- I was wrong to think that an annual family membership to the zoo would leave us out of pocket.
- It took just two visits to the Bronx Zoo to cover the cost of our discount deal.
- We also added parking to the membership, which cost us $35 for the year — instead of $20 per visit.
My daughter loves flamingos, my son is obsessed with ring-tailed lemurs, my husband has a thing about grizzly bears, and I've long been a fan of giraffes.
Living just a 30-minute drive from the Bronx Zoo in New York, we've repeatedly seen our favorite animals there over the years.
But it wasn't until this March, after spending hundreds of dollars on zoo visits, that we decided to become members — and it's one of the smartest ways we've saved money as a family.
The Wildlife Conservation Society, the nonprofit that runs the attraction, is certainly a good cause. But I shudder to think how many dollars we've paid the organization since we started to go on a regular basis following the birth of our first child in 2008. As our family grew — my son was born two years later in 2010 — we continued visiting the zoo. And before we were members, as a family of four, it used to cost us as much as $158 each time plus the $20 parking fee.
We occasionally visited for free on a Wednesday (the one day when there's no charge), but have mostly paid full admission over weekends to avoid missing any school or work.
But the membership changed all that.
A year's membership cost my family less than what we'd usually pay to visit twice
I'm somewhat frugal and had always dismissed the idea of an annual membership to the zoo. I'm also hopeless at math.
But in March, I saw the light.
I rarely bother to look at promotional deals, but a recent email from the Wildlife Conservation Society offering a 15% discount on membership fees caught my eye. With the help of my eighth-grader and a calculator, I realized that it was one heck of a bargain.
The best type of membership for the four of us was the Family Zoos Plus option which would admit us not only to the Bronx Zoo, but also the Queens Zoo, Prospect Park Zoo, and New York Aquarium. The membership cost us a total of $191 with 15% off; without a discount, it usually costs $225. It covers three adults — our daughter counted as one because she's over 12 — and up to four children. There are good deals on a selection of kinds of memberships, too. (For anyone curious, the special offer we used to book our annual membership is seasonal; the current discount of 15% runs until May 31, 2022.)
When we would visit as non-members, we'd pay $20 to park our car each time. With a membership, I could add year-round parking at the zoo for an extra $35. The same 15% discount applied to the parking fee too, so ended up being $30 in our case.
My teen and I figured out that the total discount price was $38.20 more expensive than a single regular family visit to the Bronx Zoo. Even if we went just twice before March 2023, we'd save 40% on the cost of four tickets, including parking.
The price of the membership was also tax-deductible. It entitled us to discounts on supplementary activities like the zoo's Tree Top Adventure and Zipline as well as private Wild Encounters with species like the two-toed sloth. They even threw in a T-shirt.
Membership isn't a bargain if you only visit the zoo once a year — and it won't save you much on food
I highly recommend looking into your local zoo's membership options if your family is anything like mine. We've already made our money back by visiting the zoo twice since becoming members, and we have 10 more months to go back as often as we want.
Still, the terms don't suit everyone. It's not worth the money if, for example, your family visits once a year.
One caveat for the Bronx Zoo membership is it won't save you much on concessions. Members qualify for a 10% discount on snacks and themed merchandise like souvenir drinking cups. But during our first trip since becoming members, we still got sticker shock over the $9 hot dog with chips and the $5 ice creams — I made a mental note to pack a picnic next time.
Still, I forgot about the dent in my wallet as soon as we saw the giraffes, flamingos, lemurs, and grizzlies.
"Can we go to the zoo every week?" my tween asked his dad.
Worth it.