On layoffs, very bad attendance, and Iger's legacy being one of disgrace

Sirwalterraleigh

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
photoginit said:
Yep, NY, NJ, CT are huge markets for Disney World and all for those states require a 2 Week quarantine if you come here. If I was Disney I would be ****ed at the Governor and state government in Florida for their completely incompetent response to the Coronavirus.
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I hear they may have/are threatening to pull the plug just because of this. But that’s just a rumor.

I don’t think they would have opened if they had it to do over again.
 
1HAPPYGHOSTHOST

1HAPPYGHOSTHOST

Well-Known Member
pheneix said:
Disney Springs doesn't require navigating thru a compulsory registration system just to go inside. Good to hear they can make a go of it with the world on fire.

When MK reopened, they relentlessly pushed Splash merch on the ebay sellers with no shame. Ppl hauling trash bags of plushes out. Disney knows how bad that looks. They also don't care. The only other high demand merch run I've heard about was the launch of some Disneyland 65th stuff. DL anniversary merch always turns up a crowd. Total crickets at retail other than those eBay Pirate runs.

People are scared. Even the guests coming to WDW are not escaping the real world anymore. They're taking a smoke break from it. And their phones are still getting bombed with bad news. No wonder in park spending is near zero when Disney charges these old economy prices. Disney will have to correct pricing to the new reality. They all will.

I should note that Universal's attendance and guest spending is also garbage. Today, someone tweeted a photo of the Blues Brothers performing for like a family of 3. This is a theme park that has literal hundreds of people inside. More employees than guests for sure. I don't know why these resorts are doing this to themselves.
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Wait...how did they "push splash merch" on the ebay resellers?? That's not how it works. When they opened the ebay sellers just went in and bought everything up because Disney made the splash refurb announcement so ebay resellers knew splash merch would be hot. How is that Disney pushing it on them? Sure Disney made sure to have plenty of Splash Merch stocked up due to the announcement but it's not like Disney themselves announced a Splash Mountain sale merch or something. So can you please explain your statement?
 
Sirwalterraleigh

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
DVCakaCarlF said:
Wow, we actually both can agree on something...
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DVCakaCarlF

Well-Known Member
pheneix said:
Disney is straight up using quantum math to claim this operation is profitable. It is not. We all see the deserted theme parks and lack of guest spending. Yet, there's many Disney spinsters trying to tell us that what we see isn't really what we see. They're good at that. Look at the failed opening of Galaxy's Edge and the continued online bickering over "how bad it did."

Despite other "insiders" (not a dig at Steve *at all* cause I have my own "alternative" connects claiming the same) saying attendance is not in the hundreds," I mean... we see what these parks look like. You can certainly pull the entire day's chart and find that a few thousand ppl wandered thru the gates. They don't stay long. By 4pm every park is lucky to still have a thousand in park. On most days. its rotten luck!

They got hotel occupancy in the teens yet their transit system is getting worked like the 4th of July every day because of COVID ops. By Disney's own math alone -- baking transportation costs into room rates -- they really screwed this.
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Like any retail business, their cost of goods/services are only 20-30%, with the rest being gross margin. I can see how they are turning a “gross” profit.

“Net” is TBD.
 
bryanfze55

bryanfze55

Well-Known Member
How about we just wait and see what happens? My instinct is to say this is all doom and gloom, but maybe I’m wrong. Rome crumbled; maybe Disney will, too.

I’m inclined to think the majority of American Disney guests are either locals who can visit relatively cheaply, or tourists who have good incomes and probably are working from home and not financially impacted by COVID-19. I think American tourism will pick up at some point. International will be tougher.
 
EagleScout610

EagleScout610

What a wisecracker
Premium Member
1HAPPYGHOSTHOST said:
Wait...how did they "push splash merch" on the ebay resellers?? That's not how it works. When they opened the ebay sellers just went in and bought everything up because Disney made the splash refurb announcement so ebay resellers knew splash merch would be hot. How is that Disney pushing it on them? Sure Disney made sure to have plenty of Splash Merch stocked up due to the announcement but it's not like Disney themselves announced a Splash Mountain sale merch or something. So can you please explain your statement?
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I'm waiting for them to look really stupid once the retheme gets axed for financial reasons and then they end up with three rooms of Br'er Bear plushes
 
Sirwalterraleigh

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
DVCakaCarlF said:
Like any retail business, their cost of goods/services are only 20-30%, with the rest being gross margin. I can see how they are turning a “gross” profit.

“Net” is TBD.
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That’s actually not the case at wdw. Though instinct would lead you to believe it is.

Disney has a tremendous “sunk cost” due all the overhead costs they eat as they run the infrastructure. Nobody “pays” for a fleet of hundreds of buses, a private security force, horticulture, road maintenance, water system management, etc. reedy creek is a puppet municipality...at the end of the day.

The profit is still overwhelmingly from merchandise. Nearly all of it. Product from china...you do the math.

I used to actually see the figures - long ago...but my data is so out of date I can’t address the differences in prices, labor costs, benefits, upsells, etc now...

...but it’s not that different.

The old adage was that they never have made a dime off a hotel room charge or a ticket.

It was surprisingly accurate.

Overhead is much higher...which is why I equate wdw making profits as “climbing a mountain”...once they cross the top...it’s all profit on the downslope. Have to have numbers for that.
 
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DVCakaCarlF

Well-Known Member
bryanfze55 said:
How about we just wait and see what happens? My instinct is to say this is all doom and gloom, but maybe I’m wrong. Rome crumbled; maybe Disney will, too.

I’m inclined to think the majority of American Disney guests are either locals who can visit relatively cheaply, or tourists who have good incomes and probably are working from home and not financially impacted by COVID-19. I think American tourism will pick up at some point. International will be tougher.
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It wouldnt be be bad if they focused on Americans for a minute.
 
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DVCakaCarlF

Well-Known Member
Sirwalterraleigh said:
That’s actually not the case at wdw. Though instinct would lead you to believe it is.

Disney has a tremendous “sunk cost” due all the overhead costs they eat as they run the infrastructure. Nobody “pays” for a fleet of hundreds of buses, a private security force, horticulture, road maintenance, water system management, etc. reedy creek is a puppet municipality...at the end of the day.

The profit is still overwhelmingly from merchandise. Nearly all of it. Product from china...you do the math.

I used to actually see the figures - long ago...but my data is so out of date I can’t address the differences in prices, labor costs, benefits, upsells, etc now...

...but it’s not that different.

The old adage was that they never have made a dime off a hotel room charge or a ticket.

It was surprisingly accurate.

Overhead is much higher...which is why I equate wdw making profits as “climbing a mountain”...once they cross the top...it’s all profit on the downslope. Have to have numbers for that.
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That’s what I said “gross,” and not “net.”

The overhead, I’m sure, is astronomical, but is a fixed cost and, at this point, it’s been capitalized. That monorail beam costs nothing compared to the fuel those buses use. Did you know they actually “lease” those tires?

And, with the amount of money that place makes, I bet they “made the summit of that mountain” in the first quarter of the fiscal year.
 
Piebald

Piebald

Well-Known Member
1HAPPYGHOSTHOST said:
Wait...how did they "push splash merch" on the ebay resellers?? That's not how it works. When they opened the ebay sellers just went in and bought everything up because Disney made the splash refurb announcement so ebay resellers knew splash merch would be hot. How is that Disney pushing it on them? Sure Disney made sure to have plenty of Splash Merch stocked up due to the announcement but it's not like Disney themselves announced a Splash Mountain sale merch or something. So can you please explain your statement?
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Well they kind of created the demand by getting rid of all of the merch from their website, eliminating most of the merch that could be found in multiple locations (i.e. there was a little Brer Rabbit thing that clipped onto bags and stuff, gone from the other parks) and basically leaving only one location to sell it all. Once they got rid of it online people went nuts.
 
1HAPPYGHOSTHOST

1HAPPYGHOSTHOST

Well-Known Member
Piebald said:
Well they kind of created the demand by getting rid of all of the merch from their website, eliminating most of the merch that could be found in multiple locations (i.e. there was a little Brer Rabbit thing that clipped onto bags and stuff, gone from the other parks) and basically leaving only one location to sell it all. Once they got rid of it online people went nuts.
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That is not pushing the merch on anyone. No one is forcing them to buy it. controlling where it is available is not the same thing.
 

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