Everland named one of top 10 theme parks

Samsung Everland Inc. on Tuesday said its theme park “Everland” was ranked among the global top 10 of such facilities for a fifth straight year in 2010.

Everland stood at 10th place, with 6.88 million visitors according to recent figures from the Themed Entertainment Association.

Everland has been included in the list of top 10 theme parks since 2006, the Seoul-based company said.

In the category for water-themed parks, Everland’s Caribbean Bay grabbed fourth place with the total number of visitors tallied at 1.73 million.

Caribbean Bay in 2007 had stood at third place before dropping a notch to fourth in 2008. In 2009, it placed fifth.

Everland was launched in 1976, about a decade after Samsung Everland was created. It stands as the nation’s largest amusement park.

Samsung Everland has over the years built a sprawling entertainment and food business around Everland. The company now has significant market share in golf resorts and food services.

Samsung Everland also served as a holding company for Samsung Group.

The latest figures from TEA showed that the Magic Kingdom theme park in Walt Disney World Resort in the U.S. had the largest number of visitors of 16.97 million last year to take first place in its survey.

Disneyland Park, also based in the U.S., took second place, followed by Tokyo’s Disneyland.

Back in Korea, indoor theme park Lotte World took 14th place with 5.55 million visitors.

By Kim Ji-hyun (jemmie@heraldcorp.com)