Ripley teams with Dutch company for photo venture
Ripley Entertainment and Amsterdam-based GoPhoto have formed a joint venture designed to expand souvenir photography at attractions in North America.
Ripley, headquartered in Orlando, is installing GoPhoto equipment in multiple aquariums and “odditoriums,” museum-inspired attractions stocked with unusual artifacts and information. Visitors strike poses at the kiosks, then buy traditional prints or videos with added special effects they can use on TikTok and other social media platforms.
Photography systems devised by GoPhoto require fewer hands-on workers and increase revenue for attractions, according to company executives.
“There’s tons of flexibility with the system. There’s very little training required to utilize it,” said Pablo Chavez, a regional manager for Ripley.
“It’s a lot faster, and it’s less cumbersome for a staff member because all they have to worry about is being friendly and welcoming to the guests,” he said.
The digital age prompted changes in the business, said Daniel Duivestein, CEO and founder of GoPhoto. His initial interest hatched when he and his brother operated an observation wheel in Finland that needed a photo system.
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“I have some photography background and some tech background as well, so I thought it was a nice project to take on to add an additional experience to our wheel operation,” Duivestein said.
The GoPhoto system gives attractions internal control “instead of giving 50-60-70% away to an outside vendor,” he said.
And it lets visitors decide if they want old-school prints or an artificial-intelligence enhanced video. Photo magnets remain a strong seller, Duivestein said. Venues can offer customized digital backgrounds. The system uses self-service options, QR codes and cloud storage.
“It’s just to close the gap between what the younger generation wants and what the older generation wants,” Duivestein said.
“We provide the tech and expertise to capture that moment, even enhance that moment, so they can take it home and share with friends and family,” Duivestein said. “And in 10, 15, years, open a drawer and they get reminded by the amazing day that they had,”
After working with GoPhoto, Jim Pattison – owner of Jim Pattison Group, the Canadian company that acquired Ripley in 1985 – suggested that the companies partner to expand in the U.S., Duivestein said.
“It’s not that easy to move into the U.S. with a company. You need a network, you need expertise to actually grow your market,” he said. “We can raise money, but just with money alone you’re not going to make it in the U.S.”
Enter Ripley, which operates 100 attractions in 10 nations, including locations on Orlando’s International Drive, in St. Augustine and at Panama City Beach.
“Being a 100-year-plus entertainment company, we can provide a lot of feedback to them on how to develop the technology further, how to scale that and how to improve on the both hardware and software in order to provide a better product to not just us, but also other amusement companies that might be interested,” Ripley’s Chavez said.
For GoPhoto, artificial intelligence goes beyond photo enhancements and into statistics, Duivestein said.
“AI also provides a lot of data about the visitors. We can see what content is performing better than others. If it’s not performing well, why is it? Is it in the wrong spot? Is the team not doing a good job?” he said.
“We provide photo products, we provide pricing strategies, we provide data analytics,” said Duivestein, who is moving to Orlando as part of the venture’s push.
GoPhoto customers have included Icebar Berlin in Germany, a soccer stadium in Amsterdam as well as Jurassic World: The Exhibition and the Disney 100 Exhibition in London.
“There’s a huge community that we’re building among all the clients that we have to share best-case practices, because why should one aquarium not share how successful a certain photo op is with another aquarium? It doesn’t hurt your business so why not share that?”