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Magic Memories Provide Personalized Photo Book Solution at Pretoria Zoo

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Magic Memories, the company with a “mission to turn the worldwide attraction photography business on its head”, has provided its full service personalized storybook solution to Pretoria Zoo, the National Zoological Garden of South Africa.

Magic Memories provides attractions photography solutions worldwide with around 100 partner attractions in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, China and the United States.

Together with South African license partner the Happy Snappy Photo Company, Magic Memories has created a world class visually rich photo book solution for Pretoria Zoo.  The Zoo’s ‘Hero’ animals are featured in an interactive photo experience, placing guests in ‘wild’ backgrounds with some of their favourite animals.

Magic Memories thinks and behaves like a tourism company, understanding the guest experience and producing stories that do more than simply keep the memory alive.  The photo book solution, introduced at Pretoria Zoo at Easter 2013, creates unique memories for guests which are also available online and can be shared via social media.

Happy Snappy’s James Cussen says, “This was our first zoo in South Africa and having similar operating models in our other sites means we can confidently deliver on day 1 based from experience.  We also learnt from our previous installations when it came to recruitment, production flow, staff training and other key areas of operation to ensure we are continually improving and adding increased value to our partners.”

Happy Snappy also operates the Magic Memories photo solution at a number of other sites in South Africa, including the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway, the Wheel of Excellence in Cape Town, uShaka Marine World and the Orange and Breede Rivers.  Specially selected, well trained staff are a vital component of all Magic Memories/Happy Snappy venue partnerships explains Cussen:

“We interviewed a large volume of potential staff, well ahead of time and picked those we knew had the attitude that fit the very specific Magic Memories/Happy Snappy guidelines for success.  We looked for high energy personalities who would buy into the high quality product, had previous retail experience and who had a good track record of reliability. The Magic Memories model, blending a very high quality of products, people and processes is a new concept to South Africa Wildlife Parks and Zoos and guests have been impressed with the solution and we are very happy with the operation to date.”

Magic Memories CEO,  John Wikstrom, adds, “We are delighted with Happy Snappy, who continue to expand their South African footprint into fantastic attractions, while also continuing to uphold our core promise to make people smile.”

Pretoria Zoo is the largest in South Africa, welcoming more than 600, 000 visitors a year.  Commenting on behalf of Pretoria Zoo, Craig Allenby, Manager of Commercial Services and Business Development at the National Zoological Gardens of South Africa, said, “The Happy Snappy photography solution has been the perfect integration for us. Their staffing has made a positive impact both for our relationship and our sales performance with the additional reward of our guests really feeling like they have been part of a truly wonderful experience here at Pretoria Zoo. We look forward to seeing the product, service and technology from Happy Snappy continue to evolve into the future.”

 

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