CaptainAmerica
Premium Member
Weird I wonder if anything was going on in 2021 that may have affected attendance.
That's exactly what TouringPlans measures. They don't count clicks, they measure wait times.
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News Disney Park Pass System announced for Walt Disney World theme park reservations
- Thread starter wdwmagic
- Start date
I understand they were still increasing capacity in 2021. I’m curious to see 2022. But I have to wonder, if they measure wait times to determine their rating, why are so many saying it’s more crowded than ever? Is it just human perception? Or is the fact people have to pay for Genie+ affecting perceptions?
CaptainAmerica
Premium Member
Because in many cases it is. Attendance is back at or close to 2019 levels but staffing hasn't fully recovered. And perhaps more importantly, patterns have changed. People are taking these YOLO trips when they normally wouldn't because COVID messed up their budgets and vacation time.
They are simply wrong. It is wrong to say the parks are more crowded than ever. Wait times in early 2020 or peak travel time periods in 2019 far exceeded anything we’ve seen since reopening.
I think a lot of message board types understood how to game trip timing to mostly go during low crowd level times; those just don’t exist any more, so to them it feels more crowded than ever, but really, they’re just dealing with the same mess most people dealt with for the past decade+
IMDREW
Well-Known Member
So this may be a stupid thing to say, and they’re definitely not doing it or probably even thinking about it. But, every time a new wdw park was brought up one of the main reasons not to was because it does not mean more people or more days spent at Disney.
So wouldn’t that be the perfect solution for this problem? Spreading people out more, making the experience feel greater, let people spend more money instead of waiting in crazy lines all day.
So wouldn’t that be the perfect solution for this problem? Spreading people out more, making the experience feel greater, let people spend more money instead of waiting in crazy lines all day.
Precisely. I used to do three trips a year: early Oct, early Dec, and early Feb to specifically go on the "dead times" and when schools are in session.
But they stopped being dead times. The holiday party nights became hugely successful always selling out. Fall and Winter discounts moved people from the peak Summer days to the off-peak times. This was the goal of raising prices over all, but discounting off-peak.
A guess on my part is that we now have a lot more "Disney adults" that can freely go anytime they want and not get locked into a school vacation schedule.
I remember people used to be saying that WDW was for children, and my retort would be, "Then how can they be open on school days?" They would say, "Because pre-schoolers." And I'd say, "Oh, pre-schoolers 'drink around the world'?"
So, in short, WDW feels a lot more crowded to me now because I used to go in the dead times, which don't exist anymore.
nickys
Premium Member
It would seem like it. Overall that would be a small price to pay IMO,. Onsite resort guests were very rarely affected.
That’s based on Disney’s experience with Animal Kingdom which I think was 1) likely not based on a long enough run of data, 2) was certainly done over 20 years ago, and 3) yes, ignores the face that if guests still stay the same number of days but shift a day to a 5th park, that frees capacity at the other 4 parks for more guests.
The constraining factor is MK, which everyone wants to go to, and most people pick as their extra second day. They need more castle parks. That pushes my thinking to a 3rd resort.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The problem with a third US Resort is that it will not have that classic Disneyland / Magic Kingdom experience because Disney refuses to build those type of experiences. It’d be an ugly castle surrounded by poorly laid out franchise lands with not enough to do.
flynnibus
Premium Member
Here’s a thought…
if disney’s parks are so busy… and the benefit of reservations to disney is to forecast demand then clearly the reservation system is redundant and not needed because if the parks are that busy… the forecast is always going to be ghe same. ‘Full staff needed’
if disney’s parks are so busy… and the benefit of reservations to disney is to forecast demand then clearly the reservation system is redundant and not needed because if the parks are that busy… the forecast is always going to be ghe same. ‘Full staff needed’
JD80
Well-Known Member
Random questions on strategies to spread out crowds across four parks and this is based on the fact everyone is on their phones and MDE all day:
- Why doesn't Disney offer random free hopping to some people in a specific park (without hopper tickets) to go to another specific park via push notification?
- Example: I'm in MK and MK is crowded, offer everyone linked to my MDE a free hopper to AK. (They are still able to come back to MK).
- Sweaten the deal by offering free snacks or discounts to food or free LLs.
- Offer, via Push Notifications, to those with existing hoppers incentives to go to specific parks.
- Example: I'm in DHS with a hopper ticket and I get a push notification to get a free pretzel at Epcot, or a 10% discount at any QS location in AK thats available for that day only?
- Example: I'm MK and my party is offered a free LL for Remy's to use anytime for that day only similar to the LL's you get if an attraction goes down.
Ayla
Well-Known Member
It isn't available for Americans. There are a ton of sweet perks Brits get Americans don't.
CaptainAmerica
Premium Member
It isn't
mickeyfan202
Member
As someone that saves and cuts corners 51 weeks out of the year to pay for a "deluxe" WDW vacation, I would not be satisfied at all. LLs filling up when I paid for the priviledge of saving time in line would not provide me with guest satisfaction. Granting someone with a little random pixe dust every once in a while might be a nice thing to do. But offering the type of freebie that would impact me when I paid for the extra would not make me happy.
nickys
Premium Member
That’s the main one, and it’s good value certainly. And sometimes we can get a dining credit per room. Not over Christmas though. Hardly “a ton”.
On the down side we get charged £50 per person for making changes or cancelling, no matter how far ahead.
SteveAZee
Well-Known Member
I would think that changing a reservation would need to exist. As long as there's a reservation available at the park you want to switch to... why wouldn't they be fine with it? Seems like they mostly want to avoid people having a ticket but not being able to get into a park somewhere, particularly one that the guest picked themselves. I guess the downside (or the manipulative side) is that guests might just book their entire trip at the MK and then as the trip gets closer switch out as needed to the other three parks.
I guess the question then is... are the price differences for the four parks baked into the purchase price, or (if in my example) you book the entire trip for the MK, do they charge you more than if you did the same for Epcot... or worse, do you have to send them more money if you switch from Epcot to MK on one of your days?
I hope they pick the simple path for this rather than the nickel-and-diming path for this...
Joel
Well-Known Member
Lotta good winning that war did.
Sirwalterraleigh
Premium Member
The dining plan did all that. 180 is pointless now…you can get most everything closer in and people dump the reservations one, two days…now a couple hours in advance
lentesta
Premium Member
You still think the reservations are about managing crowds?
…it’s labor allocation. Just a guess
Heh. I think we all know it’s labor.