Attractions 'fighting for life' as season starts

Tourism businesses in the South West say they are approaching the Easter break under growing pressure from rising running costs and uncertainty over how higher fuel and living expenses could affect visitor numbers. After a number of closures in recent years, some attractions say new investment could help boost trade and secure their future.

"Easter is the yardstick", says Josh Haywood of Crealy Theme Park in Devon. "We'll be able to judge the success of our whole season in the next 10 days."

Crealy is one of the region's biggest attractions with 500,000 visitors a year and hundreds of employees.

It has just spent £500k on a new thrill ride, Pirates' Plummet, and says the investment is crucial.

In recent years other park based attractions have closed down in the region, including Flambards and Dairyland in Cornwall.

"We've seen theme parks and attractions chuck in the towel. It does feel like we are fighting for our lives," Haywood says.

"It's tough out there, national minimum wage, national insurance increases but we feel as a business, it's the right time to invest. New rides, new accommodation, new facilities".

A second new ride, which cost around £1m, is due to open in May.

"If you want people to spend their hard earned cash, you've got to give them something to spend it on," he says.

During a visit to Crealy on Tuesday, Tourism Minister Stephanie Peacock said the sector was "hugely important".

"We want to attract an increasing number of visitors to the UK, we want them to stay longer and travel further," she said.

Peacock added: "Talking to businesses here, I've heard that there is a cumulative challenge for the sector, the government is listening and that's why we're going to publish our tourism growth strategy in the months ahead."

The new owner of Paignton and Newquay Zoos is also investing in the attractions.

"I hope that we will grow the visitor numbers by between five and ten percent this year", says Serena Van Kammen from Dutch company Libema, which bought both zoos at the end of 2025.

The company is investing £2.5m at Paignton Zoo this year, building new enclosures, habitats and introducing new species like white rhino. Libema also plans to spend around £10m across both sites in the years ahead.

"We need to grow visitor numbers to make sure we have a healthy, financially fit organisation and we can keep investing in the zoo, not only to keep the visitors coming in but also so that we can continue with the work we do in education and conservation," Van Kammen adds.

River Dart Country Park in Devon, which gets about 70,000 visitors a year, is celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2026.

Managing director Roger Sell says the park employs about 30 or 40 young people each year and costs have risen.

"In the last few years the lower wage brackets for young people has been massively increasing and that costs you more money.

"I'm hearing a lot of attractions saying they are not going to employ young people any more".

In 2024, Flambards theme park in Helston said it was closing "with immediate effect" because of rising costs and falling visitor numbers.

Dingles Fairground Museum in Lifton, on the Devon and Cornwall border, closed in October 2024.

An indoor amusement park which opened on the same site in 2025, closed less than two months after opening.

The then manager of Dingles Fun Park in Lifton, Tom Ellis, said the park had "incredible support from the locals" but the "vast scale" of the site meant the rent was more than the park could generate.

"We hoped to bring in more attractions as planned, however we just couldn't quite obtain a long-term lease to suit us and the landlords," he said.

Paignton and Newquay Zoos were put on the market in October 2025 with their owner, the Wild Planet Trust, blaming financial difficulties.

Stephen Kings, the trust's interim chief executive, said it wanted to "secure both zoos as thriving institutions".

The news came on the same day that Axe Valley Wildlife Park, near Axminster in Devon, closed its doors, citing "difficult" times for businesses.

General manager of Visit Devon Sally Everton said she asked Peacock, about government support and funding during her visit this week.

"I made a plea that if there's any more funding the South West should be looked at, as at the moment we get zero," she said.

"Things like marketing, our competitors are very much out there.

"We need to make a noise, we need to shout, we need the funding to do that."

She said marketing was "incredibly expensive" and Visit Devon currently relies on payments from partners to fund it.

A government spokesperson said: "We have the right economic plan - we're reforming business rates to back hospitality, with a £4.3bn support package to limit bills rises, alongside capping Corporation Tax at 25%, cutting red tape and taking action on the cost of living to boost the sector.

"Increasing the National Minimum Wage boosts pay for over 200,000 young workers, and employer NICs are lower when hiring under‑21s."

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