Local Attractions Profit in Amusement

In addition to supporting family togetherness, Cronin likes to support worthy causes. Octagon Animal Showcase, a public expression of Cronin’s personal behind-the-scenes assists to Southwest Florida’s Octagon Wildlife Sanctuary, now occupies 12 acres at The Shell Factory. Contributions and attraction receipts support animal care and feeding both here and at the original 30-acre rural sanctuary. Additional income is slated to establish a full-fledged exotic animal hospital and recovery center.

Strengthening of community interaction with Octagon is apparent as total visitor tallies have climbed from 30,000 to 150,000 with relocation of selected animal exhibits to the second site. “What we want to do is integrate animals and plants, and involve the community in caring for the habitats,” notes Cronin. This year Octagon Animal Showcase will open a Serpentarium and Rain Forest at The Shell Factory. Plans to tour educational exhibits will reach even greater numbers of adults and school children.

As an entrepreneur and landlord of 17 restaurants over the years, Cronin knows that one must continually offer things that are new and different to keep people coming back. “Some of it is silly stuff,” he admits, “but it’s working.” He learns what people want, and gives it to them.

This year The Shell Factory’s staff of 140 expects to complete 29 upgrades and additions and welcome 800,000 to 900,000 guests. In season, an estimated 50 percent derive from the local region. In summer, that rises to a satisfying 70 percent. With an onsite coupon book, visitors can treat themselves to a $43 value for just $20. Cronin speculates that rising gas prices may encourage regional tourism.

Though The Shell Factory built its market using $50 billboards, today’s roadside placard fees are out of reach. Television and radio ads now support wide distribution of tourist brochures. Visibility, renovations and fun ideas move forward as grants, donations, fund raising events, and operating revenues progress.

“We’re impatient to get things done,” says Cronin. “I’m also ecstatic that building this will never end.”

Sun Splash Family Waterpark

Cape Coral’s Sun Splash Family Waterpark has become a national role model for municipalities that want to stop subsidizing community facilities in favor of strategies that turn profits. Since its third year of operation, Sun Splash has contributed an average $100,000 a year to city revenues. This community-owned water park adheres to its mission of serving residents, attracting tourists, reinvesting capital, and maintaining affordable prices. Now in its 10th season of welcoming new and returning visitors, it’s a work in progress that’s working like a charm.

Cape Coral Recreation Superintendent Jean Wood does what few, if any, corporate presidents do. Each week finds her laboring incognito onsite at several city recreation facilities under her care. Her most recent role at Sun Splash Family Water Park is attending to guests climbing up the towering new 5-story, 457-foot Giant Electric Slide, the first of a pair that more than doubles a typical trip into the catch pool.

“I’m there to hear what people have to say,” says Wood. “Unsolicited opinions, positive and negative, are better when people don’t know who I am.” She has discovered, for instance, that adults love the Electric Slide as much as teens. Overheard comments prove as helpful as marketing surveys. Working alongside staff, experiencing their jobs during regular hours and at special events, also helps this unconventional manager understand employee needs and sparks a “150 percent effort.”

Fourteen years ago, Wood sold the city on the feasibility of a financially and socially profitable city aquatic facility that would “grow up into a water park.” Most water parks are simple tourist attractions. As Cape Coral saw it, however, only a well-rounded community facility steeped in both instruction and recreation would do. Too, its comprehensive plan specifies that “the city’s recreational resources must parallel population growth,” according to water park Manager Mike Fischer.

So along with sheer fun-in-the-sun came swimming lessons for all ages, scuba classes and water aerobics. Summer lifeguard camps annually produce 110 certified lifeguards, who often hire on as Sun Splash staff. One-week Splash-Ca-Teer preteen job training introduces young people to a variety of Recreation Department opportunities.

Costs mount when you maintain a payroll of 8 full-time managers and 162 part-time employees working programs seven days and three nights a week. The water park’s 146 operating days run March through September. Sun Splash consumes millions of BTUs to keep one million gallons of water in three outdoor pool systems circulating at a constant 76 to 82 degrees regardless of ambient weather. (A treatment pool for arthritis comes online in 2001 at 90 degrees.) The advertising budget is a cool $100,000. Then there’s a public commitment to deliver a novel capital construction project every two years. So how does such a facility turn-in a consistently healthy profit?

By making the water park accessible to all. That’s accomplished by catering to every imaginable niche population, ranging from single parents and preschoolers to seniors and those with special needs. And charging everyone just $8 to $10 or less, selling season passes, and promoting group discounts.

More than 40 percent of the 1,300 people who pour into Sun Splash each summer day are Cape Coral citizens. In all, 70 percent hail from Florida, 25 percent from up north, and 5 percent from overseas countries. Attendance in 2001 has risen 10 percent over last year. A current 1,600-person capacity could reach 3,000 daily admissions at build-out.

Families, grandparents with grandkids, and teens love playful splashing that is both refreshing and responsibly supervised. Adults can relax and cruise the quarter-mile Main Stream River in tubes. They stroll the lily pad walk, revivify at a rain tree, and soon will gaze from gazebos connecting to a newly announced eco-boardwalk.

The more adventurous take a deep breath and plunge through the Cape Fear waterslide, Drop Slides, Zoom Flume, and Funnel-L-Tunnel. Or they can jump into a game of water volleyball. “Our ultimate dream is having a wave pool that generates ocean-size swells,” notes Fischer. Children are at home in interactive play areas, graduated wading pools, and a space dubbed Squirt Works.

“Lots of families can’t afford to take a vacation,” observes Wood. “Sun Splash is a great experience in their own backyard.” Wood’s own grandchildren, who travel and visit attractions around the world, can’t wait to return. “Sun Splash is their favorite,” she grins.

This 25-year veteran of Cape Coral’s Recreation Department has reason to smile. Sun Splash was conceived by her vision and continues as one of three profitable enterprise zones on the Cape. (Two others are a city golf course and yacht basin.)

Revenues flow into Sun Splash from more than water play. “Corporate sponsors play a big part in supporting our programs and capital improvements,” says Fischer. Pepsi Bottling Group, Lee County Electric Coop, Sprint, and Edy’s Ice Cream each contribute from $1,000 to $10,000 a year. The adjacent 1,000-foot-long Lake Kennedy eco-boardwalk, set 30-feet offshore to preserve vital wetlands edge for wildlife, will be made possible by a Lee County Visitors & Convention Bureau grant. Further appetite for supplementary income is quenched by the Calypso Café, Oasis Deli, and Ice Cream Shop. Current souvenir sales serve up memories of trips down the Electric Slide at the Sun Trader Gift Shop.

Direct marketing initiatives invite corporations, churches, reunions, hotels, city recreation departments, and youth sports organizations to come out and play at Sun Splash. Last year, group sales accounted for 40,000 of 194,320 visitors. General advertising and publicity draws Lee County residents through billboards, newsprint, and television. Regional radio and cablevision penetrate county borders to reach the rest of South Florida.

Sun Splash Family Waterpark comprises 12 acres of Cape Coral’s 32-acre Lake Kennedy Community Park. It too, annually grows and adds facilities in order to keep up with the city’s soaring population, which recently topped 100,000. A nature park and exercise trail, senior center, and special population center will be joined by a $5 million youth center. The latter will be paid for by grants and sponsorships and will open coincident with installation of the second giant slide. Fischer foresees a logical spillover between the youth center and water park.

“Always,” says Fischer, “our challenge is finding ways to continue to operate and improve without raising ticket prices.”

S. Alison Chabonais is a freelance business writer.