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What makes for a perfect day at a theme park?
- Katapult Team
- Jun 9
- 6 min read
Theme park influencer Bex Callinswood from Parkcast joined Insights Director Robbie Jones, to discuss the latest research we'd conducted. After scouring the opinions of global theme park visitors, we identified 10 key reasons why guests leave unhappy. Here is Bex's view on the shortlist.
You must be really excited from a fan perspective just how much is seeming to be cracking off in this country with new theme park developments?
Yeah, I think we're about to enter literally a new dawn of theme parks in the UK. I think the last huge year that we had was 1994, the year of the roller coaster, when we obviously had the big one open and Nemesis open and Shockwave at Drayton Manor. I know, and I remember it, which is making me feel very old. But it's crazy to think actually we haven't really had a huge year. This is just going to be the start because when Universal come over here, all everyone's going to do is try and step up. yeah, it's really exciting.
Despite the cost of living narrative on the news, it hasn't stopped people spending money on leisure and theme park visits. Why do you think that is?
Yeah, in some ways I think it's more, and we talked about that on my podcast a few weeks ago, it's almost that when things are a little bit depressing and news isn't great, you want that escapism, you want to be able to go somewhere for the day and just forget that all of this is going on around us and get fully immersed into this new happy place where everything's colourful and bright and things are great and you're having a great time with your friends or your family.
How does being a parent to a four-year-old change your experience at theme parks?
I need massive roller coasters and that's what's going to make the difference between me having a great day or not. But I have noticed my opinion shift having been to some smaller parks where they might have a big coaster or two, but it's not their whole driving force. And I've actually had an amazing day there and it's because you've got that big roller coaster, that big e-ticket, as we would have said, but you've got a mix of attractions. You've got stuff that my daughter can go on.
What's the best version of Parent Queue that you have experienced?
I've got two and they are very different, but they both worked for different reasons. So the firstly Phantasialand over in Germany, there it's the most simple system in the world. One parent queues at the end of the ride, they say to one of the ride staff, can I have a baby swap? They literally hand you a ticket, you hand that to your partner, they walk down the fast track and they get on. And it's as simple as that. There is nothing more that goes into it. At Universal, it's completely different. But what they do is they say, right, you queue together as a family. So you actually spend that time together. When you get to the front, there's a family room and the family room is air conditioned. It has a TV in it. It has sofas in it. It has a water fountain. It sometimes has a loo in it. And you leave your partner at that point, you go and ride. You go back to the room and your partner swaps and you sit in the family room and they go off and ride as well. So that worked really well for us when we went to Universal.
Why does ride availability annoy theme park guests?
Most theme park guests don't have an annual pass. This is a once a year, once a two, once a five year visit for them. And if a ride is down all day and they really wanted to get on it, of course they're going to leave disappointed. You know, they're not going to be able to just come back tomorrow. And I think obviously stuff goes wrong at theme parks all the time. You go on the app and you just see closed and that's the first you've heard of it. Nothing has told you beforehand that that ride isn't going to operate today. Yeah, super frustrating.
Why do a lack of public amenities concern guests, including a lack of benches, bins, shaded areas and accessible routes?
I have noticed most parks in the UK, can obviously take your own food into and often there is a lack of covered areas where you can sit and eat your own food. So, obviously that mentions shaded areas, for us, think it's like rainproof areas and you will often then find that because there isn't anywhere for people to go, they will go and take their own food into park cafes and things like that. And then they take up tables that actual paying guests for that cafe want to use. That is something that I think we could do with a bit more of a bit more, well, generally indoor areas in parks. But if that also included some sort of area where people could sit, whether it's sunny or rainy, then, yeah, that would definitely help things.
Why is theme park cleanliness so important?
I went to visit Toverland over there. And whenever I go to the Netherlands, it always strikes me as a very clean, very neat country. But you can just see it in the park. There is no litter anywhere. I saw countless gardeners just tending to flower beds and things like that. The paths were all perfect. There was no graffiti. And we talked earlier about perfect park experiences that actually genuinely did make us feel like we were in a nice, well cared for, well kept park.
What makes a theme park great value for money?
It is really hard because like I said, I actually don't think park admission alone in this country is very expensive. Like I said, you can get day at theme park for about 30 pounds and as going as an individual and taking your own lunch with you, it's a cheap day out if you choose to do nothing else. But how many people visit like that? So that 30 pounds times it by an average of four if you're going with a family becomes expensive. But, when we went over to Epic and it cost us £150 each to get into Epic Universe. Now, if you said that to someone in the UK and said it's going to cost you £150 to go to a theme park today, we're not doing that. But for us at the time and even now, we'd say that was worth it.
How much of an issue is excessive wait times for rides at theme parks?
I don't know what the answer is. I genuinely don't because I mean, apart from the answer that you've just given where they did the park example you've said have basically just charged people more to give them a better experience in the lower queue time. I like that way of thinking. But I think just in from a general point of view, a theme park in the summer, how are you ever going to get away from a long queue? I don't think you will because if they limit it too much, they're just not going to make the money that they need to see them through the rest of the year. I think that maybe the word here is excessive wait times and it's what does someone class as excessive. So no attraction in the world is worth a two hour wait time for me. It's just not. There is nothing that I would queue two hours for. So how can a park maybe make sure that a wait doesn't ever extend that long? I don't know. It's interesting.
Why has virtual queueing not hit the mark, in your opinion?
I don't know if it's the technology isn't there yet. I know Disney in Orlando used to have a very popular system where you can basically pre-book your line on three rides and that seemed to work pretty well. But every single person in the park is looking at their phone and they're refreshing the virtual queue page waiting for it to go blue and everyone is doing it no one's looking up no one's enjoying the park everyone is stood still at that point trying to get a virtual queue slot and when it does go live you might get into it and i got got into it quite a few times and you try and choose a slot, it boots you out and you try again and it boots you out and it boots you out and eventually it all just disappears and there you go, that's the 11 o'clock fun over and you then wait until three o'clock and you do it all again.
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