InPark Magazine: When I sit down to write the yearly strategy plan for Gantom, I begin, as most do, with a SWOT and environmental analysis. I review top stories from 2025, industry research, and trend reports to identify the environmental forces shaping the attractions industry.
Those environmental forces inspired a recent episode of Green Tagged, and also this article.
2 comments:
While this article isn’t necessarily the most exciting to read, I think its very interesting to see what is shaping the market in entertainment. I also think its really important that people like Philip Hernandez keep in touch with what customers want and value in entertainment experiences. I especially think parks should pay attention to the “creature comforts” section. Hernandez is right that I am no longer willing to pay exorbitant prices for shitty food and I don’t really care for useless souvenirs. These factors also provide context for why museums are having a moment. Museums are free or at least cheaper than park tickets, and don’t have the consumerist aspect of theme parks. I thought all the discussion of weather was really interesting as I didn’t expect the weather to have such an effect on customer trends. Maybe I’m just from a place where we do everything no matter the weather, but the concept of focusing on having weather infrastructure is strange to me. Overall, I think themed entertainment companies need to refocus on the customer experience.
This article really seems to reflect what I’ve experienced regularly visiting Disney and other parks over the past few years. It seems like parks are no longer able to just coast on the pent up post pandemic demand that they used to make record profits in 2022, 2023, and 2024. Anecdotally, 2025 definitely seems like it was the quietest year since 2021, and it seems like the economics reflect that. Another thing I’ve observed that the article seems to reflect is the ever-increasing divide between high end themed entertainment, such as Disney Parks and Universal Parks, and the more standard parks, such as Six Flags. Disney seems to be putting more effort into the guest experience lately, by both increasing maintenance cadence as well as by beginning their first major expansions since the last wave from 2019 (though it is worth noting that the projects begun in 2019 were not completed until around 2023).
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