FLP up again to $249 on Saturdays

To that I'd say that any up-front backlash they may receive from a pricier pass would be easily counteracted by a great social media presence during the season, because more guests are having better experiences more frequently.

I think the trouble is that the better experience won't happen until 9 months after the firestorm has occurred. The pass prices come out in August. It is a long way until the following May.

I agree that the long term benefit is better, but there is a lot of pain in the short term.

A 25-50% year over year increase would cause backlash, not so sure a 5-10 % yearly increase until an equilibrium is hit would cause much.

A 4 person membership to the our city pool is $300. A Gold membership (top tier) to Columbus Zoo/Zoombezie Bay is $154 per person. Sure you can go in winter but there is little to see or do. Probably couldn’t even drag Jeff there. :)

A Platinum/Gold with drink and dinning is a lot of bang for your buck in comparison even with a $20 round trip fuel cost.

If they are still making money and profits are up, then I don't see what effect any bad press would cause. They did exactly what they had hoped for. Bad press is just a little noise in that case.

I think they missed a golden (ahem.... Pun intended) opportunity to increase the price if the passes this year without the dreaded backlash. It would be easy to say that the $99 was a one time special promotion for the $150th. Now that they've done it again, it'll be harder to raise without upsetting some customers.

I'm just a guy with an opinion and am but a mere anecdote. So, take the following for what it's worth.

Fortuitously I forgot to renew our family's 4 platinum passes prior to last year's season. Not knowing how much we would use them this summer we again decided not to renew and to just do a day trip to Cedar Point and Kings Island. We returned last night from a one-night stay at the Breakers hotel followed by a one-day visit into the park -- a rainy, dreary Monday in Mid-August when many of Ohio's kids were supposedly back to school. It was packed, unpleasant, and almost all of the roller coasters were down at some point throughout the day for an extended period - even Magnum and Iron Dragon had waits consistently over 1 hour. We normally visit Cedar Point 3-5 days and Canada's Wonderland, Kings Island, and Michigan's Adventure one day each year on our platinum passes. Seeing yesterday's crowds and reading about the conditions throughout the year, we agreed not to renew our Platinum Pass again next year, finding that our experience yesterday did not warrant $1000 for next summer. We went to Kings Island two weeks ago on a perfect 75 degree day and didn't encounter any of the issue we had yesterday. The lines were nowhere near as long as Cedar Point's, the rides were mostly running, and the food stalls were all operating etc. Unfortunately, Kings Island is too far to justify more than one trip a year. Otherwise, I would simply change my focus from Cedar Point to Kings Island.

We determined that it is a better value for us to go once to Cedar Point in the early season and once to Kings Island in later summer than it is for us to purchase a pass and to go to Cedar Point more than two times next year. I enjoy going to the park so, I hope this year's problems are mainly related to the park not able to use foreign workers, that next year's experience will be better and that it inspires us to reconsider our decision. Until that time, we'll be more strategic, take advantage of the Michigan savings tickets and/or the two days at two parks promotions Cedar Fair usually runs, and save some money.

I don’t see the labor shortage as an issue once they staffed up with higher wages by July. Unless an argument can be made that the foreign workers hustle more than lazy Americans and ride op procedures aren’t the issue. I can’t speak to that other than the observation KI has had great ride ops this season.

I also think a decent sized slice of the population is just more price than wait sensitive. The KI Dollar Days promotion is a excellent example, packed park and tons of parents waiting 45 minutes in a food line just so they can get their kids a itty bitty Blue Ice Cream cone for $1.

Seems like the demographic CP wants to capitalize on, just not sure how compatible that is with the expectations of a $300/night resort guest or the per caps metric.

Urumqi said:
Monday in Mid-August when many of Ohio's kids were supposedly back to school. It was packed, unpleasant, and almost all of the roller coasters were down at some point throughout the day for an extended period

The major Ohio school districts are going back this week & next. Toledo & Dayton 8/18, Cincinnati 8/19, Cleveland 8/23, Akron 8/24, Columbus 8/26. There are only a handful of straggler small districts in Ohio that aren't back by Monday Aug 30th. Michigan Schools are kind of split between Aug 30/31st & Sept 8th. You were a little early to catch the back to school drop. The week beginning Aug 30th is the week to go.

Not only that, the last couple of weeks before schools start tend to be nuts in any year; that's the "OMIGOD SCHOOL IS STARTING AND WE HAVENT BEEN TO CEDAR POINT YET!" week, and the attendance usually reflects that.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Yep. Pre-COVID (and pre $99 Gold Pass) you could pretty much guarantee on a very quiet and mellow June, the July 4th surge, and then the end of July through mid August "omg we didn't go yet".

Followed by a fantastically quiet week prior to Labor Day.

mallman said: I dunno ... I could see this the other way. The gold pass expense is long in the rear-view mirror and folks didn't have to pay anything to get into the park this year, so why not splurge on FL?

That was part of the rationale I used when I bought FL+ for my daughter and I on our last visit. We got our season passes for a trip up to Cedar Point in October, 2020 (and they were valid for the last bit of 2020 and all of 2021). When we returned in July, the fact that the Gold Passes had long since been paid for (and the fact we were saving some money by camping instead of getting a hotel) made it a lot easier to justify splurging on Fast Lane +.

My one regret is not getting the passes in advance... I bought them Wednesday night after we got back to camp and we were likely among the first to pay the new $159 Weekday price. (It had still been the old price on the website earlier in the day when I checked)

I'm happy to report that it appears the price increase has worked. I've been to the park four times since they began raising the prices/beginning of this thread and it definitely makes a world of difference. As a FL user the experience has been great. I can't speak for those that don't use it but I can imagine it has to be much better for them as well considering there's significantly less people "cutting" in front on them.

From the sound of it, it sounds like they've updated the FLP pricing to a rational price point. That's promising. Now they need to follow suit with the season passes.

Agreed!