Universal Epic Universe (South Expansion Complex) - Now Open!

[celluloid]

It’s not the next six weeks, but rather the ticket sell through once they open up to 22k. It’s pretty interesting they are able to scrape how many tickets remain for sale each day. The park isn’t going to get remotely close to its 7.5-8M capacity for quite a while, if that’s predictive.

Though, as I said, I don’t really know theme park booking curves and maybe they tend to be very close in.



Shanghai was pretty busy. Other than opening day, which started at noon and was definitely capacity limited. This seems to be a capacity limitation issue, I wonder if they’ll just open up more sales. There’s little point in it being “sold out” and running walk on lines.

On the flip side, maybe they are caught off guard that Ministry is suddenly working.

The sales are in higher numbers as the days continue. In the next weeks people will be jealous of what these first attendees got. The park has opened as the most tested theme park of all time and things are going fairly well for now as tweaks continue.

Shanghai of course was busy because it was one of the largest populations anywhere no matter what time of year. Memorial Day kick off here had many preview days before it where the vloggers and hype have already occured.

Also every person there is paying full or near full price admission and having a great GSAT, which is great for the company.

No TMs or APs allowed to enter gratis is what you are seeing the result of. Everything to plan on that front anyway.

 

[celluloid]

That was my commentary. They have to look outside themselves for fandoms and seem a bit resistant to building it themselves. With the one exception that HHN has some sub culture behind it.

I mean 3/5ths (and arguably Illumination holds interest in Mario's success but I won't count that) is Universal owned when it comes to EPIC.

Not too far off of DHS when you consider that up until recently MGM/DHS was about the same situation. Disney had yet to own Star Wars, RnR had an artist they no longer owned the catelogue for, Great Movie Ride was filled with others including generic horror scene and CBS with TW Zone, all while playing the Superman and Potter themes from WB in park's music loop. The rides created did not suffer though. (we could go back even further to where Pixar and Muppets were partnerships)

All this being said, it is not a competition in park specific of who owns what completely, but how well things are done and sell, and Uni is fine giving 40 cents for every Butterbeer to WB or 7 bucks for every band to Nintendo.

Walt was not above partnerships himself either. He tried for a lot that would not sell and of course some are famous ones like deals with PL Travers.

 

[flynnibus]

Doesn't this happen with every new theme park?

People think it's going to be super busy which leads it to be ironically not busy?

The ticketing is also highly constrained in this stupid limited park visiting and mandatory add-on model.

You're not going to get normies to jump through all those hoops without a huge drag on their conversion success.

I think it is much like Disneyland with SWGE - they put up so many constraints and hurdles that they didn't just tame the demand.. they outright nerfed it.

I mean it's better to run light than to blow up and fall over completely... but they need to make the park more accessible to the gen pop to see big add-ons and pull through IMO.

 

[BringMeTheHoriz]

The sales are in higher numbers as the days continue. In the next weeks people will be jealous of what these first attendees got. The park has opened as the most tested theme park of all time and things are going fairly well for now as tweaks continue.

Shanghai of course was busy because it was one of the largest populations anywhere no matter what time of year. Memorial Day kick off here had many preview days before it where the vloggers and hype have already occured.

Also every person there is paying full or near full price admission and having a great GSAT, which is great for the company.

No TMs or APs allowed to enter gratis is what you are seeing the result of. Everything to plan on that front anyway.

Excellent reminder that everyone in there is currently paying full freight. $180 x 13,000 =$2,340,000.00. Multiply that by 30 days and that’s $70M before you get into food and merchandise. Obviously there’s massive costs with running a park but clearly Universal has made the decision to ensure that for the full price guests are paying they are in turn provided a great experience. Something to be said for a company not trying to max out capacity right out of the gate when they easily could.

I do agree that Ministry working with the adjustments has caught them off guard. But with it seemingly working more reliably they must feel confident in adding more tickets day of without it having a negative impact on GSAT.

Overall I think what we’re seeing is Universal trying to control how this park is launched and so far everything is going how they want it to.

 

[celluloid]

Excellent reminder that everyone in there is currently paying full freight. $180 x 13,000 =$2,340,000.00. Multiply that by 30 days and that’s $70M before you get into food and merchandise. Obviously there’s massive costs with running a park but clearly Universal has made the decision to ensure that for the full price guests are paying they are in turn provided a great experience. Something to be said for a company not trying to max out capacity right out of the gate when they easily could.

I do agree that Ministry working with the adjustments has caught them off guard. But with it seemingly working more reliably they must feel confident in adding more tickets day of without it having a negative impact on GSAT.

Overall I think what we’re seeing is Universal trying to control how this park is launched and so far everything is going how they want it to.

As the ole saying goes, if they are not waiting in line, they have more opportunities to spend money.
The guest spending here has been healthy.

About two weeks ago more park day tickets were added when the park's operations were going smoothly. This is what has resulted in some ticket avalibility for the few days after opening. You will notice June dates are selling out again.

Hotel bookings are also very healthy and from what I can tell above projection, which is part of the major goal of the park as well. So many of the people paying near full freight also have spent time in the other property parks.

Look at the Express sales still. Because of operations more were unlocked but you will notice most days in June are also very sold out for express even with added availability.

As for the complicated method proposed argument from some. Not really. If you want more than Just Epic, You can book a package, if you want just Epic, you buy a ticket. Nothing really complicated about it and is kind of funny when you consider how booking things can get complex and tiered these days. If days and express passes are selling out, then it is not too complicated.

And soon HHN based ticket packages will be out to keep the bookings healthy.

 

[flynnibus]

As for the complicated method proposed argument from some. Not really. If you want more than Just Epic, You can book a package, if you want just Epic, you buy a ticket. Nothing really complicated about it and is kind of funny when you consider how booking things can get complex and tiered these days

Wow man.. can you take the blinders off?

It's constrained.
Is it the same as the other UNI parks? NO
Can you goto Uni on a multi-day ticket and visit Epic as much as you want like the other parks? NO
Can you goto Epic and get discounts for visiting more? NO - you have to buy multiple single day tickets.
Can I book a room package and just buy the epic days I want? No.. you gotta go full ala carte.

Can you get around these constraints? Yes, as long as you are willing to just pay your way at full price on top of everything else.

None of this is how the rest of the parks run. It's not the same as visiting the other parks, and is variations customers have to account for, or show up naive and get severely disappointed.

 

[celluloid]

Wow man.. can you take the blinders off?

It's constrained.
Is it the same as the other UNI parks? NO
Can you goto Uni on a multi-day ticket and visit Epic as much as you want like the other parks? NO
Can you goto Epic and get discounts for visiting more? NO - you have to buy multiple single day tickets.
Can I book a room package and just buy the epic days I want? No.. you gotta go full ala carte.

Can you get around these constraints? Yes, as long as you are willing to just pay your way at full price on top of everything else.

None of this is how the rest of the parks run. It's not the same as visiting the other parks, and is variations customers have to account for, or show up naive and get severely disappointed.

Constrained(which is a funny word choice, but really its controlled, but we will go with it) does not equate to complicated.

Its working and earning money.

It is not like they are selling Annual Passes that include the park and you are playing a guessing game of when you are good to go or not.

People really hate that this is working huh?

 

[BrianLo]

Excellent reminder that everyone in there is currently paying full freight. $180 x 13,000 =$2,340,000.00. Multiply that by 30 days and that’s $70M before you get into food and merchandise. Obviously there’s massive costs with running a park but clearly Universal has made the decision to ensure that for the full price guests are paying they are in turn provided a great experience. Something to be said for a company not trying to max out capacity right out of the gate when they easily could.

They likely would not be breaking even in this range. Let alone be getting a stellar return. We know operationally from a lot of Disney parks what the operation margins are. Perhaps the ticketing pricing helps, but sub 5 million guests wouldn’t cut it. We’re talking half the money that Disney brings in on after hours events here, which they are double dipping on an operational day.

But again, it’s not now that I care about - It’s July/August when they aren’t even selling through 10k tickets. Like I said, I don’t know the booking curves and will be watching them. I actually do really want this park to do well for the sake of the industry. The other thing we don’t know is how much redistribution is occurring from their other gates and the evidence seems to suggest a moderate amount so far.

 

[flynnibus]

Constrained(which is a funny word choice, but really its controlled, but we will go with it) does not equate to complicated.

The constraints lead to to complications when the customer has to work out what to do because the easy tools or ads don't fit what they want to buy. Frustration.. especially in the 'how do I buy this?' or 'how do I get that price?' portion of a sales is friction.. friction hurts conversion.

 

[Jrb1979]

The constraints lead to to complications when the customer has to work out what to do because the easy tools or ads don't fit what they want to buy. Frustration.. especially in the 'how do I buy this?' or 'how do I get that price?' portion of a sales is friction.. friction hurts conversion.

I do get what you're saying. Its frustrating cause you can visit the other Universal parks multiple times with multi day tickets. You can only visit Epic one time unless you pay full price each time.

They want to limit attendance at Epic for the first while to make sure the park can handle crowds while making sure all attractions are good to go. I don't know how else you expect them to go about limiting guests.

 

[celluloid]

The constraints lead to to complications when the customer has to work out what to do because the easy tools or ads don't fit what they want to buy. Frustration.. especially in the 'how do I buy this?' or 'how do I get that price?' portion of a sales is friction.. friction hurts conversion.

You are trying to make the friction sound like a pinchpoint.

It is not. The consumer is doing great and results are showing it so far.

For the most part, the consumer understands the supply and demand.

 

[Lil Copter Cap]

As the ole saying goes, if they are not waiting in line, they have more opportunities to spend money.
The guest spending here has been healthy.

About two weeks ago more park day tickets were added when the park's operations were going smoothly. This is what has resulted in some ticket avalibility for the few days after opening. You will notice June dates are selling out again.

Hotel bookings are also very healthy and from what I can tell above projection, which is part of the major goal of the park as well. So many of the people paying near full freight also have spent time in the other property parks.

Look at the Express sales still. Because of operations more were unlocked but you will notice most days in June are also very sold out for express even with added availability.

As for the complicated method proposed argument from some. Not really. If you want more than Just Epic, You can book a package, if you want just Epic, you buy a ticket. Nothing really complicated about it and is kind of funny when you consider how booking things can get complex and tiered these days. If days and express passes are selling out, then it is not too complicated.

And soon HHN based ticket packages will be out to keep the bookings healthy.

I have to ask, and you don't have to go into details for revealing too much, but do you know this information based on data or is this all being surmised?

With it being only a few days after open, I am curious to seeing how non-local/influencer/media crowds take to the park experience.

Technical rehearsals were, by and large, a mess operationally. And I know Universal is avoiding bad press by limiting attendance at initial open. Having a colleague attend the media preview day, he had nothing but wonderful things to say about the experience. But the park was light on crowds, wait times were low, the portal opening experiences were being performed, and a nighttime show was provided. None of this will be a typical day at Epic Universe (at least not for some time).

With reports of Universal refunding Express passes at Epic because they aren't needed...this initial opening period, in my opinion, is just the next phase of technical rehearsals, but with full-priced paying guests.

 

[celluloid]

I have to ask, and you don't have to go into details for revealing too much, but do you know this information based on data or is this all being surmised?

With it being only a few days after open, I am curious to seeing how non-local/influencer/media crowds take to the park experience.

Technical rehearsals were, by and large, a mess operationally. And I know Universal is avoiding bad press by limiting attendance at initial open. Having a colleague attend the media preview day, he had nothing but wonderful things to say about the experience. But the park was light on crowds, wait times were low, the portal opening experiences were being performed, and a nighttime show was provided. None of this will be a typical day at Epic Universe (at least not for some time).

With reports of Universal refunding Express passes at Epic because they aren't needed...this initial opening period, in my opinion, is just the next phase of technical rehearsals, but with full-priced paying guests.

To your first part:
My background revolves around marketing for the industry and while plans for the way it is being done were rolled out.
Observational supply and demand are evident. The park would not say no to money and attendance and revenue are healthy.
Express is often sold out and Uni has always been decent about refunds if it is prior to date.

In the next weeks, the people who returned their express may regret it.

 

[celluloid]

In Celestial Park, The Oak and Star will have entertainment at the Plastered Owl bar section. A dueling guitar and improv banter based set.

For those who remember Celestial Park's live entertainment getting cut. (Remember I mentioned it was the show not the people) here is where some of them went when a new entertainment idea was produced with their talents.

 

[Mike S]

In Celestial Park, The Oak and Star will have entertainment at the Plastered Owl bar section. A dueling guitar and improv banter based set.

For those who remember Celestial Park's live entertainment getting cut. (Remember I mentioned it was the show not the people) here is where some of them went when a new entertainment idea was produced with their talents.

I saw the set. Plastered Chandler and Plastered AJ were great.

 

[Sorcerer Mickey]

When can we expect for traffic to ramp up? I'd like to visit while lines are still incredibly short.

 

[hsisthebest]

Constrained(which is a funny word choice, but really its controlled, but we will go with it) does not equate to complicated.

Its working and earning money.

It is not like they are selling Annual Passes that include the park and you are playing a guessing game of when you are good to go or not.

People really hate that this is working huh?

I'll definately be watching wait times/trends but today (Memorial Day), the top wait time this afternoon at EPIC is 90 min. for Harry Potter - The rest are 45min. or less. This is totally a "Shut-up and take my money" way of operations. I gave up on WDW and haven't been since 2018 beacuse we kept paying more and getting less and less- including making it onto attractions. We are planning a Uni- only trip next year for my family of 6. I gaurantee if lines and crowds are managable I will be a very happy dad willing to spend more money around the parks. You are correct that "this is working."

 

[coffeefan]

When can we expect for traffic to ramp up? I'd like to visit while lines are still incredibly short.

Supposedly on July 1st capacity will double. The wait times should get longer then. Once they open up the park APs then it will get hectic.

 

[Tom Morrow]

People really hate that this is working huh?

If they aren't hitting the already very low attendance cap that they set for themselves which is what is possibly happening (can't confirm), then no, it might not be working.

I'm not saying they're being dumb, or that Epic is going to fail or any kind of panic like that. Just that they may have been a little over-zealous with preventing people from going to the park and may have to course correct. May.

 

[celluloid]

If they aren't hitting the already very low attendance cap that they set for themselves which is what is possibly happening (can't confirm), then no, it might not be working.

Most of June sold out even when the extra avalibility opened.
This extra avalibility opened due to Ministry working well enough to allow a larger park attendance for the goals.
All of those in June have been reaching sell out status again as are the express passes.
People are enjoying a brand new theme park opening era like they have never been able to by design. Operations are going smoothly considering the preview to opening week.
EPIC is meeting Comcast's goals, so in this regard, it is working.

My comment you quoted was for people personally insulting me because of some personal anger about it.

It has since all been deleted by mods. Disregard if it seems out of place.