The Business of Theme Parks, How Much Money Do They Make?

Despite our extended rambling, we’d like to think that you can leave with some concrete implications.  In summary, here are some of the major ones.

• Mega theme parks such as Disney and Universal find it difficult to be profitable in the first few years after opening, and have a very low project ROI.  But it doesn’t matter.
• Don’t seek to compete with Disney or Universal, unless you are them, or you can line up tremendous sources of financing.  Look for creative sources of financing.
• For investors, indoor parks are promising because they generate enough in sales productivity to be appropriate for urban retail environments.
• Regional and superregional parks are appropriate when land prices are extremely low, and the market does not have similar types of developments.  They can be built relatively cheaply.  And once built, these parks can become the landmark attraction of a market for decades.
• Waterparks are often a more efficient alternative to regional parks, in that they occupy less space but have a similar return profile.
• It’s important to define the return measure for attractions.  Very often, the partner/developer/government cares less about financial returns and more about employment, tourism, and GDP impacts.  Governments can be a good partner.  On the other hand, don’t benchmark these kinds of developments if you’re a purely private operation.

https://www.theparkdb.com/blog/the-business-of-theme-parks-part-i-how-much-money-do-they-make/

https://www.theparkdb.com/blog/the-business-of-theme-parks-part-ii-how-much-do-they-cost-and-earn/