To be shocked by the cost of this?

[squashedsandwich]

It’s £20.95 per adult to walk around our Christmas light trail this year. Tickets have just been released. It does look fantastic, but it’s only a mile long.

It’s £15.95 for a 3-15 year old, and free for under 2s.

They’re doing family tickets, 2 adults and 2 kids for £60.

I think it’s sad that at some point soon these activities are reserved for only those who can afford them. Maybe that has always been the case and I have been living under a rock but as someone who is pregnant with their first, I can’t see how families aren’t bankrupt over the school holidays and festive periods just simply from doing these kinds of activities! As with anything, the more DC you have the more it bumps the price up. I know you can intersperse them with free things to do, but I’m sure lots of families at Christmas will feel compelled to pay over the odds just to make it a nice and magical time.

We will likely go. It will be nice for baby’s first Christmas. £40 for us and an under 2 would be affordable right now but I can imagine when you have two in primary the cost must get crazy.

AIBU thinking these companies are taking the mick?

They are all around this price

But you're likely going to pay and go so obviously people can afford it and there's a market for it.

It's a bigger hike in price at our local pinetum too. But it's become a family tradition since Father Christmas got outgrown so we'll go but it will cost around £150 once the hot chocolate/mulled wine and doughnuts have been factored in.

OP, with all gentleness, this isn't about some people being priced out of these wonderful holiday opportunities (which, you're right, they are and have been for years), it's about how much smart/mercenary money-making enterprises can gouge out of customers by convincing them this is a must-do event, that they'll be "doing Christmas wrong" or "letting down their kids" or "missing out" if they don't.

Social media has convinced us all that there's this really narrow path we have to follow to be doing parenting, relationships, and friendships right, and - surprise! - it almost always involves spending vast amounts of cash just to have something to put online. Take the kids for a walk with a flask of hot chocolate at dusk, take them to see town Christmas lights, take them to a candlelit church service (if you're comfortable in a church), get them to spot holly, robins and mistletoe in the wild. None of these cost anything, and they'll be much more memorable than yet another #makingmemories occasion that you have to pay £££££ for.

Assume you live in Oxfordshire too? 😂

Blenheim palace tickets are very expensive BUT given the display they put on I imagine it costs them £££ too, so no, I don't think it's reasonable to ask private companies to charge "reasonable" amounts (whatever that means to people) when they are putting on a luxury display and no one is forced to go or buy the extras. Unfortunately there is gross socioeconomic inequality in this country that recent governments have failed to reduce.

In some ways I'm not so bothered that some families can't go to luxury Christmas displays - what grates me is the fact we live in a society where some parents can afford private school fees whereas others can't afford shoes for their children.

It’s extortionate. We looked at Tulleys for Christmas and it’s nearly £300 for a family of 5. Eye watering. My kids don’t expect it, they haven’t even asked, just thought it would be nice to do but not £300 worth. All days out are £££, there’s a noticeable difference between price per person I’ve found between having my eldest and youngest.

I’m sure the shopping centre Santa’s gifts were cheap, as you say. But I remember being thrilled by them.

Agreed!

Penguinfeet24
you may be interested to know that THIS year Blenheim palace are charging £197.00 for 2 adults and 2 children 😱this does however include Neverland!!

Kew Gardens looks to be about £83.00 so you pay your money and make your choice.

I'm shocked at the cost of everything nowadays but that just sounds like a total rip off.

I was just planning on walking around our local city, I didn't even realise these paid for events existed. I understand that some families will be priced out but I'm sure most children would be just as happy doing as we are.

These things are pricey but we found you only go a couple times in a child's life. If you do it when they are a baby, they won't even remember it. Maybe 5 or 6 years old for each child. Once they reach about 11 years old, they lose interest. It's not something you have to do every year or anything like that. So one way to go is, this year we do the lights, next year we do a pantomime, and so on.

We did a few of these types of things when we had a couple of children, but we're expecting our 6th now, and these things are just not worth the massive expense. Our local town has a free Father Christmas visit, and they each get a selection box, that's enough for them to be happy with their visit.
I think if we do anything this year, it'll be Longleat or something like that so there's much more involved for the cost. I'd have loved to do the Polar Express, but it'd be £387 for us.

Surely you can just wander around and look at the lights in your neighbourhood?

They may be free to the end user but they are not free to put on. Even for the council - as I'm sure you understand. Private businesses are not local government and will charge to cover their costs AND make a profit. Like any business. Do you also resent the cost of a cinema ticket? Or a meal out? Nobody is forcing you to go to see the lights or rely on any other form of paid-for 'entertainment'.

Talking from experience here, babies don’t enjoy light trails. They just cry the whole time as it’s cold, even when you put your baby in so many layers they’re practically a human beach ball bobbling about in the pram

I think it’s sad that at some point soon these activities are reserved for only those who can afford them.

Yes - and increasingly that extends to education and healthcare. We live in one of the most unequal societies in the western world. There is a chance the new govt will do something to try and address this but I’m not holding my breath.

That's mad pricing, I would never pay that. I think there's a lot of businesses struggling because their suppliers are taking the piss with extortionate prices, and as always, it's the end user, the public, who gets all the costs passed onto them.

If you go anyway, despite complaining about how expensive if it, then you are part of the problem.
Of course a business is going to charge too much if people are willing to pay anyway!

The trouble is, expectations are high, lights are expensive and the labour cost involved in setting them up must be astronical too. Then there's the cost of public liability insurance and qualified electricians to check the whole thhing. It wouldn't surpirse me if it didn't cost at least £250k to set up a half decent light show that extended over a mile. And probably a lot more than that. Then, it's probably £10k a week to run it, and they need to make a profit. So you are probably looking at the thick end of £500k to recover.

At £60 a family that's nearly 8,500 tickets, or 34,000 visitors to be viable. Sure, the big ones will get that - but that's stretch for many I expect... And £10 per adult and £5 for a child is 2/3rds the curent pricing - so you need to sell 50% more tickets... You can't just throw up a few strings of LEDs you bought cheap in the sale at Homebase and expect people to be happy!!

ALL activities are reserved for "those who can afford them". It just sounds like you've met your affordability limit. You're lucky - some people couldn't even afford something like this even if it was £1 each.

If you think this is bad, wait until you start paying for activities on a daily basis and then nursery! These ticket prices are absolutely nothing in comparison.

That wasn't my point though. It's that there are a shrinking number of people who can increasingly do more of these things and an increasing number of people who can do less of them. And the gap between them is widening all the time.

I took my 3 month old to the garden centre last year 😂😂 she didn’t care at all. We will walk around my mums neighbourhood this year as they go all out

Well that may be true, but there's still plenty of people who can pay the prices.

Things sell out quickly, look at all the Taylor Swift tickets going for hundreds of pounds? Big festivals sell out in hours. Center Parcs is always full. etc etc.

There's still enough people deciding that they can afford these things and they are worth the money.