If you had one superpower, what would it be? Telepathy? Invincibility? For Weston resident Rob Cannon and his family, the answer was taking flight. “Everybody loves to fly,” Rob tells Westport Lifestyle with the conviction of a man building an adventure park empire to prove it.
The Cannon family—Rob, his wife Lisa, and their daughter Caroline— has become the proprietors of a quickly-expanding amusement park business, Thrillz Indoor Adventure & Amusement Parks. “When our children were young, we took them to a local trampoline park and thought, ‘we could do this, but better,’” Lisa Cannon says. So she and Rob, who was “semi-retired” from Wall Street, began ideating. “The concept came to me of trying to create an indoor water park with no water,” Rob says.
After finding 25,000 square feet that fit that lofty plan of giving people the opportunity to fly (into stuntman airbags, of course), the family opened their first park in Danbury in 2018. The adrenaline-pumping, freefalling obstacles at the inaugural Thrillz park went viral not long after. “We were open before New York during COVID, and these four girls from the Bronx came in and made a TikTok that got 6 million views in 24 hours. We sold out for the next nine months,” Rob explains. Boosted by the virality, the Cannons opened their second location in King Of Prussia, Penn., in 2023, at which point their Caroline quit her New York City tech job and joined her parents full-time in the family business. “My dad is an absolute visionary,” Caroline says. “He can walk into a space and immediately picture what the potential could be.”
Their third, and latest, park in Atlanta is the most adventurous yet. “We wanted to make everything bigger, and actually expand upon the Thrillz footprint,” Caroline says. “We had our airbag elements, which is our bread and butter, but we doubled the size of our facility to almost 60,000 square feet.” The state-of-the-art park includes a 35+-foot Mega Slide Tower (the only one in the country, though you can find similar rides in Switzerland and Dubai), a Drop Tower, and a VR Coaster (with a 360-degree upside-down flip). And for amusement traditionalists, the attractions are aplenty: think laser tag and duckpin bowling.
As far as scaling a business goes, the Atlanta park wasn’t without challenges. “It’s easier to get a Harvard degree than to get permits in DeKalb County,” Lisa admits. But the family—close-knit, ambitious, adventurous and creative—persevered, and after over a year of construction delays and unexpected building hurdles, Thrillz Atlanta had its grand opening in July. Rapper Lil Baby visited when the doors opened, declaring Thrillz “the place to be.”
“We all have very clear paths of how we impact the business, and the three of us actually come together to form one whole: managing the business, day-to-day operations, and charging forward with our growth,” Caroline says. “I'm so grateful that we have been able to find this balance as a family.”
So what’s next on the Cannon family agenda? Caroline is getting married and closing on her first home in Weston this fall. Alongside wedding planning, the family is preparing for a massive renovation to their original location in Danbury later this year. Like jumping into freefall, starting a family business takes a brave leap of faith. But the thrill along the way for the Cannons has been nothing short of exhilarating.
Thrillz High Flying Adventure Park is located at 5 Prindle Ln. in Danbury. For more information, visit thrillzparks.com
Moments Of Gratitude With The Cannons
On Caroline joining the business:
“I thought, I can collaborate equally with my parents—what an incredible opportunity. I’ve never worked in a setting where people’s egos aren’t coming into the workplace.” —Caroline
"She made that decision on her own, we didn't even pitch her on the idea. It's actually the best thing that ever happened to Thrillz." —Rob
On collaboration:
"There are a lot of tender moments behind the scenes as a family that have been woven into this process, despite all of the stress." —Caroline
“We design everything ourselves, and we do everything in-house. We're a small but mighty team. And I’m grateful for that.” —Lisa