On any given day during the summer, it would normally be common to find large crowds throughout the gift shop, cafeteria and attractions at Hershey’s Chocolate World.
The venue has served as the official visitor center for The Hershey Company since 1973, according to Suzanne Jones, vice president of The Hershey Experience. The location has been closed since March 15th due to the coronavirus, but the company has reopened on June 5 after installing several new health and safety precautions.
“We are so excited!” Jones said about the reopening. “For anyone who’s been out and about in the public, [the new safety measures are] going to be nothing that’s too unexpected – pretty typical for what we’re seeing in a phase yellow in Dauphin County.”
Under the yellow phase of Gov. Tom Wolf’s reopening plan, retail businesses can begin operation again, but only if they follow several continuing safety guidelines such as reduced capacity and masks for customers and staff.
To maintain a safe number of occupants within Chocolate World, admission will now be done through a timed entry pass. Groups of guests must reserve a pass online, for free, which will designate when they can enter. Passes will be doled out in 15 minute increments.
“What that does is reserve space in the building for you and your family, or you and your friends, to come in and have plenty of space to move around,” Jones said, explaining that the system will allow for a safe distance between guests while inside. “You’ll have several hours to be in the building. But every 15 minutes, we’l be letting people in as others leave.”
Jones confirmed that guests and staff must wear masks while inside, and that visitors will also have to have their temperature checked by staff, to ensure no one has a fever of over 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit.
“If we find that anyone is over that, then what we’ll do is let them sit down to the side for a few moments,” Jones said. “Maybe they’ve just gotten too hot in the sun and they just need to cool off and have a cup of water. And then we’ll do another temperature check.”
While automated temperature scans may be a possibility in the future, Jones said, for now the checks will be done via staff and forehead scanning thermometers.
Not all of the attractions at Chocolate World will be available immediately: as of June 4, the gift shop will be open, and the food court offering a limited menu of what Jones called “our indulgence items, the things that are a hallmark of a visit to Chocolate World,” such as milkshakes, cookies, s’mores and cookie dough cups.
But the food will be sold as carry-out only for the time being, and the Chocolate Tour ride and other attractions won’t be open quite yet. The company will take their cues from the governor’s office and the state’s Department of Health for reopening the rest, Jones said.
“Right now our plan is to be able to open those as Dauphin County moves into the green phase,” she said. “But it’s an going conversation for us to understand how we might open, what we’re doing to keep everyone safe, but still preserving what makes those experiences fun. We don’t want to sacrifice one for the other – we want it all. And so we’re working to make sure we can deliver that for our guests.”
Post time: Jun-06-2020