That’s the tension, right? They want to charge luxury prices for what was once a slightly expensive product that offered excellent value for the money and strip out the human element that once was a differentiator.
Efficiency matters, but redesigning the checkout process to make things faster for the cashier and guest still maintains a cashier.
It’s funny because we’re headed towards a future where human interactions in the service and hospitality industries will be the marker of a luxury or higher end experience.
Safety. Courtesy. Show. Efficiency.
Sure, the hierarchy of the Keys have been muddied since the addition of “Inclusion,” (which arguably was already included in the earlier 4, notably courtesy), but it’s still clear that courtesy is supposed to be more important than efficiency.
Just think about loading a crowd for a show: Surely they could be more efficient if they could rush people to move quickly, squeeze together with strangers, and separate from their families to fill in small gaps. But nobody wants that, so there’s an accepted degree of inefficiency to allow for a pleasant experience. Similarly with restaurants, there’s an accepted degree of inefficiency to remove the workload from the guests and give them one less thing to worry about being responsible for that day. The morning food court rush is hardly a luxury experience, but it certainly is an assault on the senses; adding more tasks that guests must complete on their own is only going to make the overall experience more miserable and overwhelming.
But as we all know, Disney likes to think of itself as an exceptional product that is above-average in many ways. Their prices certainly reflect this self-belief. Similar to calling out the shortcomings of many recent WDI projects, this isn’t fans being overly picky, it’s holding Disney to the standards that they very publicly set as business differentiators for themselves.
Either they charge more than their competitors because their product is better, or they need to reduce their pricing to be in line with similarly low-quality experiences. They can’t have it both ways. Disney set the rules themselves; now they need to follow them.
blogmickey.com
