Is Disney a Greedy Business?

Pepper's Ghost

Pepper's Ghost

Well-Known Member
I don't get the logic of some folks. If they don't understand basic economics, it's fine, but if the prices are lower, then the crowds are even larger. You can't complain about the huge crowds, and then in the next sentence say it's too expensive. Supply and demand... plain and simple. If you make it more affordable, the crowds swell making lines longer. Complain about one, or the other. You can't argue both points. Disney raising prices will cut the crowds a bit. People will go once every 5 years instead of once every 3, or 2. It's simply logic and economics.

Myself? I think the FP system is what makes lines too long. I've said it several times on these boards recently (sorry for repeating myself), but by my thumb in the air estimation is that the priority for FP slows the standby line by 2 to 3 times. A 20 min wait becomes a 60 min wait in standby. That's just an estimate, but it's based on standing in line for rides pre-FP, and post FP. You stand in the same exact place without moving 2 to 3 times longer than pre-FP. I also estimate that on the estimate that they let 20 people in from the FP line, then 10 from standby. That means for every 30 people that go in, now it's just 10 from standby hence my estimate that it slows the line by 3x.
 
Disstevefan1

Disstevefan1

Well-Known Member
hopemax said:
About 5 years ago, I realized one of my biggest issues with Disney Parks is that the employees are not efficient and proficient, reliably. These are different than "friendly." Which seems to be the metric many guests judge by. I don't care how friendly you are if it takes 15 min to ring up my Dad's transaction, because you don't know what a Spouse Maingate Pass is.

Most businesses seem to understand that you need to have competent staff in order to service your customers. If your staff isn't up to par, you simply can't service the number of people that you wish your business would. This is one of those accepted "costs of doing business. In the real world, when I notice the competency of the staff drop, the number of staff drop, it seems like that company is short for the world (or is dieing). Circuit City and Sears during Black Friday was eye-opening. Biggest shopping days of the year and they can't have more than 2 registers open? Things.Are.Not.Good.

At Disney, the College Program leads to such high of turnover there is no way for there to be proficiency. The five most basic tasks? Maybe, but everyone knows that in the course of a job there are things you only see once a day, once a week, once a month, once a quarter, etc. And when those things come up at Disney...grinds to a halt. The full-time staff is just about putting in their hours doing as little as possible, so if they have an excuse to go backstage, or huddle in the corner, they will. So no efficiency by the staff who should be proficient. My Mom worked at WDW for 9 years, and the story she would tell about her co-workers... And now we're hearing that because of an issue every single corporation in the world is dealing with, the response by Disney is to damage their operational businesses with even more cuts.

I would like to think Disney is greedy, but I can't give them even that much credit these days. Just a complete lack of awareness by Burbank, and complete incompetence in local management.
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As soon as you mentioned maingate pass, we know it’s a castmember serving a castmember. Disney could care less about how castmembers serve other castmembers period.

Complaints from a castmember (or a castmembers family) about a castmember are seen in a different light then if the complaint made by a regular guest.

I agree about the lack of training, but again, dealing with a discount using a maingate pass has to be low priority in the training, because its a castmember. Disney gives the castmember perks, but I bet secretly the hope they are not used because it takes time from serving real guests.
 
M

Mickey5150

Well-Known Member
The biggest problem for the parks is that they are a part of a much larger company. Every part of the Disney corporation combined has to make money, not every part does. It's easy for Disney to jack prices on the parks since people keep on coming and that helps with other parts that aren't making money. That is why Tokyo Disney is such a highly regarded resort, it needs to be desirable to make money for the parks alone, not for every project in the Disney corporation. So yes, Disney is greedy, but they kinda have to be.
 
John park hopper

John park hopper

Well-Known Member
Disney reminds me of Bank of America there was a time they were buying up all sorts of smaller banks and the bigger they got the worse the services became in the local BoA branches--at least in my area. BoA was all over the nation IMO and in the end they got to big and suffered for it cutting branches and service areas. Will this happen to Disney who knows
 
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hopemax

hopemax

Well-Known Member
Disstevefan1 said:
As soon as you mentioned maingate pass, we know it’s a castmember serving a castmember. Disney could care less about how castmembers serve other castmembers period.

Complaints from a castmember (or a castmembers family) about a castmember are seen in a different light then if the complaint made by a regular guest.

I agree about the lack of training, but again, dealing with a discount using a maingate pass has to be low priority in the training, because its a castmember. Disney gives the castmember perks, but I bet secretly the hope they are not used because it takes time from serving real guests.
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But then there is a REAL guest waiting for our register to clear, who isn’t getting checked out because they are the only CM at the register and they are fumbling around for 15 minutes trying to handle us.

If it is acceptable to give LESS service to one guest, then you are delaying everyone else behind them.

And how very magical it is to know that it doesn’t matter how many thousands of dollars a person can spend but if it’s not in the right bucket it it means they deserve less service. Premium company indeed.
 
Gringrinngghost

Gringrinngghost

Well-Known Member
Disney and Universal both act as if money is going out of style and with some actions employee morale is at low levels.

Just to throw out for example. Disney denied their Union their $1,000 for over half a year because their union wanted $15 per hour. Disney also wanted concessions on it, but the tipping point was the month prior when DLR got their $15 courtesy of a California law on an expedited approach.

Disneys answer has been to cut entertainment among others in the park to ensure a greater then 5% increase in revenue by quarter, all while Iger is getting ready for a half a billion dollar severance. Just imagine how much entertainment there would be if Iger gave just merely 10% of his severance to invest it into the parks.
 
Goofyernmost

Goofyernmost

Well-Known Member
Pepper's Ghost said:
I don't get the logic of some folks. If they don't understand basic economics, it's fine, but if the prices are lower, then the crowds are even larger. You can't complain about the huge crowds, and then in the next sentence say it's too expensive. Supply and demand... plain and simple. If you make it more affordable, the crowds swell making lines longer. Complain about one, or the other. You can't argue both points. Disney raising prices will cut the crowds a bit. People will go once every 5 years instead of once every 3, or 2. It's simply logic and economics.

Myself? I think the FP system is what makes lines too long. I've said it several times on these boards recently (sorry for repeating myself), but by my thumb in the air estimation is that the priority for FP slows the standby line by 2 to 3 times. A 20 min wait becomes a 60 min wait in standby. That's just an estimate, but it's based on standing in line for rides pre-FP, and post FP. You stand in the same exact place without moving 2 to 3 times longer than pre-FP. I also estimate that on the estimate that they let 20 people in from the FP line, then 10 from standby. That means for every 30 people that go in, now it's just 10 from standby hence my estimate that it slows the line by 3x.
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I tend to agree with you completely. The queue lines are basically the same now as and there was never over 40 minute wait in the longest queue. Now the standby lines are very slow moving and if you are in one you must prepare for a long wait. Before, if you were in line, you could expect to get through comparatively quickly. That also hinged on the premise that people were intelligent enough to not get into a line that extended to the starting point. We'd come back later.
 
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Robbiem

Robbiem

Well-Known Member
I think disney is short term greedy at the expense of long term growth.
things are priced high to get the most money now, not build long term loyalty and growth rather than £100 a year they want £300 now and don’t care if i feel ripped off and never come back.

when I look at prices now I know I wouldn’t be able to visit as often as we did in the 90s when I was growing up, would I be as big of a fan as I am? Probably not

disney may be a business but if it prices itself out people like me will go elsewhere for our vacation time and they’ll loose out in the long term
 
F

fryoj

Active Member
Of course they are greedy. They are not a non-profit. I don't have a problem with them making money. I wish it wasn't as expensive, but if it was cheaper, more people would be there. If anything, they haven't reached the breaking point on prices. I hate it as much as anyone. I'm planning a December trip and am disgusted with how much I'm about to spend. But guess what... I'm going to do it. I might pay more if I knew there would be less people there. lol
 
Rosanne

Rosanne

Active Member
seascape said:
In November I got to ride MFSR. In January I got to ride RotR. In April, I have fastpass for MMRR. In Septet I get ride Ratatouille. 4 visits, 4 new rides in one year. Disney is investigating billions in WDW, so are they ready? No. They will make more money but they are reinvesting in their property, so we should all be happy. If they were greedy they could have opened fewer new rides and made more profits.
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I dont care if they open new rides.. I'd rather have the old rides and less crowds. The new rides bring more people. I have only gotten to ride Avatar once since it opened. It will probably be 5 yrs before I can get on the Star War rides. They can stop adding new rides.
 
el_super

el_super

Well-Known Member
dmw said:
A business cannot be greedy - that is an individual trait. IMHO the problem is Wall Street expectations that companies have to grow quarter over quarter and CEOs are expected to cater to that requirement if they want to keep their jobs.
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Its important here to remember that "Wall Street," collectively answers to shareholders. They demand results for their shareholders and when you follow the money you find out that most shareholders are just normal people looking for a retirement. Pension funds and 401k funds all managed for individuals that put in money in order to get something back.

It isn't an unreasonable system at all.

It also seems a great time to point out that Disney ends up donating something close to half a billion dollars a year to charitable organizations. Recently they donated $1 million for hurricane Dorian relief and $5 for Notre Dame reconstruction.

Donating is generally against Wall Street mantra of increasing returns, but it's an area where the general public have set an expectation that corporations be a force for good, and Disney has to respond to that.
 

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