Q2 2025 United Parks & Resorts Inc Earnings Call

Good morning and welcome to the United Parks & Resorts second quarter 2025 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode.

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I would now like to turn the conference over to Matthew Stroud of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to the United parks and Resorts second quarter earnings conference call. Today's call is being webcast and recorded.

Replay information from this call can be found in the press release and will be available on our website, following the call.

Joining me this morning are Marc Swanson, chief executive officer and Jim nikolich Chief Financial Officer and treasurer.

This morning, we will review our second quarter Financial results and then we will open the call for your questions.

Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that our comments today will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal Securities laws.

Risk factors may be updated from time to time and will be included in our filings with the SEC that are available on our website.

We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements,

In addition, on the call, we may reference non-GAAP financial measures and other financial metrics such as adjusted EVAa and free cash flow.

More information regarding our forward-looking statements and reconciliations of non-gaap measures to the most comparable. Gaap measure is included in our earnings release available on our website, and can also be found in our filings with the SEC.

Now, I would like to turn the call over to our chief executive officer Marc Swanson mark.

Thank you, Matthew. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us.

We are pleased to have grown attendance in the second quarter, despite experiencing amongst the worst, whether we have ever experienced in a second quarter.

Despite those headwinds, we saw an increase in international and group visitation compared to the prior year in the second quarter.

Additionally, we saw an increase in attendance at all of our Orlando Parks, including SeaWorld Orlando, aquatic Orlando and Discovery Cove.

Looking forward. We continue to be encouraged by the forward. Booking Trends, we are seeing in our group business and at our Discovery Cove property.

Both of which are up mid to high single digits for the remainder of the year.

Well, it's early. The 2026. Bookings are also showing very strong Trends in both areas as well.

We excited about the remaining lineup of events, as we wrap up the summer, including bands, brew and barbecue at SeaWorld Orlando.

Some are spectacular at SeaWorld, San Diego.

Red white and barbecue at SeaWorld San Antonio.

And Beerfest Brews and barbecue at both of which Garden stamp of a and Busch Gardens Williamsburg.

Over the next few weeks.

later in September, we'll start our popular Halloween events which will run through October

and be followed by our Christmas events in November and December.

These special events continue to grow in popularity and we expect this year's events to be among our biggest ever.

Early forward booking.

Ticket sales for our Hollis Scream events across our parks are running ahead of prior year.

I want to thank all of our ambassadors for their hard work and dedicated efforts to make these things happen.

I'm also happy to announce that our board has approved a new $500 million share repurchase program.

Stockholders.

We intend to file, preliminary proxy materials for a special meeting.

Of stockholders within the coming days and expect to have the vote within the next 30 days.

With our strong, balance sheet and significant, free cash, flow generation. We are excited to be able to take advantage of what we believe to be a very attractive opportunity to invest in the shares of our own company via a share repurchase and return Capital to our stockholders.

The board and the company strongly. Believe our Shares are materially undervalued.

As we have expressed in the past, we have significant confidence in our business, our prospects, and the value of our assets, and we believe any reasonable way. You look at it, we feel we are materially undervalued and that there's meaningful upside opportunity in our current share price.

Our balance sheet continues to be strong.

Our June 30th 2025, net total, leverage ratio is 3.0 times and we had approximately 883 million of total available liquidity, including approximately 194 million of cash, on the balance sheet.

As a reminder, we generate a majority of our cash flow in our Peak summer season stretching over the second and third quarters.

The strong balance sheet gives us the flexibility to continue to invest in and grow our business and to opportunistically allocate capital with the goal to maximize long-term value for shareholders.

On cost, we are a little disappointed and probably could have and should have done a better job of proactively managing some of our park labor and operating expenses in the face of poor weather that impacted demand.

We have tightened and improved our processes and added additional resources to help manage these areas better in the future.

There are other areas of the p&l that we have opportunities to manage better also,

In light of this, we are implementing an additional cost reduction plan that we expect will reduce up to 15 million dollars of cost in the second half of the year.

On Orlando there has been considerable interest from you. All on the opening of Universal's new epic universe theme park this year in Orlando and a potential impact on demand at our SeaWorld Park in Orlando.

As we and some of our other competitors have consistently communicated. We welcome investment in the Orlando market and we believe more high-quality investment is good for the overall market and good for our business.

As you know, over the past 50 years since we arrived in Orlando,

There has been significant investment in the market, which is driven more and more visitors and residents to this highly attractive Market.

Today, Orlando is the most visited city in America and amongst the top, most visited cities in the world.

We benefit substantially from the Strategic position in this market.

As you know, for competitive and other reasons we do not normally share individual Park performance information.

however, in the spirit of hopefully giving Clarity in some conclusion to this open question,

I will share with you all that as expected our attendance at R SeaWorld, Orlando park has been up.

In attendance, since Epoch opened on May 22nd.

It was up for the full second quarter and it was up. If you measured from the date Epoch opened through the end of the second quarter.

It continues to be up quarter today in the third quarter, through August 6th on a day-to-day basis.

And we expect attendance for the remainder of the year at this park to be up as well.

We hope this provides helpful context for you all.

We have great respect for our competitors. In Orlando, we welcome increased investment from them, and we are very happy to be a major operator in this market, benefiting from its growth and vibrancy

We hope we really don't have to discuss this topic again, and we do not plan to make it a normal practice to discuss individual Park performance information in the future.

I'd also like to take a minute to highlight our early forward insights into 2026. As I mentioned earlier, our early group booking transfer 2026 are up.

Our early Discovery, Cove property, booking transfer 2026 are up and our very early and recently launched at select Parks 2026 pastels are off.

We have another exciting lineup of new rides. Attractions events and activations. We are planning for 2026.

in addition to certain food and beverage retail and Technology improvements, which we look forward to implementing,

we are in the midst of 2026 planning right now and the team is working hard and putting a good plan in place for next year.

Moving on to some of our strategic initiatives.

On the sponsorship front, we have been actively working over the past several months. I'm very sponsorship opportunities that leverage our valuable assets and customer database.

As a reminder, we have over 21 million annual visitors across our Park portfolio and the average length of stay is over 6 hours.

We have secured agreements with a number of Partners. Our parks and continue to work through our pipeline of other potential opportunities.

We are projecting approximately up to mid-single-digit million dollars in sponsorship revenue for this year.

With an annual Outlook of approximately 20 million dollars in the coming years.

On our International opportunities, we are an active discussion with multiple potential partners and expect to have 2 signed mous by the end of the year.

More to share in the coming orders.

On the digital transformation front. We continue to make investments and build out our CRM capabilities and our mobile app.

Continue to believe that CRM will play a role in our long-term growth strategy, providing deeper insights and more meaningful connections with our guests as we continue to scale.

In regards to the mobile app, we continue to make progress on functionality. Adoption usage, and financial impact.

The app is being used by an increasing number of gas in our parks to improve their impact performance.

The app has now been downloaded by more than 15.6 million.

Oh yeah. Excuse me. The app has now been downloaded more than 15.6 million times up from 14.3 million at the end of q1.

Sale orders.

You're excited about the potential of the app and its ability to improve the impact guest experience.

Driving increases in revenue and decreases in cost.

On Hotel front. Our work and discussions. Continue with various potential Partners on a variety of structures. As we have discussed previously.

We continue to be excited about opportunities to monetize. A portion of our substantial and valuable unused, land Holdings and have hotels integrated into our properties.

On real estate more generally as we have discussed.

We own over 200 Acres of valuable, real estate and desirable locations, including approximately 400 Acres of undeveloped land, adjacent to our Parks, including significant developable land in Orlando.

We do not believe that the public markets have, or are appropriately, giving credit to these attractive and valuable 100%-owned real estate assets.

On IP Partnerships. We continue our discussions with various Partners to bring globally recognized, IP to our Parks via new rides, attractions, and our other exciting activations.

I'm excited about the significant Investments. We are making and the many initiatives we have underway across our business and we'll expect will improve guest experience.

Allow us to generate more revenue and make it more efficient.

And more profitable Enterprise.

We are building an even stronger and more resilient business that we are confident over time, will deliver improved operational and financial results and meaningful increases in value for stakeholders.

With that.

Jim will discuss our financial results in more detail. Jim.

Thank you, Mark and good morning everyone.

They're in the second quarter, we generated total revenue of 490.2 million.

A decrease of 7.4 million or 1.5% when compared to the second quarter of 2024.

The decrease in total revenue was primarily a result of decreases in admissions per per capita and impart per capita spending partially offset by an increase in attendance.

Attendance for the second quarter of 2025 increased by approximately 48,000 guests or 0.8%. When compared to the prior year quarter.

The increase in attendance was primarily due to a favorable calendar shift, including the shift of Easter and spring break holidays from the first quarter to second quarter, partially offset by the impact of significantly. Worse weather compared to the prior year quarter

In the second quarter of 2025 total revenue per capita decreased 2.2%.

Admission per capita decreased 3.9%, and in part, per capita spending decreased 0.4%.

admission per capita decreased primarily due to lower realized pricing on certain emission products when compared to the prior year quarter,

Operating expenses increased 14.6 million or 7.7%. When compared to the second quarter of 2024?

The increase in operating expenses is primarily due to a 9.6 million increase in non-cash Self Insurance adjustments, compared to the second quarter of 2024.

Selling General and administrative expenses. Increased, 0.6 million or 1% compared to the second quarter of 2024.

We reported net, income of 80.1 million for the second quarter compared to net income of 91.1 million in the second quarter of 2024.

and we generated adjusted Eva of 206.3 million, a decrease of 11.9 million when compared to the second quarter of 2024,

Looking at our results. For the first half of 2025, compared to 2024 total revenue was 777.2 million, a decrease of 17.9 million or 2.2%

Total attendance was 9.6 million guests, a decrease of 11,000 guests or 0.1%.

Net income for the period, was 64 million. A decrease of 15.9 million and adjusted Eva with 273.7 million, a decrease of 23.6 million

now, turning to our balance sheet, our June 30th, 2025 net, total leverage, ratio is 3 times,

Approximately $194 million of cash on the balance sheet.

This strong balance sheet gives us flexibility to continue to invest in and grow our business. And the opportunistically allocate Capital with the goal to maximize long-term value for shareholders.

Our deferred revenue balance. As of, the end of June was 207.8 Million deferred revenue, decreased approximately 22.7 million when compared to June of 2024,

Through July 2025, our past base, including all past products, was down approximately 3%. Compared to July 2024,

We have been pleased to see our past base improved since the end of the second quarter. And we are also in the midst of launching our 2026 passes which will which will include what we believe our our best ever passed benefits program.

We are excited by our new 2026 Pass Program and we expect the launch of the new passes will be well, received by our guests to drive, continued Improvement, and growth in our past base as we progress through the second half of the year.

Very early signs in a few of the parks where we have launched our positive.

As a reminder, approximately 40% of our total annual attendance comes from our loyal and recurring pathways.

Finally, as of June 3025, we have invested 110.5 million in capex.

Of which approximately 98 million was on core capex, and approximately 12.5 million on expansion or Roi projects.

For 2025, we expect to spend approximately 175 to 200 million dollars, on core capex, and approximately 50 million dollars of capex and growth in Roi projects.

Before turning the call back over to Mark, I want to reiterate our comments on cost.

We have been and continue to be focused on operational efficiencies and optimizing our expense structure to deliver results.

While we have expense growth of 1.6% in the quarter, in just 1.2% year to date, which was approximately in line with our discussions. The last 2 quarters, we are not satisfied with our ability to dynamically manage our costs in the face of whether headwinds and related impact to demand, that we experience.

We should move more quickly and more proactively to manage our labor and operating expenses in reaction to lower demand over certain periods.

We have improved and will continue to improve our processes and organizational talent to ensure we are better going forward.

And also, as Mark mentioned, we have implemented and incremental and accelerated cost Reduction Program that we expect will reduce second half expenses by up to 15 million dollars.

With that, I'll turn the call back over to Marshall Sher some final thoughts.

Hey, thanks. Jim.

Uh, before we open the call to your questions, I have some closing comments.

In the second quarter of 2025.

we came to the aid of 500 animals in need

Over our history, we have helped over 42,000 animals including bottle-nosed Dolphins. Manatees sea lions, seals, sea turtles, sharks birds, and more.

I'm really proud of the team's hard work and their continued dedication to these important rescue efforts.

While we were just over 7 months into 2025,

we are excited about the remainder of the year, with our current and upcoming events, including our summer festivals, going on now.

And starting later our Halloween events which will be followed by our Christmas events.

I want to thank our ambassadors for their efforts during our busy summer season, as well as their ongoing preparation for our exciting fall and winter events.

We are confident in our ability to deliver operational and financial improvements.

That will result in meaningful increases in Revenue, adjusted Ava and total shareholder value.

While headwinds impacted our performance. In the first half of the year and took us off the pace. We initially set, we're focused on and expect to deliver strong second half Financial results.

I'm excited about the opportunity to set in front of us. Both in the near term where we see clear paths to drive meaningful progress and over the medium term, where the growth potential is even greater

We are focused, well positioned, and confident in the investments. We are making the operational efficiencies. We are realizing the value we are building for stakeholders.

With that, we can now take your questions.

If you are using a speaker-phone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys.

To withdraw your question. Please. Press star. Then 2

Please limit yourselves to 1 question and 1 follow up. If you have further questions, you may re-enter the question queue.

At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster.

And our first question will come from Steve wisinski with stifel. Please go ahead.

Yeah, hey guys, uh, good morning. Um, so so Mark you give us a lot of color around the the Epic opening, and it sounds like visitation into the, you know, the Orlando Parks continues to be, you know, up year-over-year even through July, which I think is probably, you know, a little bit surprising to, um, you know, to, to some folks. Um, but, you know, I guess my question is, did you guys do anything to, you know, to maybe drive that visitation meaning? You know, if I look at your cost in the second quarter, they were, you know, obviously a little bit higher than we were expecting some of that. Sounds like it was, you know, from you guys not being aggressive enough around, you know, labor type to weather. But wondering, if you guys were, you know, a little bit more aggressive on the marketing side of things, to kind of drive that visitation into your Lando parks, to help, you know, maybe offset some of the the impact from Epic.

Yeah. Hey Steve, I can take that question and, um, just to, uh...

Make 1, quick comment. I mean, I I said the attendance was actually through through yesterday, you know, it was up at at at she wrote Orlando for the quarter today on a day-to-day basis.

So, um, that's through August 6th. But as far as like, what what we did, you know, obviously we, you know, we were, well aware epic was coming.

And I think you can you can imagine that we we do uh look at our marketing and make certain adjustments and tweaks to that in response to things, we know that are that are coming. So

You know, I would, I would agree with you that, you know, probably put a little more emphasis than, than maybe normal on on that. And then obviously, um, we had some, some, some weather impacts in in the second quarter where we had to be, um, you know, a little more promotional than we would probably normally like to be, uh, can't can't wait around for the weather to get better so that that drove, uh, some promotions as well, kind of across the company.

Okay, gotcha. And then, Mark want to ask about deferred revenues, um, which you know, were, you know, are down about 10% year-over-year. And I'm just trying to square that up with, um, you know, your commentary around forward indicators in terms of group bookings, disc Discovery code bookings. Um, you know, the new set of been pretty solid? I think all the way out through, you know, early in the 2027

So, I'm just trying to understand, you know, maybe why that deferred is down so much. Maybe that, you know, it's some pricing pressure around past products. Just, you know, just trying to understand and square that away a little bit better. Thanks.

Yeah, on the, on the deferred revenue. I mean there there's a number of factors as as as Jim mentioned, but certainly you have uh, the the different mix of of products in that in that, um, in that bucket. So whether it's the type of passive, people, acquire, or, or anything like that, can have an impact on that. We're obviously have sold less less passes than than we'd like with the past space. Being down, that did get a little bit better as Jim mentioned in July. And then you have this Dynamic of, you know, people that um, have passes over over over over time over after a year. They um, they cycle out of out of deferred revenue. So there's a variety of factors. Certainly some of the promotions that, you know, we had to do around the weather at an impact as well. And we'll have to kind of live with those for, for a little while till they till they cycle through. But I think what, what the point we were trying to make a little bit is while the deferred revenue is down, uh, like you noted for for the quarter, you know?

We do see good indicators in Discovery Cove and in group bookings in the Hallow Scream sales as well. So those give us some confidence that at least is headed in the right direction. And past sales did get a little better in July as well.

You have to also remember that there is some rolloff for to month to month. So we have experienced the month-to-month roll off and we do continue to have uh pass visitation has continued to range in kind of that 40% uh range for us historically. So that's been pretty steady. Uh, so between that and and what Mark said about the past sales and kind of and what we have queued up for next year, I think we're, we're in a good spot.

Thank you. Our next question will come from James Hardiman with Citigroup. Please go ahead.

I think you, you mentioned, um, you know, maybe a little bit more marketing, given the Epic opening. Um, I wanted to ask about her cap, specifically admissions per caps being bound for percent. Um, about you're going to share this number, but you've given us a lot of info on Orlando care to share, what the Orlando per caps look like. But ultimately, the question is, have you gotten more aggressive, um, in Orlando given given that epic opening

Yeah. Hey James. I I can I, I can take that question. So yeah. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna break out the, the per caps for, by by Park. I mean, I think attendance is a, is a good is a good metric. Um, I can tell you, you know, revenue for, uh, the second quarter was, was, was positive at SeaWorld Orlando. So, you know, you can read into that what what you'd like, um, but clearly, with the weather, we had really kind of coming out of May or, you know, around Memorial Day and into June.

Uh, we we had to be more promotional than we'd like, and, you know, that that's being smart, though. We could we have to react to these situations, can't wait for weather to get better. So that, that puts some pressure on those spur caps. You know, not only in, you know, uh, Orlando, but, but across the across the company, you know, going forward, you know, if if we can, um, have a more normalized.

Weather pattern. You know we we do feel optimistic that again like we've said repeatedly that you know over time we think we can grow our admissions per cap and our pricing. We're always going to defer though to driving more total revenue. So there's going to be a times that we we do things that might be at odds with per cap but our a better total revenue play.

Makes sense. Um, and then, um, you've called out a few different factors, um, moving the numbers. I don't know if you'll quantify any of these, but I guess as I think about the weather headwinds, you've quantified that at times in the past. Um, sounds like there was a calendar benefit. Any way to quantify that? And then the marketing, um, the increased marketing. Um, any quantification note on any of those three?

Yeah, I mean, I think what I can tell you is I I'll just give you a little more color. Um, you know, the the the Easter benefit if you will in the second quarter like we said was was almost entirely offset by by bad weather in the quarter. So those kind of, uh, neutralized each other, uh, unfortunately. Uh, so

That that gives you a little more color on that, um, I don't know that, we'll, we'll share much more than that.

Thank you. Our next question will come from Thomas. Yeah, with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Thanks appreciate it. I just wanted to maybe dig into the underlying Trends if we kind of remove that whether timing and the user timing just I think up here cited some low-end consumer Valley Consciousness at the margin, that's been seeping into the market. A little bit is that something that you've been?

Seeing as well.

Yeah. Hey Hey, Thomas. I I can help you on that. Um, look, we don't we don't see anything materially obvious on the, on the consumer.

Uh, what, what we what I typically look at would be our impact spend. And, you know, it was, it was, you know, almost uh, almost flat for the quarter down 15 cents, which, you know, is a very, you know, small a small decline.

So, I think if there was some some, you know, significant headwind you, you would, you would see it show up in their. Uh, the other thing I would, I would point out is that, you know, our past sales did improve in July, as as as Jim mentioned, our our early hallow scream cells are positive as well.

and then 1 that I think is really impressive, is Discovery Cove here in Orlando, which is

We said look like um, you know we're still able to hang in there and if anything the forward indicators give us confidence that people are still still wanting to come to our park and buy our products.

Understood, that's helpful. And then, did I hear you correctly that you expect to focus on the hotel initiative that you said, 'stay tuned'? But just maybe, any help on shaping that from a capital intensity appetite perspective, and how much you think you might be putting into growth capex for that?

Yeah, you you did hear me correctly, we would expect. Uh,

Sorry, sorry, Thomas, did you say hotels orus? I'm sorry I thought

You're oh, no.

I was asking about the mous and then just also on the hotel initiative whether or not there's any expectation on.

Yeah, okay, so you you heard me correctly on the mous there. There's, I said we would expect to sign 2 of those, right? And that is related to International, um, you know, opportunities, uh, and I think you can expect, you know, probably something, you know, in line with how we did Abu Dhabi from a capital like standpoint um, on the on the, on the hotels, I don't have anything more specific to share with you on as far as how that may or may not impact our, our Capital spending obviously.

There's a variety of structures you could look at a variety of ways, you could, you could structure those things. Um I think you're obviously familiar with the makeup of our board and the the focus on our board and the private Equity uh component of having Hill path on our board. And there are obviously very involved in the business and certainly very involved in in the hotel discussions and and what that may or may not ultimately look like

Thank you. Our next question, will come from Lizzie dove with Goldman Sachs? Please go ahead.

Hi there. Thanks for taking the

You mentioned that the SeaWorld Orlando attendance was up. And I think that means that the kind of not Orlando Parks was down which, you know, looking at the foot traffic data for a while, it feels has been the case, you know, for the last kind of year or so. And so you know particularly like let's say the Busch Gardens Parks like what has been the gating Factor here and you know are there drivers you can pull to kind of turn the attendance Trends around there whether it's new rides or kind of any other initiatives you have

Yeah, I I can, I can take that question. So look, I I think we we have to do, uh, you know, a better job and have more opportunity. Certainly in like Busch Gardens Tampa, for example. And there's there's a variety of of reasons, um, you know, some of which obviously has been the weather in that area, we had a pretty meaningful, uh, hurricane impact in that Park last year. Um, you know the

Weather has has not been ideal for the second quarter in, in, in Florida as well. So, you know, some of it's certainly is whether uh, it's a great Park. Uh, has a lot of great attractions. I'm not sure that the awareness is, is where we'd like it to be. And that certainly, I think an area where we can improve but um, a lot of opportunity there that Park does have. I would argue 1 of the more popular Halloween events and I think we can uh play that up more and we're looking forward to to doing that, you know, going forward. So certainly some opportunity there.

Great. And then just as a follow-up, you know, obviously not referring to record, but DARPA this year anymore, and you mentioned in the release, you know, meaningful increases in revenue and EBA. I'm not sure if that's like a this year, comment, specifically, or the rest of this year. Comment and so curious just now like, what's changed in terms of any expectations for the second half specifically, and what you're kind of factoring in, you know, assumptions around how attendance can Trend per caps costs. Um, that'd be super helpful. Thanks.

Yeah. Uh look I think my my my my my general comment on on the ability to to grow is is you know kind of something. We talk about every every quarter and, you know, that's meant to be, uh, you know, more over time and and how we think about things and then I did I did have a specific comment, uh, obviously on the on the second half. So the way we kind of think about the second half is like I said the the the quarter today.

Losing a holiday day. I think last year, a lot of people had a 4 Day weekend. This year was a 3-day weekend so that had an impact on us. We also had some, some challenging weather and some of our markets over over the 4th of July and then, you know, the rest of July had some positives and some negatives but but ended up being down uh and not something we liked, but then we've we've made that attendance up here in August and um so that that's good that we've made up that that last July attendance here in August, you know, some of that is we have some better weather comparisons. But, you know, sitting here today, like I said, ordered at 8:30. Yesterday were were slightly positive on a day-to-day basis and attendance and we still have big weekends ahead of us.

Still have the conclusion of our events, uh, to wrap up the summer and then we'll, we'll start our our Halloween events which generally have been, uh, pretty popular over the years and then we'll move into Christmas.

A couple other things, you know, pastels improved in July, as you heard, Jim talked about how, how a stream ticket sales for the separately, ticketed event, our our positive. We, we, we like our Halloween event. Um, so that's good to see that the Discovery Cove and group bookings are are positive for the rest of the year, and then obviously, we know we have some pretty meaningful whether, uh, benefits ahead of us, especially around the hurricane. So we had last year that we're more in end of Q3 and into Q4 now, obviously.

You know, part of our assumption is that we're going to have better or improved weather than than last year. So hopefully we won't have the type of hurricanes we had last year but you know our assumption would be the weather normalizes and we have uh we pick up some, you know, pretty meaningful attendance from not having such a significant hurricane impact as last year and then we've got to execute on the on the cost plan that that Jim and I both spoke spoke about. And so we're, we're focused in, you know, on on executing on that plan and I think the other thing we have to see is uh, improvement in our, our admissions per cap and again, some of the really early indicators on on sales. I think it's, you know, at least headed in the right direction.

you know, still still negative I think for for the co quarter right now but

It appears to be moving in the in the right direction and that'll be something that, you know, we have to, to see continued to improve. And, and obviously, another assumption would be getting our, our impact per cap back to positive. The, the 1 thing, I'll, I'll kind of leave you with kind of a long answer, but I do think historically, uh, you know, the, the, the Halloween and Christmas seasons are are distinct and separate in many ways from from the summer. So uh, just because you had a maybe do things in the summer, whether it was, you know, reacting to whether with certain promotions and things like that, I don't know that you necessarily have to repeat that or would be expected to repeat that into the fall and winter. It's almost like you're

You're resetting kind of the business and we're resetting, I think into what traditionally has been a strength of ours, with our Halloween and Christmas events. So, putting that all together, that's kind of how we think about the second half of the year.

Thank you. Our next question, will come from arts and carrion with UBS. Please go ahead.

Hi, thank you so much for taking my, um, question. And I'm sorry. I'm hoping between calls this morning, very busy morning. So I'm I'm sorry if I missed, but you had previously alluded to slightly over 700 million of ibida as a benchmark. You should be able to hit this year in terms of full year performance, but your release does not have that guidance. Of course. And and you did mention expectations of solid sort of performance for the back half. I was wondering, you could give us your updated thoughts, whether you can still sort of come in in that in that range for the year.

Yeah. Hey, it's Mark. I I don't know if you just

kind of caught my answer, I just gave I gave Lizzie but, um, you know, we're not we're not guiding to anything but I I did walk you through

Kind of the ins and outs of how we think about things. I I can do that uh, maybe quickly again if you'd like but but obviously our tenants on day-to-day basis through

Big weekend. Still ahead of us in in August and in the Labor Day.

Uh, then our Halloween events starting uh, as well. And then eventually our our Christmas events which traditionally have been. Like I said, stronger events for us and have a fair amount of popularity to them. Our Hollow scream ticket sales for the parks were separately. Ticketed, you know, those are those are positive uh to date so so that that's good. Our Discovery Cove and group, bookings are also positive for the rest of the year. And then we'll have, you know, we would expect to have

Meaningful weather benefits in late Q3 and into Q4 with the hurricane.

Hurricanes I guess, but especially hurricane Milton that we had last year. So, you know, 1 1 caveat would be assuming we don't have any big hurricanes. You know, we would expect to hopefully pick up uh just with improved weather alone. Uh, we have to execute on the cost savings that Jim and I talked about and, you know, we're focused and and have a plan, uh, to try to deliver on those cost savings. And then we need to see, I think Improvement in, in, in admissions per cap and in park per cap. And again, there's some there's some signs that those are are heading the right direction. Uh, still still negative for for the quarter today. It looks like we're, you know, there's still preliminary numbers but I think moving in the right direction and the point I was really trying to wrap up with was that

I I think you have an opportunity here with Summer concluding, you, you kind of reset the business and you move into a different phase of the business with Halloween and Christmas that traditionally

I would argue has been 1 of us our stronger uh, parts of the year. You know, if you look at the growth in Halloween, the growth in Christmas, that's certainly been something that we've been able to take advantage of. And I I'm confident that the product we're we have coming out this year is going to be as good as ever. And um you know, if we can just execute our plans not have any really big weather impacts. I I like the opportunity to um you know, have a better second half obviously.

Thank you. That's very helpful. Um, just a quick follow up, follow up. You know, would you agree that folks that are actually showing up, are are spending less? There's these broader takeaways that the customer might be showing up, but spending a little bit. Like, what, what patterns are you seeing? I mean, there are difference between kind of different cohorts and then, you know, on on admissions per cap that can vary, I understand a bit depending on sort of past mix and other things that you're doing to drive, um, vegetation. But impact spent you guys have historically done a pretty good job on that. Do you still expect that to be up for the year? Just the impact spend of, uh, per capita. Thanks?

Well, we've had pretty good success with our impact, spend over over the, you know, last uh, many, many quarters, right? Until you know, and this this quarter we were we were slightly down so I'm I'm optimistic. We can get those, those issues corrected. And we are moving into, um, you know, and ultimately, you know, get get to a a positive and and impart we're moving into Halloween and Christmas, which have quite a bit of opportunity to drive in park, spend around them. So, we'll have to, we'll have to see how we execute, but certainly, you know, we, we were disappointed. We were a little negative in the quarter.

We again, some of that was driven by having to be a little more promotional than we normally would like to be because of the weather.

So I think we can hopefully get that corrected, and certainly that's one of the things we're focused on.

Thank you. Our next question, will come from Chris orona with Dosa Bank. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning guys. Thanks for taking a question. Um,

You know, Mark you you just kind of mentioned that the Halloween and Christmas. And and as you say you know, have greater awareness and maybe you're a little bit more more unique. Um and and also maybe a little bit more adult scene. So you know the question is, have you guys historically or or can you almost, you know, reverse engineering high these fall and winter events into opportunities?

To sell, people tends to be a little bit more.

I don't want to say commoditized but a little bit more commoditized on a national level.

Well.

yeah, and you broke up a little bit but I I think what you were kind of asking was, you know, is there opportunities to kind of Leverage the popularity of

Uh, Halloween and Christmas to, to maybe, um, have a better summer, right? Is that kind of what you're asking. Chris,

Opportunity like you said. So 1 of the things we really try to do like in some of our Parks, we've already started to sell season passes for for next year. And, and 1 of the things we talk about is, hey, get, get your pass now and you can still enjoy the summer but more, you know, but maybe more more exciting to that person buying the past is, hey, you're also going to get to be able to come around Halloween and Christmas. So we want to, we want to, we know people like coming to Halloween and Christmas if we can give them a reason to secure that product and also have some hook to come in the summer as well. Those are things that we're going to continue to try to do and I think um that certainly an opportunity for us going forward.

Okay, very helpful. Thanks Mark.

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

Thanks, Wyatt. On behalf of Jim and the rest of the management team here at United Parks & Resorts, we 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 financial results and long-term value for stakeholders.

Thank you very much and we look forward to speaking with you next quarter.

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.