Case Study: Bearizona
Note: Visit occurred in November 2023.
One of the lessons of my Arizona trip is that Arizona has an extreme diversity of habitats and ecosystems. Northern Arizona, where Williams, AZ—the home to Bearizona—is located, is an upland alpine woodland forest. In fact, the area is a weekend escape for Phoenix residents where just 2 hours’ drive away, temperatures regularly differ by 30-40+ degrees.
Located in the ‘last town on Route 66 to be bypassed by I-40’ along the main road accessing the popular South Rim of the Grand Canyon, Bearizona is a great spot for tourists to pass some time, since Williams doesn’t offer much. It’s historic Route 66 vibe downtown is just a couple of blocks. And that leads us to Bearizona.
A baby in terms of zoos, Bearizona opened in 2010 as a privately and family-owned park. Building upon the vintage charm of Williams, Bearizona embraces a rustic woodsy Western lodge theme with many heavy timbered wood (or faux wood) structures. Throughout, western art is at the heart of the visual aesthetic with appealing realistic animal sculptures and beautiful artisan metal signage. Tongue-in-cheek humor and surprises are infused for those with sharp enough eyes.
The park itself has two components for a varied guest experience: a well-done self-drive portion and a traditional zoo experience both embracing the gorgeous naturally wooded site. The pine forest really makes the experience authentic with enhancements added as needed to make the habitats usable by the animals. The habitats in both parts of the experience are large and naturalistic and tucked into the pine forest. The raccoon habitat utilized the very tall trees as natural climbing options for the raccoon where I saw one up higher than I’ve ever seen a raccoon before! A special experience!
However, the habitats are also where my nitpicking begins. Almost all of them utilize an almost unlimited supply of artificial rockwork. Every barrier is rockwork and nearly every habitat utilizes outdated vertical drop moats—which are useful in certain limited applications, but it was overused in my opinion, to the detriment of the authenticity of the experience. I'd love to see far less of the heavy handed and often homemade-looking rocks be replaced with heavy timber and wire mesh fencing to capture the beautiful natural landscape. I was worried for animal safety in a few of these areas as well. Grizzly had at least one moat that didn’t appear to offer a way for a bear to get out if it accidentally fell in.
At Bearizona, I did get a chance to chat with their COO, Dave O’Connell who told me about their crew of artists who build almost everything at the zoo. Interestingly, they use scrap and salvaged materials whenever possible—which is a great story to tell and should be interpreted for all guests to know. However, another nitpicky detail for me was lack of ‘back of house’ areas, especially related to the salvage materials and facility equipment. Piles of scrap metal, rusty shipping containers and old vehicles were stacked in plain view throughout the forest. While I know these things are actively being used and there is a sense of pride in transparency here, they’d also very much benefit from an awareness of guest perception. In many places, it felt like we were driving through a junk yard rather than a facility that educates about respecting the environment and native animals.
That was one of the great things about Bearizona. There is a clear educational message: If you love it, leave it alone. It is reinforced on nicely designed graphics and in their very cool animal show. The show itself is very unique and engaging and displayed the high quality of animal care by the Bearizona staff. The show is presented in-the-round on a grassy lawn where guests can sit on benches or stand and watch from the pathways. Both manmade and natural (ie trees), permanent and temporary perches are used to move animals above and between guests all around. Guest volunteers participate in some of the animal behaviors as well. It was a natural behavior-based, educational yet highly entertaining show.
The other thing Bearizona does right is hospitality. Everyone we met were engaging and happy. Keepers chatted freely with guests, and made sure you saw everything. The retail and food and beverage options were killer. Beautifully designed with varied options including some Native American recipes and multiple opportunities for alcohol including craft cocktails. The main restaurant was probably the best I’ve ever seen at a non-Disney property. The artists really did their best work here. Guests sit inside a massive two-story cavern with beautiful painted and carved murals and views to the adjacent jaguar habitat. The gift shop, again, probably the largest I’ve ever seen, had pretty much anything you could ever want from art to candy to the standard branded merch.
Lastly—and unfortunately, it’s a negative—the current layout of the walking portion (Fort Bearizona) was clumsy and unplanned. We backtracked and missed things far too much for such a small zoo. Most pathways were a dead end. This seemed a result of a lack of long-term planning at the facility, something that this authentic and charming half a million per year in attendance facility really needs to start doing considering the amount of success they are having after only being open 14 years. If fourteen more years of these reactionary additions continue to occur, the walking portion is going to become a frustrating maze of rockwork, and more importantly, and its authenticity and woodsy charm will be totally undermined. (Give me a call, Bearizona! Let’s set you up for long-term success!)