SeaWorld's profits are sinking fast, a downturn the company attributes to, among other things, the recent wave of negative publicity over its treatment of animals.
On Wednesday, the company said it expected revenue to drop by six to seven percent on the year, a contraction worse than many analysts had feared. As a result, the company's stock price dove a stunning 33 percent in one day.
So what's to blame for the company's financial fallout? Bad weather kept some tourists away, and increased competition from new theme parks peeled away other would-be visitors. But notably, SeaWorld also blamed the bad publicity it has endured in the wake of the CNN documentary Blackfish, which examined the theme park's controversial treatment of orca whales.
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"The company believes attendance in the quarter was impacted by demand pressures related to recent media attention surrounding proposed legislation in the state of California," the company said in releasing its earnings statement.
The legislation Sea World is referring to is a bill proposed in response to Blackfish, which would ban orca shows. Should it pass, it could potentially send SeaWorld's entire business model down the drain.
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