Industry Insider
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the summer holidays. However, it made it a lot easier for people to move around, they feel less pressured to getting things done quickly and it has reduced queues. This has also had a huge impact on the income of the park. Visitors are spending more time in shops, and restaurants are full with our pre-booking system. While we allow a few walk-ins, we’ve continued our pre- booking system, as have most attractions. The pre-booking system has also allowed us to anticipate how many staff members we need. We can target where we need to have our labour at certain times, so we haven’t just got people standing around. The supply chain and transport issues following the pandemic have certainly
had an impact. Pre-pandemic, you could get a delivery ordered and delivered within 24 hours. Now, whether it’s confectionary or animal feed, deliveries will come once or twice a week. In terms of the operation of the park, the pandemic has affected this
significantly. We’ve become more cashless; this was not out of choice it just happened by default due to the pandemic. Although we’re starting to see more cash being used, it is not at the level it used to be. This used to be an 85% cash business and the costs that came with that were extraordinary. We’ve now started saving time and money in other areas e.g., staff spending hours cashing up. We’ve also changed our ticketing system so instead of people just buying a ticket, we now send them a pre-visit email. This gives the visitor an insight into what the day will entail and we’ve found the system is more effective.
JB: At the park you generate animal waste, food waste, packaging, etc. What are you doing to mitigate the effects of this waste? CK: Our parent company is French so they are a little bit ahead of the UK in terms of what they want to be in a green society. Everything we do now has got a green part to it. The company we use reports back to us on a weekly and monthly basis exactly how much of our waste gets recycled. We’ve reduced our use of plastic significantly, we won’t purchase items that contain palm oil e.g., straws, and we now use refillable cups. Any animal waste is also used by local farmers. The Group as a whole is focused on educating our visitors about our efforts to be more sustainable and environmentally conscious, and we have included this in our feedback questionnaire as we’re open to improvements. We’re also in the process of implementing a solar farm on the park so we can use electricity from that and sell it back to the grid. The new animal houses will have these solar panels and they also now capture water to be used for plants and animal ponds, etc. Also, within the animal houses we’ll be looking at how we can we use biodiversity for heating by using wood chip or wood pulp instead of using gas or electricity. It’s an industry in itself and I still think we have a long way to go, but as a
park we’re making great strides towards it. We still use old Land Rovers that run on diesel because we haven’t found a vehicle robust enough to use on the track. We’ve still got a way to go with that but the next big thing we’re looking at is to reduce the number of vehicles that go around the safari by replacing
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them with electric trailers. It’s expensive but our parent company believes they can do that for us, and it will allow us to take around 75 passengers around the safari.
JB: What trends do you think we’re looking forward to? Do you see any current trends emerging in the industry? CK: Leisure itself is becoming all-year round. In the summer, people would go to a theme park and in the winter, they’d go to a museum. Companies like us cannot survive on the old six-month system. It’s become a year-round operation and it has become diversified with weddings, events and accommodation, anything that will bring in guests. Some people are successful at it and some people are going to struggle. I think climatically the further north you are in Europe that’s going to be tough, and some parts in the south in Spain, Portugal and France, they’re finding it a lot easier. In terms of what the future will bring, I think there’s going to be more in virtual reality. I think it’s an area that we’ve got to look at when we’re replacing some of our rides because this generation are more in tune with technology and how things can be improved. I think there is a timeline on the old arcades and I fear for some of the seaside resorts. When talking to some colleagues and friends, I think seaside resorts are trying to reinvent themselves as more of 365-day attraction as opposed to a 26-week vacation. We’re all look at extending our season, and changing the way we think of what visitors want. What visitors are looking for is much different to what they were 40 years ago. I remember going to Disney for training there and thinking it was fantastic. They think about everything they do which is what we’re now doing. We don’t just open the gate and hope people come in and have a good time. We monitor what they do, we make sure they’re getting what they want. We look at their how things have changed and what they eat. It’s an ever-evolving world, but I think it’s going at such a pace now that change is going to come very quickly.
SEPTEMBER 2022
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