Kings Island's 314 ft. tall Eiffel Tower Gets Repainted

Not all jobs require passion, but for some of them it's essential. Especially when your client is handing over the keys to their most important landmark. These days I'm reminded daily of that when I hear what sounds like a swarm of bees just outside my office window.

It's not actually bees, but rather the sounds of 5000 psi pressure washers tearing away old paint off Kings Island's Eiffel Tower, not quite 100 yards from my desk.

Hear it for yourself in this video:

The tower is being repainted in preparation for Kings Island's 50th anniversary in 2022. This season men and women, harnessed in safety gear hundreds of feet in the air, can be seen pressure washing and scraping away old paint and rolling or brushing on a fresh coat of Sherwin Williams' Eiffel Tower Green in its place.

Photo: Chris Baynum talks with Tony Hopkins, the third generation of Hopkins men to work on Kings Island's Eiffel Tower.

Repainting the Eiffel Tower is NOT a job for me, and I'm guessing that, at heights of up to 314 ft., it's likely not the job for you either. But it is THE job for Chris Baynum and his Newport, Kentucky-based Baynum Painting crew. This is the third time they've painted the Warren County, Ohio landmark, and they began the undertaking in mid-August.

"It truly comes from the heart to be working on this project," said Baynum. "I'd drive by the park in the early 1970s, before I ever came to the park, and see the Eiffel Tower while heading up to Columbus. Looking out the window of my parents' car I'd think about how neat it would be to go to the top of it. Then, just a few years later having the opportunity to actually work on it. Well, it was special then and it's more special now, 33 years later."

If the task at hand comes from the heart, it comes through in the job you do. That's one of the reasons why park leadership chose Baynum for the job. When you want your park's iconic landmark to look as good as it did when guests first walked through the front gates fifty years earlier, you pick the experienced team whose going to treat the project as if it were their own.

"This project is iconic to Kings Island. People have their favorite rides and roller coasters. But when you think of Kings Island, it's the Eiffel Tower. It's the central landmark of the park," Baynum said. "What a thrill to be the ones to have maintained and cared for it for so many years. We've treated it like it is ours. It's that special to us."

Baynum and his team have been painting amusement park rides and attractions including Kings Island's The Beast roller coaster and the iconic 1/3 scale replica of the Eiffel Tower, for more than 30 years. To date, the company has finished more than 300 roller coasters and other painting projects for hundreds of amusement parks around the world. You can read more about them on their website.

If you'd like to check out their work on the Eiffel Tower yourself, visit Kings Island during the fall through October 31, 2021. View the park's operating calendar here. Also, check out this online story from Spectrum News' Tino Bovenzi.

Chad Showalter is a results-focused communicator with an MBA and more than 15 years of successful public relations and marketing leadership. He only writes stories about businesses he loves and issues he cares about. Connect with him on LinkedIn today, and follow him on Twitter.