One-day admission will be $65 for adults, $55 for children ages 3-12. Annual passes will cost $99. Plus passes, which include parking and food and merchandise discounts, will cost $159 for adults and $129 for children. Note that the park is calling these "preview" prices.
Here's more detail about the new park, which held a hard-hat tour for the press today.
Tweet
The lifetime pass to the Legoland theme parks used to be $1,000, less than a decade ago. So that's been the fastest-rising recent admission price in the theme park business that I can recall.
Still, the $99 Legoland Florida annual pass price is aggressive, a strong attempt to lock in the Central Florida family market. If I my kids were still under age 10 and we lived in Central Florida, I know what they would be getting for their birthdays next summer.
Looked like an interesting question.
I first calculated the number of years for you to break even on a LegoLand pass using an average annual price increase of 5.7% and an inflation (discount) rate of 2.6%.
Based on this, you breakeven on the LegoLand pass on what would be your 13 annual pass.
If you then base Disney pricing their ticket based on the 13th annual pass renewal, the current value (price you would pay) of the pass is $7200.
Disney has a long history in Central Florida and can be more aggressive on pricing. If they calculate the annual pass on 17 annual passes, the current price would be about $10,000.
If Disney is even more agressive on pricing and who thinks they wouldn't be,you can have a lifetime of Disney for only about $14,999. (Breakeven for 22 annual passes)
Raw Data Sources
Expected Price LegoLand 1/1/11 is $159. Since it is a discounted rate as the park is not yet open, we will treat the same as an annual pass renewal.
Expected Price for a Disney annual pass renewal on 1/1/11 is $459
Disney price for a basic annual pass renewal has increased on average about 5.7% from 1991-2009. They are the effective price leader for the market. I used this site for the raw data. http://allears.net/tix/tickethistory.htm
Inflation has averaged about 2.6% annually since 1991. I used this for the discount rate.
That said, the dirty secret of travel journalism is that many people who cover theme parks get their travel to them paid for by the parks. (FWIW, Theme Park Insider is not one of them - I never accept travel expenses from theme parks, such as airfare and hotel. And if I'm not covering an official press event, I always pay my own way into the parks.) If Disney's picking up the tab to fly planeloads of reporters and bloggers to Central Florida, Legoland can throw its press event at the same time and get coverage without having to pay to bring anyone in.
Brilliant.
All this, of course, assumes that Legoland does its opening at the beginning of the month, close to the Disney anniversary. If it waits until later in the month, it will get close to no out-of-town coverage, since few publications will send their correspondents to Central Florida twice in the same month.
How much does Six Flags charge for annual passes? Legos should be cheaper.
Dear econ math wizzards,
in regard to the lifetime pass, its a sucky deal obviously, since no one would buy an annual pass that often. But lets asume for a second a mythical person knows for certain he/she would actually do so, since economists love to asume problems away.
In that case the annual card is still a horrible deal due to substancial bankcrupcy risk. Merlin is owned by a Blackstone PE fund, thus leveraged like crazy.
Sure, Legoland targets a narrow age range, but if your children are within that range, they'll have the chance to visit a theme park tailored just to them. My kids preferred Legoland to Disneyland when they were between 5 and 8. Guess what? There's always a supply of elementary-aged kids to keep Legoland parks filled.
I've always thought the lifetime pass a bit of a gimmick, but there are life-long Lego fans out there who care less for the attractions in the park and more for the engineering and artistry of Lego construction. The lifetime pass used to include one session a year with a Lego master builder (haven't checked to see if it still does), which I suspect was as much a draw for whoever would buy that pass as anything else. Still, I've not seen any numbers on how many Ambassadorships Legoland actually sells.
Finally, there's zilch chance of Legoland closing due to Blackstone's finances. Given the political climate in America, Blackstone clearly qualifies as a "too big to fail" institution. (I'm not saying that I agree with businesses being too big to fail, but it should be clear by now that both Republicans and Democrats are playing that way.) Legoland's doing fine as an individual unit, too, and would draw investment interest if Merlin or Blackstone ever wanted to divest it.
PS> Y'all should register with the site, its easy and makes it more personal
I will probably never bring the fambly to Legoland, as the kids are a bit older now and unlike me they never really took to lego when they were little. But a Madurodam type attraction, if it was well done and well priced I would definitely bring them to see.
I have no idea if Blackstone will go broke some day, but don't minor Florida attractions have a history of disappearing? Think of Splendid China (another scale model town) and of course Cypress Gardens.
This article has been archived and is no longer accepting comments.
If its $2500 for Legoland I wonder what SeaWorld, Uni, and WDW would be?
Someone with far more free time than me could calculate (today's price) x (normal price increases) x (typical lifespan) x (time value of money) to figure out the equilibrium price versus what we think they'd actually charge.