No more free drinks at All Star Sports Resort

[Uncle Lupe]

I still think that my idea of the cup with the dissolving bottom is a much more fun way of solving this problem.

 

[brifraz]

Just some quick, not founded in fact, number crunching....

Based on our visits, I would vastly underestimate 2 'stolen' soda per half hour per resort. Assuming they pay next to nothing for the syrup, water, and gas, that's $10 lost revenue per hour per resort. For the sake of easy math, I'm going with 20 resorts (yes, there are more, but I like easy round numbers). So, $200 per hour WDW wide. Again, to make round numbers, I'm going with 20 hours of usage per day (since I was under on resorts, I'll be over on hours). So, $4000 a day of lost revenue. Multiplied by 365 days a year and we have $1,460,000 per year.

Now, I have no idea how much the new machines are costing Disney, but I would assume the initial install is a cost they see as absorbed almost immediately (as the machines need to be replaced every few years regardless). If the RFID tags are really 1/20 of a cent (as someone earlier suggested) and Disney has a little over 100 million visitors a year (I know that number includes all USA parks, but I'm doing easy numbers here) who buy 2 sodas each day, we have a total annual cost for the cups of 100,000.

So, with my very horribly estimated numbers, Disney is likely looking at well over $1 million in soda profit a year that is lost due to 'stolen' sodas in old mugs. That kind of bottom line could go a long way to improving infrastructure somewhere in the parks (monorail pylons or otherwise). I think I can understand why it is a priority for them.

I have also just secured the fact that I will never be an accountant.

As tends to be the case with me, I found myself bothered by my estimates, so after some reading of the RFID Journal (yes, there really is an RFID journal), some Wall Street Journal articles, and some other sources (none of which are called Wikipedia), I re-ran the numbers:

I'm going to hold to my approximation of around $1.5M per year of lost revenue for 'stolen' drinks. Now, if we were to assume that all those people purchased mugs for $15, that number would actually go up. I would suspect that the average mug user does not use it 6 times per visit. The average wdwmagic user is likely to use their mug 25 times per day, but the average visitor buys it on day one, then only remembers to use it about 4 times per visit. So, my guess is that Disney considers mug sales to be a slight profit over regular cup beverage sales as opposed to what us Disney-philes consider to be a decent deal (if used well).

OK, so the RFID cup costs... based on reading a couple articles, it looks like Disney could get mass produced cups with RFID chips at an approximate increase of $.03 per cup (please feel free to document a dispute to that guess, but I'm tired of articles about something I couldn't care much less about). Approximately 21000 resort rooms, with about 80% occupancy annually (numbers I found ranged from 85% to 92% annually so I'm really lowballing it) and average room occupancy of 3 people. That's 50K people at resorts per night on average. If they each get 1 soda at their resort (might be a high guess, I know we often don't visit the resort soda machines daily)each day (18M sodas), we are looking at an additional cup cost of $1500 per day in cup cost. That's 547,500 in annual cup cost to add the RFID chip.

So, Disney is still looking at about $1 million in additional revenue from preventing 'soda stealers' as they see them. Now, I'm no idiot. I know the odds of that actual cash finding its way into a monorail pylon are very slim. But, I also know that an additional $1M on the bottom line makes it a lot easier to make decisions like additions to the 'insert area of need here' budget.

There's my $.02 (or my 2/3 of a high volume mass produced passive RFID chip).

 

[NX2I85]

The only people this should confuse are those trying to cheat the system (ether intentionally or unintentionally). If you buy a new RFID mug, the mug is scanned at the register so it's unique RFID chip is registered and associated with your reservation.
:

Exactly. If someone has enough sense to drive a car or ride an airplane to WDW then they can sure as heck figure out how to dispense a self-serve soda.

 

[PalisadesPkteer]

All of them up until the early 2000s when the policy changed to 'length of current stay'

I have a Pop Century mug from 2004 which I figured was too new to have the refill for life. Or am I wrong?

 

[Kamikaze]

I have a Pop Century mug from 2004 which I figured was too new to have the refill for life. Or am I wrong?

Definitely. The change was before 2000.

 

[poocher]

Sorry, but even these analyses are only a guess at "potential lost income." It is VERY unlikely that Disney would actually generate more than a small fraction of the potential value. As discussed, people who want inexpensive drinks will bring their own and Disney will have approximately the same income, and higher expenses. In economic terms, this is called "elastic demand." If the demand were not based on price, Disney could double the price of anything and double the gross income.
So the calculations are interesting, but irrelevant. Disney may be losing a few million in potential income, but it's unlikely to collect actual income if this is implemented across the board.

 

[Monsterfan99]

I can't wait for the day the system goes offline during lunch and no one can get soda.

 

[Mongomil]

In 2008 when we went to Blizard Beach the soda machines there were barcode activated. The only problem we had there was when the scanner didnt work. All they did at that point is turn on the soda machine so that it would dispense. It seemed to work fine other than that hicup which did not take them long at all to fix. Your cup holds so many ounces and it dispenses it. Oh and actually it will dispense a little less than what your cup will hold because of ice. So if you do not add any ice then there will be a little room at the top. And it is funny to hear all the people saying that the technology will be to advanced. They have been doing this at plenty of other places and do not seem to have problems with it.

 

[puntagordabob]

i still think that my idea of the cup with the dissolving bottom is a much more fun way of solving this problem.

:roflol:

 

[Thorpyness]

Stopping any losses to theft is good in my books. It saves the rest of us paying somewhere else.

 

[Mimi]

It's sad that the problem is so rampant that such a severe response is required to fix it. Why do people have to be dishonest about something so minor... and in front of their children? Heck, they probably teach their kids that it's the way to do a family vacation.

Don't people have any scruples anymore? What happened to "Thou Shalt Not Steal"? Stealing is wrong... even if you know you can get away with it. In the end it hurts everyone.

Was it really worth it???

 

[hrcollectibles]

Wow that is fascinating technology! It is a sensor that reads whether or not it is a Disney "Length of stay" mug! If the mug is old, like from a previous trip, the machine will not dispense anything but ice and water.

I can totally understand why Disney started doing this. I can't recall how many times I would be getting a drink at Port Orleans Riverside with my mug, and the family next to me would be using a different hotels mug. Smart move by Disney to crack down on the cheating of the system. I wonder how long it will be until these dispensers are spread throughout all the resorts....

I have seen guests use gatoraide bottles...

 

[hrcollectibles]

This thread comes up every so often and I remember it did so around this time last year, just before we went, and by chance one day a manager was in the food court and said 'wow, dixie landings cups, not seen them in a while' the CM she was with asked what mugs they were and the manager explained that 'these mugs were bought back when this resort was called dixie landings, and at that time the mugs were sold as 'unlimited refills for this and all future stays at this resort'.

Could it be that Disney's way around this situation is that Port Orleans is no Longer called Dixie Landings? As the manager said 'unlimited refills for this and all future stays at this resort'.:shrug:

 

[hrcollectibles]

Seems like a fine idea with me. I always pay for my mug, what difference does it make?

Same here. Also when you add either the quick service or deluxe dining plan you receive a mug. I just never understood how people could spend thousands of dollars on a trip to Disney and spend 20 -25 dollars on a shirt. But yet have difficulty spending $15 on a mug.

 

[VillanovaBlue]

Regarding the cost of the system to Disney, I believe I read in one of the other threads about this that the ValidFill company was providing at least part of the system for free (or at greatly reduced cost), since this would obviously be a huge proof-of-concept when selling to other fountain-drink sellers...

So really, there's not much of a cost for Disney to do this, and they make more $$ due to increased mug sales and/or single cup sales...

Sorry all you soda thieves, the free ride is over! :lol:

 

[LisaB08]

Disney guests are getting the real mugging!

I was one of those people that were told the mug would be good forever. I have been coming to Disney for 20 years. We vacation at WDW twice a year. Am I supposed to buy two new mugs a year? That is totally ridiculous. We are not DVC members or super duper premium passholders. I don't understand why the refillable mug is such a hot topic. How much time do you really spend at your resort anyway? We are there when the parks drop the rope and get back to the hotel late. I'm lucky if I fill up once a day with the mug. Disney constantly raises their ticket, hotel, food and merchandise prices. So what if people reuse their mugs from year to year. I laugh to myself when people use the word fraud or stealing. Get a life people. I could go anywhere for my vacation, but I chose to spend it either at Disneyland or WDW. It's about Disney gives me something back.

 

[juniorthomas]

I love it when people get up in arms about "big brother" when all that is happening is they are finally enforcing a rule that was already in place. They are doing it quietly with a clever technology rather than trying to tick people off with real live cast members policing the situation.

It matters not to me. I don't use the overpriced generic mugs anyway.

Truth.

 

[juniorthomas]

I still think that my idea of the cup with the dissolving bottom is a much more fun way of solving this problem.

It would certainly be more enjoyable to watch, anyway

 

[juniorthomas]

It's sad that the problem is so rampant that such a severe response is required to fix it. Why do people have to be dishonest about something so minor... and in front of their children? Heck, they probably teach their kids that it's the way to do a family vacation.

Don't people have any scruples anymore? What happened to "Thou Shalt Not Steal"? Stealing is wrong... even if you know you can get away with it. In the end it hurts everyone.

Was it really worth it???

I would think that really thirsty people who like free things, even if they aren't really free, wouldn't bother to think much about right and wrong. Afterall, these are the same people that can justify bringing a plastic cup (or multiple plastic cups) from their last Disney visit two years ago back for their next stay.

 

[xdan0920]

I was one of those people that were told the mug would be good forever. I have been coming to Disney for 20 years. We vacation at WDW twice a year. Am I supposed to buy two new mugs a year? That is totally ridiculous. We are not DVC members or super duper premium passholders. I don't understand why the refillable mug is such a hot topic. How much time do you really spend at your resort anyway? We are there when the parks drop the rope and get back to the hotel late. I'm lucky if I fill up once a day with the mug. Disney constantly raises their ticket, hotel, food and merchandise prices. So what if people reuse their mugs from year to year. I laugh to myself when people use the word fraud or stealing. Get a life people. I could go anywhere for my vacation, but I chose to spend it either at Disneyland or WDW. It's about Disney gives me something back.

A couple things, without being insulting I hope. Firstly, if you rarely use the soda mug, then just don't buy one on your next trip.

Second, Disney is not giving you anything back. You are taking something back. Big difference there. All they are doing is putting an end to that.

As for what Evan and a couple others have said about pass-holders who come multiple times per year. I would think the next step in this process is an annual soda pass. So you should wind up not being effected too much.