Wonderla and Imagicaa, India’s biggest amusement parks, are ramping up their portfolios with new properties, acquisitions and additional rides in their theme parks.
Imagicaa is spending Rs 770 crore on acquiring four properties, while Wonderla is investing as much as Rs 660 crore to launch a park in Bhubaneswar in the June quarter of FY25 – three months earlier than what the company expected – and a park in Chennai, which is estimated to open in FY26.
Wonderla runs three theme parks in Bengaluru, Kochi and Hyderabad and is in active discussions with the Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab governments to open parks in these states.
Wonderla expects about 600,000 footfalls with an average revenue per user (ARPU) of Rs 1,000 in the first year of operations of the Bhubaneswar park, according to managing director Arun Chittilappilly. Comparatively, the Bengaluru park attracts 1.2 million footfalls with an ARPU of Rs 1,300-1,400.
"Bhubaneswar is a tier-II city. For a smaller city, we are expecting only half the demand of what we will see in a bigger park. Also, ARPU will be only about 60 to 70 percent of what is recorded in a big city park," he said.
More theme parks
The cost of the Bhubaneswar park is Rs 160 crore to Rs 170 crore and for the Chennai property, Wonderla plans to invest about Rs 490 crore.
Rival Imagicaa will acquire four operational theme parks in Maharashtra and one water park in Indore, which is expected to be completed by the June quarter, for a total of Rs 770 crore. The four operational parks are located in Lonavala and Shirdi operating under the brands of Wet’n Joy and Sai Teerth.
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Imagicaaworld Entertainment, which operates the Imagicaa theme park, water park, snow park and hotel Novotel, expects to complete the acquisition in the next two months, it said on February 8.
Wonderla is also adding more rides and attractions to existing properties.
"In Kochi, we have added a new attraction and we will be adding more worth about Rs 15 crore. In Hyderabad, we have added some attractions for about Rs 20 crore, and we will be adding other attractions for another Rs 20 crore. So, roughly another Rs 20-25 crore of investment in Hyderabad and Bangalore, we can see an investment of roughly about Rs 40 crore because we are adding a couple of new attractions including some water slides. I am looking at all this (investments) for FY25," Chittilappilly said.
Pandemic pain
Wonderla surpassed pre-Covid business last year, said the MD.
"We are almost double of pre-Covid right now as revenues were roughly about Rs 260-280 crore. Last year, we did Rs 440 crore and this year we should grow," he said.
Wonderla’s profit fell 4 percent to Rs 37.36 crore in the first nine months of FY24 from a year earlier, while revenue increased 9 percent to Rs 1,236 crore.
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"Kochi had a bit of a Covid scare at the end of December, which is our peak season, resulting in a 6 percent drop in footfalls. Bengaluru had 10 percent growth in footfalls and Hyderabad had 5 percent. The drop in footfalls in Kochi affected the overall numbers," he said.
Amusement park operators had a bumpy ride during the Covid years with full shutdowns and partial reopening leading to losses. The Indian Association of Amusement Parks and Industries estimated a Rs 90,000 crore loss due to the pandemic in 2021.
Imagicaa was struggling with a Rs 1,600 crore debt burden and then the pandemic led to closure of amusement parks for almost two years. Last year, the Malpani Group acquired a majority stake and control of Imagicaaworld Entertainment through a debt resolution process.
Jai Malpani, managing director of Imagicaaworld Entertainment, said recently the company will accelerate expansion into new territories.
"We anticipate an increase in our footfall by more than 2x, revenue by more than 1.5x, EBITDA by more than 1.7x," he said.
The company reported a profit of Rs 4.3 crore in the December quarter, down 37.6 percent from a year ago.
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