Four Key Best Practices for Water Parks and Theme Parks

Experts Share Revenue, Operations, Guest Experience, and Staffing Lessons That Water Parks and Theme Parks Can Learn From Each Other

By Prasana William

Two pictures: one of boys on a mat slide and one of a roller coaster loop

Water parks and theme parks share a lot in common, but both can benefit by learning from their differences. During IAAPA Virtual Expo: Asia a panel of experts from both types of attractions shared these takeaways during the session “What Can Water Parks Learn from Theme Parks and Vice Versa.” Here are five areas where water parks and theme parks can learn from each other’s experiences:

Revenue Generation

What Water Parks Can Learn
Look for ways to spread revenue out over the year like theme parks do by lengthening the season. This could mean building out rental spaces or installing dry attractions to offer outside of peak season.
What Theme Parks Can Learn
Consider the ancillary revenue possibilities of VIP rest areas. Water parks prioritize space for rental cabanas—an area to take a break from the hustle and bustle of a theme park could generate additional revenue.

Queueing and Crowd Management

What Water Parks Can Learn
Look for opportunities to start queuing at ground level rather than on a tower to improve accessibility, similar to how theme parks designate accessible queues for guests.
What Theme Parks Can Learn
Think in terms of attractions with passive capacity. Water parks have wave pools or lazy rivers—these attractions have the ability to occupy large groups of guests, which in turn keeps the queue manageable at other rides.

Staff Training

What Water Parks Can Learn
Make staff a part of the park’s story. Theme parks use storytelling heavily and incorporate staff into the narrative—water parks can also bring staff into the theme.
What Theme Parks Can Learn
Lifeguards are required to undergo stringent and comprehensive training that is often facilitated by a third party, which also audits a water park’s operations. This formalized training by third party experts, and the audit, could help theme parks benchmark and ensure they’re meeting industry standards for ride safety.

Guest Experience

What Water Parks Can Learn
Ride vehicles and the ride path are often visible in theme parks, giving guests an idea of the experience they will have should they choose to ride. Slide walls make it difficult to replicate this at water parks, but where there is an opportunity, showing guests what they can expect on a water slide and the raft can help them decide whether the ride is the right fit for them.
What Theme Parks Can Learn
Wearable RFID has untethered water park guests from their physical wallets and reduced the barrier to retail transactions. In the current landscape, theme parks can consider the benefits of reducing card- and cash-based transactions using RFID bands as water parks do.

The speakers on this panel included Moderator Nate Jones (Cavu Designwerks), Noel Dempsey (Pico Play Pty Ltd), Brad Loxley (Sun World Holdings Vietnam), Chris Perry (Attractions Consultant), and Dawn Tong (WhiteWater).