Looping Group being acquired by PAI partners

[Dan_R]

Surprised this was never mentioned before, but PAI have been in talks since May, to acquire Looping's group.

History would tell us, that a private equity firm owning a theme park is never usually a great thing for the park itself. One of MANY negative examples would be the fall and huge decline of Alton Tower's in the mid 2000's. Where budgets were cut and the park quite literally turned into a cash grab, with overpriced things being sold to the customer at any and every opportunity. With massive and huge cuts to the operational, food, hotel and entertainment budgets. Alton Towers has only JUST started to recover from those days nearly 2 decades ago.

Now, the park will still have higher budgets than what it did under the Bryans, as they were literally skint. But a private equity firm owning a theme park is rarely a good thing imo, as usually their goal is to ruthlessly make a profit, putting that above all else.

Time will tell I guess, but I have never seen a single case in history of this being beneficial to the long term success of a theme park.

 

[alfie8]

Surprised this was never mentioned before, but PAI have been in talks since May, to acquire Looping's group.

History would tell us, that a private equity firm owning a theme park is never usually a great thing for the park itself. One of MANY negative examples would be the fall and huge decline of Alton Tower's in the mid 2000's. Where budgets were cut and the park quite literally turned into a cash grab, with overpriced things being sold to the customer at any and every opportunity. With massive and huge cuts to the operational, food, hotel and entertainment budgets. Alton Towers has only JUST started to recover from those days nearly 2 decades ago.

Now, the park will still have higher budgets than what it did under the Bryans, as they were literally skint. But a private equity firm owning a theme park is rarely a good thing imo, as usually their goal is to ruthlessly make a profit, putting that above all else.

Time will tell I guess, but I have never seen a single case in history of this being beneficial to the long term success of a theme park.

I hope this is not the case. Drayton are doing so well for themselves at the moment and for something like this to happen would be such a shame for the park.

 

[Dan_R]

They do list Looping Group on the PAI website under investments.

This does seem to indicate that they have indeed been acquired by them, seeing as the press release weeks before this posting stated they were in final talks.

I can see this either going really, really well, huge investments into the park, or really, really bad, as it cost cutting and money grabbing at every corner.

Both will net returns on investment, but one is more long term and sustainable, the other is not. It all depends on what PAI's strategy is, do they want short term profit? In which case, they will squeeze the lemon hard and dry, very fast. Rubbish, badly thought out additions just to boost the park value, with the intention of selling for a profit ASAP. Or are they in this for the long run? Where they will make quality, well thought out investments that are sustainable for the long run. This is totally unclear at this point, there is no indication of either.

 

[RustyShackleford]

Think there is a middle way. Sustainable investment in line with existing plans?

I think the other thing is that we mustnt consider DMR in isolation. There are other parks in the looping group.

Other thing about investment groups is that they may split groups up. Or they want to boost, add value and sell on.

I think anyone coming in with any money in the leisure market at the moment with pressing economic concerns has to be (cautiously) welcomed.

 

[Dan_R]

Think there is a middle way. Sustainable investment in line with existing plans?

I think the other thing is that we mustnt consider DMR in isolation. There are other parks in the looping group.

Other thing about investment groups is that they may split groups up. Or they want to boost, add value and sell on.

I think anyone coming in with any money in the leisure market at the moment with pressing economic concerns has to be (cautiously) welcomed.

This has happened before, with companies that have had multiple parks in their portfolio. The closest one to home was The Tussauds Group. All the soul was ripped out the parks, crap attractions were quickly added, to boost the on paper value, before they were sold.

I can see them being in this to get rich quick, that is usually what investment groups do. Get rich quick at the detriment to the parks, after all, why would they care, as long as they sell quickly and get their profit. The do not care how the park pans. Time will tell I guess.

 

[alfie8]

They do list Looping Group on the PAI website under investments.

For some reason it is listed under 'food and consumer'?

 

[Themeparksandy1981]

Sorry been a very busy weekend so only catching up with the news. The looping group is still in charge with PAI Partners buying the shares from Mubadala Capital and Bpifrance.

 

[Ollie]

Seems like it didn’t go too bad, with Frontier Falls being an amazing new area to the park and the incredible new coaster.

 

[alfie8]

Seems like it didn’t go too bad, with Frontier Falls being an amazing new area to the park and the incredible new coaster.

PAI became the reference shareholder of the Looping Group. This is a good thing because it gives looping more money from other sources that they can put back into their parks.