It’s getting a facelift, leaning on some friends with cash and ratcheting up the buzz with high-profile public events.

Universal Studios Hollywood is launching an overhaul on June 26, coinciding with new marketing campaigns and an ambitious sponsorship drive.

The moves are designed to help the 44-year-old park – a unique but aging amalgam of behind-the-scenes studio tours, thrill rides and attractions – which has seen its attendance drop while the Southland’s other theme parks are seeing more visitors. Many of the park’s attractions are more than 10 years old and showing their age, including “Back to the Future,” “WaterWorld” and “Terminator 2: 3D.” Some of them have limited appeal to prospective young park-goers.

Universal Hollywood saw a 6 percent attendance drop last year, luring less than 5 million park visitors. Disneyland and Magic Mountain continued to see attendance grow, posting respective 8.5 percent and 5 percent increases over 2004, according to Amusement Business and Economics Research Associates.

Ron Herman, senior vice president of partnership development for Universal Parks & Resorts, said the key to the plan is to land the kinds of sponsors that will appeal to Universal’s target audience, which Herman described as “fun loving, family-oriented” types who tend to be a little bit ahead of the curve in terms of electronics and gadgets.

“It is a chance for us to get out there to new consumers,” Herman said, adding that sponsors would undertake promotional efforts to drive consumers to the park. “Media promotions are good for us, and we do see an uplift in attendance when sponsors do promotions.”

The park is making a simultaneous advertising push: It just signed with a new agency, L.A.-based davidandgoliath. Universal Hollywood spent $7 million on advertising in 2005, according to TNS Media Intelligence, a figure that pales when compared to the $45 million spent in 2004 by its sister park, Universal Orlando Resort in Florida, according to Nielsen Monitor-Plus. The difference is that the Florida theme park is considered a “destination site,” drawing long-distance travelers for multi-night stays. At Universal Studios Hollywood, a substantial number of visitors are from Southern California.

Revving up
Whoopi Goldberg has signed on to become the voice of the park, appearing as a celebrity spokesperson via video displays on all the tour trams.

NBC Universal’s Universal Parks & Resorts, which includes Universal Studios Hollywood and the much larger Universal Orlando, has hired Velocity Sports & Entertainment to bring in family-friendly park sponsors. The firm is hoping to land four or five long-term deals a year.

The park presently has a handful of sponsors, including Volkswagen, Coca Cola, Nestlé’s Arrowhead water, MasterCard and Chase Bank. Sponsorship revenues currently hover between $6 million and $7 million for the parks on both coasts.

Most of the deals go back at least four years, like Arrowhead and MasterCard, some as long as seven, like Coca Cola. Volkswagen is in the second year of its five-year, $200 million product placement deal, which extends across all of NBC Universal’s properties.

“This is not a quick-hit deal for a sponsor,” Herman said of the park’s partnership terms. “This is all multi year, at least three to five years, and it’s always a very significant startup investment for them.”