Cedar Point (CP) Discussion Thread

[kenban]

Even if it was open the operations at the food locations I visited were terrible. I figured I would try Miss Keats Smokehouse, except they had ran out of every single meat, and it would be a 20 minutes wait for anything, how does a smokehouse run out of every single meat on a slow day? Not wanting to wait I figured try a new burger over at Round Up, and I will admit the food was actually pretty good when I finally received it. But it took 5 employees almost 10 minutes to make a burger and fries.

[CP Maverick]

Sounds like you were there while they were training people. Operations are usually slower so the new people can pay attention to each step.

 

At least, that's how it goes when we train new people at work.

[thrillrider]

I don't ever recall the park having this much of a staffing issue.

 

Several food locations were closed, and most that were closed were locations that accepted the dinning plan.

 

The water park is also being affected by staffing. Several closed attractions.

Several gift shops were closed, and some had limited hours. A walk down the frontier trail, and you will see 3/4 of all retail locations closed.

 

And can somebody please explain to me why the gift shop at the front gate closes at 10? We were leaving the park at 10:30, and it was closed. Several people were wanting to get something from the shop, but found the doors locked.There were still a lot of people in the park. I have never been to a park where they closed the gift shops at the front gate of the park that early. Lots of missed sales. Some locations like sweets and treats are not even opening. Kings islands shops are always open later than the park, so is Disney, ect.....

 

I know it's still early in the year, but there has also been a lot of rides that have been down due to mechanical issues as well.

 

Now....I "kind of" understand and it does not affect me as much as a person that is only able to visit once a year. I have a season pass and go to the park multiple times a year. Personally, I would be pissed if I spent a LOT of money to visit the park, only to find all these issues. I would expect the full cedarpoint experience. The staffing issues are not the paying guests fault. The least they could do is maybe offer a early season discount ticket with something like "excuse us while we stretch our wings" type of thing.

 

We have been to several different parks this year, and have not run into these issues at those parks.

 

With that being said, why do you think that staffing is such a big issue at cedarpoint this year? Is it just the area the park is in, and the pool of workers limited? Or is it just that teens just don't want to work summer jobs like they used to? Or perhaps it's the parks fault for not trying hard enough?

I just watched an interesting piece on why teens are not working summer jobs like they used to, and the effect it's having on summer based businesses. It's not just a cedarpoint problem, it's pretty much any buisness that relies on summer help. A few of the reasons they gave were that more teens are involved in sports that involve practice and games in the summer. Another reason was that more high school students are doing volunteer work to help there chances of getting into college. One business owner said that he used to have people knocking down his door wanting summer work. He is now struggling to keep his store running because he can't find workers.

 

Any thoughts on why this year is so bad? Is it just a lack of a work pool to choose from, or is it something else?

[RaceBoarder]

I don't ever recall the park having this much of a staffing issue.

 

Several food locations were closed, and most that were closed were locations that accepted the dinning plan.

 

The water park is also being affected by staffing. Several closed attractions.

Several gift shops were closed, and some had limited hours. A walk down the frontier trail, and you will see 3/4 of all retail locations closed.

 

And can somebody please explain to me why the gift shop at the front gate closes at 10? We were leaving the park at 10:30, and it was closed. Several people were wanting to get something from the shop, but found the doors locked.There were still a lot of people in the park. I have never been to a park where they closed the gift shops at the front gate of the park that early. Lots of missed sales. Some locations like sweets and treats are not even opening. Kings islands shops are always open later than the park, so is Disney, ect.....

 

I know it's still early in the year, but there has also been a lot of rides that have been down due to mechanical issues as well.

 

Now....I "kind of" understand and it does not affect me as much as a person that is only able to visit once a year. I have a season pass and go to the park multiple times a year. Personally, I would be pissed if I spent a LOT of money to visit the park, only to find all these issues. I would expect the full cedarpoint experience. The staffing issues are not the paying guests fault. The least they could do is maybe offer a early season discount ticket with something like "excuse us while we stretch our wings" type of thing.

 

We have been to several different parks this year, and have not run into these issues at those parks.

 

With that being said, why do you think that staffing is such a big issue at cedarpoint this year? Is it just the area the park is in, and the pool of workers limited? Or is it just that teens just don't want to work summer jobs like they used to? Or perhaps it's the parks fault for not trying hard enough?

I just watched an interesting piece on why teens are not working summer jobs like they used to, and the effect it's having on summer based businesses. It's not just a cedarpoint problem, it's pretty much any buisness that relies on summer help. A few of the reasons they gave were that more teens are involved in sports that involve practice and games in the summer. Another reason was that more high school students are doing volunteer work to help there chances of getting into college. One business owner said that he used to have people knocking down his door wanting summer work. He is now struggling to keep his store running because he can't find workers.

 

Any thoughts on why this year is so bad? Is it just a lack of a work pool to choose from, or is it something else?

It's a complex issue...

 

Wages are a big part of it. These jobs are low paying, seasonal work, so you eliminate a lot of folks with that right off the bat. Kids being involved in other stuff and not wanting to work is another part of it. Even college kids aren't filling the gap for summer work because they are taking formal internships, other volunteer type work, or something directly related to their degree to pad their resume.

 

It's a complex issue that goes beyond theme parks. I work for a big box outdoor retailer in the Chicago area and the number of applications we see is down as a whole. And the simple answer of "Pay More" is just putting a band aid on the problem.

[FeelTheFORCE]

^ Those reasons definitely make sense. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there now more than ever before, and having just a degree isn't good enough anymore. The market is so saturated with bachelors degrees now that kids need to have X amount of internships and experience under their belt also. There's also the technology aspect of things and the ability to make money from home. You see more and more kids doing app developing or web coding that pay a hell of a lot more than working at any grocery store or wherever. I don't blame these kids for doing that, rather than performing a manual labor-type job for 12+ hours a day. I just hope it doesn't have a detrimental effect on Cedar Point long term, and hopefully things will return to normal once schools let out. It's definitely been a strange start to the year.

[coasterlvr]

Ther is *another forum* where whenever the topic of Cedar Point running out of space comes up, someone links to a post from 1993 where the user is perplexed as to where the park could possibly find room for another big coaster.

 

Uhhhhh. Call me crazy, but I don't think there were online theme park forums in 1993...

 

 

Usenet has been around a long time. Which i still use to this day.

[Samuel]

Is Cedar Point still hiring large numbers of Europeans? I never dug into how that hiring deal worked, but Hershey & Cedar Point always seem to have a lot whole of European employees. I also noticed a lot of American college students working there last year, with their schools printed on their ID. think it also makes for a friendlier, more efficient park versus those parks that are stuck with sometimes-fickle personalities in the local talent pool.

[thrillrider]

I forgot about the over seas employees. I only noticed 1 so far this year. They used to have quite a presence in the park.

 

The workers with school names on the name tags are called ride prides. They come from several different colleges to raise money for their fraternities(sp). I'm not sure if they actually get paid, or if all the money goes to the fraternity. They are just temporary workers they use in the spring and fall that i have noticed.

[Philrad71]

While it sounds like most parks are hurting for staffing at food stations, stores, vending, etc...it's still early in the year and most high schools are not out yet.

 

CP has always depended on high school, college and foreign students for help. But given that a lot of the younger generation are lazy, self-entitled spoiled brats, I can see why they wouldn't want to work for peanuts at a theme park doling out sh%t food in a 100 degree small kitchen.

 

And if I were a foreigner seeing a lot of what our a-hole POTSA is tweeting about immigrants, walls and other BS, I would be reluctant to come over here and work. I'd be more than happy to stay in my country, work at the local park and laugh at the joke that this moron is making out of the USA.

[CP Maverick]

I don't ever recall the park having this much of a staffing issue.

 

With that being said, why do you think that staffing is such a big issue at cedarpoint this year? Is it just the area the park is in, and the pool of workers limited? Or is it just that teens just don't want to work summer jobs like they used to? Or perhaps it's the parks fault for not trying hard enough?

I just watched an interesting piece on why teens are not working summer jobs like they used to, and the effect it's having on summer based businesses. It's not just a cedarpoint problem, it's pretty much any buisness that relies on summer help. A few of the reasons they gave were that more teens are involved in sports that involve practice and games in the summer. Another reason was that more high school students are doing volunteer work to help there chances of getting into college. One business owner said that he used to have people knocking down his door wanting summer work. He is now struggling to keep his store running because he can't find workers.

 

Any thoughts on why this year is so bad? Is it just a lack of a work pool to choose from, or is it something else?

Short answer: Yes.

 

As someone who employees low-wage seasonal help, the applicants are:

 

1. Not very motivated to work 45%

2. Have priorities outside work 45%

3. "Fight for Fifteen" 10%

 

With that said, if you can hire more of #2 and be flexible with staffing, the effects of #1 and #3 are limited. With a semi-isolated location like Cedar Point, hiring "more" people who work "less" hours may not be very practical. When you literally have thousands of employees living on the property, you want them working so they aren't idle in the dorms, possibly causing damages. When you hire employees locally that do not need housing, you might get away with more flexible hours, but you are also competing with the market infrastructure that has developed because of your own business. Years ago, Rt 250 didn't have nearly the number of businesses it does now; and those businesses are definitely deterring locals from working at the park.

 

Now, I personally do everything I can to keep my employees happy without having to pay them more (which I need permission from the owners anyways.) So I offer them different incentives and am extremely flexible with the hours they work. We also offer them perks that they can use when they are not working, or to invite friends or family to join them.

 

If the different park operations divisions can work out the flexible scheduling, maybe they can offer things like: Free Admission for you and a guest. Half price on all food and drinks. Discounts on all shop items and Fast Lane. Maybe offer incentive prizes (gift cards, bonus hours, free food.) Etc. Would this work? I'm not sure. I would need more details into the hiring pool and staffing coverage required for minimum, normal, and maximum operations.

 

---

 

PS- Can we please keep the politics out of the discussion?

[Philrad71]

I don't ever recall the park having this much of a staffing issue.

 

With that being said, why do you think that staffing is such a big issue at cedarpoint this year? Is it just the area the park is in, and the pool of workers limited? Or is it just that teens just don't want to work summer jobs like they used to? Or perhaps it's the parks fault for not trying hard enough?

I just watched an interesting piece on why teens are not working summer jobs like they used to, and the effect it's having on summer based businesses. It's not just a cedarpoint problem, it's pretty much any buisness that relies on summer help. A few of the reasons they gave were that more teens are involved in sports that involve practice and games in the summer. Another reason was that more high school students are doing volunteer work to help there chances of getting into college. One business owner said that he used to have people knocking down his door wanting summer work. He is now struggling to keep his store running because he can't find workers.

 

Any thoughts on why this year is so bad? Is it just a lack of a work pool to choose from, or is it something else?

Short answer: Yes.

 

As someone who employees low-wage seasonal help, the applicants are:

 

1. Not very motivated to work 45%

2. Have priorities outside work 45%

3. "Fight for Fifteen" 10%

 

With that said, if you can hire more of #2 and be flexible with staffing, the effects of #1 and #3 are limited. With a semi-isolated location like Cedar Point, hiring "more" people who work "less" hours may not be very practical. When you literally have thousands of employees living on the property, you want them working so they aren't idle in the dorms, possibly causing damages. When you hire employees locally that do not need housing, you might get away with more flexible hours, but you are also competing with the market infrastructure that has developed because of your own business. Years ago, Rt 250 didn't have nearly the number of businesses it does now; and those businesses are definitely deterring locals from working at the park.

 

Now, I personally do everything I can to keep my employees happy without having to pay them more (which I need permission from the owners anyways.) So I offer them different incentives and am extremely flexible with the hours they work. We also offer them perks that they can use when they are not working, or to invite friends or family to join them.

 

If the different park operations divisions can work out the flexible scheduling, maybe they can offer things like: Free Admission for you and a guest. Half price on all food and drinks. Discounts on all shop items and Fast Lane. Maybe offer incentive prizes (gift cards, bonus hours, free food.) Etc. Would this work? I'm not sure. I would need more details into the hiring pool and staffing coverage required for minimum, normal, and maximum operations.

 

---

 

PS- Can we please keep the politics out of the discussion?

 

Yes, I will...but that bit of politics could potentially be a big reason as to why more foreign students are not coming to the US to work in theme parks. You certainly can't deny that and I consider that a valid point of discussion on the topic of park staffing.

[coasternut]

I was at the park for the past 4 days. Yes, there are very few foreign employees, which surprised me. They normally are excited to be here in the U.S., and have a great attitude. They have filled the "gap" early and at the end of the season. Operations were poor at best...

[Philrad71]

MARCEL...come back....CP needs you!!!!

[michaellynn4]

There's a pretty simple explanation for the decline in foreign workers. You can not want to talk politics all you want, but there has been a well-documented decrease in work and student visa applications in the last year and a half ever since the White House and Congress begun initiating steps to make acquiring the visas more difficult. Additionally, various tech companies are starting to rely on the H1-B work visa program more and more, which is the program parks would use to hire temporary foreign workers in the past. This, coupled with the overall decrease in approved visas across the board, and that helps explain why theme parks may be struggling with staffing issues. You can have whatever opinion you'd like on the current state of politics and the administration, but those are facts.

 

There are also some very interesting statistics on a variety of contributing factors to the decline of the "summer job", as it's not necessarily just an increase in laziness. From the article:

 

Why did American teens stop trying to get summer jobs? One typical answer is: They’re just kids, and kids are getting lazier.

 

One can rule out that hypothesis pretty quickly. The number of teens in the workforce has collapsed since 2000, as the graph below shows. But the share of NEETs—young people who are “Neither in Education, Employment, or Training”—has been extraordinarily steady. In fact, it has not budged more than 0.1 percentage point since the late 1990s. Just 7 percent of American teens are NEETs, which is lower than France and about the same as the mean of all advanced economies in the OECD. The supposed laziness of American teenagers is unchanging and, literally, average.

 

Short answer: more and more teenagers are focusing on their education, including an overall increase in college enrollment and an increase in students taking summer classes. As someone previously stated, the days of a bachelor's degree being enough to stand out in a job market are long gone (hell, I'm kicking myself for going straight to grad school and getting a generic MBA instead of waiting and choosing a more specific masters degree in my field to help my resume stand out more).

 

Are there lazy kids out there? Absolutely, but that’s no new thing - I worked with plenty of other teenagers growing up who had questionable work ethic. It’s important to avoid the rose-tinted glasses when discussing this subject. I myself am one of those middle-class adults who tends to wax nostalgic about my summer job experience and used to have pretty strong opinions on "making sure my kids grow up right, know the value of a dollar, understand the meaning of hard work, blah blah BS BS yadda yadda". However, facts and statistics don't lie, and, once my kids are old enough, I'll need to consider what the culture, education environment, and job markets are like in order to figure out what's really best for their future before I choose to “gift” them working papers on their 14th birthday like my mom did to me.

Edited October 25, 2019 by michaellynn4

[Philrad71]

^ Great post, Michael - very informative!

[coasterbill]

There are some great posts here. I’d also like to add that Sandusky (just the city of Sandusky, I’m not even talking about the surrounding towns) has an unemployment rate of about 6% which is about 1,500 or so people.

 

They could easily staff a major portion of the park with those people alone. People are quick to point to teens, but Americans in general think they’re too good for these jobs. There’s no law saying that you have to be a teenager to work at Cedar Point and I don’t see those unemployed adults busting down the doors at HR. I’d also bet money that a lot of those people spend their days talking about how teenagers are lazy and entitled.

 

I know the common talking point is that we should cut back on the visas because there are so many Americans out of work, but Cedar Point has enough open positions to hire basically every unemployed person in the city for the summer and um...

 

... crickets

[FeelTheFORCE]

^ It's funny you say that, because Adventureland in Iowa has an operating staff of primarily people that appear to be of the "retired" variety in their 50s and 60s. They were doing a great job hauling ass to check restraints and such also when I was there last summer. I agree that it doesn't need to be teenagers doing those jobs.

 

Also, very well said, Michael.

[Philrad71]

^^ Those are great points, Bill.

 

^ The same can be said for SDC and Dollywood when you mention older employees that really do a great job. I wonder what the salary is for a ride op or food vendor at these parks versus the CF and SF parks? I assume that they would make more, but wonder if anyone on here has any "inside info"?

[AndrewA86]

It looks like most of the jobs at CP pay less than $10 an hour. I’m in The Detroit area and I can’t go 10 yards without seeing a help wanted sign and there have been a lot of new businesses open at least by me since Jan 1. And they all pay at least $10 an hour. I don’t know if this is the same in Toledo, Cleveland, or anywhere in between, but maybe there is just too much competition in the job market and people are staying home to work.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Nrthwnd]

I think Internet At home-Jobs are increasing more and more every year or so.

That means, less and less people actually out in public, doing any job with actual people.

 

Robots as Ride Ops better be around the corner, pretty soon.

[CP Maverick]

There are some great posts here. I’d also like to add that Sandusky (just the city of Sandusky, I’m not even talking about the surrounding towns) has an unemployment rate of about 6% which is about 1,500 or so people.

 

They could easily staff a major portion of the park with those people alone. People are quick to point to teens, but Americans in general think they’re too good for these jobs. There’s no law saying that you have to be a teenager to work at Cedar Point and I don’t see those unemployed adults busting down the doors at HR. I’d also bet money that a lot of those people spend their days talking about how teenagers are lazy and entitled.

 

I know the common talking point is that we should cut back on the visas because there are so many Americans out of work, but Cedar Point has enough open positions to hire basically every unemployed person in the city for the summer and um...

 

... crickets

There is a percentage of those people who are getting unemployment benefits for not working. I get some need disability benefits, but there are many who could work a 20 hour week to help alleviate the park but the park doesn't seem to schedule 3-5 hour long shifts.

[thrillrider]

The park used to offer a $1 per hour bonus if workers completed the contracted summer schedule. From what I hear, they got rid of this perk.

 

Perhaps more incentives like this would help.

 

This year the park has loosened its grooming guidelines, and is now allowing facial hair and tattoos.

[DorneyKid14]

^ dorney allowed facial hair last year and tattoos this year, which is a huge plus.

 

 

In my opinion, people are probably finally realizing that working at an amusement park (not just cedar point) is awful because the parks work you to death, with small pay and little incentives.

 

In my 4 1/2 years at dorney, 3 1/2 as a supervisor my summer was working 6 days a week, 50-60, some times 70 hours a week. Getting paid around 9.00-9.50 as an area games supervisor is not ideal. I know dorneys employee turnover over the years was God awful because pay sucked and they worked you to death. Ride ops and dorney were usually the worst because ride ops were getting around 7-8 dollars.

 

I'd imagine this has some of the effect on why parks hurt for staffing.

[AmyUD06]

Call me an old man, but I've got to believe it's just this generation of youth being lazy and/or believing that they are "too good" for that kind of work.

 

Back in my day, I worked at Six Flags Great Adventure from 15-21 years old in 1998-2003 for $5.15-8.25 an hour and was thankful for the job.

[ytterbiumanalyst]

Ther is *another forum* where whenever the topic of Cedar Point running out of space comes up, someone links to a post from 1993 where the user is perplexed as to where the park could possibly find room for another big coaster.

 

Uhhhhh. Call me crazy, but I don't think there were online theme park forums in 1993...

 

 

Usenet has been around a long time. Which i still use to this day.

Yep, this. To the OP, there were Internet forums before there were websites. Let that rattle around in your brain a bit.

 

Call me an old man, but I've got to believe it's just this generation of youth being lazy and/or believing that they are "too good" for that kind of work.

 

Back in my day, I worked at Six Flags Great Adventure from 15-21 years old in 1998-2003 for $5.15-8.25 an hour and was thankful for the job.

This line of thinking is completely wrong. Labelling a generation as characterized by any one aspect has always been wrong. It was wrong when the baby boomers said our generation was lazy, it was wrong when their parents said they were lazy, and it's wrong for us to say it about the next generation too. And yeah, I also got a job at $5.15 in 1999 at age 15.

 

Saying "Millennials are like this" is exactly the same as saying "Geminis are like this" or "People born in the Year ofthe Rabbit are like this." It's just as useless and just as wrong.