INVESTMENT
Investors & Major Corporates in 2012-13
Nigel Bland on reasons to hope the performance of attractions will continue to improve into next year
A
Disney Merlin
Universal Parques Reunidos Six Flags Cedar Fair Grevin Average6
1
ll the major operators posted strong results in 2012 (see Table 1), but those that report separately by geog- raphy showed a clear differentiation between the US (strongest), Asia (strong) and Europe (weakest). For instance, Disney grew revenues of 11 per cent in the US and six per cent in Asia, whilst suffering a small decline of one per cent at its Paris sites. Growth in the US and Asia for Disney was driven equally by higher visitor numbers and higher spend. Merlin described the European market as
TABLE 1: PERFORMANCE OF THE GROUPS Company Sites
111 94 6
72 18 16 14
Dec 2012
20 4
10 3 2 4
Countries 4
Visits
2012 (m) 128.5 27.1 34.5 27.1 25.8 23.6 9.3
Revenue growth rates (per cent)
2011-2012 9.5 16.12 4.8 11.3 5.6 3.9 6.05 5.2
Number of attractions, revenues also include cruise and the new resort in Hawaii; 2 (0.5 per cent); 3
Like-for-like growth 7.9 per cent; 4 (excluding full annual impact of Futuroscope); 6 Harry Potter!; 5
2010-2011 9.6 18.13 24.34 8.2 3.8 5.2
(0.2) 8.4
Like-for-like growth 1.6 per cent Using like-for-like numbers where available. 68 Attractions Handbook 2013–2014
2009-2010 1.0 4.1 n/a 2.6 9.0 6.6 3.6 4.5
Like-for-like growth
“extremely tough”, citing the weather (truly awful), the economy (not much better) and the Olympic effect, specifically in the UK. The combination of these factors meant that like-for-likes were flat at Merlin, with growth being driven by the full-year effect of their acquisition of Living & Leisure in Australia and the opening of seven new attractions. In general, the larger-charging attractions
in the UK were down, many by around five per cent (eg Tower of London and Edinburgh Castle), with London Zoo suffering particu-
Sales were down at Edinburgh Castle
larly badly, with a drop of over 10 per cent in visits. This comes as no surprise given the distraction of the Olympics and it's to be hoped that the Olympic legacy provides 'payback' to these attractions over the next few years. As ever, investment in new products was a big driver of visitor numbers. While nobody hit quite the same jackpot as Universal in 2011 with Harry Potter, Disney’s better than competitor performance in the US was sig- nificantly helped by the impact of the opening Cars Land in Califorinia.
The average increase in like-for-like revenues was just over five per cent, which is less than last year (8.4 per cent), but that's largely due to the Harry Potter effect in 2010-2011. Indeed, if you exclude that, overall growth rates have been reasonably consistent at around the five per cent mark for the last three years.
TRANSACTIONS
Looking back over the past 18 months (see Table 2), the simple instruction to anyone selling a business is that in Europe, in addi- tion to Merlin, there are three trade buyers who may be interested: Parques, Aspro and newcomer Looping and one in Asia – Merlin
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