Park Profile
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Polo enters Uzbekistan
Polo Amusement is also in the final stages of building a park in Uzbekistan. Fun ‘n’ Food Village in Chirchik near Tashkent is the first of what the company hopes will be 10 parks in CIS (former Soviet) countries, places where many international operators would struggle to succeed. “The West don’t see the big picture,” declares Polo managing director Balwant Singh Chawla. “When we did our first park in India, I wrote to over 1,000 companies to see if they wanted to partner with us as there was no theme park in India at the time. I told them the spending would be $1. Only five companies wrote back to me. One said even if there was a queue from Delhi to Hong Kong he would not be interested!” Nowadays, Polo claims to make a profit on an average spend of $5 per head and this combined with low
manpower/construction costs and Indian-built attractions make it confident of success in Uzbekistan. Currently awaiting approval,
Fun ‘n’ Food Village is scheduled to open towards the end of the 2010, and will comprise an amusement park, waterpark and various food/retail offerings.
www.funnfood.com
Rock Hoppers Den will keep guests rocking at Penguin Bay
guests over from other Emirates. That’s why Ice Land, unlike some waterparks, has been designed to provide a full day of fun.
“If you do a waterslide it only takes half a minute,” observes Singh Chawla. “We have seen in our parks in India, the more interactive things there are for guests they better time they will have and the longer they will stay. That’s we we’ve got things like the aqua football and the rain dance pool.” “For the first year we will be targeting local market, the second year we will focus on the rest of the Middle East, then the third year we will target the wider market and international tourists. Most of the marketing will be with local travel agents and direct contact via the internet. However, I very much believe in word of mouth.”
Strategic Location Ras Al Khaimah International Airport is already used by several tour companies to fly in Dubai-bound tourists. Singh Chawla believes this presents an opportunity to “borrow” guests before they make to their way over to the more famous Emirate. He also cites RAK’s atmosphere and looser restrictions on alcohol as being important to its own tourist offer in years to come. “Something like a beach bar would really make this place come alive,” he says. As part of the WOW RAK resort, Polo is developing a beach resort at the far end of the waterpark. Comprising 16 prefabricated chalets, each with 11 rooms, this high-end accommodation will be complemented by a 700-room, 3-star hotel. A “dry” park called Planet Earth is planned as a second gate. Slightly bigger than the waterpark, it will feature the classic theme park cluster of five
Kids Cove children’s pool
lands around a lake. Featured will be a total of 72 attractions, around 50% of which will be undercover. Linking the two parks will be a “shopping mall,” the first phase of which opens next year. Here Polo has decided not to compete head on with the UAE’s many other retail experiences. “We are calling it a shopping mall, but really it is somewhere to sell all the gifts and souvenirs from the park,” describes Singh chawla. “People buy things, go on the rides and then get desperate when they forget them. Instead of having shops all over the park, we have just brought them to the entrance.”
Around 450 staff from over 10 different nationalities have been hired for the waterpark and eventually there will be up to 2,000 people working across the entire resort. As in India, everyone is trained to perform multiple tasks so that office staff can work front of house when required, and vice versa. For the time being the park’s operators are being conservative in terms of attendance expectations. Despite the eye-watering capacity, the goal is for between 250,000 and half a million guests in the first year of operation (the park will open year round). “We say that only 10 days in year will we have 100% capacity,” concludes Singh Chawla. Long term, however, he is aiming for top five waterpark status.
This a project of epic proportions, and we will watch with interest in the years to come as the rest of WOW RAK is developed. Will it succeed it in raising Ras Al Khaimah’s profile? For you, dear reader, it already has.
www.icelandwaterpark.com
Synthetic flooring and shading ready to be applied throughout the waterpark in RAK
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A maze of waterslides in the Polar Mountains
A model of the planned Planet Earth theme park JULY 2010
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