Ghostly Manor Branding & Marketing Review

Paultons Park's new for 2025 ride is coming along nicely and features a really exciting and engaging marketing campaign for an equally exciting ride concept.

Ghostly Manor at Paultons Park

In 2024, Paultons revealed their new ride, a "gameplay theatre" from german manufacturer, Mack Rides with theming, storyline, & technology from Lagatronics, Leisure Expert Group, & Themics. Alongside the construction, Paultons have started their marketing campaign for the ride, teasing all the elements the ride will include.

Guests are invited inside Dr Kinley's Manor, a renowned ghost hunter who is on a trip to the arctic. Back at his manor, his captured ghosts have escaped so its up to the guests to retrieve them using laser blasters. All of this information has been nicely revealed through the park's marketing plan that has involved videos from Dr Kinley, logo reveals, construction updates, & an online game.

Logo Design

There are many examples of spooky logos created for the theme park rides as well as horror movies that could compare to Ghost Manor's logo. These logos communicate a level of horror depending on the audience they're aiming for. For example, the logos for the killer clown movie series "IT" & "IT: Chapter 2" feature a dark red, sinister design that resembles very clearly that its a horror movie aimed at adults who enjoy scary stuff. Ghostly Manor, however is aimed at families with the park being voted the UK's no. 1 family theme park, and the ride's logo resembles this to be appealing to families and a younger audience.

Branding & Marketing

The marketing campaign for Ghostly Manor has been brilliant so far, with multiple video releases from Dr Kinley explaining the ride's backstory. The first video, revealed at a superfans event at the park, gave a first look at the premise of the ride and what spooky-ness level the experience would provide. The animation style of the characters and ghosts, as well as the language used throughout gives the impression that the ride will be a perfect level of horror for families and children that won't leave them with nightmares! The mix of the shooting element also creates a fun challenge for younger audiences, creating a game-like experience.

As well as the themed videos, the park have been releasing construction updates with one of the directors, Lawrence Mancey. These videos have been a great insight into how the ride is progressing and what atmosphere it will create, as well as adding to the excitement leading to its opening day.

Online Game

The park have also released an online game on their website aimed at younger audiences where you have to shoot ghosts but not let them touch your phantom phaser! Creating this game that children would enjoy is such a good idea to excite them to ride and will communicate to them that the ride won't be really scary.

My review

So far, the marketing campaign for Ghostly Manor has done a great job at exciting both adults and children to ride. The logo design, videos, game have all been created in a family style with a hint of spookiness which I believe is the perfect blend for the park's audience. The green and gold colour scheme mixed with bold, all caps typography create a big sense of excitement with a good amount of spookiness, emphasising the need to be brave and capture the escaped ghosts! Comparing Ghostly Manor to another haunted style dark ride that has opened recently, Curse at Alton Manor at Alton Towers gives a clear difference in the atmosphere and target audience of both rides. Curse has a much more eerie atmosphere created in the ride experience and the logo with its all white, gothic style. This however, matches Alton Towers' target audience and the existing rides that also feature horror themes such as the alien theme of Nemesis Reborn, sacrification of Wicker Man, & the demented hypnotic theme of The Smiler.

I'm very excited to see what Ghostly Manor is like when it opens later this year and as a current ride operator at the park, I'm even more excited to work on it!