Is Disney Expensive?

[Sirwalterraleigh]

No, Motel 6 is not... the Poly is a luxury item of high esteem by many.

No...that’s what it was built as...the history can’t be changed to suit the present spin

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I just read your edit. Have you seen Atlantis marketing materials? What do you think they do?

Swimming with dolphins, parasailing, yoga on a paddle board.. it’s all extra. The restaurants- ridiculously priced, every last one of them, even the mediocre buffet. The walk from the ‘heart of the action Royal Towers” to the beach- lonnnnggg. Lines for the slides? Ridiculously long.

I did it for many years because it was a cheap and quick flight, and I enjoyed the casino and atmosphere of the resort..but it wasn’t until I took my own child that I realized just how overrun with “day pass guests” it had become. The value wasn’t there for me anymore. It wasn’t a bad trip, just not ‘worth’ a repeat anytime soon, especially not with their pricing and slow service. To be fair, it may have improved over the past 4 years.. I hope they did anyway.. but it doesn’t look or sound that way when I look at/hear about friend’s trips.

Misleading ads and tv spots are on a completely different level to the nonsense Disney has spun over decades...they are much better at it.

I both give them credit AND call “Bs” on it

 

[Goofyernmost]

No...that’s what it was built as...the history can’t be changed to suit the present spin

I'm afraid history has nothing to do with it. I have stated all along that none of the resorts are what they were built to be, but, just like a lot of automobiles on the road today, the people that built them PR'd them as more then what they really are and it isn't changing history to know that if people will pay the kind of prices they demand (and people do indeed) then it is what it is today and it doesn't matter if it were built with Lincoln Logs. I was watching a TV show the other day that auctions off a 1963 Ford Falcon (restored, not modified) for over $80,000.00. That made it a luxury and not a necessity or basic that the original $1500.00 dollars, historically, was implied when new. It's how and where the saying "making a silk purse from a sow's ear" comes from.

I understand what you are saying and it is backing up my reasons why I never go to any Disney Resort, just the parks. In 1983 it cost around $35 to $40 per night at The Contemporary. Hardly a luxury hotel even at that time. How much does Disney charge now and people happily pay for the prestige of staying there. That alone makes it a luxury hotel even if the sinks are falling off the wall in the bathrooms. Location, Location, Location! Over time with demand and the right spin, it became a luxury hotel. It all depends on how you define luxury. Since they call it that and price it based on that and people pay it... that is what it is. Even if the Poly started out low end. I don't think it really did because even John Lennon stayed there and I think he could have been able to afford just about anyplace. It's ambiance and service level is far above a Motel 6, don't you think?

 

[21stamps]

We’ve gone full on ridiculous.

It’s one thing to dedicate your online time to bashing Disney.. but to say that the Polynesian was basically built as a motel 6? There’s 0 amount of truth in that.

 

[eliza61nyc]

We’ve gone full on ridiculous.

It’s one thing to dedicate your online time to bashing Disney.. but to say that the Polynesian was basically built as a motel 6? There’s 0 amount of truth in that.

LOL more to the point is " and how is that even remotely relevant"???? Once again I am not a Disney passionate person but even if we go with the premise that 47 years ago it was modeled after a motel 6. maybe because that's what was popular in the area. Can people go in and say "hey in 1970 this was supposed to be a cheap motel, can I get a 400/night discount based on that history".

Disney sells it as a Deluxe resort, it is marketed as such, it is a big difference than it's value resorts and the market is supporting it as such. how it began has absolutely no bearing.

I wonder, do people make all their purchases based on 40, 50 year history? Do we base our appliance purchases on what appliances sold for back in 1965?

 

[Kristoff]

Anyone that's paying attention will learn that you don't have to wait this long for *anything.* Get your Fastpasses, show up at rope drop or shortly after, and you won't wait more than 30 minutes for anything.

Your plan may work if you have a family full of adults only but assuming you have any young children, getting there at rope drop means them being up at 6 AM to get to the parks and be fed on time. Unless your child is superman/woman by the time mid day rolls around they will crash and then you'll lose a few hours going back to the hotel for naps. Even going at rope drop, you may be able to have a 10 minute wait on the first ride by the time you walk there and queue up but by the time you get out of the first ride,the other headliner will have at least a 30 minute wait. Factor in walking and getting around and my original estimate of 60 minutes is pretty spot on. The timing restrictions of fastpass prevents you getting more than 3 fastpasses during the first three hours of the park so you will be waiting in standby for numerous attractions. During any busy time of the year all the tier A and B fastpasses will be gone by the time that three hour mark ends. If you could see every attraction during summer with less than a 30 minute wait, you'd be a millionaire because everyone would pay to have a shot at that.

You wouldn't *have* to wait 2 hours. Get a FP for Frozen, do Soarin' at rope drop, do TT at the end of the evening (after 8:30 since everyone is migrating to WS for Illuminations) and your total wait time for all three combined is less than an hour -- possibly even less than 1/2 an hour. And we've even managed to get in line for TT at 8:20 and be off in time to walk up to WS and watch Illuminations.

As I mentioned in my comment above, if you are in a family situation where you have young children, there is little to no way that you can both make rope drop and keep going through the nightime entertainment without stopping for a midday break where you lose at least 2 hours with travel time and naps. If you're in a group of all adults this could conceivably work although i've never seen TT with less than a 40 minute posted wait even 10 minutes before Illuminations unless it's January or February or you do a single rider line.

Our 'realistically' is a bit skewed for sure - as two teachers with a high school student daughter, we usually spend about 45 minutes at a TS and 15-20 at a CS (obviously pending service). We don't wait in line for anything more that 30 minutes. The 40 we waited for Flight of Passage in February was an aberration to our usual touring approach. But the 'entertainment' at the restaurants at Disney is certainly much more than at the comparably priced NYC restaurants we visited last weekend. 12 hours might be a stretch, but for our family not an totally unrealistic amount of entertainment in a day at Disney.

I think my overall point is that during most of the year, the operating hours of the park are about 12 hours from open to close. Even waiting less than 30 minutes per attraction (I personally think AK is the toughest park to use wait time examples on because there are only really 4 or 5 good attractions there) you will lose a significant portion of those 12 hours to waiting in line. The advantage you have is that you have a teen child so if you wanted to go rope drop to park close you could do so without any slowdown whereas you may not be able to do that with young children. I would also wager that with your party's age group you don't do the really young rides (barnstomer, dumbo, PP flight) so ultimately you spend less time waiting than parents trying to do these rides as well as the normal ones. I think ultimately you are losing somewhere between 4 - 6 hours of those 12 hours depending on how aggressive you tour the parks even if you can do every attraction in under 30 minutes.

 

[21stamps]

LOL more to the point is " and how is that even remotely relevant"???? Once again I am not a Disney passionate person but even if we go with the premise that 47 years ago it was modeled after a motel 6. maybe because that's what was popular in the area. Can people go in and say "hey in 1970 this was supposed to be a cheap motel, can I get a 400/night discount based on that history".

Disney sells it as a Deluxe resort, it is marketed as such, it is a big difference than it's value resorts and the market is supporting it as such. how it began has absolutely no bearing.

I wonder, do people make all their purchases based on 40, 50 year history? Do we base our appliance purchases on what appliances sold for back in 1965?

I’m going to try that next time I make a major purchase.

 

[21stamps]

Your plan may work if you have a family full of adults only but assuming you have any young children, getting there at rope drop means them being up at 6 AM to get to the parks and be fed on time. Unless your child is superman/woman by the time mid day rolls around they will crash and then you'll lose a few hours going back to the hotel for naps. Even going at rope drop, you may be able to have a 10 minute wait on the first ride by the time you walk there and queue up but by the time you get out of the first ride,the other headliner will have at least a 30 minute wait. Factor in walking and getting around and my original estimate of 60 minutes is pretty spot on. The timing restrictions of fastpass prevents you getting more than 3 fastpasses during the first three hours of the park so you will be waiting in standby for numerous attractions. During any busy time of the year all the tier A and B fastpasses will be gone by the time that three hour mark ends. If you could see every attraction during summer with less than a 30 minute wait, you'd be a millionaire because everyone would pay to have a shot at that.



As I mentioned in my comment above, if you are in a family situation where you have young children, there is little to no way that you can both make rope drop and keep going through the nightime entertainment without stopping for a midday break where you lose at least 2 hours with travel time and naps. If you're in a group of all adults this could conceivably work although i've never seen TT with less than a 40 minute posted wait even 10 minutes before Illuminations unless it's January or February or you do a single rider line.



I think my overall point is that during most of the year, the operating hours of the park are about 12 hours from open to close. Even waiting less than 30 minutes per attraction (I personally think AK is the toughest park to use wait time examples on because there are only really 4 or 5 good attractions there) you will lose a significant portion of those 12 hours to waiting in line. The advantage you have is that you have a teen child so if you wanted to go rope drop to park close you could do so without any slowdown whereas you may not be able to do that with young children. I would also wager that with your party's age group you don't do the really young rides (barnstomer, dumbo, PP flight) so ultimately you spend less time waiting than parents trying to do these rides as well as the normal ones. I think ultimately you are losing somewhere between 4 - 6 hours of those 12 hours depending on how aggressive you tour the parks even if you can do every attraction in under 30 minutes.

Have you seen a Disney queue? They’re like that for a reason. Most kids (and adults) can appreciate them. Now I’m not talking for 90+ minutes.. I wouldn’t wait that long. I don’t like to wait more than 30-45, but I utilize FP constantly... the queues are interesting though, and it doesn’t feel like you’re just being bearded through ropes of people.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

Kids...the history is the history...

That’s not in dispute. The consumers have allowed the prices to go where they have gone. I don’t Blame disney for that...

No more analogies spun into elaborate hypotheticals...at least not from me.

 

[eliza61nyc]

Kids...the history is the history...

That’s not in dispute. The consumers have allowed the prices to go where they have gone. I don’t Blame disney for that...

No more analogies spun into elaborate hypotheticals...at least not from me.

My apologies, I was the one who used the appliances analogy
I didnt mean to open it as a dispute. We were just postulating on the relevance of its history on what it is today.
As you say history is history. I'll add contemporary is contemporary .
It's now a deluxe resort. Is is what it is.

 

[Kristoff]

Have you seen a Disney queue? They’re like that for a reason. Most kids (and adults) can appreciate them. Now I’m not talking for 90+ minutes.. I wouldn’t wait that long. I don’t like to wait more than 30-45, but I utilize FP constantly... the queues are interesting though, and it doesn’t feel like you’re just being bearded through ropes of people.

I don't think anyone is arguing that the queues aren't interesting or done well. The argument is some paint and theming doesn't negate having to wait 30+ minutes for a ride even assuming you say you spend 25% of that time waiting "enjoying" the queue.

 

[Jedi Stitch]

Yes it is. We went for a ton of money for a week and that was the value resort ASMo. Next time at WDW, it will be a Deluxe like the Poly. I plan to go to DLR this year, after I get my next Certification Level. Difference I plan to use a good neighbor hotel, because the Disney ones are $300 a night for the cheapest, and $100 a night for the good Neighbor cheapest.

 

[21stamps]

I don't think anyone is arguing that the queues aren't interesting or done well. The argument is some paint and theming doesn't negate having to wait 30+ minutes for a ride even assuming you say you spend 25% of that time waiting "enjoying" the queue.

That’s part of an amusement park.
Even at a sporting event I can wait 15-30 minutes in line just to get a cocktail or food.. unfortunately we are never the only ones at an Entertainment venue.
Standing in a Disney queue is definitely a lot better than standing in a line, freezing, while trying to buy a slice of overpriced pizza.

 

[Donal Duck]

Yes it is. It used to be much more affordable. Disney is making it harder and harder for middle class families to come. They are targeting upper middle class and wealthy families.

 

[Chef Mickey]

The Polynesian costs $500/night almost entirely because of its location (monorail, 2 minutes from the most visited theme park on earth, convenient location, etc).

It's just like the junky house that's $2M because of its insanely good location. It really doesn't matter how house or in this case, the hotel looks (although it's definitely not Motel 6). It's LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION, just like any real estate.

 

[jloucks]

The Polynesian costs $500/night almost entirely because of its location (monorail, 2 minutes from the most visited theme park on earth, convenient location, etc).

It's just like the junky house that's $2M because of it's insanely good location. It really doesn't matter how house or in this case, the hotel looks (although it's definitely not Motel 6). It's LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION, just like any real estate.

I like your house example, but in those cases gentrification kicks in and you get new houses. The trailer park by my house is getting weird. Trailer - trailer - $400,000 house - Trailer - $500,000 house - trailer -trailer. ...you get the point.

So if it is all about location, whey don't they put in a brand new mega hotel? Is it as simple as they don't have to?

 

[jloucks]

Yes it is. It used to be much more affordable. Disney is making it harder and harder for middle class families to come. They are targeting upper middle class and wealthy families.

I wish this were true. The parks just continue to get more and more crowded. Those crowds are not upper middle and wealthy. Probably.

 

[drwadadli]

We opinions differs like it does with restaurants but to ask if Disney is expensive, the answer is dependent on what that one person deems is expensive and the experience is worth that cost.

To me and my wife, yes Disney is expensive but we save up for it because the experience and memories collected is well worth the cost of the vacation no matter if we stay at the Polynesian Village or Grand Floridian or Port Orleans or All-Star Music. Each experience is different and each vacation costs differently but for us, we are willing to pay for that cost. Because of the memories from our past trips, we will continue to go to WDW no matter what the cost.

 

[larryz]

The Polynesian costs $500/night almost entirely because of its location (monorail, 2 minutes from the most visited theme park on earth, convenient location, etc).

It's just like the junky house that's $2M because of it's insanely good location. It really doesn't matter how house or in this case, the hotel looks (although it's definitely not Motel 6). It's LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION, just like any real estate.

Good point. Location is everything. The "Deluxes" have theme park proximity. The "Values" don't. That'll will change somewhat with WDW's new emphasis on amenities and travel time (as shortened by the Skyliner).

Take this house for instance...

It's for sale in my area. And the listing price is lower than what a lot of people spent on their last Disney vacation.

Spoiler

$9,500 in Southwest Ohio.

Here's another house for sale...

Can you guess what it's selling for and where? (Hint: it's over 50 times what the other house is selling for...)

Spoiler

$585,000 in the San Francisco area.

So, is Disney "expensive"? Is that house "expensive"?

I guess it all depends on what you can afford.

 

[Donal Duck]

I wish this were true. The parks just continue to get more and more crowded. Those crowds are not upper middle and wealthy. Probably.

A lot of locals that do not stay over.