The Principal Factors That Affect The Carousel Rides' Prices

The carousel is one of the oldest traditional amusement facilities. Almost all theme amusement parks must be equipped with amusement equipment. Understanding the price factors affecting the carousel can help amusement park operators make reasonable procurement of a carousel suitable for their own amusement park's positioning, to improve their operating income!

7 Key Factors That Affect the Price of a Carousel

1. Appearance Design Cost

When looking for a high-quality carousel for a theme park, the first thing to consider is the appearance of the carousel. Attention-grabbing colors and a unique appearance can make your amusement park quickly become the focus of attention, and often changes to the appearance of the carousel will increase the additional cost of the carousel.

Direct Purchase-Lowest Cost

If you are directly purchasing the existing style carousel from the production factory without any change in appearance, then this is the lowest cost option, because a production factoryoften operates for a long period of time, theycan grasp the production quality and production links, and can provide direct purchase style carousel at the lowest price.

Color Adjustment-Medium Cost

In order to adapt to the theme or color of the amusement park, if you want to make color adjustments on the original style provided by the production company, this is a good choice, as long as the replacement of different color accessories, such as the color of the top of the merry-go-round, replacement of different colors of the seats, etc., canbe a very low-cost way to complete the theme adaptation ofthe park.

Custom Appearance Design-High Cost

If your specific theme park or IP requires customization, and you need to modify the merry-go-round, this requires a higher cost, which often involves the design of new accessories, the merry-go-round accessories, and seat shape customization. For example, if you want all the seats to be animal-shaped, as well as jungle features for the appearance of the merry-go-round, this requires the production factory to work with appearance designers to design a new amusement equipment, which also consumes a lot of time and costs a lot of money.

The importance of appearance depends on the respective customer base. For example, if most of your amusement park's patrons are children, you should choose a design that includes superheroes and cartoon characters. This is because their favorite cartoon characters or superheroes will instantly attract youngsters to ride the carousel. Additionally, slightly older children will enjoy more thrilling rides, including those with swinging chairs. An important point to remember is that the more complex the design of the ride, the more expensive it is likely to be.

2. Occupied Area

The footprint of a carousel is usually measured in terms of diameter. For example, the footprint of a 36-seat merry-go-round typically ranges from φ9 to 15 meters. The footprint includes the equipment itself and the safety fence that is attached to the equipment. The overall area with the safety fence is usually used to calculate the carousel's footprint. The more seats you choose, the larger the equipment footprint, the more structural support steel, platform, decoration, and fencing materials you need, and the corresponding increase in transportation and installation costs.

3. Equipment Height

Indoor use: The height of the carousel is usually limited by the floor height of the indoor amusement park, which requires advance planning of the amusement park layout and selection of a carousel of the appropriate height.

Outdoor use: the height of the carousel is generally not limited, but in typhoon-prone areas, the requirements for equipment support performance are higher, so the cost increases accordingly.

4. Number of seats

The more seats there are, the more steel is needed to make the swivel arms, and the more horses there are, the higher the requirements for safety features and load-bearing structures, which will directly increase manufacturing and operating costs.

5. Music and Lighting 

The basic model only includes mechanical rotation; most of the rides are equipped with dynamic music, LED lighting, and remote control system, which is more attractive overall, but also more costly.

6.Maintenance and Repair Costs

This is an additional cost that is easily overlooked. Maintenance costs and daily upkeep depend on the quality of the carousel equipment. If the core components such as steel and motor, are of good quality, it will save you a lot of maintenance costs in the future. A carousel produced by a capable manufacturer can theoretically operate for more than 15 years. However, due to erosion from wind, sand, and rain, some parts may be damaged. You can contact the manufacturer to replace them. As long as the core cost components such as fiberglass, motor, and main steel structure, remain stable, it will not cost too much for maintenance and upkeep. The key is to choose a manufacturer with experience and the ability to provide long-term operational maintenance.

7. Production Process and Product Quality

The material a carousel is made of can affect its cost. Carousels can be made from a variety of materials, including fiberglass, steel frames, and more. The quality of the materials and the level of craftsmanship involved in the construction process can significantly affect the price. As a result, high-quality materials and intricate details will increase the overall cost.

SUNHONG is a carousel manufacturing factory that has twenty years of production experience. It has been recognized by more than 200 amusement parks for its high level of craftsmanship, such as CNC cutting, seamless welding, and automotive-grade painting. Because of the high durability, safety, and cost-effective price, SUNHONG is your choice for purchasing and designing a carousel. See more carousels from SUNHONG!

How Much Does a Carousel Cost?

Below, you can visualize the factors that affect the carousel, as well as the main component costs, which will be able to give you a reference for purchasing carousel equipment:

How to Choose a Suitable Carousel for Your Amusement Park？

1. Location and Passenger Flow

The location of the amusement park and the flow of people will determine the carousel you should purchase which carousel. Amusement park operators need to analyze the city center, tourist attractions, tourist resorts, and other attractions to understand the flow of people.

Look at the location: more people or fewer people?

If in the city center, scenic spots, shopping malls, atrium, and other crowded places, it is recommended to choose a large carousel with many seats and an eye-catching appearance;

If it is in the community, parks, and such a stable flow of people, you can choose small and medium-sized carousels; these devices are more suitable for daily operation, because of the lower cost, and are easy to operate to save labor costs.

Look at the crowd: are there more adults or children?

If for ordinary tourists such as a comprehensive crowd, there are special modeling style carousel can make visitors happy to update in social media, such as animal theme, fairy tale style, to meet the demand for taking pictures and shooting videos, but also help you to improve the amusement park in the social platform of the heat;

If it is mainly for children, choose the cartoon modeling, brightly colored children's models of the carousel, which has a smaller footprint, shorter seats, procurement costs are also lower - the carousel is more suitable for children. The purchasing cost is also lower.

Look at the customer flow: decide the number of seats

l High customer flow: it is recommended to choose more than 16 seats;

l Medium or small customer flow: you can just choose a small model with 6~12 seats to save space and budget.

2. Extra Features

Many operators will choose to discard the carousel's lighting and music features in order to reduce purchasing costs, which is the worst choice. For customers, it is the visual and auditory experience that most intuitively attracts them. If you want to enhance the attractiveness and popularity of your amusement park, you should not save money in this area. Instead, the volume and sound quality of the audio should be upgraded with more dazzling lighting effects, which will significantly enhance the competitiveness of your amusement park.

3. Choose a One-stop Service Factory

You should choose a one-stop carousel manufacturer that can provide appearance customization, equipment production and installation, after-sales guidance, and amusement park operation guidance. Choosing an experienced and capable factory can greatly reduce your time cost and purchasing cost.

SUNHONG was founded in 2000 and has 25 years of experience in the design, production, installation, and maintenance of carousel equipment. By choosing us, you can also get the latest amusement park operation guidance support for free, including staff training, safety training, fare setting, and daily operation service guidance, which can help you better purchase the carousel and improve the amusement park's traffic flow and return on investment. Learn more about Sunhong's Carousel.