Vancouver Aquarium offered to U.S. tourism firm

The Vancouver Aquarium was sold to Herschend Enterprises, a US-based private tourism company, to avoid closing due to financial losses last year.

The aquarium announced Thursday the sale by the Ocean Wise Conservation Association and said an agreement had been reached “to save the aquarium from permanent closure due to severe financial challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic”.

“The agreement ensures Vancouver will continue to have a world-class aquarium with the financial strength to build on its 64-year success,” the nonprofit said in a statement.

The aquarium has been closed for the most part since the pandemic began, with the exception of a brief period last summer. The attraction reopened in June with 25 percent capacity and $ 2 million in emergency funding.

It was closed again in September.

Company also theme parks, US aquariums

Ocean Wise predicted the aquarium would run out of money this spring, even after Hundreds of employees laid off, applied for government funding and received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations.

The nonprofit stated that it costs $ 1 million to feed and care for the 70,000 animals in the aquarium each month.

As a result of the deal, Herschend Enterprises now has full ownership of the aquarium.

Founded in 1950 by two brothers in Missouri, the company owns a dozen theme parks, amusement parks, water parks, and aquariums in the southern United States.

It also owns Dollywood – an amusement park owned by musician Dolly Parton – as well as the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team.

Vancouver Aquarium employee Jessica DeBenedetto feeds a sea lion on the main aquarium path on September 10, 2020. The aquarium was closed to the public during much of the COVID-19 pandemic. (Jonathan Hayward / The Canadian Press)

The sale includes a donation agreement

The aquarium is the company’s first Canadian company.

Ocean Wise had operated the aquarium since the nonprofit started in 2017.

Under the sales agreement, Herschend will donate one percent of its gross annual income from the aquarium to Ocean Wise to support its conservation program.

The aquarium was the first public aquarium in Canada when it opened in 1956. The facility is located in Stanley Park on land leased by the city.