Why did Wild West World fail?

[pstokely]

Besides its association with Terry Fox

[FoxNewsSucks]

1. Isn't that enough?

I don't care how great a theme park was, I would never go to any place that associates itself with a far-right lying piece of shit like Terry Fox. Or Joe Wright.

Aside from that, I'd agree with the LTTE I saw. No one really cares about the cowboy thing anymore. A modern theme would have been better for the park, and wouldn't have reinforced the "hick" image of Kansas.

[pstokely]

2. It sounds like a bad business plan also doomed the park

The cowboy thing seems to work at Silver Dollar City

[atommom]

3. Their press release blamed it largely on bad weather. But they also went WAY overbudget.

And they probably did overestimate the appeal of a cowboy theme park.

On May 1st 2007 we opened Wild West World to the media, just as we had promised, even though we did it in the rain. On May 5th the public was invited to Wild West World's Grand Opening just as promised…but again the rain would pour down. On Grand Opening Day the community wasn't in a theme park mood. The entire State was in shock as a result of the catastrophic Greensburg tornado the night before that wiped a nearby community literally off the map.

And as we all know the rain continued in May and June. Over the course of May, June and early July 2007, almost 50 days would experience rain, storms or overcast days. Independence Day, July 4th, ended in torrential rains. Flooding covered Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas throughout June and early July. We built the park as we said, but the weather and lack of cash flow have made it impossible for us to keep it open. It pains us to reach this point, but we have to close the park and find a buyer who can reopen and run it. We hate to do it, but we don't see any other alternative.

http://www.wildwestworld.net/Closed.htm

[TheLeftyMom]

4. Bad planning, bad budgeting and no real major attraction

It looks like a kids funtown from the highway and there is no major roller coaster or anything really for 'big kids' or adults. It was done half assed.

The guy that opened it? Let's just put it this way, around town there is a saying that you won't make any money if you work on a project with him. Everyone lost money from their ad agency to the kids that they hired to sweep the sidewalks.

I don't think Terry Fox has anything to do with it though! LOL

[Big Unit]

5. UNDER CAPITALIZED

I cannot imagine a large, new business like WWW - they had over 500 employess - which opens for business and then only survives for 2 months. Clearly, they were not financially prepared to make it past springtime in Kansas. Many new businesses fail in their first year, and the usual culprit is under capitalization. I'm not a business major, but I think that means that the new business is not adequately prepared to pay wages and overhead for at least the first year of doing business. The first months of operation of a new business is well known to be a time of meager cash flow. Bad business planning someone else said here, and that is clearly the case.

[beyurslf]

6. Who wants to go to a cowboy theme park? Ugh!

[greenbriar]

7. no major coaster

?