Six Flags Entertainment Corporation/NEW Q3 FY2024 Earnings Call

Thank you for your patience. My name is Krista, and I will be your conference operator today. I would like to welcome everyone to the Six Flags Entertainment Corporation Third Quarter 2024 Conference Call. Thank you. I will now turn the conference over to the Six Flags management team. Please proceed.

Thank you, Krista, and good morning, everyone. My name is Michael Russell, Corporate Director of Investor Relations for Six Flags. Welcome to today's call to review our 2024 third quarter financial results for Six Flags Entertainment Corporation. Earlier this morning, we distributed via wire service our earnings press release, a copy of which is also available under the News tab of our Investor Relations website at investors.sixflags.com. We have also posted a short slide presentation that you can access either on the webcast page for today's call or on our IR website presentation page. You'll find the slides provide additional information about Six Flags strategic road map and long-term metrics for measuring our progress, which we will cover on today's call. Before we begin, I need to remind you that comments made during this call will include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. These statements may involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from those described in such statements. For a more detailed discussion of these risks, you may refer to the company's filings with the SEC. In compliance with the SEC's Regulation FD, this webcast is being made available to the media and general public as well as analysts and investors, because the webcast is open to all constituents and prior notification has been widely and unselectively disseminated, all content on this call will be considered fully disclosed. On the call with me this morning are Six Flags Chief Executive Officer, Richard Zimmerman; and Chief Financial Officer, Brian Witherow. With that, I'll turn the call over to Brian.

Thank you, Michael. Good morning, and thanks to everyone for joining us today. I want to welcome you to our first earnings call that will cover the post-merger consolidated financial results for the new Six Flags Entertainment Corporation. I'll start my remarks by recapping results for the third quarter ended September 29, 2024, before providing some color around our performance over the last five weeks, including the impressive demand for our incredibly popular Halloween events. I'll wrap up with an update on long lead indicators, including the status of season pass sales to date before passing it over to Richard. On a consolidated basis, operating days in the third quarter of 2024 totaled 2,585 days compared with 1,091 operating days for the third quarter last year. Of the 1,494 incremental operating days, 1,591 days relate to operations during the third quarter at the legacy Six Flags Parks. Meanwhile, legacy Cedar Fair parks had 97 fewer operating days compared to the third quarter last year with 71 of those fewer operating days due to a fiscal calendar shift. The balance of the remaining decrease in operating days at the legacy Cedar Fair parks was the result of planned changes to park operating calendars as well as the impact of extreme weather and related operating disruptions. For the third quarter, we generated net revenues of $1.35 billion on attendance of 21 million visits. These third quarter results included $558 million of net revenues and 9.2 million in attendance from legacy Six Flags operations. Third quarter revenues from legacy Cedar Fair decreased by $52 million compared to the third quarter last year primarily due to 660,000 fewer visits during the current period, 460,000 of which were due to the fiscal calendar shift. The remaining 200,000 visit decrease in legacy Cedar Fair attendance was the result of the extreme weather and related operating disruptions during the period. As we noted on our last earnings call, extreme weather caused challenges in the beginning of the third quarter with Hurricane Beryl disrupting demand across multiple parks in early July. Later in the quarter, Hurricane Debby disrupted early August operations and then operations during the last week of September were again disrupted by Hurricane Helene. Excluding the three weeks that were directly impacted by the extreme weather events, attendance across the combined portfolio during the balance of the third quarter was slightly up over the same three-month period last year, supporting our belief that our consumers remain healthy and demand for our products remains strong. Looking at third quarter guest spending trends for a moment, out-of-park revenues for the quarter totaled $102 million, which included $21 million in revenues from legacy Six Flags operations. Out-of-park revenues from legacy Cedar Fair operations decreased by $5 million, the direct result of the fiscal calendar shift. Meanwhile, in-park for capital spending in the period was $61.27, representing a decrease of 2% compared to the in-park per cap reported by legacy Cedar Fair in the third quarter last year. Approximately half of the decline related to the impact of the merger with the other half attributable to a planned decrease in average season pass pricing and the higher mix of season pass visitation at the legacy Cedar Fair parks. The per capita headwinds of the legacy Cedar Fair parks were partially offset by improved guest spending on food and beverage, which was up 2% in the quarter, and higher spending on extra charge products, including merchandise, which was up 4% in the quarter. These positive trends underscore our guests' willingness to spend during their visits and are a tribute to our park teams who provide compelling products and high-quality guest service. Moving on to the cost front, operating costs and expenses in the third quarter totaled $894 million, which included $368 million of operating costs and expenses from legacy Six Flags operations. The third quarter costs were made up of $575 million of operating expenses, $209 million of SG&A expense and $110 million of cost of goods sold. Third quarter operating expenses included $245 million related to operations at Legacy Six Flags and an $18 million adjustment to self-insurance reserves at legacy Cedar Fair. These items were partially offset by a $10 million decrease in operating expenses at the legacy Cedar Fair parks related to the calendar shift. Excluding these factors, third quarter operating expenses at legacy Cedar Fair decreased by $11 million, the result of our plans this year to reduce stand-alone operating expenses as part of the first phase of our merger-related cost synergies. Meanwhile, third quarter SG&A expenses included $81 million from legacy Six Flags operations and $55 million of merger and integration-related costs. Excluding these items, SG&A expense at legacy Cedar Fair was up $9 million, primarily due to higher full-time wages, including bonus expense. The $110 million of cost of goods sold in the quarter included $42 million related to legacy Six Flags operations during the period. As a percentage of food, merchandise, and games revenue cost of goods sold in the quarter increased 30 basis points, 10 basis points of the increase related to the operations of the legacy Six Flags parks, with the remainder driven by an increase in food and beverage cost at the legacy Cedar Fair parks. As we previously noted, we remain laser-focused on driving operating efficiencies and improving margins. We are moving ahead with a sense of urgency to fully realize the $120 million of merger-related cost synergies on a run rate basis by the end of 2025. The cost-saving efforts we've initiated to date at both legacy Cedar Fair and Legacy Six Flags put us on pace to achieve our target of realizing $50 million in run-rate cost synergies by the end of 2024. Turning now to adjusted EBITDA, which management believes is a meaningful measure of park level operating results, adjusted EBITDA for the third quarter totaled $558 million, including $206 million of adjusted EBITDA from Legacy Six Flags operations. This was partially offset by a $21 million decrease resulting from the fiscal calendar shift at legacy Cedar Fair and a $15 million decrease due to the impact of the extreme weather on attendance and revenues during the quarter at the legacy Cedar Fair parks. Consistent with our commitment and long-term practice of providing transparency around operating results, let's turn our attention to results since the end of the third quarter, results that reflect the outstanding performance of our increasingly popular Halloween events which continue to deliver some of the biggest attendance days of the year. Over the past five weeks, we entertained 6.5 million guests across the combined portfolio, an increase of 20% or more than 1 million visits compared to the combined portfolio over the same five-week period last year. The strong momentum in demand across both legacy Cedar Fair and legacy Six Flags parks also translated into a meaningful increase in the sales of season passes and memberships. Over the five-week period, sales of 2025 season pass units were up 8%, with the average pass price up 3%. This brings the early sales of season pass units across the combined portfolio up 2% over the same time last year. Based on the solid season pass base and the strong performance of October, which historically represents approximately 60% of all fourth-quarter attendance, we believe we are on pace to achieve fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $205 million to $215 million, with actual results dependent on operating conditions and macro factors such as weather over the final two months of the year. Now turning to the company's balance sheet for a moment. Our balance sheet remains in solid condition. At the end of the third quarter, we had $90 million of cash and cash equivalents on hand and approximately $4.8 billion of gross debt. Of our debt outstanding, approximately 80% is fixed through long-term notes, and outside of $200 million in senior notes which mature in July of next year, we have no significant maturities before 2027. Liquidity as of September 29, 2024, totaled $743 million, including cash on hand and available capacity under our revolving credit facility, providing us with ample financial flexibility going forward. Deferred revenues on September 29, 2024, totaled $359 million compared with $208 million of deferred revenues on September 24, 2023. The $151 million increase includes $144 million of deferred revenues at the legacy Cedar Fair — Six Flags park, with the remaining increase reflecting the strong sales of advanced purchase products at the legacy Cedar Fair parks. Through the end of the third quarter of 2024, deferred revenues at legacy Cedar Fair were up $7 million or 3%. And for modeling purposes, during the quarter, we spent $110 million on capital expenditures. For the fourth quarter, we expect CapEx will be in the $100 million to $110 million range. Looking ahead, we expect to invest between $500 million and $525 million in capital expenditures in both 2025 and 2026. These investments represent a level of CapEx spending necessary to accelerate the integration process and begin to activate the growth potential of the combined portfolio. The investments will be primarily focused on projects aimed at increasing demand and driving higher levels of guest spending, but will also include addressing any deferred infrastructure needs across the portfolio. While we are still finalizing capital programs beyond 2026, we are targeting annual CapEx spending to be in the range of approximately 12% to 13% of net revenues over the long term. Lastly, from a cash flow perspective, in 2025, we are projecting annualized cash interest payments of $305 million to $315 million and annualized cash taxes of $130 million to $140 million. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Richard.

Thanks, Brian, and thanks again to everyone for joining us today. Today, I'll briefly reflect on our third quarter performance, share updates on our progress towards driving long-term value creation and discuss the key strategic initiatives that will position the new Six Flags for sustained profitable growth. I will also discuss our expectations for next season at a high level and our targets for assessing progress over the long-term. First, let me say that I'm excited to share with you the early progress we've made since the completion of our transformational merger on July 1. I couldn't be prouder of how our team has worked together with a sense of urgency to capture early wins while establishing a strong and stable foundation for delivering on the combined company's long-term potential. We have made significant progress on our integration process while ensuring all 42 parks maximize performance during the most important months of the year. And despite headwinds from the impact of three hurricanes, we delivered solid results. As Brian mentioned, excluding the three weeks most directly impacted by the hurricanes, third quarter attendance across the portfolio was slightly up over the same three-month period last year, and that momentum carried into October when demand for our Halloween events pushed year-over-year attendance up 20% over the past five weeks. In addition to the outstanding recent attendance trends, I am particularly pleased with the robust early demand we've seen for season passes, which is one of our best long lead indicators heading into next season. In addition to delivering a strong second half of the year, we've been focused on continuing to improve the guest experience at all our parks and build demand momentum that we can carry into 2025. As we shared with you on our last earnings call, one of the hallmarks of our long-term success is delivering unmatched entertainment and exceptional guest service. Based on decades of experience, we know guest satisfaction is vital to the sustainable long-term growth of the business. With that in mind, our team moved quickly to make recognizable improvements at the legacy Six Flags parks that have already proven to resonate with guests and have helped produce our highest guest satisfaction scores in the last four years. The early returns from our actions are clear: investing in the guest experience drives higher attendance and establishes a strong foundation for future growth. Our early progress reinforces our confidence that we are well positioned to continue to drive meaningful attendance growth heading into the 2025 season. I'm also happy to report that the integration process is progressing smoothly. Through Project Accelerate, our internal initiative to unlock the full potential of the new Six Flags, we're seeing the early positive results we anticipated. Swift action on our core objectives has put us in a position to deliver on the revenue upside and the cost synergies we know are available from the merger. As Brian noted earlier, we are on track to achieve $50 million of cost synergies by the end of this year, and we remain confident in our ability to deliver the full projected $120 million of cost synergies on a run rate basis by the end of 2025. With our work on capturing cost synergies well underway, we have turned our focus to pursuing what we consider to be the greatest opportunity to the merger: driving significant attendance growth in the combined new portfolio. In a demand-driven business, strength in attendance acts as the catalyst for improvements across all key performance indicators, including longer length of stay, greater pricing power, higher levels of guest spending, and ultimately, improved margins and higher free cash flow. Therefore, growing attendance is our highest priority, ensuring that parks stay comfortably crowded while still providing a quality experience to keep guests coming back year after year. Looking at the legacy Six Flags parks, the opportunities around attendance growth are compelling. Increase in attendance back to 2019 levels would represent a 48% increase over the 22 million guests the parks entertained in 2023, a goal that we believe is both achievable and appropriate, particularly when noting the relevant market penetration rates of the legacy Six Flags parks where roughly half those of the legacy Cedar Fair parks in 2023. With this upside potential as well as the strong momentum in season pass sales coming out of October, we believe we are well positioned to deliver attendance growth across the combined portfolio in 2025 that is ahead of our historical attendance growth rate of 1% to 2%. Our ability to successfully grow attendance and improve guest spending levels next year will be driven in large part by our compelling capital program. As we discussed last quarter, one of our guiding principles is strategically investing capital to drive growth. Consistent reinvestment in our parks and underlying infrastructure is essential for creating long-term value. We are executing a disciplined approach to capital allocation that balances our investment in marketable new attractions and expanded in-park offerings with infrastructure improvements that often go unnoticed but are extremely important to keeping our parks running efficiently. This ensures we maintain the integrity of our parks while broadening and enhancing the guest experience. As Brian mentioned, over the next two years we plan to invest $500 million to $525 million annually in capital expenditures across the portfolio. This will include investing approximately $325 million to $350 million each year on marketable new attractions and revenue centers and investing another $175 million each year on infrastructure improvements. Our marketable capital projects will be focused on the parks that generate the highest levels of potential cash flow, ensuring that our investments will drive the greatest possible returns. Before I conclude with a review of our long-term targets, I want to clarify a few points to ensure our investors understand our strategic approach moving forward. First, increase in attendance does not require and will not involve aggressive discounting. Based on our strategic approach to the business, we do not rely on price cuts to drive attendance. Our playbook focuses on delivering a high-quality experience that guests value and are willing to pay for, rather than dynamically pricing tickets based on demand, much like how hotels and airlines operate. Our business intelligence team's pricing strategy is time-tested and successful at setting consistent market expectations, building long-term trust with consumers and sustainably growing attendance and per capita spending together. We have taken the successful dynamic pricing tools and practices we've spent more than a decade building and expanded them across the combined portfolio. We fully expect these tools and our team's efforts to be equally effective moving forward just as they have been in the past. Second, we remain confident in the capital investments we have planned for the upcoming seasons and how those capital programs fit within our capital allocation priorities. As we previously noted, the legacy Six Flags parks are foundationally strong with solid infrastructure, which we believe can be enhanced without the need for outsized capital investments. Because of this, the majority of the investments we plan to make in the parks will be responsibly deployed towards high-return opportunities that are aimed at enhancing the guest experience and driving growth. Third, the cost synergies we outlined upon announcing the merger can be fully realized and retained. As we've already noted, we have a line of sight to deliver the entire $120 million of cost synergies on a run rate basis by the end of 2025, with $50 million expected to be achieved by the end of this year. Much of the remaining cost synergies come from eliminating redundant overhead costs, optimizing shared services, and rationalizing and leveraging our supplier base. As Brian noted, while we are prepared to reinvest operating costs back into our parks to help drive growth, we intend to find additional cost savings to offset such initiatives. Finally, we are laser-focused on managing near-term debt levels and reducing net leverage through growth in free cash flow. We are moving with a sense of urgency to put the necessary initiatives in motion to help us achieve our goals. In addition to driving organic growth in the business, we have also activated a comprehensive review of our portfolio, including excess and undeveloped land. This is an exercise that we have undertaken in the past and one that is focused on optimizing our asset base, narrowing our focus, and helping us accelerate our planned reduction in leverage. While we take the steps necessary to optimize near-term results, we are working tirelessly to unlock the full potential of the merger. Looking ahead, we've set ambitious but achievable targets that will help us measure our progress as we advance our strategic objectives. Ultimately, we are targeting annual unlevered pretax free cash flow of $800 million or more by 2027, which would imply an average growth rate of more than 10% over the next three years. This sustained level of growth can be achieved by increasing annual attendance to more than 55 million guests and expanding modified EBITDA margins to 35% or better. This level of free cash flow growth would, in turn, facilitate our ability to reduce net total leverage back inside 3.5x adjusted EBITDA by the end of 2027. We are planning to host an Analyst Day towards the end of the first quarter next year, at which time we will provide more specifics around the core strategies of our new long-term plan as well as more color around our outlook for growth in the business. Further details on our Analyst Day will be forthcoming. Before we open up the call for questions, I want to emphasize my confidence in the tremendous potential for long-term value creation at the new Six Flags. Our resilient business model, strong foundation and clear roadmap for success will drive sustained growth and profitability for the foreseeable future. By focusing on guest satisfaction, making disciplined capital investments, and emphasizing operating cost efficiencies, we are positioning Six Flags to thrive for the long term in any market environment. I'm extremely excited about our future. We have the right strategy, the right team, and the right assets to deliver exceptional experiences for our guests and strong returns for our shareholders. Thank you for your continued support, and I look forward to keeping you updated on our progress in the quarters ahead. That concludes our prepared remarks. Krista, please open the line for questions.

Your first question comes from the line of Steve Wieczynski with Stifel.

I hope you're all doing well. So Richard or Brian, if we think about the 55 million attendance it's called a target by 2027. Is there any way to help us think about how the cadence might look getting from the current run rate level out to '27? I'm assuming it's not going to be a straight line over the next three years given the heavy investments that are going to need to be made in certain legacy Six Flags parks in '25 and '26. But just wondering what kind of color you could give there beyond what Richard mentioned in his prepared remarks, about '25%. I think you said, Richard, being up above that 1% to 2% kind of historical growth range.

Yes, Steve, it's Brian. So yes, I'd start by emphasizing what Richard said in the prepared remarks, when we look at '25 and there's certainly some steps we're taking across the portfolio to position ourselves for longer-term growth, but we definitely believe there's upside in attendance next year beyond what historical growth rates for this industry for legacy Cedar or legacy Six would have shown that low single-digit growth rate. I think your point is a good one. The growth isn't often linear; that would be easy if it was. But it does tend to ramp up, and there is an inflection point, right, at some point. And as we look out, we're really excited about what we have put in motion for '25, but I think we're even more excited about the capital program and the set of initiatives for '26 and what we're working on beyond '26. As we said on the call, still some of those discussions in process. But I think there is that point where whether you call it the hockey stick or the Nike Swoosh inflection point, growth will ramp, '25 has got growth. But I think looking beyond it is where you start to see that inflection point kick in.

Yes, Steve, it's Richard. Let me jump in here. As I've said often, there's two things that really drive demand in our business and the improvements to underpin our resiliency. First, it's guest satisfaction. We're tracking along at four years high on both sides of the portfolio. So we're really pleased with that. And second, as Brian talked about, a really compelling capital program. Look, I think '25 is really strong. I'm really excited about the '26 program, which I think may be the best capital lineup I've seen in almost four decades. So I think we've got an ability to drive it, how the markets react and the particulars of any particular set of macro conditions like weather always have an influence. But I think we're taking the necessary steps to drive that demand.

That's great color, guys. And then second question, if we think about the $800 million of unlevered free cash flow at to 2027, if we do some math here and kind of back into some things, we're kind of getting you guys somewhere around, let's call it, about $1.28 billion to $1.3 billion of adjusted EBITDA. And if that math is right or directionally right, just wondering if you could help us think about maybe how you're thinking about the per caps, how those could kind of trend in the out years? And then does that target include any of your original revenue synergies? We heard about the expense synergies but didn't get any color around that, the original $80 million of revenue synergies.

Yes, Steve, it's Brian. On the revenue synergies, what was never really encompassed in that number, that $80 million number, was, as we said on the call, we think the real upside and full potential or realizing the full potential of this merger is, and that is the big opportunity to drive attendance growth, right? Over the next several years, much of the growth — the revenue growth that's going to come from the merger should be a step function in growth in attendance, which is often at odds with per caps, but it's critical to the long-term success of the business, right? So we remain confident in our ability to continue to grow per cap. But there's no doubt that the primary near-term focus is on driving revenue growth through attendance.

Obviously, if you look at sort of the performance of your stock since the merger closed, it seems like there's been somewhat of a shifting narrative. And in talking to investors, I think that narrative seems to be that you guys were surprised by, A, the lack of investments that had been made at the Six Flags parks. And then B, that the level of investment that would be required to sort of begin that turnaround was much greater than you originally anticipated. So maybe speak to those notions, what was surprising? What's been sort of part of your expectations set all along? And then maybe specifically, if you can speak to 2025, I mean, you've sort of laid out how to think about the cost synergies next year. You also made the point that ultimately, all that's going to fall through to the bottom line. I don't know if that's going to be the case next year. Are there incremental sort of OpEx investments that need to be made short term that we won't see offset next year, but maybe how to think about OpEx specifically, but sort of the margin profile in 2025?

Yes, James, thanks for the question. It's Richard. When I think about the state of the business, we keep talking about how resilient our business model is. Whether that's a legacy Six or legacy Cedar, there's a tremendous amount of appeal for our product. As you saw, 20% up in attendance in the month of October speaks both to the appeal of Halloween, but also how we tap into that appeal on a scale that few can match in each of our particular regions. So as I think about the questions we've gotten since the merger was consummated, a lot of them actually revolve less around the investments; some of it was around the investment, but a lot of it was around the health of the consumer. What we have said from the beginning is that on days where the weather is good, we were encouraged by the demand we were seeing. That was particularly true in October where the weather was outstanding. But also in the third quarter where we said we were up slightly, if you took out three weeks impacted greatly by hurricanes. Now weather is part of our business; we're an outdoor business. But we've got an incredibly resilient business model because of the demand that we can generate. The assets we have, that we put together, the strength of this combined company, we have what we need to be able to drive demand and continuously improve all of our parks. There are things we want to work out on the legacy Cedar side. There are things we want to work on, on the legacy Six side. But you'll hear us continue to speak to the broader strategic themes of, as I said in my prepared remarks, reinvesting capital that generates a return and that very specifically taps into consumers that are willing to spend. Our results prove that even though it's a bifurcated economy, the appeal of our product is there; our consumers are healthy. And when they come, they are spending, and they're coming in numbers that are high percentages based off last year. So I think the state of where I am as the combined portfolio, we have incredibly resilient, irreplaceable assets that allow us to continue to drive demand. Brian, on the margin front?

Yes, James. On the margin front, as we said in our prepared remarks, margin remains a key focus for us, and it has been going back to 2023 on the legacy Cedar side of things. As we've talked about, it's both being more efficient on the cost side, but it's also about driving attendance. So as we look to '25, certainly, leveraging our fixed cost base with higher attendance levels is critical. But it's also important that we remain focused on activating additional cost efficiencies to offset any pressure that may come from our decisions to layer in incremental costs at the parks, whether that be related to expanding the operating calendars or efforts to improve the guest experience. As an example, I would tell you, on the seasonal labor front, as we've gotten into operations over the second half of the year, we're finding both on the legacy Cedar and legacy Six side that it isn't always about adding hours but using the hours more efficiently. I think as we're taking our workforce management tools and applying them across a broader portfolio, the ability to take the same hours and use them more efficiently is going to be critical to driving that higher margin as we roll into 2025.

Got it, that's helpful. I wanted to follow up on Steve's question regarding the $800 million pretax unlevered free cash flow figure. Can you guide us on how this translates in both directions? To reach EBITDA, the key piece seems to be CapEx. It appears that the consensus is around $1.25 billion to $1.3 billion in adjusted EBITDA. I assume that aligns with the modified EBITDA as we consider the individual components. Any clarification on that would be appreciated.

Yes. Let me, I guess, start at a high level and just say we're not going to provide EBITDA guidance. But as you try and do the walk back, we've given where we believe the cash interest and the cash tax numbers are for 2025, certainly, we're not going to be satisfied with those levels and there are steps we're going to take to try and drive both of those things down over time. As you think about CapEx, as we said, $500 million to $525 million for the next couple of years. We said all along that we were going to try and activate the integration process and the opportunity to drive growth as fast as we could and then settle back into what we think is the longer-term CapEx trajectory, which is, as we said on the call, 12% to 13% of net revenues. So, depending on how you model it, you'll come up with your CapEx number. But what I would just underscore is $800 million or more of unlevered pretax free cash flow is what we're targeting in 2027. We're not going to be satisfied just stopping at $800 million, but there's a lot of work to be done between now and then.

I was hoping maybe you could talk a little bit about, I think one of the opportunities you mentioned in the past but haven't talked about quite as much recently, retail and arcade within the legacy Six Flags portfolio. Can you maybe put some borders around that in terms of the size of the opportunity and how you realize it?

Yes, Chris, I think I'd step back to a higher level. We think that, as I said earlier, there's a lot of opportunity once we get the guests to drive that demand and get them inside the gates. That opportunity, as you know, we have focused heavily on food and beverage, and we think there's a lot of runway there. We increasingly see the appeal as we keep our parks comfortably crowded as the premium experiences that we offer and continue to try and come up with new premium experiences that our guests value and tell us they value that they want us to roll out. In terms of in-park games and merchandise, we think there's equal opportunity. What we've seen is where we go in and reinvest and rehab and renovate and upgrade the facilities, we've seen a nice return on a facility-by-facility basis. So we're working through those plans right now. Again, we just closed the merger four months ago. But we do think there's incredible opportunity for merchandise and what we call games to play a role in the experience and also generate some nice revenue lifts over time, but it will take some capital investment for us to get there, but we've factored all that in. When we talk about investing in revenue centers, that's all of the things once you get inside the park.

Okay. I understand. The second question is related to your mention of asset sales possibly being part of your long-term value creation strategy. While I know you can't provide specifics, could you offer some guidance on what will influence those decisions? Also, can you share whether this is something that could occur in the next 12 to 18 months, or is it more of a long-term goal if the right opportunity arises?

Thanks, Chris. As I think about this portfolio optimization, we've done this in the past on the Cedar side, certainly sold two small water parks in 2012 and 2013. And we underwent a comprehensive review several years later that led to the sale of the land underneath our Santa Clara Park. I would say I wouldn't put a time frame around it as much as I think we're working closely with the Board, and we're looking internally at our capital structure and our capital allocation priorities. What we're trying to do — and I'll go back to what I said in the August call — every park in our portfolio has a role if it plays its role right. These are irreplaceable assets, but we also want to make sure that we're investing to drive growth across the combined portfolio. So I wouldn't put a time frame on it, but we're going to be very diligent and work methodically through what we think is possible and what would make sense as we think about our capital structure and capital allocation priorities.

Maybe just wanted to dig into the fourth quarter guidance, which you guys have not given quarterly guidance as I can remember in the past. So maybe your rationale for doing so, but then maybe give us some of the moving pieces, if you can, as it pertains to attendance or per cap assumptions in that EBITDA guidance range.

Yes, Mike, it's Brian. You're right. I mean, typically, one we've not — it's been a long time since we gave short-term annual guidance, let alone quarterly guidance. But I think kind of the heels of the merger just closing four months ago, there's a lot of noise in as you've seen in the earnings statement this morning, and you'll see in the 10-Q later, just based on the reporting requirements, it's sort of difficult to glean current quarter versus prior year because it's a combined NewCo Six Flags versus legacy Cedar. So just trying to provide a little bit of clarity and give the Street a little bit more visibility as to how we see the quarter developing given how strong October was, right? I mean, a 20% lift in attendance is, quite frankly, very impressive and something we're really proud of. That said, we want to make sure that we don't get out over our skis on what that might mean for the balance of the quarter. October is about 60% of the attendance; so as you look at rolling that forward for the balance of the year, what happens in November and December from a macro factor perspective, again, we're in the outdoor entertainment business; weather is always an issue, and it's a much more truncated portfolio that's in operation over the balance of the year. And so from a full quarter perspective, we're going to have less operating days in the fourth quarter than we did last year on a combined basis. A lot of that is because of some calendar shift again with Cedar — on the Cedar Fair side of things. We've added some days back on the legacy Six side of things. But net-net, we're confident that we're tracking towards that $205 million to $215 million range we gave, which I think is a nice way to finish off the year and continue to build momentum as we roll into 2025.

Okay. Great. And maybe help us with the $50 million in run rate savings. Did you generate any cost savings in the third quarter? I think you had mentioned something as it pertained to the legacy business in the quarter. But maybe you could give us a sense of how much of that's already been enacted maybe how much we can see in the fourth quarter, just the business is so seasonal. This isn't going to be linear. I know that, but any guidelines or parameters you can provide that would be great.

Yes. We noted in the call that when you strip out the noise of the extra week and some accounting noise around self-insurance reserves, again, looking just really at the core operating costs for the operating expenses for legacy Cedar were down approximately $11 million in the quarter. And again, that's been driven by the initiatives that we put in place. We talked about at the beginning of the year. Those stand-alone operating costs savings, the first phase of the synergies on both the legacy Cedar and legacy Six side that we were looking to activate here in 2024. Certainly, more of those stand-alone, we felt the opportunity was greater on the legacy Cedar side. And so that's where more of those savings have been generated. As we go into the fourth quarter, you're right, Mike, it's not linear because, as I just mentioned, you've got a lot less operations and a lot less opportunity to take out variable costs as we roll into November and December, than you certainly would have had back in the third quarter with July, August, September being a bigger month for cost. But it's also on the corporate side, right? We started to put into effect here in the last several weeks, over the last month or two, activating some of the other cost synergies, the duplicative overhead costs, leveraging some of the advantages of scale. We won't have a full year pocket of what those cost savings will mean to us by the end of the year, but we'll have on a run rate basis, got them moving. That's everything from third-party professional services and other such things that we've been operating with a sense of urgency to get those synergies mined as quickly as we can.

So maybe on the top line, could you elaborate just maybe a little bit more on the cadence of attendance trends in the third quarter relative to the drivers of the October magnitude? And just how much you see this tied to macro or weather relative to early execution wins?

Yes, Matt, it's Richard. I'll jump in here and then Brian can fill in. I think, we'll kind of walk you through when we looked at the third quarter, a lot of noise we just did the merger putting the park chains together. When you stripped out the noise around the three weeks that were impacted by hurricanes, Beryl in July, Debby in August, and then Helene in late September, we were up slightly in attendance. So we were seeing reaction as we went through and implemented some operational changes like the chaperone policy. We started to see the markets react as we thought we would. When you got to October, listen, last year, there was a little bit of weather on the East Coast. So we benefited from better weather on the East Coast — but we also, when we look at the two halves of the portfolio, the legacy Cedar side was up against a record. To be up what we were up in October says that both the strength of our business model, the resilience that I've spoken to, but also the appeal of the product and the value our consumers see it. So we're posting double-digit, high double-digit increases on what was a record year in part of our portfolio. So every year, we look at October, and we go, how’s Halloween going to get bigger? And every year, it does get bigger, in part because the second half of the year, we've always said this, 70% to 80% of our revenues and EBITDA get generated in the back half of the year. Part of it is the weather, quite frankly, has gotten better and very conducive. Part is the appeal of something like Halloween. And the last part is, as we keep growing season passes and building a higher season pass base year after year, whether that's at the standalone companies or the combined companies, we continue to have more passes that can be used in the back half of the year as we start selling the next year season passes. That higher level of our biggest program underlines the attendance foundation for the back half of the year. Brian, anything you want to add?

Yes. I would just underscore your point, Richard, on the impact of weather. Listen, we're in the outdoor entertainment business, as I said earlier. So it's not a question of if weather is going to have an impact, but rather when and where. And we're not going to use weather as an excuse. But I do think it's helpful, and we do this; we believe it's helpful, and we do this exercise as we're going through and evaluating our results. If we carve out, as Richard said, those weeks. And there's no doubt that July with Beryl and September with Helene were more impacted in the quarter than August. Debby was modestly impactful in the Southeast. When I look at — as you're trying to assess the health of the consumer, where demand sits, if I just take out the week or the one week in August that Debby did hit, attendance in August was up 4%, sans that one week. So again, it continues to underscore, as I think Richard just said, the consumer, our consumer is still healthy and willing to spend on experiences. And certainly, when weather conditions provide it, they're showing up.

Great. And then maybe a follow-up, Brian, just on the bottom line. How best to think about maybe linearity of the 35% EBITDA margin target by 2027? And relative to low 30s today, just incorporating the, I think you said the Nike Swoosh top line progression commentary?

Yes. So I think, Matt, when it comes to margin or any one of those key performance indicators, you're right, it isn't linear. So much of margin is driven by the attendance number. So I think it depends on how you model out the opportunity to drive attendance, right? As we get more efficient, and listen, we're not done; there's more work to be completed and more initiatives to be executed against, but we've made good strides on the operating efficiency side of things. As we get more and more efficient, that allows more of that attendance and revenue lift to follow the bottom line faster. So that remains a focus for us. But I think it really depends on how you model out the attendance lift since that's such a big driver for margin in this business.

Can we just go back to the October acceleration? Is there anything we need to be aware about concerning comparability? So not taking away from the 20% year-over-year. But just as we think about the progression from 3Q to October, so 3Q adjusted for weather per operating day on our numbers was up around 6%, and — year-over-year, which is obviously very healthy, but then October is up 20%. Were the operating base comparable in those periods? And then what's the latest thought for operating days in the full year? Is it still down around 112 days year-over-year for the full year?

Ben, it's Brian. So on your 112, you're looking just at the legacy Cedar side, correct?

That's correct. Yes.

Yes. Again, weather dependent over these last couple of months and what they might mean for the parks left with operations. So we're still in the hunt for that general trend line for operating days on the legacy Cedar side of things. In terms of the comparability, that number — that 20% lift north of 1 million visits is on an apples-to-apples basis as best as we can do. So that's comparing equivalent five weeks versus the equivalent five weeks the year before on a combined basis. So I'd say, again, what we saw in October, as Richard said, was continued momentum of what we saw on non-weather disrupted days in the third quarter but just juiced by the fact that you were at the time of the year that is probably the most popular time of the year for our guests with the events, whether it's Fright Fest at the legacy Six flags or Haunt or Halloween event at the legacy Cedar parks.

Yes, Ben, let me jump in here. I just want to say when we look at the plans coming into the year, we both — you put this company together midyear. I will say legacy — Selim and his team really made a huge investment in Fright Fest, putting in IP in terms of the mazes, really focusing on how to drive the October. So on both sides, what we saw in October was reasonably similar on both sides, just outstanding demand, but I think that comes from the planning that all of our ops teams do to get ready for handling bigger crowds. And what I'm most pleased with, and we say this all the time, it's counter to, we do our highest per caps on our biggest attendance days because of the scalability built into our model.

Got it. And just to clarify very quickly, I understand that it's a comparable trailing five weeks, but just — I know the operating days are moving around a lot. So you think the operating days in October this year are comparable to the prior year, just to be clear.

Sans some weather impact, I would say, generally, yes. I mean, we're looking to add days back, Ben, when it comes to the highest demand times of the year. So over the last couple of years, we have added days into October, and that's going to be an area that we continue to look closely at. As Richard likes to say, you fish where the fish are. Our guests have told us October, September — late September, October with the Halloween events is when they want to come when it's probably the level of urgency is the greatest. We'll continue to look to add days. But on a general — at the highest level, the operating days are generally comparable.

Thanks, Brian. I'll just echo that. We're excited about the performances we delivered with our Halloween events this year, and that’s reflected in our attendance numbers. We'll keep monitoring our operating days as we strive to meet demand effectively.

I was just hoping to reconcile some of the comments on operating days and in light of the comfortably crowded commentary. Brian, you were noting that some of the busier season periods you're looking to add operating days. But Richard, you were also noting that you were looking to extend the stay in certain days that were busier. How should we think about the portfolio-wide view of operating days on a run rate basis going forward?

Yes. I think, Paul, when it comes to operating days, there's always going to be puts and takes, right? Our operating teams in the field are always trying to figure out ways to be more efficient, and nothing is more efficient than taking some days out that might be lower value days and pushing that attendance, if you can, to other times of the year. I think we were very successful on that, this past year in the legacy Cedar properties, particularly the mid-tier parts where we made a lot of operating adjustments early in the season, a little bit in the fall, but it was probably more of a spring adjustment to the calendar, taking days out and sliding that attendance to other times of the year. We're going to continue to do that where it's most appropriate, but where demand is the greatest, and there's probably no time of year that's more focused than, as we said, in the fall, late September, October given most of the parks are open daily Memorial Day to Labor Day; there’s not much to be done there, and there's not a lot of reason to take days out there other than maybe adjusting late August, as school calendars continue to move around. But as you look at October, I'll give you a great example. You go back five or six years ago, and Cedar Point, one of our largest parks in the portfolio, was only open on the weekends for their Halloween event. We added Friday nights, not only drew a nice evening crowd, but put people in hotel rooms. We saw that demand grow, and as Haunt or the Howl weekend demand continued to grow, we added all-day Friday and then Thursday nights. We've not seen a spread out of the attendance but actually continuing to drive that attendance growth. So we will do that where it's most appropriate. That doesn't work across the entire portfolio at every park, but there are certainly some parks in the portfolio where it's going to make a lot of sense, and we'll give a lot of thought to it.

Just a quick follow-up on the mix of new attractions for the capital plan going forward. Legacy Cedar Fair has historically had a really robust festival and unique sort of holiday celebration slate. Is that — I guess, how should we think about how that might influence the mix of capital projects for legacy Six going forward as part of that capital plan that's been outlined?

Paul, good question. As we think about it really is the answer, as Brian always said, different park-by-park, region by region. As we look at how we intend to sequence the investment, what demos we're targeting, we're working through exactly how the events will work and where they will work and how they'll unfold. Clearly, Halloweens are best and our biggest example of an event. We do things like Boysenberry and other things. There's been some traction with Octoberfest in some of the Six Flags parks. We’re going to evaluate how to be most effective in our messaging and most effective at driving the demand. We just want to make sure we've got enough firepower in all four seasons to really put that demand underneath the season pass program and give people a reason to come out all four seasons, but it will be very different park by park.

Just wanted to double tap on that season pass momentum. Richard, you just mentioned the average price as pricing up 3% even with the unit growth. Can you just help us think about whether you're seeing the mix of tiers evolve as you kind of refine the product offering and what goes into the season passes? It seems like there's potentially more price taking on the higher-end prestige product. Any help on the mix shift and also just whether the all parks pass adoption has been helping at all?

It's Brian. In terms of the all pass adoption, I think we're early. I mean we're pleased with what we're seeing, but it's such a small sample size. I don't think we want to get too excited or too out of our skis on that just yet. There's still a lot to be done in terms of harmonizing the products from a benefits perspective, getting on the same ticketing system will be a big part of allowing us to take that next step, and that's the efforts that are underway right now as we plan for next year. Already, right, going on sale in '25 with '26 passes. That's the objective. In terms of the mix, we harmonize the programs takes maybe a first step in harmonizing the programs as best we can, not being on a singular ticketing system. We're watching how the guest purchasing patterns shifted around a little bit on that. I think what we're most pleased with, in addition to seeing the big jump in demand of units, which isn't surprising given what we've historically seen when attendance is up, season pass sales follow. October being what it was, it certainly was somewhat expected, but pleasantly so. But I think more so, we're really pleased with the fact that we're seeing average pricing up, right? 3%. We'll see how that plays out. Again, as you noted, that's often a function of mix. But as we start to get into the spring sales and having this momentum, it gives our business intelligence team more of a tailwind regarding the pricing side of things. So I think we're well positioned as we roll into calendar year 2025.

Just wanted to double tap on that season pass momentum. Richard, you just mentioned the average price as pricing up 3% even with the unit growth. Can you just help us think about whether you're seeing the mix of tiers evolve as you kind of refine the product offering and what goes into the season passes? It seems like there's potentially more price taking on the higher-end prestige product. Any help on the mix shift and also just whether the all parks pass adoption has been helping at all?

Yes, Thomas, it's Richard. Dallas and Atlanta, the original partnership part are tremendous markets. They're great assets in tremendous markets, tremendous franchises. We absolutely believe that there is a place in our portfolio and we'll work towards making sure that we exercise those at the appropriate time. But our — as we look at where there's opportunity, those Dallas Fast growing, Atlanta over $6 million, $7 million and growing, both those markets are extremely attractive. It's tough to find M&A. I think the partnership parks is built in M&A. But in terms of the specifics around modified margin, I'll throw that one over to Brian.

Yes. In terms of what we've assumed in the modeling, Thomas, is that the modified and adjusted would be the same from that perspective.

I just want to go back to the point on operating days. I think you said in the past that legacy Six Flags cut about 400 operating days versus 2019, you want to add back maybe half of those. Curious, a, is that still the case and b, the kind of cadence of that? Is that going to contribute to the kind of ramping of attendance growth over time and just which years might be added back?

Yes, Lizzie, it's Brian. That's correct. I mean if you look at where the operating days were trending compared to where they were pre-pandemic, the legacy Six assets they were down about 400. I don't know that we've reached a final conclusion yet on what the right number of days to add back. As I said just a little bit ago, there's always going to be puts and takes. I don't think every one of those days was a high-value day and they probably needed to be taken out of the system, similarly to what we did coming into 2024 at the legacy Cedar parks. We'll add days back responsibly. As I mentioned, we've constantly played around with the operating calendar based on what the markets and the consumers are telling us. But no decision has been made yet as to of those 400 days how many will ultimately, over the long term, get added back. But I can tell you, we're not going to try and boil the ocean. We'll dribble some days back into the system where it's most appropriate and where the risk is the least and we'll see what the returns are on that. If we like it, we may add more days; if we don't, we may pause or we may reverse course.

Thanks, Richard. Please feel free to contact our Investor Relations department at (419) 627-2233. Our next earnings call will be in February after the release of our 2024 full-year results. Krista, that concludes our call today. Thanks, everyone.

Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude today's conference call. Thank you for your participation, and you may now disconnect.