Revenue per visitor calculator: what each child visit is worth

The formula

total sales                 = play + food and drink + parties + passes + retail + other
revenue per visitor         = total sales / child visits in the period
revenue per visitor by category = category sales / child visits
revenue mix by category     = category sales / total sales

What is revenue per visitor, and why per child visit?

Revenue per visitor is everything a venue sold in a period divided by the number of child visits in that period. It answers a question no price list reaches: what a family actually spends when they come, once the coffee, the socks, the extra half hour and the occasional party are counted alongside the entry. The unit is the child visit, rather than the family or the transaction, because it is the unit your capacity, your timers and your break-even are already counted in, so the numbers line up.

How do you count visits consistently?

Decide once and keep to it. The cleanest rule is that a visit is a child entering the floor: every started timer, every pass punch, every party child. Do not count adults, because they do not use capacity, and do not count a transaction as a visit, because one sale often admits several children. In PlayAreaOS the timer board holds this count already, each started clock is one child on the floor, and a pass punched at the POS is a visit too, so the number is read rather than estimated.

Which sales belong in each category?

• Play and entry: sessions, entry, and paid extensions of time.
• Food and drink: the café, plus drinks and snacks rung at the desk. In play cafés it can be the largest category rather than the second one; your own mix decides.
• Parties: packages, extra children and party add-ons, for parties held in the period, not booked in it.
• Passes and memberships: multi-visit passes sold in the period; see the caution below.
• Retail: socks, toys, merchandise.
• Other: room hire, events, vouchers sold.

Whatever you include, keep every category on the same VAT basis, all inclusive or all exclusive. Mixing the two skews the mix towards whichever categories carry VAT in the price. The rate is whatever your venue has configured; this page assumes none, and the VAT pricing calculator converts a figure from one basis to the other.

What about passes?

A pass is cash today for visits later, which makes it the one category that can mislead. Sell a lot of passes in a month and revenue per visitor jumps; the month those passes are used, visits rise and the per-visit number falls. There are two honest ways to handle it. On a cash basis, count pass sales when sold and accept the swing. On a per-use basis, count a pass at the moment each visit is punched, at the pass price divided by the visits it contains. Either is fine; switching between them is not. The passes and memberships guide covers the deferred-revenue side in more detail, and membership ROI prices the pass itself.

How should you use the result?

As a trend against your own baseline, not against anyone else’s number. Run the same period each month and watch the direction. A rising number with steady visits means families are spending more per visit. A rising number with falling visits is a warning dressed as good news: fewer families, spending more. A falling number with rising visits often follows a price cut or a pass promotion, and is only good if the total went up. The KPI glossary defines revenue per child alongside the other numbers to read it with.

The per-category lines are where the decisions live. If food and drink is a small slice per visit, the café is a menu and placement question. If parties are a large slice, the party profit calculator tells you whether that revenue is actually margin. And once you know what a visit is worth, the break-even calculator, which counts only play revenue, is easier to read: a venue earning well per visit from the café and parties breaks even on fewer play visits than that page shows.