News Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge - Historical Construction/Impressions

[Deleted member 107043]

Right -- but customers can freely talk with their wallets and despite the price increases, the demand still is there. When you start reducing admissions, you are essentially telling your customer (in their minds) 'Sorry, we don't want you here.' and well, people don't respond kindly to that. Especially people who have traveled a very long way to be there (and paid for it), taken off a day of work, etc.

Humor me for a moment.... a plane only has so many seats. If permitted airlines would likely find ways to permit as many passengers on a flight as demand allows. Maybe travelers would stand in the aisles, sit on crowded benches, or in the toilets until there just wasn't a single spot left to put a person. Consider hotels. Rooms are booked based on the number of humans that can be accomodated comfortably in each room. Most hotels don't permit guests to reserve a single occupancy room with one bed for them and their ten family members. You can't go to see Katy Perry, Beyonce, an NFL game, or a Broadway musical without a ticket assigned to a single seat.

Likewise the same should apply for Disneyland, and when the place approaches the boiling point a polite "Sorry we're sold out today" at the ticket windows or turnstiles should suffice. However, instead of establishing reasonable and efficient capacity levels for everyone's comfort and enjoyment (and to allow Disney to maintain a generous revenue stream) they are cranked up for maximum profit with little regard for guest experience.

 

[Deleted member 107043]

Uh..... What? Someone buys a ticket for a family vacation and because they didn't show up an hour before opening they get turned away because "the park is at capacity"?

You wouldn't go to the airport without buying a ticket first to ensure you had a seat, would you? You don't walk into the most popular dining spot in town at 7pm on Friday expecting to get a table. Even many movie theaters are now reserve only. A Disney theme park should operate in a similar way.

 

[dweezil78]

Humor me for a moment.... a plane only has so many seats. If permitted airlines would likely find ways to permit as many passengers on a flight as demand allows. Maybe travelers would stand in the aisles, sit on crowded benches, or in the toilets until there just wasn't a single spot left to put a person. Consider hotels. Rooms are booked based on the number of humans that can be accomodated comfortably in each room. Most hotels don't permit guests to reserve a single occupancy room with one bed for them and their ten family members. You can't go to see Katy Perry, Beyonce, an NFL game, or a Broadway musical without a ticket assigned to a single seat.

Likewise the same should apply for Disneyland, and when the place approaches the boiling point a polite "Sorry we're sold out today" at the ticket windows or turnstiles should suffice. However, instead of establishing reasonable and efficient capacity levels for everyone's comfort and enjoyment (and to allow Disney to maintain a generous revenue stream) they are cranked up for maximum profit with little regard for guest experience.

I don't disagree with you on any of that. I do think, however, that the primary difference between theme parks and everything you named off comes down to walk-up/day-of business vs. advance reservation business. You know well in advance for planes, hotels, shows, etc whether or not there are tickets/rooms/seats left. And although you can buy Disneyland tickets in advance, a great deal of people do not do this.

Again, not saying you're wrong with where you're coming from. I just don't think it's quite apples to apples. (Unless Disneyland moves to a 100% advance ticketing solution.)

 

[MisterPenguin]

You wouldn't go to the airport without buying a ticket first to ensure you had a seat, would you? You don't walk into the most popular dining spot in town at 7pm on Friday expecting to get a table. Even many movie theaters are now reserve only. A Disney theme park should operate in a similar way.

That's fine. But then that means that airlines don't and shouldn't sell general admission seats. The way tickets are sold would have to be restructured that they are linked to a specific day. And you use them on that day or you lose them.

The current model is that every ticket is general admission for any day of the year. People buy a 3 or 4 or 7 or 10 day ticket for their Disney vacation assuming they can just show up and get in. They buy their day/time limited airplane ticket and arrive at their day/time limited hotel room. Then they head to the park. And imagine if they get turned away because "we're full." The only way to avoid that is to limit the number of tickets sold for that very day. Is that the model you're suggesting?

 

[mickEblu]

I don't disagree with you on any of that. I do think, however, that the primary difference between theme parks and everything you named off comes down to walk-up/day-of business vs. advance reservation business. You know well in advance for planes, hotels, shows, etc whether or not there are tickets/rooms/seats left. And although you can buy Disneyland tickets in advance, a great deal of people do not do this.

Again, not saying you're wrong with where you're coming from. I just don't think it's quite apples to apples. (Unless Disneyland moves to a 100% advance ticketing solution.)

Right the system would have to change. And it would be a Huge change but I suppose it could be done. Not sure how succsssful it would be though. The big question is how far in advance would one have to make a reservation? If an AP had to suddenly book a day at Disneyland 30-60 days in advance that would be a big turn off of being an “AP.” And Disney doesn’t want to lose that bread and butter. Personally I wouldn’t mind this sort of system if I was guaranteed or at least had a good chance of reserving a day 7-14 days out.

I agree, it’s not necessarily apples to apples as for the most part booking flights and hotels are planned well in advance for most people. Not so much for theme parks unless it’s a vacation/ trip or something. Culturally, I don’t know if I can see people in So Cal reserving a theme park day 30 days in advance. I mean you may as well get rid of the AP program at that point.

Anyway, we know Disney will not turn away money. So they probably won’t go to a reservation based system or get rid of the AP program. I still think capped APs is the best solution.

 

[Deleted member 107043]

I don't disagree with you on any of that. I do think, however, that the primary difference between theme parks and everything you named off comes down to walk-up/day-of business vs. advance reservation business. You know well in advance for planes, hotels, shows, etc whether or not there are tickets/rooms/seats left. And although you can buy Disneyland tickets in advance, a great deal of people do not do this.

The more we discuss this the more I suppose what I'm really advocating for is a restructuring of the way Disney distributes and sells tickets for any given day.

That's fine. But then that means that airlines don't and shouldn't sell general admission seats. The way tickets are sold would have to be restructured that they are linked to a specific day. And you use them on that day or you lose them.

The admissions model is essentially the same today as it was in 1955. Yes there are more ticket media options, but the fact that you can just show up at the gates whenever you want and be granted access 99% of the time is the same. It's a system that seems out of step with the way that other businesses in the hospitality and entertainment industries operate today and will in the future. Yes, I think there should be a limit to how many tickets are sold for a given day, much in the way that concerts, theater shows, restaurants, etc operate.

Whatever the solution is Disneyland seems reluctant to address it in any meaningful way.

 

[MisterPenguin]

Yeah, every day the Disney parks open they hope that all those millions of general admission tickets and APs they already sold don't all show up on the same day.

And they sorta do some times of the year when they have phased closings.

But imagine if Congress created a national week-long holiday for the first week of November for elections. Well, everyone will use their tickets for that week and they'll be hitting phased closings.

 

[Disney Irish]

The one million number only makes sense if each AP only comes to the park once per year. But when you have one million people visiting multiple times a year, they figure WAY more into the 17 million than just one million.

Except you're assuming that the 17 Million is all or mostly repeat visitors and not individual visitors. We can't make that assumption.

Is it hard to believe that Disneyland could have a majority of the 17 Million as individual non-repeat non-AP visitors a year? Or even if there are repeat visitors as part of that number is it really going to dramatically reduce attendance? So what is the REAL number of individual visitors in your opinion? 5 Million, 10 Million, 15 Million?

So lets for the sake of argument say that 30% (over 5x the number of APs) is repeat visits. That is still almost 12 Million individual people, which is about 35k per day.

I think we all just have to face it, no matter if there are APs or not its going to be crowded.

 

[Professortango1]

Except you're assuming that the 17 Million is all or mostly repeat visitors and not individual visitors. We can't make that assumption.

Is it hard to believe that Disneyland could have a majority of the 17 Million as individual non-repeat non-AP visitors a year? Or even if there are repeat visitors as part of that number is it really going to dramatically reduce attendance? So what is the REAL number of individual visitors in your opinion? 5 Million, 10 Million, 15 Million?

So lets for the sake of argument say that 30% (over 5x the number of APs) is repeat visits. That is still almost 12 Million individual people, which is about 35k per day.

I think we all just have to face it, no matter if there are APs or not its going to be crowded.

Nobody is saying the parks are going to be empty again, we're just saying that the difference between AP crowds and non AP crowds is a noticeable difference throughout the year.

If we're looking at a million APs, and the average APer probably visits the park 7 times a year. That's a good chunk of people we're taking out of the mix.

 

[Curious Constance]

Except you're assuming that the 17 Million is all or mostly repeat visitors and not individual visitors. We can't make that assumption.

Is it hard to believe that Disneyland could have a majority of the 17 Million as individual non-repeat non-AP visitors a year? Or even if there are repeat visitors as part of that number is it really going to dramatically reduce attendance? So what is the REAL number of individual visitors in your opinion? 5 Million, 10 Million, 15 Million?

So lets for the sake of argument say that 30% (over 5x the number of APs) is repeat visits. That is still almost 12 Million individual people, which is about 35k per day.

I think we all just have to face it, no matter if there are APs or not its going to be crowded.

I'm not sure what the number of non repeat visitors is, or how greatly crowds would reduce if APs all fell down a rabbit hole. All I was saying is your claim that APs only contribute 1,000,000 to the 17,000,000 total was extremely, totally, unequivocally WRONG.

Now just reply with a simple, I was wrong and CC proved it, and we can move on with our day.

 

[nevol]

Everyone other than AP's spend weeks, months, years planning their Disney visits/vacations. There is probably not one person in the park on a single day ticket who didn't know at least the evening before that they were going to Disneyland. Change to an reservation/online ticket purchasing system.

 

[Disney Irish]

I'm not sure what the number of non repeat visitors is, or how greatly crowds would reduce if APs all fell down a rabbit hole. All I was saying is your claim that APs only contribute 1,000,000 to the 17,000,000 total was extremely, totally, unequivocally WRONG.

Now just reply with a simple, I was wrong and CC proved it, and we can move on with our day.

I'm not going to say I'm wrong because we just don't know the break down of the numbers. The 17 Million could be made up of both repeat visitors and unique visitors or just unique visitors only. Since Disney doesn't provide actual numbers we will likely never know the REAL numbers.

My point is and will continue to be that in my opinion is that even if all APs stopped going today that the parks will still continue to be crowded. The only difference would be that you'd likely get the off-season back. We can see this played out during the summer months when all but the top Signature APs are blocked and its still crowded. I went in July (I have a Signature AP) and it was still crowded.

 

[rle4lunch]

Fair enough.

I guess I'm not bothered by it because I know he's genuine and not pretending to be a professional narrator and these videos (because I asked) are more of a bonding project with his daughter, Megan.

Back on topic...

I like everyone's faux concern/ backlash toward my comment far more than my original post.

I commend the guy for doing a project with his daughter, and hey, if it brings them joy than so be it.

And I truly appreciate the thought police on here metering my topical comment about the narrator's lack of any joy or exuberance of emotion while talking about I- Beams. Thanks for putting me in my place. Lol.

 

[JD2000]

2. Limiting APs. As mentioned above, APs aren't the full source of the overcrowding, but they do have some effect. IMO, the best solution is for APs to become a discount club. Buy into the discount club at an initial set price (say $200) and then tickets are at a reduced price for the year (with surge pricing). This way, it's never 'free' to hop over to the park for a few hours or every day. In the end, someone who goes to the park more often than another person is always paying more, as it should be.

This could be the best idea yet other than eliminating APs.

 

[Rich T]

As busy as the park gets, I've never felt unsafe. Annoyed, frustrated, unsatisfied... absolutely. But never unsafe. The days where it does get into unsafe territory are the few days in the year that they actually close the park temporarily to guests. Are there times that I question the sanity of any guest willing to pay $$$ to go inside and put up with those crowds? Absolutely.

I've had a couple of experiences at DL where my family and I were basically trapped in a sardine situation where no one could move (no one out of a few hundred people) for ten or fifteen minutes, and it is not a scenario anyone wants to risk. I'm not one of those nincompoops who calls 911 over something like that, but Disney is dang lucky nothing "went horribly wrong" such as someone passing out or causing a panic.

My worst experience was not recent, though--It was during the dark days of Pressler. My family and I were stuck in the middle of a huge crowd waiting for the Train at the TL station. No one could move, no one could get out if someone had to go to the bathroom (and several people needed to), only one train was running, and THERE WERE NO CAST MEMBERS AT THE STATION AT ALL. The magic of budget cuts! No one to talk to the (many) angry guests, no one to make sure someone didn't hop the fence and stand on the tracks... NO ONE. Things aren't quite that dire these days.

 

[vancee]

I have the Signature Annual Pass and I don’t mind if they raise the price again, as long as it gets less crowded. Blockout days for SoCal passes is crowded. Disney will keep raising the prices, and I’ll be one of the MANY suckers who remains a pass holder regardless of the price.

 

[TP2000]

New video from our favorite lady blogger. I always enjoy these views she gets from Tarzan's Treehouse.

 

[britain]

Hey, lookie here! A really good Fresh Baked video!

 

[tikiphil]

A part of the Galaxy's Edge model is on display in the Star Wars Launch Bay in Disneyland.

 

[Deleted member 107043]

Slashflim.com has an article about new SW:GE artwork that was released on trading cards at SW:Launch Bay.

http://www.slashfilm.com/star-wars-galaxys-edge-images/