Even under the umbrella of travel and tourism, somebody always has to ruin it.
Now, let me preface this by saying I fully expect the onslaught of passive aggressive – OK, aggressive aggressive – comments. You’ll want to call me a boomer; you’ll think I’m telling folks to get off my lawn, blah, blah, blah.
But this is why we can’t have nice things.
Last year, Six Flags introduced an add-on to its season park pass. For an extra $80, a patron could add on an unlimited meal plan – well, unlimited defined as two meals a day, a snack and unlimited drinks.
This past week, Six Flags dropped the promotion.
The reason?
A TikTok user made a video showing others how to game the system, a video that was copied and shared by others to the social media site. The user, known as “Six Flags Scoundrel,” basically showed how he took advantage of his proximity to a Six Flags park, bought the $200 season pass, added the $80 unlimited meal plan and showed how he could get $2,000 worth of food over the course of less than a year.
Six Flags caught on, realized it was losing money on the deal and ended the promotion. Six Flags CEO Selim Bassoul said it also made for longer lines at food service locations in the parks.
“They ruin the experience for somebody who came in on a single-day ticket with their family…who paid a lot of money to come…now they have 45 minutes to an hour to wait to get a meal while those other people are choking up the line for $80 for the whole season,” he said on a quarterly earnings conference call.
Lovely.
Gee, that TikTok user must be so proud of himself.
Now, let me say this about social media – I love it, with an asterisk. I think it can be informative, funny, inspiring and newsy. But it can also be destructive and woefully full of misinformation.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say that this TikTok user falls into that last category like he’s some QAnon disciple promising that John F. Kennedy Jr. is coming back from the dead to personally reinstate Donald Trump as President.
But, let’s face it – “Six Flags Scoundrel” did ruin it for everybody. I supposed you could call it another travel hack or shortcut, but, really, who did it benefit? That one TikTok user? Maybe a handful of others? And what’s the point of even making the video when he had to know it would eventually get back to Six Flags and that this would be the end result?
Perhaps it’s me, but I don’t see the whole point.
I can only say, this is why we can’t have nice things.
