Characters at WDW

[MagicHappens1971]

Super sorry if this is already another thread.
I highly doubt meet and greet's cost much to operate, why doesn't WDW have more characters? Especially free roaming characters? A lot of character's have been "retired" like Sebastian, and until the dance party at DHS this year, and the recent runDisney race I haven't seen him out in forever. If Disney has the costumes why aren't they used? I was just wondering if theres a reason

 

[copcarguyp71]

Probably because there is really no money in free roaming characters. Putting them in a fixed location/building allows them to funnel guests like cattle right through some convenient moichandising.

 

[Master Yoda]

Meet and greets are surprisingly expensive to operate on a per guest basis. If you look at an attraction like POTC, half a dozen CM's can cycle 1000-2000 guests or more per hour. A meet an greet would be lucky to do 100-200 guests per hour with the same staff. The characters also get paid more than your average attraction CM.

Roaming characters are a logistical nightmare. They are often mobbed by guests making security and safety a problem. Getting a picture with a roaming without someone else in the picture is also near impossible which prompted a large number of guest complaints.There are simply too many people in the parks for Disney to do anything other than the assembly line meet and greats they currently do on a day to day basis. Special events are a little different as attendance is lower and you will often see roaming characters at them.

Which characters are out is kind of a supply and demand thing. The CM not only has to be qualified to play a role, but they also have to fit the costume. Quite often there are simply not enough CMs that can fill the costumes of every character they have in inventory so Disney has to pick and choose who goes out. They are not going to have 5 obscure characters at a meet and greet at the expense of having no Mickey's available.

 

[wdrive]

There's less of a range of characters that are out meeting now than in the past due to the way most 'fixed' meet and greet locations work such as Ariel's Grotto, Fairytale Hall, Epcot Character Spot etc. Characters meet here constantly park opening-park closing or close enough to it. They have regular breaks, usually around 30-40 minutes per hour, so you need more cast members to cover all the breaks. They are also all mostly double capacity so there's 2 sets of each character meeting at the same time. For example at Ariel's Grotto, you'd have Ariel 1 and Ariel 2 meeting. Then it's time for their breaks so Ariel 3 and 4 come in. They have lunch/end their shift and Ariel 5, 6, 7 and 8 take over.

Previously at WDW you'd have had probably just one of that character out a day. For the price of running Ariel's meet and greet you could easily have at least 10 different characters meeting randomly out in the park.

That's why there's a perceived lack of characters out now then what used to be. In reality there's more characters than ever before just many of them are duplicates.