The Story of Dinotropolis

At Leisurexpo 97, Dinotropolis, a children's entertainment center in Caracas, Venezuela, won the Newsmaker Award for the best new foreign FEC.

The beginning of Dinotropolis dates back to a day in November 1994 when Enrico Banchi was looking through magazines in the American Embassy in Caracas for ideas for a new use for 70,000 square feet of third floor space in the Unicentro El Marquas, the second largest shopping mall in Caracas. The space was only rented occasionally for exhibitions. The shopping center's owners wanted to renovate it as an anchor attraction to increase the shopping center's market share and traffic. Enrico ran across an advertisement in one of the magazines for the upcoming Leisurexpo in Orlando, Florida. The idea for an FEC was born. He and Vincente Perez, one of the company's Directors, made plans to attend Leisurexpo 95 to search out more information and help.

They attended a seminar at the convention by Randy White of the White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group in Kansas City, Missouri. They met with Randy and found an instant synergy between their entrepreneurial energies and his company's expertise. Randy then introduced Enrico and Vincente to Frank Seninsky ("Frank the Crank") of Alpha-Omega Amusements of East Brunswick, New Jersey, also a seminar speaker and one of the leading experts in coin-operated redemption and games in FECs.

Several weeks later Randy flew to Caracas to evaluate the property's potential for renovation as an FEC and to assist with the feasibility study. Based upon the desire to attract a family market of parents accompanying children to the FEC and the shopping center, it was decided that the space would be renovated as a children's entertainment center for children between 2 and 10 years old. The White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group was then hired to develop plans, designs and a storyline and theme for the Center and to assist the owners with starting the business.

Extensive cultural research was conducted. On the basis of the findings on Caracains' traditions, values and aspirations, a storyline was developed. In abbreviated version it tells about some Caracas children who find a buried space ship that flies them on auto-pilot to the planet Gemini. There they find a civilization of intelligent dinosaurs - Momosauros, Quack-a-Dinos and Toromoros. They meet Max, head of the Momosauros, and visit the capital city, Dinotropolis. There are wonderful Play Palaces for the Momosauro children built and run by the Quack-a-Dinos. The Toromoros live on the dark side of the planet and are jealous of the Momosauros' hot fudge and flowers. Each day one of the Momosauros sits on the secret hot fudge recipe to hide it. The Toromoros are always knocking over the Momosauros looking for the recipe and also trampling their flowers. The children teach the Toromoros about electricity so they can light up their side of the planet and grow flowers. The children are heroes so Max returns to Caracas with the school children and helps them build their own play palace which they name Dinotropolis in honor of Max's home city.

With the storyline as the foundation, White Hutchinson then developed a new design style of dinosaur-tropical-deco to create the 'sense of place' that is an essential element of theming.

Developing Dinotropolis was no easy matter. Venezuela experienced 80% annual inflation throughout the Center's development. Since the space didn't meet modern structural requirements for the weight load of an FEC, major structural deficiencies had to be overcome. This included removal of 4 inches of the concrete floor slab and replacement with light-weight concrete and special engineering of the roller coaster floor supports to distribute the structural load caused by its G-forces. Plumbing had to be run through operating stores located under the Center. A new electric substation had to be constructed underground. A new monumental stairway entrance had to be built from the mall's second level as the entrance to the Center. And half-way through construction, it was discovered that the entire roof over the Center had to be re-built.

The White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group coordinated the custom design, purchasing, shipping and installation of $1.5 million of equipment and furnishings that came from the United States, Canada and Europe. Even the logistics of something as simple as installing the custom designed U.S. carpet required flying in a trained carpet installer to oversee the installation since the carpet was unique to Caracas.

Dinotropolis features the world's first roller coaster (by Wisdom Industries) which travels through the middle of a soft-contained-play unit (by Omni Little Tikes). Alpha-Omega selected a custom mix of over 110 video and redemption games and modified them in their New Jersey plant before shipment to operate on a debit card (Dinocard) system. Outside on a large 6,000 square foot second floor patio there is a large Hags Play climbing structure, a Crank 'n' Roll train, interactive water play and a maze ("Laberinto loco para Ni - os") by Minotaur Amusements, Inc. Six birthday party suites cover 10,000 square feet to accommodate the large size birthday parties and their pinata breakings. Each party suite is serviced by a service kitchen. In addition, several of the suites have a special room where fathers can play games such as pool and darts during the parties which is the custom in Caracas. Rather than the typical redemption counter, the White Hutchinson designed a 700 square foot redemption prize store with prize displays, separate ticket counter stations, and three prize purchase points-of-sale.

Food is no small matter at Dinotropolis. Max's Cafe features a wide selection of fun foods including made-from-scratch pizza, hot dogs, submarine sandwiches and fresh pastas. The largest seating area for the cafe is next to one of the Center's most popular areas, the hands-on/discovery or edutainment area that is specially designed for toddlers through 6-year-olds. There are tree houses, a pretend supermarket, a play house, pretend dress-up, a puppet theater, a dinosaur dig, a construction area, a fleet of cars and trucks for children to ride and a special dedicated area for older infants and early toddlers and their parents. And adjoining the area is Dinoteatro stage and theater area for live performances.

Dinotropolis uses innovative software to check guests in and out. Using bar coded wristbands, the system knows the exact composition of the entire family or party group and the current occupancy of the Center. For example, a family with 2 adults and 3 children are checked in and when they exit, a scanner recognizes the family as the correct family unit and checks them out. An adult can first leave the facility alone if there is another adult in his/her family remaining with the children. On many busy weekends, the system allows admissions to be stopped at a predetermined Center capacity to prevent over crowding. And the tight security maintained at the Center includes metal detectors and gun checking (a high percentage of Caracains carry guns) and no adults or children are allowed in the Center by themselves. They must enter and leave together as an adult-child grouping.

Since opening in August 1996, Dinotropolis has experienced a peak daily attendance of 3,300. Annual attendance is expected to exceed 400,000.

One feature that sets Dinotropolis apart from most FECs is its acoustics. Guests are not subjected to the loud reverberate noise of most FECs and can conduct conversations throughout the Center at normal voice levels. This is not an accident. From the very first steps of conceptual design, the White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group make acoustics an integral part of the design process. Thorburn Associates of Castro Valley, California, were called in as acoustical consultants on the project. As a result of the acoustic engineering that was part of the design process, special acoustic treatments increased Dinotropolis' cost less than one percent (1%).

Dinotropolis is not a static FEC. The owners and management are already making innovations and improvements standard operating procedures to continually enhance the guest experience and value. Max's Cafe's menu will soon be getting some new items. New games are being added. Max's Journal will soon debut with its first issue. And the White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group has been retained to design children's art studios and Exploratropolis, a special educational area with a mix of hands-on learning activities for 6 to 9-year-olds and early grade school field trips.

Randy White of White Hutchinson says one of the great rewards of their work with foreign FEC's like Dinotropolis is that their company is always learning new ideas and concepts for FECs. "The owners and management of Dinotropolis had no preconceived ideas of what the FEC should be. This allowed us and the suppliers to freely collaborate with Enrico and the owners and introduce concepts that might have been quickly rejected in the U.S. by to the conventional wisdom that already dominates the FEC industry there." And Enrico and the owners are more than satisfied with the end results - tens of thousands of smiling repeat guests and a highly profitable business.