- Feb 15, 2012
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Because the event changes every year and the queues are built every evening. “They stop giving up after opening weekend” is a straight up lie.
Halloween Horror Nights 32 (UOR) - Speculation & Rumors
- Thread starter Brian G.
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Because the event changes every year and the queues are built every evening. “They stop giving up after opening weekend” is a straight up lie.
- Feb 7, 2014
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The FIRST time I saw individual express utilized was at Busch Gardens Williamsburg in 2017. They had a strict limit on ALL express passes and from my understanding, they sold less individual express passes vs the combo express. When I went there was one house I wanted to see which opened later in the evening. By the time I got over to that area of the park the lines were insane. When I went to buy a pass for the one house I wanted to see, they were completely sold out.
It’s an interesting concept, but it has to be managed well and for a heavy hitter like Stranger Things, you definitely would have to limit the individual sales.
How drastic does the event really change year to year from an operations standpoint? The same queues are utilized each year with the exception of maybe a new location. They already have years of data on how many people they can put through a house in an hour, you would think they would figure out the best approach by now. They should have implemented a new Express system years ago based on reserved time slots to flatten Express utilization throughout the event and prevent a crush of express users.
Yes, I'll show up every year to the event, and spend boatloads on frequent fear, merch, etc., but I don't think it's unfair to criticize some of their downfalls... especially when it happens every single year.
Well because the houses/layouts are different, which means the staff is different - both inside and out - so that means scares are different. Etc. etc; and they only have one night to stress test each one. That’s why you usually hear everyone sing different tunes every year by event’s end in comparison to opening weekend.
I don't have much insight into how Universal staffs its operations employees at events like horror nights, but at Disneyland/California Adventure it was rare for there to be veteran guest control employees. Once you'd been with the park long enough, you were more valuable as a ride operator than as a glow-stick waver ... and herding guests all night isn't exactly anyone's idea of a good time.
my point being that while Universal likely has a playbook on how operations should function, my guess is there's not much institutional knowledge or experience among employees on the ground. as such, it wouldn't surprise me if they're essentially breaking in new employees every year, which, to Brian's point, is why things go so much more smoothly by the time the event is nearly over.
my point being that while Universal likely has a playbook on how operations should function, my guess is there's not much institutional knowledge or experience among employees on the ground. as such, it wouldn't surprise me if they're essentially breaking in new employees every year, which, to Brian's point, is why things go so much more smoothly by the time the event is nearly over.
- Feb 2, 2008
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It never ceases to amaze me how much of the infrastructure they have to take down and put back up each and every event night. You can’t really appreciate that until you do the Unmasking The Horror Tours and you see how different things look during the day.
- Aug 5, 2018
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I really can't recommend these tours enough
None of my comments about HHN are directed at TMs, they have always been directed at management. There should be a pretty decent standard operating procedure no matter how much experience a TM has.
Disney relies on the college program to run most of its in-park operations, that's a lot of new CMs being trained every few months... and yet their ops remain smooth and consistent. Universal has a horrible onboarding practice and a history of just throwing TMs out there without much training unfortunately.
- Feb 15, 2012
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If it was that easy they’d have it down pat but it’s not. Now you can continue to listen to people with insight or you and Casper the Troll can reduce the event to a bunch of ATM lines and have everyone laugh at you.
Like, they place miles of queue DAILY, any changes can throw Express waits on a ton.
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I am hoping for a great façade for this one. Hoping it starts of at Notre Dame with the Hunchback. Façade would be gorgeous either way.
And they can only guess/predict what the average guest will do until average guests are there.
- Feb 15, 2012
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How many times do people complain about the flaps slowing people down. Not every house not every year!
It's great to see you avoid a healthy discussion and proceed directly to call me a troll.
I am fully aware of how the event operates and handles itself, I'll provide some positive changes over the last few years below, but there's still a lot of work to be done.
- Removing flashlights from in-house ops
- Increasing security throughout the event
- Actual action from zone supervisors to reduce external lighting from guests' devices
- Improvement of food quality
- Jun 15, 2023
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I mean it has been over a decade since Gothic, and each façade in the Universal Monsters series seems to be grander and grander, so here's to hoping!
- Apr 30, 2017
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To be fair, I think he’s calling me a troll. He’s a very angry fellow.
HHN is a tremendously complex event logistically. It is also arguably Universal’s most high-profile event and something they charge guests a lot of money to attend, especially if we factor in express, which seems fair to do in a discussion of how house lines are handled. Guests have a right to expect well-trained staff. The fact that the staff does improve so noticeably over the course of the event is a strong indication that the problem is, in fact, one of training and management.
I actually think Uni TMs often get an unfairly bad rap - in general, I’ve always found them at least as competent as Disney’s and, generally, a bit friendlier. The first few weeks of HHN stand out all the more because of this. It’s a training and management issue.
- Jul 24, 2018
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To be quite honest, in my experience I've liked Uni TMs more than Disney CMs.
I must be on an island, because I've never had to deal with these long Express waits that people are talking about. If they decided to roll out a test for individual Express passes, I could see them doing it like "these are only available or valid after 10 PM" or something along those lines.
- Dec 7, 2017
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OMG THIS IS THE KIND OF POST THATS GONNA CAUSE HOME DEPOT TO PULL OUT OF THE EVENT! AAAAAAAAAARGH!
- Mar 27, 2019
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I have had some crap experiences in Express.. and it's usually always at the same place - whatever house is in the parade building (the one where Legends Collide was last year). Something about that location - they simply seem to forget or don't understand how to move the express line along. However, I also understand the massive amounts of people they are trying to push through, and not every person working on balancing those lines is going to understand. It happens. It won't prevent me from buying express with my FFP because I don't think I could make it very long if I had to stand in regular lines for hours and hours. I'm too old for that sh*t.
I think the problem with Express comes because Uni knows what a cash cow it is, and they are simply greedy as most big corporations are. The proper way to do Express is charge your big fee to include it with FFP because those are guaranteed. Then, you have to do the math and figure out how many individual express passes realistically make sense for each night after considering how many were sold with FFP. It gets to a point where if you keep selling them, they lose value to the customer because it's not really "express" anymore... it;s more like purgatory instead of hell for the guests. Again, big corporation probably doesn't care that they piss people off because they know we will keep buying the passes to avoid the hell that is the regular lines. The solution would require the big corporation to do what is right for their customer instead of trying to gouge every penny. We know that won't happen.
I saw a comment above that there may be another annoucnement this week.. some think it's monsters and others ST. I saw someone say they think ST won't be announced until more towards end of July? That seems crazy to me. Why would you hold out on a HUGE IP like that until just shy of a month before opening night?
What are the odds we actually get something this week? I would think rather good odds since next week is a holiday week, and we don't normally get anything during a holiday week.
- Jul 24, 2018
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Yes, that line seems to be notorious for being the worst Express line. It just seems like the merge point for that one happens WAAAAY too early. But like you said, I'm willing to put up with it.
My first 3 years going to the event - 26/27/28, we didn't have Express. I can't go back to that.
- Mar 16, 2022
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So you can end the announcements with a bang and pair it with the release of the multi night tickets. Just like they did with Weeknd last year.
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