Universal sets opening date for Kids Resort
Universal's new theme park in Texas has its opening date.
Universal Kids Resort will open July 1, Universal announced this morning. The new park in Frisco, Texas is designed for families with young children and features lands and attractions themed to Shrek, Puss in Boots, Jurassic World, SpongeBob SquarePants, Minions, Trolls, and Gabby's Dollhouse.
We showed you the full line-up for the park late last year, and you can see that here: Universal reveals more details about its new Kids Resort.
The park's entrance also features the 300-room Universal Kids Resort Hotel, with dining and an outdoor pool. Hotel packages as well as daily tickets and an annual pass are now on sale, with one-day tickets from $55-80. The annual pass is $130, or $165 with parking included.
Here is Universal's CGI fly-through hype video for the new park.
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Replies (9)
I just priced a one-night, two-day trip for my family of five, on a weekday in the middle of September: $652.95.
Maybe the IP will have enough draw. My kids are going to be begging me to go, but I know that they’ll just be disappointed, I’ll be out of cash, and we probably won’t go back. I think we’ll stick with our Six Flags Over Texas season passes this year.
While I think this flagship park may not be a success, I can see a small chain of these popping up around America. . . Picture 4 or 5 of these in areas that already have a high tourist draw/theme park presence. I can see one in Pennsylvania, Virginia, maybe Ohio, and one in Orlando on the South Campus that EU occupies.
I think the low media attention is specifically to temper expectations- if they market this like a new theme park, people will want to compare it to "real" theme parks. I like what Russell said about Sesame place, that's probably what to expect from here.
Although a weirdly large draw to Sesame Place is Grover's Wacky Taxi, an allegedly pretty great family wooden coaster. So I think this place should expand with at least one "mini headliner". . . maybe an ART engineering spinner like the new ones at Legoland.
Fire up the churro machine!!
I thought this was a year or two away at least.
Universal's original deal with the city called for a June 2026 opening. Technically, with the hotel opening June 30 - the night before the park - Universal just made that.
A "six flags quiddiya" situation I see.
I feel like it would have been better to not tie Universal's name to this park so explicitly, as after the turbulent opening of Epic Universe, if Kids Resort doesn't meet expectations it might start raising some eyebrows with regards to the company. Hopefully it all works out for them, but I feel like this simply might be aimed at too small of a market to succeed.
Russell Meyer, it's TPI... has to be 90% positive Disney for the swag baskets and invites to keep arriving.
Plenty of YouTube channels not on the Disney approved list willing to highlight Universal stories and not worry about the "backlash".
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Frankly, I don't think there's been enough discussion of this resort, not necessarily the concept, but the details surrounding the development and anticipated operation of this new park. I think that's why Universal has been keeping this park on the down low, and not enough media attention has focused in on that and the fact that this brand new theme park is being deliberately knee capped to more or less be a private tot lot for locals. I strongly believe that if Universal was fully aware of how much control Frisco was going to exert on this development, they would have never moved forward with this, and you can kind of see the lack of full effort and attention to detail in the marketing for this resort and the overall quality of the finished product.
This reminds me a bit of Sesame Place, a similarly sized park with a massive IP draw, but a local community that wishes they didn't have a popular tourist destination in their back yard.