SeaWorld Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:SEAS) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Robert Aurand: All right. And then just as my follow-up. I wanted to ask about October per caps. You had said in the release, up low single digits. Can you give us any kind of color there, kind of breaking that between admissions versus in-park? And then kind of how you’re thinking about those buckets into 2024? I mean it sounds like you want to grow both those buckets, but maybe where you’d expect kind of more of the growth to come from?

Marc Swanson: Yes. So just a little bit of color on per caps in October. I mean, I think admissions and in-park were both positive for the month, and that gave you the total increase that we talked about in the — I think, in the low single digits, we said. So that’s hopefully helpful. And really, the way we think about it is kind of what I already said. But if you can grow your pricing a little bit each year on the admissions. You don’t have to grow per capita more a couple of percentage points, right, 2%, 3%, 4%. And if you can grow your attendance a little bit and manage your costs well, that can drive an increase in EBITDA that I’ve already talked about. So again, that’s how we think about it going forward. I think what else we add into that is some of the venue refreshes that we’re doing, some of the new additions in our parks, whether it’s getting things open that were under construction previously or new venues.

I was just down in Tampa a couple of weeks ago, Busch Gardens Tampa. And they just opened a refurbished pizza venue that’s really well done. And I think it’s new, and then the bathrooms adjacent to it are all redone. So it’s very nice. And I think those are the type of things that we’ll continue to do. And typically, when we do refreshed venues, we do see good returns, as we’ve talked about. That’s why we do them. So we’re going to continue to make the investments in those types of things, but then we’ll also look for kind of other opportunities to take pricing or get more penetration as well on a go-forward basis.

Operator: This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Marc Swanson, CEO, for any closing remarks.

Marc Swanson: Thank you, Chad. On behalf of Jim and the rest of the management team here at SeaWorld Entertainment, want to thank you for joining us this morning. As you heard today, we are confident in our long-term strategy, which we believe will drive improved operating and financial results and long-term value for stakeholders. So thank you, and we look forward to speaking with you next quarter.

Operator: And thank you, sir. The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.