We’re always looking to add days where there is demand. So we’re not shy about inserting a day, for instance, in youth groups. If we fill up a Thursday, we’ll open up on a Wednesday, and we’ll make sure that we capture the demand. But from a planning perspective, as we’re going through this year, we’re always building next year and we’re taking away the lessons from it. So by the time we get to early summer, we’ll look at our spring calendar and make sure that we get the operating plan for the spring next year. I wouldn’t see major changes. I think this profile seems to kind of work for us. We may add a weekend here or there, but from a profile, I think, we’re comfortable with where we’re at right now.
Chris Woronka: Okay, I appreciate that, Richard. And then next question is kind of open ended, I guess. But you and some of your peers have talked about a lot of revenue generation opportunities through the app with push offers and things like that. Is there any way to kind of size that up if not with a number, maybe a magnitude? I mean, how much do you think you’ve done versus how much more there is to go on kind of that instant revenue gratification?
Richard Zimmerman: So I’ll let Brian weigh in here in a second. But as we think about any of those types of programs, first, I would say we, like others, are firm believers in a loyalty program and making sure that we engage our customers within that digital footprint. I think that when you think about your most valuable customers, the seasoned passholder, we spend the most time with them. So we want to push that out. But when you look at a program, and I’ll take you back almost ten years, I think, we sold our first all-season dining in 2015 and followed others in the industry, Six Flags as well. We’ve seen penetration levels on that increase year after year. So clearly we’re in the very early innings. But what’s encouraging is once you build that customer behavior and they use the app and they start reacting to the push offers and all those types of things, that’s a program that no matter where you start, will continue to grow year-over-year. Brian?
Brian Witherow: Yes, Chris just adding to Richard’s comments, I would echo still in very early innings our view of the app as a component of our digital transformation efforts at the park are about – as we said in our prepared remarks, about enhancing efficiencies, eliminating pain points for the guests, which ultimately will over time translate into incremental revenue generation. I think from our perspective, the goal is always to try and push those per caps up in that 3% 4% range over the long term. If we can do that, that’s a healthy business model. This is just another tool in our tool belt for getting there as we look. For us you’ve heard us talk about it, it’s less about just going out and boldly taking pricing in the parks.
We don’t believe we have that kind of pricing power. It’s more about efficiencies and driving more transactions per guest and driving higher transaction values. And we think that the app, along with some of the other digital initiatives that we have in place, can help achieve that.
Chris Woronka: Okay, very helpful. Thanks, guys.
Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Lizzie Dove of Goldman Sachs, your line is open.
Lizzie Dove: Hi good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I know the decline in admissions per cap this quarter and last was mostly due to the California reset. And that’s obviously, as you mentioned, the majority of 1Q. But as that becomes a less important piece in our other parks open, can you help us kind of think about how to think about the pacing of admissions per cap for the rest of the year?
Brian Witherow: Yes. Lizzie, it’s Brian. So yes, I would reiterate, as you just noted that the first quarter numbers are so heavily skewed by Knott’s. As I mentioned earlier, represents close to three quarters of our operating days and honestly, probably closer to 85% of the attendance. So it’s having an outsized impact when you look at this truncated window. If I carve Knott’s out for a second and just look at albeit a small sample size, so I’ll caveat my comment that way. We’re seeing what we want to see out of the other parks that have started to kick off the per capita spending is solid. It’s in that 3% to 4% range and in line with – up 3% to 4% and in line with our expectations in the early going. Will there be pressure on admissions per cap over the balance of the year?
I think as long as we continue to see growth in some of those lower per cap channels like season pass, like group there is going to be pressure on admissions per cap. The ultimate answer to your question, though, Lizzie, will depend on the mix, where does the mix of each of those channels ultimately play out as well as where does the mix of the park performance play out. But as we’re seeing at Knott’s even aware the price adjustments we did make have had a impact on net park’s per cap. It’s had the intended result as we noted with the attendance lift and most importantly, the revenue lift. So in the early going through the first quarter, Knott’s – our revenues are up double digits, which is really what’s most important. Per cap is a key metric for us.
But at the end of the day, it’s about revenue. And so our focus is drive volume, drive revenue growth and the per cap is going to be a little bit of what washes out on the backside.
Lizzie Dove: That’s helpful. Thank you. And then I guess on the other in-park side of things, like the trends there kind of improved nicely this quarter. Any kind of read you can give on what you’re seeing from the consumer or changes to food and beverage spend or merchandise, fast pass, anything like that would be great just to kind of get a pulse check there.
Richard Zimmerman: Yes Lizzie, if I think about the month of April and what we’ve been seeing continued healthy increases in food and beverage leading the way, increased extra charge, premium offering, revenue and per cap as well, part of that. And we’re just getting to where we’ve opened now Cedar Point, with Top Thrill 2, we think the premium offerings there, most notably Fast Lane and – the holiday Fast Lane and the single-use Fast Lane will be a nice lift year-over-year. So we continue to see strength in the consumer spending once they get in the park as Brian said, part of that is we’ve built a lot of engines that will drive transaction capacity and we continue to listen to what the customers value and try and provide that and premium offerings sitting on top of a healthy attendance space seems to drive a really strong revenue growth, and that’s what we’re focused on.
Lizzie Dove: That’s great. Thanks so much.
Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Thomas Yeh of Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.
Thomas Yeh: Thanks so much. Richard, I wanted to follow-up on your comments about the healthy staffing levels and setting industry-leading wage rates. In light of some of the minimum wage increases that we’ve kind of seen in certain areas of your footprint, do you see the need to react to that? What does that kind of do to the broader wage market?
Richard Zimmerman: Well, we always – good question, Thomas – we always look at the scheduled increase of minimum wage to factor those into our plan. But as you saw last year where we managed down the seasonal wage rate in this year where we’ve managed to both take hours and manage the rate down. We think we’ve got a lot of tools to be able to continue to manage through that. So I think our workforce management team has done an incredible job working with our operators at the parks. And we are getting really a lot more efficient. And we are looking at making sure that while the rides are open and operating, the revenue centers are open, how we staff the park in general, that we’ll continue to take advantage of the regional differences in the labor markets, and it is very different market-by-market.
But we think that we have an ability to keep driving that rate slightly lower, while we have the hours we need to make sure we can service the higher levels of attendance that we’re seeing.
Thomas Yeh: I see, that’s helpful. And then just another one on the digital transformation opportunities, you laid out some pretty exciting initiatives. Is there may be a way to think about within the $210 million to $220 million CapEx guidance how much is maintenance and how much is growth? And how should we think about kind of ROI on the growth piece and how that kind of shapes out over time?
Brian Witherow: Yes, Thomas, it’s Brian. So, within those capital programs, ideally, we would usually like to see somewhere approaching 60% to 70% of that spend beyond what we would consider either marketable or ROI driving projects, projects that either drive attendance and urgency to visit like Top Thrill 2 or Iron Menace at Dorney Park or guest spending through investments in things like new mobile app, expanded or improved food and beverage offerings, et cetera. So the balance of spend then is really on more of your infrastructure type of projects, the things that are really important that people don’t often pay attention to until they’re not working, so things like a WiFi platform, things like the roadways and the parking lots, restrooms, et cetera.
In terms of returns, it will vary park by park, but it’s fair to say that the big attractions, the marquee rides, the Top Thrills, the Iron Menace, things of that caliber, have historically generated returns one-year cash-on-cash returns that are well north of 20%. Now that’s going to depend – there are a lot of macro factors that come into play, right, when you’re looking at that that’s the weather like for that season, are there broader economic headwinds or tailwinds, et cetera. But we’ve seen great success with those types of marquee attractions over the years, which is why we’re so excited about this year’s program. As we noted that it’s the first capital program that’s – what we would consider sort of the normal and complete capital program that wasn’t disrupted by the pandemic because they – those programs got disrupted by several years based on the cadence of getting those rides purchased and built.
And so we’re really excited about what we have in place for 2024.
Thomas Yeh: Great, thank you.
Brian Witherow: Thanks, Thomas
Operator: There are no further questions at this time. So I’ll hand back to Richard Zimmerman for closing comments.
Richard Zimmerman: I want to thank everybody for joining us and for your continued interest in Cedar Fair. We’re looking forward to doing an exciting year ahead, and we hope to see you with us every step of the way. We sincerely hope you can find some time this season you to visit our parks. So you can see firsthand what makes our brand of entertainment so special and so timeless. Michael?
Michael Russell: Thanks again, everybody. Please feel free to contact Investor Relations at (419) 627-2233. And our next scheduled call will be in early August after we release our second quarter results. Gavin that concludes today’s call. Thank you.
Operator: That does conclude today’s call. Thank you for participating. You may now all disconnect.
