Following the tragic incident at Dreamworld in October it hasn't just been Ardent Leisure Group (ASX: AAD) that has seen a drop in business.
MovieWorld and SeaWorld operator Village Roadshow Ltd (ASX: VRL) has unfortunately seen a drop in visitor numbers to its theme parks as well according to an announcement out of the company today.
Its share price has plunged 8% to $4.09 on the news.
At its annual general meeting in November the company revealed that after a strong start to the financial year, trading at its theme parks became inconsistent following the Dreamworld incident.
Today's release reveals that although international and inter-state visitor numbers remain in line with the prior year, the key local Queensland market has seen a 12% drop in attendances since the Dreamworld incident.
This is a big problem for the company as the market represents approximately 60% of its total attendees.
As well as a drop in ticket sales revenue, management expects to see a decline from food and beverage, retail, and other in-park revenue in its half-year results.
The company has acknowledged that it may take time for the community to fully recover from the Dreamworld tragedy, but hopes to speed up the process through a new PR and marketing campaign.
Whist things may remain reasonably volatile for Village Roadshow in the short to medium-term, I believe the hard work management has done at transforming the rest of the business has put it on a path to solid long-term growth.
This could make it a decent option for patient value investors in my opinion, especially with its shares trading at 12x estimated FY 2017's earnings and providing a trailing fully franked 6.8% dividend.
