongly received marketing campaign for Wicker Man at Alton Towers, another coaster investment of similar scale in the same year.
So overall, I think that the debate is much more nuanced than “family-owned good, corporate bad”, personally, and I feel that both family-owned and corporate parks have their pros and cons. But I’d be interested to know; do you think that family-owned parks are always superior to corporate parks?
