United Parks & Resorts - Earnings Call - Q2 2020

Transcript

Speaker 0

Good morning, and welcome to SeaWorld's Second Quarter twenty twenty Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Matthew Stroud.

Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to SeaWorld's second quarter earnings conference call. Today's call is being webcast and recorded. A press release was issued this morning and is available on our Investor Relations website at www.seaworldinvestors.com. Replay information for this call can be found in the press release and will be available on our website following the call.

Joining me this morning are Mark Swanson, Interim Chief Executive Officer and Elizabeth Galaxi, Chief Accounting Officer and Interim Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. This morning, we will review our second quarter financial results and then we will open up the call to 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. These statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to be materially different from those forward looking statements, including those identified in the Risk Factors section of our annual report on Form 10 ks and quarterly reports on Form 10 Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These 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 adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow, which are non GAAP financial measures. More information regarding our forward looking statements and reconciliations of adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow to the most comparable GAAP measures is included in our earnings release available on our website and can also be found in our filings with the SEC. Now I'd like

Speaker 2

to turn the call over to Interim Chief Executive Officer, Mark Swanson. Mark? Thank you, Matthew. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. This continues to be an extraordinary time for all of us.

We hope that you and your loved ones continue to be safe as we manage through this crisis. I'd like to start by expressing how proud I am of our team's performance during this unprecedented and challenging time. Together, we have taken significant actions to reduce our cost, carefully manage our cash flows, fortify our balance sheet and liquidity position, implement new and enhanced operating and safety protocols to meet the realities of the current environment and successfully reopened and welcomed back guests to nine of our 12 parks. As you all know, our second quarter financial results were significantly impacted by the global COVID-nineteen pandemic. As we previously announced from 03/16/2020 to 06/05/2020, all of our parks were closed.

Starting on June 6, we began the process of reopening some of our parks beginning in Texas and then in Florida and by the end of the second quarter, seven of our 12 parks were open and operating with limited capacity, limited hours and or limited days. Due to the park closures, our 2020 had only a total of seven parks partially open with ninety eight operating days compared to a total of 12 parks fully open with eight sixty one operating days in the 2019. Attendance since the parks reopened in June has been impacted by capacity limitations due to COVID-nineteen social distancing guidelines, fewer operating days per week versus the prior year, limited marketing spend and a limited events lineup. Despite these limitations, total park attendance at parks that have been open for at least thirty days has increased 15% on a same park basis from the week ended June 28, the first full week these parks were open to the week ended August 2. While the future remains highly uncertain, based on what we have seen recently, we believe attendance trends compared to prior year will continue to strengthen as we reintroduce special events, interactive experiences and other in park offerings, which were temporarily suspended and we thoughtfully ramp up marketing spend.

Since the start of the third quarter, we have opened two additional parks, Sesame Place located in Langhorne, Pennsylvania and Busch Gardens, Williamsburg located in Williamsburg, Virginia. Sesame Place opened on July 24 on a three day a week operating schedule and we are pleased with their early performance. Since reopening, we have seen high demand and we are adding additional operating days. Our Busch Gardens Park in Williamsburg opened last week with a Coasters and Crafts Brews event and is currently subject to a state imposed very limited 1,000 person capacity. Our Williamsburg team has been creative and has developed a business plan that makes sense even at those very low capacity levels.

We have seen strong demand for the event and are actively adding more operating days and we are developing additional event concepts that we expect to roll out going forward. Overall for the parks that have reopened, attendance versus the prior year period has ranged from approximately 10 to 15% on the low end and up to approximately 50% on the high end depending on the park and day. Without the capacity limitations, attendance versus the prior year would likely have exceeded 50% in some parks on certain days. From a forward looking perspective, we have seen some positive indicators. Our Discovery Cove Park, which accepts reservations up to eighteen months in advance is showing strong 2021 bookings and significantly outpacing prior year to date.

In particular, 2021 forward bookings for Discovery Cove as of 08/06/2020 are 176% higher than 2020 bookings as of the same time one year ago. With respect to California, while we don't have a park opening date for SeaWorld to announce today, we are in regular contact with state and local authorities and we sincerely look forward to opening in San Diego and welcoming back our guests as soon as it's safe and permitted to do so. As we announced this morning, we do not currently plan to open up our Aquatica Waterpark near San Diego or our Water Country USA Waterpark in Williamsburg this year. Looking forward to the fall and winter, we are planning to operate a modified version of our popular Halloween and Christmas events at several of our parks. We know how much these are loved by our guests and we are confident we will deliver compelling, exciting and most importantly safe events with relevant and appropriate operational changes.

More details will be forthcoming as we finalize those plans. While it should go without saying, we are confident we can not only operate these events safely, but we can operate these events profitably. Let me offer a few comments regarding our capital structure. We recently completed a $500,000,000 notes offering and covenant adjustment that among other things further revised our financial covenants to suspend testing of the covenant through 2021 and modify the testing of the covenant in 2022. Adjusting for the gross proceeds of the notes offering and related transactions, as of 06/30/2020, we would have had approximately $565,000,000 of cash and cash equivalents on the balance sheet and $311,000,000 available on our revolving credit facility, resulting in total liquidity of $876,000,000 By issuing these notes, we have significantly strengthened our balance sheet and liquidity position, providing us with enhanced operating flexibility, creating the ability to continue to make long term investments in our business and increased our capacity to take advantage of strategic opportunities that may arise from market dislocations.

With that, I would like to turn the call over to Elizabeth to discuss our financial results in more detail. Elizabeth?

Speaker 3

Thanks Mark and good morning everyone. As Mark mentioned, our second quarter results were significantly impacted by the temporary park closures resulting from the COVID-nineteen pandemic, which led to all of our parks being closed for the vast majority of the quarter. Our Florida and Texas parks were able to reopen in June, but with capacity limitations, reduced operating hours and reduced operating days. As a result, attendance for the second quarter decreased by approximately 6,200,000 guests or 96% when compared to the prior year quarter. We generated revenue of $18,000,000 a decrease of $388,000,000 or 96% compared to the 2019.

The decrease in revenue results from the decline in attendance due to the park closures. Second quarter total revenue per capita was $66.27 compared to $62.82 in the 2019, an increase of 5.5% driven primarily by an increase in in park per capita spending and admission per capita. Admissions per capita increased by 2% to $35.94 for the 2020, primarily due to the realization of higher prices across admission products and partially offset by the net impact of mix related to higher pass attendance when compared to the prior year period. In park per capita spending increased by 10% to $30.33 in the 2020, primarily due to increased sales of certain in park products and higher realized prices and fees, partially offset by reduced in park offerings during the quarter. We generated a net loss of $131,000,000 compared to net income of $52,700,000 in the 2019.

Adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter was a loss of $53,800,000 a decline of $203,500,000 compared to the prior year quarter. Adjusted EBITDA was negatively impacted by the decrease in total revenue, partially offset by decrease in operating expenses and selling, general and administrative expenses. The decrease in operating expenses largely results from a reduction in labor related costs due primarily to the COVID-nineteen temporary park closures. Operating expenses also declined due to a reduction in non essential operating costs, which were deferred or eliminated due to the park closures as well as cost savings and efficiency initiatives. Selling, general and administrative expenses decreased primarily due to a reduction in marketing and media related costs due to the COVID-nineteen park closures and the impact of cost savings and efficiency initiatives.

Now turning to our balance sheet. Our total deferred revenue balance related to all of our products as of the end of the quarter was $138,100,000 down approximately 15.6% from June 2019. Total deferred revenue related to our pass product was down approximately 9%. As of August 5, our total pass base, which includes annual pass and fund cards was down 31%. However, for parks which opened in the quarter, our total pass base has grown a low double digit percentage since May, which is the month prior to reopening these parks.

As Mark mentioned, we have also taken additional steps to further strengthen our financial position and flexibility and enhance our liquidity. We issued $500,000,000 in second priority senior secured notes due in 2025. Additionally, in July, we entered into another amendment to our senior secured credit facilities to among other things further revise our financial covenants to suspend testing through 2021 and modify the testing of the covenant in 2022. As a result of this amendment beginning in the 2022 for covenant purposes only, our twelve month trailing adjusted EBITDA used in the calculation of our leverage ratio will ignore the 2021 and we'll use adjusted EBITDA for the corresponding quarters in 2019 instead. While we are temporarily exempt from complying with our leverage ratio covenant, we will be required to comply with a quarterly minimum liquidity test of not less than $75,000,000 through the 2022 or the date on which we elect to use actual adjusted EBITDA to calculate the leverage ratio covenant.

This amendment along with the senior transaction further strengthens our cash position and increases our financial flexibility and liquidity. As you have heard, we have taken a number of proactive measures to manage costs and expenditures and to increase liquidity both during the temporary park closures and as we have begun to reopen. With the resumption of limited operations across most of our parks, we're even more focused than ever before on driving attendance and total revenue while eliminating unnecessary costs and continuing to identify more efficient ways to operate. Now let me turn the call back over to Mark, who will share some final thoughts. Mark?

Speaker 2

Thank you, Elizabeth. Before we open the call to your questions, I have some closing comments. During the quarter, our rescue teams continued to operate helping wildlife in need. In the second quarter, we helped rescue over four thirty animals and we have now exceeded 37,000 animal rescues over the company's history. We are one of the world's leading animal rescue organizations and we are proud of our efforts to protect and save wildlife.

We want to thank our employee ambassadors for their dedication and effort to reopen our parks and welcome back our guests. We want to thank our guests and loyal pass holders for trusting us and returning to the parks that have reopened. And finally, we would like to thank our financial and operating partners for their support and understanding during these extraordinary times. Our business model is flexible and resilient. While the future remains uncertain today, we feel very well positioned with the right assets, team, balance sheet and liquidity to navigate through this storm and emerge an even stronger and more profitable business.

We continue to have great confidence in our long term strategy and sincerely look forward to fully opening all of our parks and driving improved operating and financial results and long term value for all stakeholders. With that, let's open up the line to take your questions.

Speaker 0

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. You. And the first question will come from Steve Wieczynski with Stifel. Please go ahead.

Speaker 4

Hey, guys. Good morning. So in the release, you have a line in there talking about the opportunity to take advantage of strategic opportunities that may arise. And I'm wondering if you can give us some color around what that line actually means and then maybe what type of opportunities or strategic opportunities are out there today that you might look at?

Speaker 2

Hey Steve, it's Mark. Good to talk to you. Yes, I think what we mentioned is with the notes offering, we like the flexibility that gives us for a number of reasons. As I mentioned, one of them being the potential for strategic opportunities. There might be situations where there's market dislocation or competitors or others in the industry who aren't able to weather this storm.

And so whether it's a water park, a hotel, something like that, a park that we could look at and convert to a Sesame Place, for example, those are the type of things we're talking about. And we'll obviously make sure before we would do anything like that, that we feel comfortable about the future. But that's those are the type of things we're talking about.

Speaker 4

Okay. Got you. That's really good color. Thanks. And then I wanted to see if you could give any color on what the parks look like, and I don't know how much you can say here, kind of during July and August.

I know in the release and in the prepared remarks, talked about attendance being up very nicely. But maybe specifically, what you saw in Orlando is, as Florida has obviously been a virus so called hotspot, did you see any material changes in visitation over the last couple of weeks around as virus news kind of picked up, if that makes sense?

Speaker 2

Sure. I can take that question. So one of the reasons we pointed out the increase in attendance from the week ending June 28 to the week ending August 2 was those seven parks that are included in that comparison have been open more than thirty days and all seven of them are in Texas and in Florida. And we know those have been in the face of a tough news cycle, right? So it's good to see them grow.

Obviously, you would expect some growth in July, but I would say the trend improved slightly as well. And more recently here, the last couple of weeks, we've been pleased. We've been adding back events. We've been adding operating days. We've been giving people a reason to come and visit.

So we feel good about the current trends. And I would say, more so in Florida than in Texas, although I will say just here in the last week or so, I think Texas is picking up a little bit as well. But I think Florida is hanging in there and we feel pretty good about overall the parks that are open and obviously getting Sesame Place open and getting Williamsburg open has been good as well.

Speaker 4

Okay. Can I ask one more super quick one? I guess in your release, you're talking about Discovery Cove and how the forward bookings for 2021, I think, are up or whatever the number was, 100 and some 70 some percent. Is there any way and I don't know if you have this data, but how many of those are kind of new bookings versus just somebody that was going to come in 2020 pushing that out into 2021?

Speaker 2

Yes. What I would tell you is we won't break it out specifically, but keep in mind those people have chosen to come back. They have chosen to get a refund and instead they chose to rebook with us. Then obviously there's new bookings as well. So it's an indicator that we feel good about that people are going to come and visit Discovery Cove, which as you know is in Orlando.

So that's one of the few kind of forward metrics we have. We feel good about where it's at right now.

Speaker 4

Okay, great. Thanks guys. Appreciate it.

Speaker 0

The next question will be from James Hardiman with Wedbush Securities. So

Speaker 2

I guess two things. You had given us sort

Speaker 5

of a range versus a year ago of anywhere between 1050%. I was hoping we could maybe narrow that down a little bit. Is there a way to think about sort of an average run rate of attendance versus where we were last year? And then in terms of can you just walk us through the capacity caps, where you started out and where you are today with the various parks?

Speaker 2

Sure. Hey, James, this is Mark. Good to talk to you. So on attendance, we did give you the range kind of 10% to 15% all the way up to around 50% depending on the park, depending on the day. I think as we that's going to normalize out to when you look at the open parks in total for the month of July, you're probably in that 80% or 20% of prior year, it's going to be higher at some parks.

And I think we've been pretty pleased with especially our water parks and some others as well. So we'll keep working towards that. I mentioned we added events and days and other reasons to come and visit And we've been pretty pleased with that at a number of the parks and that would include the non water parks as well. As far as capacity, those are limitations that we have in place so that we can do social distancing within the parks. There's been a handful of days where we would have liked to have more capacity at a park or two.

But I think we've been able to manage and we'll be able to continue managing going forward. As there's not too many days that we operate at peak capacity as we talked about last quarter. So I think we feel pretty good about being able to navigate through this, especially as we move into the shoulder season where attendance obviously would be lighter by just with schools back in session in the fall and things like that. So we'll keep monitoring that, but what we're really focused on is giving people reason to visit, adding events and days and hours where it makes sense, and we'll continue to monitor that.

Speaker 5

And then as I think about the path back to profitability, I'm assuming the parks that are currently open are profitable in their own right. Is there a way to think about sort of where they would be assuming no more parks open from here, is there a way to think about how profitable those parks would need to be for you to get back to sort of breakeven from an EBITDA perspective?

Speaker 2

Sure. So you're right. I mean the parks that are open collectively, we they're operating pretty well. So we feel good about the performance from those parks on a collective basis. Is it enough to offset debt and other things?

Not at this point. But as far as what we need to do to get to that point, I think we have to be in the range of 40% of prior year. And that would there's a lot of variables, so that would depend on your capital spend and whatnot. So we to see those parks do a little bit better. That's our focus.

I can tell you one of the things we're really focused on is trying to drive to that kind of enterprise breakeven level, getting enough with the open parks to cover off our corporate overhead and debt service. And then anything beyond that related to CapEx and whatnot would be kind of more at our discretion.

Speaker 0

Thank you. The next question will come from Brett Andress with KeyBanc Capital. Please go ahead.

Speaker 6

Hey, good morning. Hoping you can provide some detail on the mix of attendance that you've been seeing at your Florida parks here recently. I guess, does that 85% of drivable attendance estimate still hold from the last time we talked? I mean, has it played out as you expected?

Speaker 2

Hey, Brett, it's Mark. So what I can tell you is, if you look at June and July, we've not surprisingly have seen an increase in local attendance. But at the same time, we the domestic attendance has held pretty steady to prior year. So I do think, to your point, the advantage of people driving in to our parks is holding and that 85% is across the whole company. It's still significant in Orlando, not quite that high, but we are pleased with the attendance we're seeing.

So if local or if local is roughly a little more than 50% of the attendance, that tells you that we're getting others who are definitely driving into the parks, which we're pleased with. And for domestic tourism, it's on par with prior year. So we're not dependent on airfare. We're not air travel into the market. We have a lot of people that can drive and access our parks.

Speaker 6

Got it. Thank you. And then last one, it seems like you've been adding more operating days here recently. So what number of operating days should we put in our model for 3Q and 4Q at this point? And then just a clarification question, I think you said 20% a prior year in answer to James' question.

Is that consolidated or is that same park? I just wanted to make sure I understood that number.

Speaker 2

Yes. So as far as operating days, we're going to we're viewing that very opportunistically and we're adding days where it makes sense and where they're profitable and we can add those days. So I don't have an exact number for you, but I mean we're going to do our events, we're going to do Halloween, we're going to do Christmas. Whether we run every single day like last year remains to be seen. And then we'll have to see as we get into the fall here, the dynamics with schools and whatnot.

But I mean, goal is to try to if it makes sense to be open, to be open. And obviously, in some of our seasonal parks where we have where we would typically go to a more seasonal schedule, we'll probably do that, obviously. Beyond yes, so that's kind of how to think about, I think, the operating days on a go forward basis.

Speaker 0

And the next question comes from Tim Conder with Wells Fargo Securities. Please go ahead.

Speaker 7

Yes. I just wanted to clarify again to Brett's question on James' or the answer you gave James. The 20% attendance average in July, that's up on a comp park basis that were open, correct?

Speaker 2

Yes. That would be comparable parks that are open, yes.

Speaker 7

Okay, okay, okay. I'll start my questions now. From the attendance mix, I just wanted to drill into that a little bit more, Mark, if I may. The season pass, can you comment there versus the non season pass and what you've seen so far? And then as things stand now, thing that you all can give us as far as your monthly cash burn expectations?

And just remember just if you could redefine how you're looking at cash burn here in the back half of the year?

Speaker 2

Yes. And let me make sure on the 20%, it is same parks, but it includes every day. So if a park is not so it's an aggregate of all the days for the month, just to make sure that that's clear. As far as pass visitation, what I can tell you is, kind of similarly to how local attendance was up in June and July, pass attendance was up as well. Normally, as a company, we do about 40% of our attendance is pass related.

We saw that probably closer to in the 50% range, maybe a little bit higher in June and a little bit lower in July. So that tells you that there's still probably about half of the attendance is coming on something other than a pass. So again, back to my point about people do drive to our parks and so we feel pretty good about that going forward. As far as your question about on cash burn, I think there's a couple of comments I would make there. You saw what we did when we were closed obviously.

And I think we did a good job with that. We had a tremendous focus on our cash flow and made different decisions to manage that obviously. And so going forward, I think if you had to use a number and we're a little bit hesitant because I think there's a lot of variables in it. If you had to use a number, I would continue to use 20,000,000 to $25,000,000 on average per month. But it's going to be influenced by the number of parks that are open and how those parks perform.

Obviously, it's going to be influenced by how we address CapEx and payments for CapEx that already been incurred and then CapEx going forward. So there's going to be some payments for that and there's going to be other payments that we make as well. So could it be a little bit higher at times? Yes, it it could be a little bit higher. Could it be a little bit lower at times?

It could be. That's our goal, obviously. So it's hard to give you a range. And I would tell you that I think we would come back in November with more of a view of how we used our cash during the quarter. I think certainly we're going to be opportunistic and to the extent that the parks perform well, we'll probably deploy cash accordingly and like I said around CapEx and payables.

And we'll continue to monitor that We're very focused on it and we like the position that we're in right now with our liquidity and our flexibility.

Speaker 7

At this point, Mark, the CapEx and D and A as things stand at this point, just for the year, specifics on that?

Speaker 3

Tim, it's Elizabeth. I can take that. Good morning. So look, as we mentioned last quarter, we are about 87% complete on our construction projects for the rides that we were now planning to open in 2021. So we've got about $15,000,000 or so left to spend to finish those rides.

What I would point out though is to the point that Mark just made, we do have some spend that we've already incurred some invoices that have already been incurred that just the timing of those cash payments haven't gone out the door yet. That's to the tune of about 40,000,000 to $50,000,000 So as you look at the latter half of the year, it'd be a combination of both that $15,000,000 in new spend plus the 40,000,000 or 50,000,000 just to get the timing of the cash payments out the door.

Speaker 2

Yes. And I would add, and I should have led with this, sorry. We're really excited about the lineup for 2021. As we noted, we're moving most of the attractions. The ones that didn't open this year will move our plan is to move to 2021.

And if you recall, we felt this was going to be our best lineup of new attractions in our history. And so many of those are now going to carry over to next year. So Iron Gwazi, the coaster in Tampa, Icebreaker, the coaster here in Orlando, Pantheon in Williamsburg. There's a lot of Emperor, coaster in San Diego. So we feel really good about the 2021 lineup of rides coming to the parks.

And so we're excited to continue to make progress towards that.

Speaker 0

Thank you. And the next question comes from Jason Bazinet with Citi. Please go ahead.

Speaker 8

I just had two part question. Can you just quickly review, I think there are some parts that are closed because of state mandates and other parts you alluded to that are closed just based on your sort of managerial decision. But I just want to make sure I have that dichotomy right. And then second, are there you mentioned the 1,000 person capacity constraint at Busch Gardens in Virginia. Are there any other sort of imposed constraints by state regulators?

Speaker 2

Yes. Hey, Jason, it's Mark. So right now, the one big park that's not open is California and so SeaWorld San Diego. So we are in touch. We work through the trade association out there where we're members along with Disney and Universal and others.

And so we'll continue to monitor that situation and hopefully get that park open, but we don't have anything specific right now. And then as I mentioned, we the water park near San Diego, Aquatica and then the Water Country USA in Williamsburg, we're not going to open those parks this year. They have a pretty limited operating season. So to get them ramped up, if they're not allowed to be open really right now, just didn't really make a lot of sense. And we're obviously really disappointed with that.

And we know a lot of our fans are, but we'll continue to monitor that whole situation obviously. As far as the constraints, mean really Williamsburg is the one place where we have a hard cap of $1,000 We have other caps that we've put on place from a standpoint of how many people we can have in the park and have the right social distancing. So we do monitor that obviously and there's some days as I alluded to at a park or two where we would have probably done more if we had the capacity. But Williamsburg is the one that it's imposed exactly by the government, 1,000 people in the park at a time.

Speaker 8

Okay. That's great. And so then just going back to the way to think about it is there is sort of a California moratorium maybe, but the for the seasonal parks that are in Virginia, that's just more a function of not wanting to open them because they're seasonal. That's the right way to think of it.

Speaker 2

Yes, they're more seasonal. So like Williams, the Water Country USA in Williamsburg, we would typically only open that park till about the September. So even if we could have opened it with under 1,000 people, there were some other restrictions as well. It just didn't make sense to open it for four weeks basically. There's a fair amount of ramp up cost.

And then similarly, Aquatica San Diego, we don't even have a green light to open a park in California. And so the thinking that we're not sure when we would get that. And then again, that park would close, I think, typically right around in October sometime. So we went ahead and made those decisions. Again, we're disappointed for our fans, but those are the decisions we made.

Speaker 0

And the next question will come from Dan Jenkins with Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.

Speaker 9

Hey, guys. That was close enough. I appreciate it. In Virginia, can you talk about the thought process with 1,000 people per day? I know I imagine that's only a few percentage points to your daily attendance.

I think some of your peers decided not to open in Virginia and not to opine on their decision. But just can you talk about kind of the thought process and strategy? Presumably, you're taking into consideration past sales Just any other information there would be helpful. Then one more.

Speaker 2

Yes. Sure, Dan. It's Mark. So I think in Williamsburg, what we've done And is a couple of if you haven't checked out the website, check it out. But so the event we're running right now is called Coasters and Craft Brews.

And so we are opening small sections of the park. And if you've ever been to that park, you know it's it has different countries. And so we segment that park pretty easily. So the whole park is not open, just certain sections. But we've got certain rides open, certain food, certain other attractions open.

So that makes it exciting. And on certain days, we're running like two shifts. So we have a four hour block in the morning where we welcome 1,000 people and then or up to 1,000 people and then a four hour block in the evening where we can welcome up to 1,000 people. So in our mind, was a pretty creative way to your point, our pass holders, they can come and enjoy it, which we wanted to be able to do that for them. And then we also have we're selling tickets for people who don't have a pass or hopefully they would buy a pass.

But so we're pleased with the event. And as I said, we're going to kind of continue to look at events like this for that park certainly while there's a cap. And hopefully over time, the cap gets lifted or increased so we can open up more of the park. But that's why we're doing it and that's how we're thinking about it.

Speaker 9

That's helpful. And then on the cost side, obviously, it's a unique environment. Has there been cost areas that are incremental to the buckets you were previously considering since presumably shutting down the parks were not part of the original plan?

Speaker 2

What I would tell you is we have a tremendous focus on cost. And we did prior to this pandemic. And as I mentioned last quarter, probably the only advantage to going through what we've just been through with this pandemic is we really were able to strip our costs down to the kind of most essential level. So we probably had as most visibility into our costs as ever. And we're being very methodical and careful as we add back costs.

So things that we might have used to think were essential to have done a certain way or staffed a certain way, we might be able to view differently now. And we're certainly trying to move more cost to a more variable model. And that's a strategy that we think over the long term will be good from an efficiency standpoint. So I think we found some new insights and we'll continue to deploy those as we continue to open parks and continue to hopefully ramp up our operations over time here.

Speaker 0

Thank you. And our next question will come from Paul Golding with Macquarie. I

Speaker 10

guess my first point around admission per caps, so they were up 2%, offset by mix. And I guess my question is if you could give us any color around what your revenue management strategy is that you've been using in this period to get positive growth there despite presumably a dilutive pass mix?

Speaker 8

And then I have a follow-up.

Speaker 2

Yes. I mean, we continue to have a lot of strategies around pricing. It was something prior to again, prior to the pandemic, we had spent a lot of time on and you'd heard us talk about that. So I think we're pretty pleased with what we've seen in that area and there's some past mix impact in there as well. But I think in general, when I look at pricing for June and July, I think if you look across all our products, look total, the price we're pretty pleased with the pricing we're seeing.

So we'll continue to do that and feel good about the strategies that we have in place.

Speaker 10

Is there any color you could give around what it would have looked like on a like for like basis adjusting out the mix shift or too tough to tell?

Speaker 2

What I would say is we have I don't know that we can break that out. I mean, what I would tell you is on a sales basis, we're relative it's all relative, right? Relatively doing better on passes than on single day and multi day tickets. So that's going to help somewhat. But I think overall, we're pretty pleased.

Speaker 0

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Mark Swanson for any closing remarks.

Speaker 2

Yes. Thank you, Chad. On behalf of Elizabeth and the rest of the management team at SeaWorld Entertainment, I want to thank you for joining us morning. As you heard today, we are confident in our business and strategy and sincerely look forward to coming out of this crisis and continuing to drive improved operating and financial results and long term value for all our stakeholders. And just with that, I want to say thank you and I look forward to talking to you again next quarter.

Speaker 0

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