Senior Thesis

Good afternoon everyone,

I have followed this site since it started when I was pretty young (maybe 6th grade) and I am currently a senior in college working on my senior year thesis. I intend on doing a statistical analysis on the amusement industry as a whole with a focus on Cedar Fair/Geauga Lake specifically because one day I hope to work in the industry. What I was hoping some people on this site could do for me is help point me in the direction to gather some data that I would need to do the paper. If I can not obtain the data I pretty much will not be able to do the research and would probably just shift my thesis to a topic on forecasting performance in the amusement industry as a whole but I am really excited for my topic and think this is the place to at least get an idea if it is even possible.

I would like to get data on individual park performance from cedar fair from when they acquired Geauga Lake until the years following its closure. Data that would be useful would be anything regarding attendance rates of individual parks (and the company as a whole) during these time periods and anything indicating ticket prices for these times would be useful. Also total costs of operating the parks annually. I also would be able to use anything that defines the cost of relocating the assets that were moved from Geauga Lake to other parks. This would be very helpful if combined with attendance rates of the other respective parks that received an asset from Geauga Lake. I am pretty much trying to find as much information about the company and parks performance during those time periods because that could help me show trends and explain why it was a wise decision to close the park. While the answer may be simple (the park just wasn't profitable) I know that I could explain this in my paper with the proper data. I also would be interested to know what % of the amusement industry is controlled by Cedar Fair and how that has changed leading up to and the years after the closing of the park, although I know it would be skewed with the acquisition of Paramounts parks. I know this is kind of an unconventional way of reaching out for help but it is also kind of a last attempt at trying to find this information from shifting my thesis because this information might be simply impossible for me to obtain unfortunately.

Also if it is any good ideas for another research topic would be VERY helpful. I am an economics major so I am looking to do some intense statistical econometric analysis with some data involved in the amusement industry. This post may be better suited for CoasterBuzz but I thought I would start here. Any guidance/direction or ideas are very much appreciated so I thank you guys in advance.

-Tim Schreibeis

I just read on another thread how attendance numbers are supposedly closely guarded but I don't know how you'd obtain them. This was in the thread talking about the near capacity limit of last Saturday.

Maybe someone can explain why these numbers have to be such a secret anyway.

Good luck on your thesis.

I know Walt had a copy of the fun-forward presentation given at the investors meeting. At least I think that's what it was called.

That is probably your best bet.

Here is the PDF of that presentation material:

http://i.coasterbuzz.com/pdf/funforwardpresentation2012.pdf

It sounds like a lot of what you are looking for on the Corporate level can be found in Cedar Fair's annual 10-K filings. These can be found on the SEC website.

Unfortunately, I don't think Cedar Fair publishes any info on individual parks. You might try contacting Cedar Fair corporate and asking about the park-level financial statements for Geauga Lake. It's been closed long enough they might be willing to disclose it.

Thanks everyone,

More than likely I am going to have to change my topic to a more broad one. Any ideas of how I could adjust the idea to do something still interesting and applicable to the amusement industry or more Cedar Fair in general? I have tried to contact corporate and they just told me to look at their website so I do not think they are going to be much help. It is unfortunate because I think it would be a really interesting idea to research but understandable that they do not want to disclose too much information so competitors can gain access to it as well. Now I am just trying to get an idea of what I can do with the information they do have published but not entirely sure. Thanks again everyone.

Attendance numbers would be a key component to this research so if finding that info out is not possible the research idea is pretty much dead and it is time for me to pursue another idea I suppose.

I know this isn't always an extremely reliable source, but the wikipedia page has attendance reports for Cedar Point. Here is a small excerpt:

Attendance[edit]
The park was the 16th most visited amusement park in North America in 2011. It is currently tied with Kings Island as the most visited seasonal amusement park in the United States with an estimated 3.14 million visitors in 2011.[78]

In 1960, the parks attendance reached 1 million for the first time. Just five years later, the attendance reached 2 million.[15][79] In 1975, attendance reached 3 million for the first time.[79] The park's attendance has yet to reach 4 million.

1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
3.30[80] 3.43[81] 3.10[82] 3.25[83] 3.30[84] 3.20[84] 3.10[84] 3.07[84]

2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
3.12[84] 3.20[85] 2.94[86] 3.05[87] 3.14[78] 3.22[1]

You can view the full page here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cedar_Point

Don't ever quote Wikipedia. One of my professors when I was in college gave an automatic zero for using Wikipedia as a source. Some items will contain a number for a citation, go to that page and use it as a source instead.

This should help with some attendance numbers. On the side there are links to PDFs of global attendance numbers for 2009-2012. http://aecom.com/What+We+Do/Economics/Theme+Index+Report

Thabto said:
Don't ever quote Wikipedia. One of my professors when I was in college gave an automatic zero for using Wikipedia as a source. Some items will contain a number for a citation, go to that page and use it as a source instead.

Wikipedia is great for finding sources. Those attendance numbers are sourced by the [#] after them. Just click on that link.

Maverick00 said:
Wikipedia is great for finding sources. Those attendance numbers are sourced by the [#] after them. Just click on that link.[/#]

That's exactly what I said, use the sources as a source instead of Wikipedia.

That is HUGE help thank you so much!

What college do you go to?

I go to John Carroll in University Heights.

Does anyone know where I can get information about admission ticket prices for the parks owned by Cedar Fair? Also i am looking for the same for Six Flags. Not sure if it is published anywhere that I could not find. Thanks everyone.

Go to each park's website. You'll find all the ticket info there.

Pretty sure he means the ticket prices over the past several years. I think he is trying to see how admission price affected attendance.
http://www.rollercoasterfreak.com/Brochures.html
try this site, several of the brochures have information about ticket prices. This is only for cedar point, but try looking up brochures for whatever park or time period you are looking for as they sometimes include ticket prices on them.

Thanks. Yeah I was thinking over the past 4 years minimum. The info wouldn't really be much help if I don't have at least that many years of data.