Fright Nights 2023

[Mattgwise]

In a real world the park should be able to stay open late and have shifts like many US parks do in the long summer months, but getting that number of staff seems tricky these days. Instead the staff work the entire day and with busy 10pm closures they would be at worst working 9am to 12am! Far too much! 

[MattyB]

Also if you factor in staff coming in to work from London, the public transport options are non existent after a certain time (from Staines/Chertsey).  I do remember we did 24 hour openings at one point.  Think it was in 1999

[Glitch]

3 hours ago, MattyB said:

 Having done Universal, I think the conga line would help in this situation, particularly if demand is high.  RE closing at 9pm, the park has to ensure its staff can get home, particularly if they are using public transport.  Considering some staff may stay up to 2 hours after park closing (depending on how busy it is).  I don't know how we got away with the late night closings back in the day!

Still find it odd why people would work up to 2 hours away for minimum wage.

with the amount Thorpe are taking in these busy periods they really shouldn’t have staffing issues.

 

I just wonder how many people go in peak and just say never again it was too crowded. That’s a customer potentially lost for life.

[Cal]

The only answer is more attractions or lower the capacity to help with the crowds really. I've mentioned it many times but the 10pm closes do make a big difference too, and I do hope they find a way to bring them back.

 

More Fright Night dates doesn't really seem to make a difference as the peak nights are the same every year regardless of how many days they're open. I remember in 2019 they started Fright Nights at the end of September, and the first few weekends were dead. It clearly wasn't financially viable as they've never done that again since.

[JoshC.]

13 minutes ago, Cal said:

I remember in 2019 they started Fright Nights at the end of September, and the first few weekends were dead. It clearly wasn't financially viable as they've never done that again since.

They did try it last year too (okay, the very last day of September, but still, a week earlier than this year). Again, doesn't seem to have been as viable as later dates.

 

20 minutes ago, Glitch said:

with the amount Thorpe are taking in these busy periods they really shouldn’t have staffing issues.

But it isn't to do with the amount the park are taking in, it's to do with the fact there's not enough people wanting to work for the park. It's something pretty much every park struggles with. 

 

Yes, Merlin could consider paying staff more than minimum wage and that may help. But how much more they'd have to pay to convince more people to work seasonal jobs with unsocial hours to make staffing issues less an issue is a real big question. Even if Thorpe paid more than supermarkets, for example, how many people who are working in supermarkets (which have clear, set hours) would change to working a job with not-set hours where they then have to find a job every winter? 

 

Halloween is a specifically tricky time for staffing in the UK parks as their younger workforce go off to uni just before, meaning they lose a fair old chunk of people.

 

26 minutes ago, Glitch said:

I just wonder how many people go in peak and just say never again it was too crowded. That’s a customer potentially lost for life.

It's a good point.

 

But then say they reduce maximum capacity by 5000 people. That's up to 5000 people who would be visiting who won't, and may potentially visit a competitor. Thus, potentially, they lose a customer, a competitor gains a customer, and they may not get that customer ever in the first place.

 

Say they just chuck tons of attractions in the park, and the quality of those attractions is not-great. People then won't want to visit because the quality is bad and it's busy.

 

There's so many potential things the park could do, but they all come with setbacks. 

 

If the park wanted to go for more HHN style mazes (continuous congo line) to increase throughput, they would have to completely change the style of their mazes, and include significantly more effects (both automatic and actor-triggered). But that would probably change the experience for the worse.

 

 

Again, this is an issue which loads of large, popular parks face.

Some aren't faced with the staffing issues so much thanks to being year-round parks, so people don't worry about being in seasonal employment.

Other parks introduce significantly more shows, roaming entertainment and just non-ride attractions to help soak up the crowds.

There's no quick or easy fix to this issue, and it happens every year. 

 

As I say, I think the best thing Thorpe can do moving forward is design mazes which have actually good, consistent throughputs. That, along with scare zones and shows, will help allow people feel like they can get their money's worth with Fright Nights.

[MattyB]

12 hours ago, Glitch said:

Still find it odd why people would work up to 2 hours away for minimum wage.

with the amount Thorpe are taking in these busy periods they really shouldn’t have staffing issues.

 

I just wonder how many people go in peak and just say never again it was too crowded. That’s a customer potentially lost for life.

I think you misunderstood me.  What I meant was, if the park closes at 10pm, some staff could potentially be working until 12pm.  I remember when we had 10pm closes, and Megastore was still heaving at 11pm.  I didn't get out until 1am.  Luckily I lived locally and had understanding parents. If I lived in London or relied on public transport to get home, not sure I would have many options open to me.

 

Regarding mazes, I think its a tricky one.  Do you go down the conga line route (Universal), increasing throughputs, or just add more of them?  If the park is struggling with capacity, I should imagine it would need to change it up a bit over the coming years, especially with Hyperia on the way.

[Mattgwise]

I'm not sure we can really say the park is struggling with capacity most of the time. Thorpe has overall been run pretty well most of the year, far better that Towers and CWoA, but always faces it's largest crowds this week and into the last couple of FN weekends. It's a similar state of affairs all over. 

 

Look at King's Island last Friday for example. 

 

 

It's the experience on those days that needs improving such as a slightly lower cap on their 'capacity' and Fastrack much more limited. However, that is money which they won't want to lose as FN brings in a fair proportion for the years income.

 

Think we need to look at the year as a whole for judging capacity and operational issues, rather than a couple of almost sell out days. Last week and the first couple of weekends (aside from a specific Sunday) crowds were completely manageable and park ran well. 

[MattyB]

Of course, agreed.  End of season for TP has always been extremely busy.  I think the issue is whether the park focuses investment to meet the demand for 1 week of the year.   I remember doing Universal and it took us 3 nights to get around all the mazes.  The Studios park was heaving and we couldn't get near the place on actual Halloween.  I think my biggest issue is the upcharge (however I'm biased as I come from a time when the mazes were part of the entry ticket price).  Universal charges an extra ticket price for the evening (or did when I visited in 2009), and I think it makes sense that Thorpe should.  However, I think the way the mazes are currently designed don't meet the demand for this last week of the year from a throughput perspective. (I.e. batching in smaller groups, pre-shows etc).  I think its nice that Thorpe are able to offer these experiences, however at some point as the park expands they would need to start looking at volume and throughputs.  Granted, the conga line method may be a lesser experience overall, however I think it would be a great challenge for the design teams to do something different with it?  Or they put more mazes on.  I'm surprised that as part of the Hyperion development site, they didn't factor in a purpose built fright nights building as part of that development. Somewhere to store everything throughout the year and then maybe use the space for 1/2 mazes.   

[coasterverse]

I said on Twitter a couple days ago that I really do think over Fright Nights especially (as none of their other events seem to get anywhere near as many people as Fright Nights does) the park should further limit their capacity (and fairly drastically at that), and then just chuck a few more days onto the end of the season to compensate. That way those customers you'd potentially lose by limiting capcity could rebook on a different day.

 

There's no ride or attraction in this country that warrants a 3+ hour queue time - that's pure and simple. 3+ hour queues are for the likes of Universal and Disney - beautifully themed, long duration attractions that would make the 3 hour wait worthwhile. It was absolute craziness to me to see 3+ hour queues for Stealth last week. A RIDE THAT LASTS 20 SECONDS!! The RAP entrance for Stealth was also snaking all the way back to essentially the main entrance which is also disgusting.

 

So in short - my opinion is to further limit capacity, extend the season by a few days to compensate, and put a cap on how many fastracks are available on the day.

 

[MattyB]

Oh wow! Didn't realise queues for the rides themselves were that extreme.  Thought it was just the mazes.  Its a tough one.  If you look at Disney/Universal, they are in a completely different game to the Merlin parks.  I don' think they have quiet periods anymore, and can plan attractions based around massive throughputs, that they will get consistently throughout the year.  They also have the infrastructure in place to support late operating hours (on site staff accommodation, transport to said accommodation that works around the clock).  In fact, those sites are truly around the clock, 24 hour operations.  Not sure what the answer is tbh.  If you limit capacity, you potentially lose revenue.  If you have extremely busy periods with +3 hour queues, you risk reputation.  They are almost a victim of their own success. 

[Glitch]

There are loads of buyout days at the end of the season this year so no extensions 

[Mark9]

What is the current Fright nights cap on numbers/

 

What would be an acceptable cap?

 

Is it just a case of a freak day where it was pretty nice weather after a horrible Saturday and everyone came out for a visit. Queues today are pretty reasonable (It's 7:20PM and the longest queue is Saw at 115 minutes for example, the flats are all around 30 minutes which is pretty standard). 

 

 

[Marc]

On 10/24/2023 at 2:43 PM, coasterverse said:

I said on Twitter a couple days ago that I really do think over Fright Nights especially (as none of their other events seem to get anywhere near as many people as Fright Nights does) the park should further limit their capacity (and fairly drastically at that), and then just chuck a few more days onto the end of the season to compensate. That way those customers you'd potentially lose by limiting capcity could rebook on a different day.

 

There's no ride or attraction in this country that warrants a 3+ hour queue time - that's pure and simple. 3+ hour queues are for the likes of Universal and Disney - beautifully themed, long duration attractions that would make the 3 hour wait worthwhile. It was absolute craziness to me to see 3+ hour queues for Stealth last week. A RIDE THAT LASTS 20 SECONDS!! The RAP entrance for Stealth was also snaking all the way back to essentially the main entrance which is also disgusting.

 

So in short - my opinion is to further limit capacity, extend the season by a few days to compensate, and put a cap on how many fastracks are available on the day.

 

I think the issue with this is people don’t want to go on some random days at the end of October - It’s always the same weeks / days packed every year simply because that’s when demand is. The park do limit the capacity, I’m pretty sure the numbers they let in are no where near what used to be seen back in 2008/9 etc.

 

It is a tricky one to balance - it’s easy to say they should sell less tickets / fastracks etc but from a business sense that only makes sense if they also up the price - which will equally annoy some people. I do wonder if enthusiasts maybe overstate it and maybe people visiting once a year on fright nights just expect it to be packed and are pretty happy getting on a handful of rides and having a day out - hard to tell!

[JoshC.]

Jack Silkstone's Fright Nights 2023 Behind the Scene documentary is now live:

 

 

 

It is again primarily focused on his, Kieran and Archie's journey and involvement with the marketing videos, giving insight into how they made the set, did the filming etc. And then some general bits about the event, SLKSTN Unlocked, wrap party, etc. There's a little bit about the build of Stitches, but not a lot. I'd love to see more of a focus on the maze building side of things, but heyho, beggars can't be choosers. 

 

As always, the amount of effort that was put into the trailer campaign is insane. It's incredible to see such level of detail put into it. I again question the worth of some of the effort - it feels a bit misplaced to, say, spend hours making a design for a toy box that is seen for 10 seconds in a trailer video in my opinion. Especially when that level of detail and effort isn't necessarily translated into overall guest experience of the event. 

 

One thing I've had specifically mixed feelings on is the 'headline character' creations from the past couple of years. We had Fear (2021), The Locksmith (2022) and the Toymaker (2023). It's shown they build in quite detailed backstories for them, much of which isn't communicated. I think that's great tbf; the worldbuilding behind the scenes is critical for creatives to build something which feels real to an audience. But it would help create such a stronger connect between the trailers and the experience if the headline character was a part of the event. They did a step with that this year, with the Toymaker appearing in a VIP experience and her voice being used in Stitches.

 

But it would be amazing if they could have the headline character physically be a part of the event. It's difficult as it either means an actor being in a full (masked) costume or heavily make-up-ed, or having different looking-actors play the same character, or rely on 1 actor to do all the dates. But it would genuinely have such a good pay off in my opinion. If they also created a headline character which remained constant each year (a curator of FN if you will), that would be awesome and build a more consistent brand. You only have to look at Walibi Holland's Fright Nights successes with Eddie de Clown to realise the potential. 

That's just a me-want though.

 

For me personally, I was watching the documentary and hearing them go "we spent *insert insane time period here* doing this", and my instant reaction is "Wow, all that time for...that?" Maybe there's a naivety from me about the amount of time required to do these things, or I have my own pre-conceptions after having flirted with the scare industry myself, but it all just feels like a ton of effort for so little guest reward.

 

Jack has been quite open about his want to work on Fright Nights in a larger role, be it by means of a broader creative aspect, designing a maze or similar. And it feels like, together with the park and UVE, they're building towards that, with greater creative control giving to Jack et al on the marketing, them building the set themselves, etc. Certainly would be cool to see: the passion and creativity is there.

From a human aspect, I still wonder the sustainability of that: the amount of work put in is clearly a labour of love, but seems all-consuming. The workload would increase ten-fold creating a whole maze / being a creative. But it's clear that they have the potential to create something cool.

 

I fear this post may come across as a bit of a negative nancy or whiny or something. It's not. It's great to get an insight into the world of FN coming to life in a clear way. The documentary itself is incredible. And it's great there's people with so much passion contributing to the event. And with the event growing, the enthusiast community growing and more roles in the industry coming to life, that will continue. I just hope we see it get reflected in the final product.