Why Great America won't go under.

by **david** on October 2nd, 2009, 12:47 am

If you see the records for normal operating season, Great America is THE most profitable park. Shapiro is an idiot if he decides to ever sell the park. For those who think Great America is run down and stupid, go visit.

by **Chitown** on October 2nd, 2009, 1:20 am

OK?????

Most here know that SFGAm will not go under. Even if SF as a company folds (which it won't) another company would pick it up in a heartbeat.

CF is known that they would buy SFGAm if it was on the market.

by **Paradise** on October 2nd, 2009, 9:23 am

Wouldn't that be something....

by **Ilovthevu'** on October 2nd, 2009, 9:26 am

If Great America was put on the market right now, CF wouldn't go after it. They have too much debt. They want to sell parks, not buy more. Disney, Universal, and Busch don't care about buying this park. You have Dollywood people left, the people that bought Six Flags Darien Lake plus other Six Flags parks (I don't think they are doing good though.), and you have Merlin entertainment which could get it, but there is no guarantee that Great America is safe for ages to come.

It's like this. When there was a store called Venture, and Value City, my area had tons of people shopping at these places. I always thought that those stores would be the last to go out because they are doing so great compared to the rest of them, but they were shut down just like the rest of them. It didn't matter that they were making a lot of money and the other ones weren't doing so good, they are gone now.

Look at all the parks that are gone: Kiddieland, Riverview Park, Santa's Village, that park that was in the mall, another kiddie park around Chicago. I hope Great America never becomes condos, but it depends if they get enough customers. The good thing for Great America is that they might get more customers because Kiddieland is not operating anymore which isn't a good thing for a lot of people that Kiddieland is not operating no more.

by **Coaster Justin** on October 2nd, 2009, 10:49 am

PARC Management Bought Darien Lake.

But I Would Love Herschend To Buy Great America. Either That Or A Private Owner.

EDITED TO MAKE ME LOOK LESS STUPID

by **Ilovthevu'** on October 2nd, 2009, 11:37 am

^I didn't say the names. I said the people that have Dollywood, the people that bought Six Flags Darien Lake. Thanks for telling me Parc Management and Herschend though.

by **rct2wizard360** on October 2nd, 2009, 1:36 pm

Ilovthevu wrote:Look at all the parks that are gone: Kiddieland, Riverview Park, Santa's Village, that park that was in the mall, another kiddie park around Chicago. I hope Great America never becomes condos, but it depends if they get enough customers. The good thing for Great America is that they might get more customers because Kiddieland is not operating anymore which isn't a good thing for a lot of people that Kiddieland is not operating no more.

Okay. PLEASE take the time to look at the size of those parks and compare them to the size of Great America. People drive from as far as Carbondale and Upper Wisconsin to come to Great America. Most people probably wouldn't drive more than hour for a day at Kiddieland. Riverview?! REALLY?! That had very little to do with the financial state of the park. That was also about, what, 70 years ago? Two of those parks were well before the time you and I were even born.

Kiddieland also took VERY little customers from Great America. Look at the capacity of Kiddieland compared to Six Flags. Great America might feel a little pinch in the sense that they'll be getting a few more customers, if even that. Six Flags still manages to bring in a very large amount of a Kiddieland market in along with the REST of the market.

I guarantee you Cedar Fair would buy us up. Guarantee you.
If they bought us up, then sold off a few parks, they'd be in DECENT standing.

GUARANTEE!

by **Paradise** on October 2nd, 2009, 10:17 pm

Do you think Great America would get fair treatment since it is one of CP's rivals? Or would they keep CP their main park.

Website · by **Jerrykoala2112** on October 2nd, 2009, 10:23 pm

Hmmm, I agree. I think everyone already knew SFGAM is the most profited SF park in the chain with the 2nd highest attendance.

If we did go under, I would hope who ever owns Holiday World, or Hershey, to buy us out.

But I don't see this coming soon, SFMM would be gone before we were.

by **SfGaMownz** on October 3rd, 2009, 1:00 pm

It wouldn't make much sense for the family owned and operated Holiday World to buy SFGAm. The parks are fairly close to each other and would basically be competing with one another in a sense.

by **david** on October 3rd, 2009, 7:45 pm

Here's whats stupid.
Six Flags had every opportunity to sell Magic mountain for more than it's worth, and they chose not to. Why not give every park a treat with a new coaster, or ride?

by **FParker185** on October 3rd, 2009, 8:05 pm

Six Flags got no offers on SFMM when it was for sale. Every offer they got was for all the parks they had for sale without SFMM, so they sold what they could. SFMM all along had such a bad rep that no one wanted it.

As for Great America, due to it's profitability, any company who wanted to buy SFGAm if SF failed could easily obtain the financing to buy the park. Banks would look at the situation and know it's a pretty safe bet.

by **Coaster Justin** on October 4th, 2009, 4:12 pm

Actually, They Did Get Bids for Magic Mountain. The Problem was that the Price was Too Low for What Six Flags Was Hoping For (Not Unlike Kentucky Kingdom).

by **onyxhotel08** on October 8th, 2009, 12:41 am

On June 22, 2006 Six Flags, Inc. announced that it was exploring options for six of its parks, including Magic Mountain and its neighboring water park, Hurricane Harbor. Though management said closing the park was unlikely, rumors still began that the park could be sold to real estate developers, with an intent to close the park and build housing developments in the area.[2] Park officials cited dwindling attendance and rowdy behavior among some of the park-goers (notably teenagers and young adults, who account for a large percentage of the park's attendance) as reasons for wanting to sell the park while management was wanting to move Six Flags into more of a family park direction.

One of the coasters at Magic Mountain: TatsuThe decrease in attendance may be due in part to the fact that the park raised its ticket prices by $10 to $60 for the 2006 season, as well as increasing the price of parking to $15. [1] Throughout the Six Flags chain, attendance in the second quarter of 2006 was 14 percent lower than it was in the second quarter of 2005. [2]

By the fall of 2006 Six Flags announced that Magic Mountain was still up for sale. They also stated, however, that it would be sold to a company that would continue to operate it as a park, and that closing Magic Mountain was not a possibility. Cedar Fair, Hershey, and several others considered buying the park but none of the offers came close to the asking price.

When Six Flags announced which parks it was selling in January 2007, Magic Mountain was no longer one of them. The company decided not to sell Magic Mountain and its adjacent water park. Spokeswoman Wendy Goldberg said that upon further evaluation, the company decided that the Los Angeles parks remained too valuable to relinquish, as sales were increasing, and that the park would not be sold. Other parks were sold as a package and remained open.

by **SwampThing** on October 10th, 2009, 1:34 am

Quite frankly, any company that grosses 50 million dollars doesn't close. That's how much GA made last year. SF, even bankrupt, is still a viable company and the investors know this, the best parks will most likely remain part of Six Flags Theme Parks, in my opinion. GA included.

by **Ilovthevu'** on October 10th, 2009, 9:11 am

You don't close Magic Mountain because you put all that money into that park, and without Magic Mountain, it's like the Six Flags chain is gone to tons of people. Also, it's hard to relocate those rides because of hills, or because they are old. For the rest of the park, they were smaller, and why not get rid of the smaller parks that don't make a lot of money compared to your top 3 attended park. (SFMM, SFGAdv, & SFGAm are the top 3)

by **BP317** on October 10th, 2009, 9:26 am

/\ I think SF was very serious about selling Magic Mountain because of operating costs and because of bad reputation (and because they over-valued the land). Even though its open year round and has the second biggest metropolitan area in the country it still wasn't even close to Great Adventure and Great America in attendance. Also they started putting all the money into fixing it (removing Psyclone and Flashback, X2, Terminator, etc) after they realized that they were going to be stuck with it.

I'm certainly glad that the Newhall Land Company didn't find the parks land as valuable as Six Flags thought it was, because it would have been really sad to see such an amazing coaster park get bulldozed.

by **david** on October 11th, 2009, 12:00 pm

Wouldn't you admit that having something like Tatsu, or X2 would have been awesome for our park? it would have brought in so many. And made RB's line's shorter...

by **monsterfan99** on October 11th, 2009, 2:05 pm

^ Well Superman is the same coaster type as Tatsu...

by **Luxornv** on October 12th, 2009, 5:55 pm

Yeah, Great America itself isn't going anywhere most likely. Six Flags may go under, but someone will probably pick up this park. It has a great location; it is in the middle of Chicago and Milwaukee, two rather large areas. Not to mention, SFGAm is the only park within 3 hours driving distance for most people, so it has this market cornered. I know some people place Cedar Point, King's Island, and Holiday World in the same market, but really, who is going to drive 6-9 hours for a casual amusement park visit?

And as someone mentioned, the other parks in the Chicago area that closed had little to do with money. Kiddieland had to do with dissent in the family and one side owning the land, and the other the park. The part that owned the land didn't want the park there anymore and that was that. With Riverview, while the park seemed great, the original owners of the park were dying, and all of their shares in the park went to a bank which was only interested in money. They wanted to sell the land to developers and make a profit on that. Bad move in my opinion because it looks like crap over there now. If Riverview had still been there, it would be hitting limits like Elitch Gardens, but I think because of what it did in its time, it would likely rival Cedar Point. By the way, Cedar Point and Riverview were opened around the same time, give or take about 15 years. They could have gone coaster to coaster with each other now.

by **Viper 88** on October 14th, 2009, 6:59 pm

The Park isn't run down but it just needs some indepth care and restoration like painting the Carousel and Rapainting and restoration of some of the buildings. But as far as actually going under it is the only park really in Illinois. U can go to indiana Beach a 3 hour plus drive in good traffic or 6+ down to holiday world or go 3 hours north to Wisconsin Dells but come on who is actually going to do that and have to shell out even more for gas and even more for tickets? BTW the Amusement park in the mall was called Old Chicago.

Website · by **Jerrykoala2112** on October 14th, 2009, 7:49 pm

I just wish that the park followed the themed areas. Buccaneer Battle was a great addition, but it doesn't fit in with the area. Southwest Territory seem to be the only "well themed" area. Well, it follows the theme. I guess Yukon Territory does too, with Loggers Run and the Moose Lodge, Camp Cartoon could have been plopped anywhere.

by **w00dland** on October 15th, 2009, 2:22 am

^Agreed. Whenever you visit a really well themed park that immerses you into different areas you can always tell how the themed areas are very cohesive. GAm was like that when it opened, but by corporate just creating about 5 Medusa's and plopping them into parks it never fits with the area.

Basically its why I'm willing to drive 10 hours to get to Busch Garden's Williamsburg, and wouldn't drive more than 2 to get to SFGAm.

by **david** on October 16th, 2009, 1:09 pm

Now, I ask you to be nice to Buccacrap Battle. The area really isn't "themed" Soon it could become a pirate area? But just give it a rest, Shapiro has admitted that due to previous management, many parks theming has been lacking.

Website · by **Jerrykoala2112** on October 17th, 2009, 11:28 am

Well, if that is his excuse, how will he explain Dark Knight and Buccaneer Battle? Those don't seem to fit the area, but they aren't bad additions. I think Shapiro is also being a little to, ummm, he blames the previous management to much. Premier made South West Territory, it is very well done! All they need to do is put some water on Ricer Rocker. Every other area seems generic.

Maybe instead of getting a 10 million dollar coaster, re-theme rides and all that. Those new rehabs will be much more worth then a coaster.

Why Great America won't go under.

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