Paying for Parking on The Way Out of Ark Encounter

My brother Larry and sister Linda and I took our elderly parents on a bucket-list road trip to Kentucky to visit the Ark Encounter. As we entered the main parking lot, I immediately noticed something radically different from every other park or attraction I had ever visited: there was no booth to collect parking fees. There was just an arm, and as you pulled up, the arm lifted and you were able to enter the parking area. They still had a couple of people to guide you to the closest area to park, but had no employees collecting money for parking.

At first, I couldn’t believe an attraction of this type would not charge for parking! But as we got up to the ticket area and were buying our tickets to enter the Ark, we could see signs everywhere that said, “Make sure you pay and get your parking ticket before you leave.” Sure enough, right as we exited the bus that deposited at the Ark site, there was a series of kiosks to pay for parking. When we finished our day, we would insert the ticket into an automated machine that would recognize we had paid and lift the gate arm.

As we were planning to leave mid-afternoon and then return for the evening, we inquired whether or not the one parking pass would work all day. Assured that it would, we enjoyed the Ark, left around 3:00, and used our pass to exit. We came back around 6:30, and again, enjoyed the rest of the exhibits. However, when we were leaving at 9:00 and inserted the ticket, the arm did not lift. We were one of the last to leave the park, so there were only a few cars behind us, but we still felt the “someone is in line behind me” urgency to resolve the problem. There was a call button, although pressing it did not seem to generate any result. We were discussing what to do next when we heard a click as if someone was coming on the speaker to converse with us, but before anything was said, the gate arm raised and we were able to leave.

We wondered what had happened. Did they have a way to know our ticket was valid for that day? Was the arm just stuck, and some command from them caused it to unstick? Or, perhaps, they raise the arm for anyone who is blocking the path so other cars can exit. This last option intrigued us: could we have not paid for a parking ticket and still left? Maybe. When you consider how much cost they avoid by not manning the entry and instead having an automated exit, even if they do have to give several dozen freebies each day, it is still likely a great business decision.

Think about your organization, your enterprise. Is there a practice you assume must be done that way (ie: paying for parking on the way in) that could be completely turned around? What if you could reverse a time-honored way of providing your goods and services that would increase customer satisfaction while also dramatically decreasing costs?

Think about it.