DreamfinderGuy
Well-Known Member
The restaurant is essentially a separate structure, right? If and when Space finally gets the axe I would hope it can stand on it’s own.
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A sequel? Nah, not this one
- Thread starter pheneix
- Start date
brb1006
Well-Known Member
Speaking of banners, I hope they don't muck up the 50th Anniversary ceremony. Never forget the anniversary ceremony from 2016.
Knowing the current state of the parks, then I call dibs on something like this to occur next Fall (if they're lucky).
Has this been confirmed?
the.dreamfinder
Well-Known Member
Wasn’t that one of the last projects John Hench did design work on?
Capsin4
Well-Known Member
It seems like it’s all or nothing at Disney for a trip less than 10 days. We always took day trips to universal but never take day trips to Disney when visiting Uni. $500 for a day at MK is nonsense.
Piebald
Well-Known Member
I mentioned this several times in the past few weeks but Universal is PACKED. whatever cap they had or have is quite generous or their parks really are a lot smaller than Disney in every way. Yes I know its 2.5 parks vs 4 but its night and day. Disney ranges from absolute ghost town to not busy whereas Universal ranges from comfortable to shock since we've grown accustomed to social distancing. Without Express Pass I felt like UO on a weekend right now especially in this heat is absolute misery. At least Flight of Passage and RoTR are essentially anywhere from walk on to 30 min tops (assuming you got a BG), I witnessed 75 min for Shrek which even accounting for the reduction in capacity was ludicrous (by comparison ITTBAB at AK has always been like a 5 min wait.)
I do recognize the situations are not extremely comparable because Disney does not have trams running so the more guests they allow the more inconvenience exists for the guests vs having a garage like UO does. The other thing I noticed too was more guests = more instances of noncompliance for all the things we've gotten used to in society re: covid.
I do recognize the situations are not extremely comparable because Disney does not have trams running so the more guests they allow the more inconvenience exists for the guests vs having a garage like UO does. The other thing I noticed too was more guests = more instances of noncompliance for all the things we've gotten used to in society re: covid.
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CaptainAmerica
Premium Member
Well, we knew that being closed meant no income. Not only from the Epcot private parties as you mention, but from all the revenue from all the private parties in all the other parks and especially from convention income in the hotels. I guess we didn't talk about party and convention money because closed is closed. All revenue streams for the parks were kaput.
We wondered just how much being closed down and missing all that income would affect Disney. Would it bring it to the edge of bankruptcy?
And then we saw the 3rd Q report, and the answer was a resounding 'no.' The parts of Disney that were still profitable, namely the TV channels, cancelled out the loss from the other segments and Disney practically broke even for the quarter. A huge disappointment from not profiting in the billions, but, not going to lead to bankruptcy.
And we noted that Disney still had $23B in the bank and access to another $17B more in a credit line. We knew Disney could weather this for a whole year (or more) if it had to. I don't recall Disney "bragging" about its cash reserve except mentioning it in the 3Q finance call, along with all the bad things that were happening.
Our insiders here already told us the toadstool festival center was right out. We also knew that was the case already when the model was removed from the Epcot Experience Center.
Our insiders told us of the near panic that Disney was experiencing that led to shutting down all projects to conserve money. And then when the 3Q report came out along with being able to start re-opening the parks, the projects that were started and shut-down were re-started (mostly). Obviously Disney isn't that panicked any more about the future if they're going ahead with building Ratatouille, TRON, and Cosmic Rewind. Our insiders have said that some form of festival center will be built. And it seems that the projects that haven't started, but are still advertised in the Epcot Experience Center aren't off the table (yet, and RIP Poppins).
And our insiders have already said that Ratatouille is delayed and other unannounced projects that might have been in the pipeline are pushed back... quite understandably.
They don't want the crowds. They know what they need to do to drive up attendance. They don't want to do it. It is a continuing choice.
Heppenheimer
Well-Known Member
Hasn't Disney been struggling to even meet their daily limits?
Basic theories of economics and business strategy? There are easy levers to pull when demand is lagging - unless the bottom has completely fallen out. They aren't pulling them (yet), which tells me there is a business reason they have not done so. They are making an active choice here. They are clearly are running a playbook. It is possible in hindsight it will prove to be the wrong one. They are not lost in the wilderness (again - yet).
Disney is a successful, publicly traded company. They aren't stumbling blindly through this without any basic business skills or strategy. I have yet to see any evidence presented -- beyond people enjoying making Disney leadership into a punching bag -- that Disney is making fundamentally incorrect or unjustifiable business decisions during COVID-19.
So are you saying that Disney is allowing more APs because they're not getting enough park reservations from hotel guests? My feeling is that they are allowing more APs due to the fact that they are allowing more people into the parks period.Disney didn't suddenly make all guests APers until the end of the year.
castlecake2.0
Well-Known Member
i don’t know what the issue is with MS, because when I do ride it (green side only) I always love it, and think it’s really well
done. The thing is the pavilion doesn’t draw me in like the others in FW, and that’s where the problem is I think. I feel like they should have almost done the layout backwards, let you walk in and see the shop and post how area then lead into the attraction, make it feel more like a pavilion on the scale of the Land and Seas rather then immediately enter into the queue. I dunno
If they wanted more attendance right now they could easily remove blockouts for cast, remove the reservation system, allow park hopping etc. Having visited bit WDW and USO the last few weeks I will not go back to universal for a while as I felt the crowds and social distancing was not being taken care of as well as Disney.
the.dreamfinder
Well-Known Member
That has been their prerogative since Iger became CEO. More Franchise/IP integration, don't increase capacity and higher prices to increase average per guest spending.
So you're saying that they are ok with just barely breaking even on the parks? I completely agree that they are taking things very carefully and slowly, to ensure that the guests have a safe enjoyable visit. But I also think that they are slowly increasing the amount of people allowed in the parks, as evidenced by the have fact that have increased the AP reservations recently.
They aren't ready to remove the reservation system just yet, and I firmly believe that they are allowing more people into the parks, since they are opening more AP reservations. If they get enough from the APs, there really is no reason to remove cast blackouts right now.
Some people have mentioned that park hopping, at least on a limited basis, might be coming back soon. Maybe not this month, but possibly next month, though people would still need a reservation for that second park.
JoeCamel
Well-Known Member
I think the reference was to Universal's "buy a day come back all year" promotion as to the why of the parks being busy