All things Knotts Berry Farm

[CaptinEO]

The Mall of America had a problem with teens and initiated a policy that youth under 16 must be accompanied by an adult 21 years or older from 3 p.m. to close. And you know what? It works pretty well.

The problem is the mall didn't sell tens of thousands of entry passes to teens before they made this policy. If I was a teen or parent I'd be very upset and expect at the very least the option of a prorated refund.

 

[Emmanuel]

I'm wondering how this is going to work when it is only two days per week during the summer.

I used to live about 30 minutes from Great America in Santa Clara. When I got my driver's license, my friends and I would go hang out at the park on our own. We didn't go all the time, and I'm not sure I would consider it "babysitting". It was just a more fun place to go hang out than the mall - because RIDES!

Anyway, relating this to Knotts' new policy: we went during the week in the summer (when our parents were at work), so a weekend ban on unchaperoned teenagers would not have effected us at all. Will the new policy just push troubled teenagers to start fights during the week? I guess time will tell.

Schools will be starting up again soon and Knotts will be closing at 6pm on Mon-Thurs starting August 15th with the schools in Buena Park starting on August 16th. I went to Knotts on one Tuesday in October with a closing time at 6pm and didn't really see teen groups around even after 3 or 4 pm. So basically even if some played hooky and showed up or did in fact come for a bit of after school fun, it wouldn't be at a level where the park would be concerned that they could cause disruptions and the park would be closing early anyway in the offseason weekdays.

 

[Phroobar]

I wonder how the new rule will effect Knotts Scary Farm. That is when you have tons of teenagers. My sister and I are like the oldest people there. My wife refuses to go since she thinks it's stupid. Oh course security is really tight and visible during it. Can a 13 year old buy a Saturday ticket to Scary Farm without a 21 year old chaperone?

 

[PiratesMansion]

I wonder how the new rule will effect Knotts Scary Farm. That is when you have tons of teenagers. My sister and I are like the oldest people there. My wife refuses to go since she thinks it's stupid. Oh course security is really tight and visible during it. Can a 13 year old buy a Saturday ticket to Scary Farm without a 21 year old chaperone?

The fact that APs don't include Scary Farm will probably insulate the event a little bit from the fallout of this (unless all of those under 18s also buy Scary Farm passes), but I'm sure they'll evaluate how the system is/isn't working and make a decision based on that at a later date.

Halloween events will attract rowdy people even if all underage teens are excluded without chaperones (the most belligerent, obnoxious Scary Farm guest I encountered was most definitely not a teenager), so hard to say how the new restrictions would be affected.

 

[PiratesMansion]

I can't speak for yesterday, but I was at Knott's today from about 3-10:30. There were plenty of signs posted and security out front alerting people about the new Friday/Saturday policy. The park was extremely busy with young families and some older couples (there was one particularly adorable middle aged couple dancing with each other to one of the bands playing in the evening when everyone else was just standing and listening, it was really sweet). There were no giant groups of unsupervised teens running around, and it makes a huge difference in the feel of the park; in fact, my very first visit to the park almost 10 years ago I actually felt a little uncomfortable because it felt like I was one of five people in the park over the age of 18, so this was the exact inverse of that; MUCH better! People of all ages were there having fun with their families and making the most of their Saturday. For those positing that Knott's is going to go bankrupt because unsupervised teens can't go to the park two days a week, today was a pretty poor showing for that argument. The park was doing just fine without them.

Otherwise, I had a great day at the park and a delicious dinner at the chicken dinner restaurant (but ordering the superior tenders to the overrated fried chicken, sorry not sorry) capped off with boysenberry pie a la mode.
-Fastlane cost me more than I've ever paid at Knott's outside of Haunt, a pretty penny, but it was incredibly helpful for the crowds that were present today, especially for Ghostrider.
-Updated Beary Tales is like TSMM but much, much weirder (you shoot with a boysenberry jar! At pies! And enemies! Or something!) and therefore is much better than Iron Reef.
-I had never really noticed before that the line for Knott's train ride is incredibly slow (a lot of it is the rolling stock they use, but then Knott's just isn't particularly urgent with ride ops in general, so I'm sure that also contributes); thankfully the train robbers were on point.
-There was a fair amount of entertainment going on, but some of the old standbys I remembered from past visits (granted, three years ago) were missing, like the Saloon show. But kudos to them for doing a show in the Bird Cage Theater in the summer, something I had never seen before. I missed most of it because of timing, but the bits I saw of Ghost Town Alive were fantastic. And kudos to Knott's to having a cycling piano player a la Disneyland over by Beary Tales!
-Calico Mine Ride had fantastic, Disney-esque lighting at night. Log Ride also, to a much lesser extent. Hangtime's lighting package speaks for itself as one of the greatest on a modern coaster. Ghostrider was blissfully unlit!
-My one true dishonorable mention to Knott's is for the park joining many others in discontinuing paper maps. As someone who collects maps as souvenirs and doesn't want to open my phone just to figure out where I'm going, I really wish they would bring them back. Particularly since Knott's is one of the few places that still gets me turned around from time to time.
-To my surprise, I actually found the updated Knott's preserved book in stock at the gift shop on the way out, and immediately snatched it up. I can't wait to read it when I have some down time over the next few days/weeks.

It was a great visit, and just about everything that I had hoped it would be after three years away. Tomorrow will begin five days at DLR; hopefully those will go well also.

 

[Sharon&Susan]

Disney's enforcing a stricter dress code because of Yippie Day? Disney is obviously gonna lose all their business, go bankrupt and most importantly be Disneydoomed!

 

[BuzzedPotatoHead89]

Sundays are now added to the chaperone policy effective today as well.

 

[Ismael Flores]

Been wanting to post this since Sunday.

I was at Knotts on Saturday and as soon as I walked into park the difference with the chaperone mandate was quite visible.

No need to deal with large groups of unsupervised teenagers, no need to try and not be bumped over while trying to walk with a cane, no need to worry about groups of them cutting in front of lines.

The ambience was drastically changed, it felt like I was in a family park and not a day care. Even walking outside going to parking lot it was civil.

Really enjoyed the difference and stayed longer than I would.

The police presence outside the park was a little overkill and made the park feel unsafe with police cars from every city in Orange County park right at the entrance but looks like they wanted to make a point that they were taking it serious.

Some police inside did not move a foot all day that I was there. They seemed to just be standing around enjoying drinks and occasional snack in groups. To me it would have made more sense if they walked around and not just stood in a corner chatting with eachother but they know what their job is.

Did see a couple young girls stopped and asked where their parents were.
It just so happen that the parents were no far behind and they just wanted to get ahead and refill their drinks.

Overall much better experience than I have seen in past trips.


Now if only they would do something about the ride operators being so unorganized during load and unload.
Shouldn’t take five minute plus to load a coaster car.

 

[Ismael Flores]

Also forgot to mention, that at the entrance anyone that looked under 21 was asked for ID or whom they were with.
If the chaperone looked young they were asked for ID.

I was really surprised how quickly they set this all up, with multiple people at the start of the entrance queue one mid walk and others between bag check and ticket booths.

 

[Ismael Flores]

Sundays are now added to the chaperone policy effective today as well.

Looks like they also left it open for possibly adding some weekdays

 

[Ismael Flores]

This new policy might be a good start, but it doesn't mean anything if Knott's doesn't spend the money to hire more security and retrain all their employees. Even then, I doubt this policy will lead anywhere as it is nearly impossible to determine the age of a minor and aside from getting verbal confirmation from a teen that they are "over 17", not much else they can do to enforce it.

From a PR standpoint though, Knott's had to do something, and they know that there is another take-over event being planned already. They're probably hoping this policy changes on its own, will discourage a lot of kids from coming down there. We will have to see if that turns out to be true.

Either way this will end up costing them a lot of money. Even if they decide to go the cheap route and not hire more security employees, and but the entire burden of enforcement on the poor teenager standing at Fiesta PC, if the policy change on its own, results in fewer pass sales, that could wreak havoc on their budget planning and potentially their long term future.

Its sort of a weird theme park conundrum. If the image of the park is hurt and fewer people want to go, lowering the prices to entice more visitors shouldn't always be the answer.

They did a really good job this weekend, throughout the park not only was police enforcing it but I had never seen such a big presence of workers with Knott security shirts on.
They also were checking very well for age if someone looked under age at the entrance before security.
Everyone at this point in age that is older than 17 should have some kind of ID whether it be a drivers license or school Id.

Anyone younger than that really doesn’t need one if you have a chaperone.

And if you can’t prove your age than entry is denied.
I forgot to mention that when I arrived Saturday there was a group of young women and they had chaperones. It looked like it could have been one of those student exchange trip and they were trying to figure out what they would have to do because they had more than three children per adult.there were like eight and only saw two adults.
Not sure how that was handled or if exception is made for school group

 

[Ismael Flores]

Looks like the updated policy has been changed not only to add Sunday but now it also added in bold that each chaperone can enter with FOUR guest under 17.
They probably realized some issues with the original 3 guests per chaperone

 

[Ismael Flores]

The problem is the mall didn't sell tens of thousands of entry passes to teens before they made this policy. If I was a teen or parent I'd be very upset and expect at the very least the option of a prorated refund.

I am guessing that their legal team said it would be ok because in theory those passes are not being blocked. Those teens can still go but with a chaperone

 

[Ismael Flores]

I was actually surprise when I first saw cars pulling off in drop off and then a group of underage teenagers just being dropped off.
More than once I would see them being dropped off and picked by Uber and Lyft.

Can underage children even book an Uber/lift? Is it allowed.

Or when I would see them walking in droves from the bus stop.
Some looked like they were barely 14 years old.

Maybe I am getting old but I don’t remember parents just letting underage kids take off for the whole day unattended
Especially with all the stuff you see on the news now a days

 

[Mickey's Pal]

Been wanting to post this since Sunday.

I was at Knotts on Saturday and as soon as I walked into park the difference with the chaperone mandate was quite visible.

No need to deal with large groups of unsupervised teenagers, no need to try and not be bumped over while trying to walk with a cane, no need to worry about groups of them cutting in front of lines.

The ambience was drastically changed, it felt like I was in a family park and not a day care. Even walking outside going to parking lot it was civil.

Really enjoyed the difference and stayed longer than I would.

The police presence outside the park was a little overkill and made the park feel unsafe with police cars from every city in Orange County park right at the entrance but looks like they wanted to make a point that they were taking it serious.

Some police inside did not move a foot all day that I was there. They seemed to just be standing around enjoying drinks and occasional snack in groups. To me it would have made more sense if they walked around and not just stood in a corner chatting with eachother but they know what their job is.

Did see a couple young girls stopped and asked where their parents were.
It just so happen that the parents were no far behind and they just wanted to get ahead and refill their drinks.

Overall much better experience than I have seen in past trips.


Now if only they would do something about the ride operators being so unorganized during load and unload.
Shouldn’t take five minute plus to load a coaster car.

Good to hear.

 

[el_super]

They did a really good job this weekend, throughout the park not only was police enforcing it but I had never seen such a big presence of workers with Knott security shirts on.

Yeah the news coming out of Knott's has been interesting to say the least. In addition to eating the costs of additional security and BPPD in the park, some estimates are showing that attendance at Knott's has dropped somewhere close to 15% as wait times for this period have dropped something close to 50% Year over Year. Great for the people going, but not great for Knott's bottom line. And there is still a legitimate question over Season Pass refunds, with so many people online complaining about the processes to get the refunds and Knott's not being consistent in granting them. That Season Pass money is their bread and butter, so it must be hard to give it up.

It is encouraging to see Knott's admitting that there was a problem and trying to correct for it, but with so much at stake ($$$), it still seems incredibly unlikely that they will want to eat these costs long term, and will eventually revert back to being the teen hangout park.

 

[PiratesMansion]

Yeah the news coming out of Knott's has been interesting to say the least. In addition to eating the costs of additional security and BPPD in the park, some estimates are showing that attendance at Knott's has dropped somewhere close to 15% as wait times for this period have dropped something close to 50% Year over Year. Great for the people going, but not great for Knott's bottom line. And there is still a legitimate question over Season Pass refunds, with so many people online complaining about the processes to get the refunds and Knott's not being consistent in granting them. That Season Pass money is their bread and butter, so it must be hard to give it up.

It is encouraging to see Knott's admitting that there was a problem and trying to correct for it, but with so much at stake ($$$), it still seems incredibly unlikely that they will want to eat these costs long term, and will eventually revert back to being the teen hangout park.

Where's your proof? The place was as packed as I've ever seen Knott's outside of Haunt all of last Saturday.

If you cannot produce demonstrable sources, I will continue to assume my own eyes are more credible than all of your extended pontificating on this particular subject.

Also, they just extended this policy to Sunday too. Would they really do that if they were so concerned with their bottom line and all of this money that unsupervised underaged teens are supposedly spending that they have now cut off access to?

"It was promised in the pass when they bought it they could get in every day." Well that's why every company ever includes the disclaimer on any pass they sell that every policy is subject to change without notice.

Really now.

 

[CaptinEO]

I was actually surprise when I first saw cars pulling off in drop off and then a group of underage teenagers just being dropped off.
More than once I would see them being dropped off and picked by Uber and Lyft.

Can underage children even book an Uber/lift? Is it allowed.

Or when I would see them walking in droves from the bus stop.
Some looked like they were barely 14 years old.

Maybe I am getting old but I don’t remember parents just letting underage kids take off for the whole day unattended
Especially with all the stuff you see on the news now a days

If anything in the past it was more common to have kids and teens be unattended all day.

 

[BuzzedPotatoHead89]

If anything in the past it was more common to have kids and teens be unattended all day.

I agree but you also didn’t have social media proliferating a platform for racketeering among underage youth then. The park has a duty to protect its guests of all ages in these instances.

 

[el_super]

Where's your proof? The place was as packed as I've ever seen Knott's outside of Haunt all of last Saturday.

You can get a lot of good attendance/wait time data on the internet. thrill-data is a good source that shows the drop in Knott's attendance year over year:

And of course the changes in average wait time for the last couple weekends:

Saturday (23) looks like it was a little busier, but the friday and sunday were trailling lower. Interesting to note from this the uptick in attendance on Monday and Tuesday.


There were also lots of reports from people online indicating that the park was basically empty, especially the friday the policy went into effect:

Also, they just extended this policy to Sunday too. Would they really do that if they were so concerned with their bottom line and all of this money that unsupervised underaged teens are supposedly spending that they have now cut off access to?

Again though: if it were really a problem, why not extend the chaperone rule to all days of the week? Why are unescorted/underaged teens running rampant OK on a Tuesday instead of a Sunday?

It seems obvious to me they are overcorrecting here. They want to present an image of a family friendly park, but they still can't give up letting those teens come in on those Season Passes. Knott's is betting that the drop in attendance is being caused by the bad reputation they have received and not because their revenue depends on the underaged teens they are now trying to kick out of the park.

"It was promised in the pass when they bought it they could get in every day." Well that's why every company ever includes the disclaimer on any pass they sell that every policy is subject to change without notice.

Really now.

That's not going to prevent a lawsuit. If they were sold the pass with the promise that they could use it on Saturdays, and now they can not, that's a problem for Knott's. It's not all that different from the shadow block-out dates that got Disneyland sued.

Knott's is perfectly within their right to change the rules midway thru the contract, but they should offer refunds automatically for those now unable to use the pass. Of course it could just be that they are assuming those teens won't bother to sue, and will hopefully re-up and re-new next year when Knott's quietly discontinues the chaperone policy.