devoy1701
Well-Known Member
This post struck a chord with me. I have only visited WDW since 2000 so I'm relatively new to them. Even when I try to have a relaxing WDW vacation, I still tend to go into commando mode (insert obvious joke here). A basic package with hotel, park tickets, and dining is so expensive that it's hard to for me to justify doing things like water skiing because I will feel like I have wasted a perfectly good park day - a park that I spent a lot of money to be in.
I think that's why the deluxe hotels have suffered. How many times have you read on these boards "all we need is a place to sleep and shower"? I have said it myself. We spend so much on park tickets that it seems silly to waste time doing other things like sitting at the pool or visiting the spa or plopping down another $50 to go play miniature golf when we have valid park ticket. In turn, it seems like a lot of amenities have been removed because people weren't using them or they weren't bringing in enough profit to justify their existence. That in turn, makes people look for lower priced options because, as you said "WDW is just theme parks + hotels" not a true resort experience. Instead of steering people back into focusing on WDW as a resort with more to offer than just theme parks, they "resorted" to raising prices to cover the ground they lost while continuing to take away things that add intrinsic value. It's kind of a vicious cycle. They seem to realize that there is a problem (the commercial from earlier this year was focused more on the hotel stay than the parks), but I don't think they have hit on a good solution for this.
This is starting to make sense now. I like the way you made your inference and I think you're exactly right. It's so hard to plan "down time" in a WDW vacation anymore, and it is hard to justify spending so much on a hotel room if you're just going to commando the parks. It's not about "something for everyone" anymore...it's all about the parks. People aren't looking to spend a full week at Disney World and divide that time among shopping, lounging by the pool, golfing, and just relaxing. It's all about maximizing that time in the parks.
I might have missed the stats earlier, are the deluxe resorts suffering the most in terms of occupancy rates? If so, then this logic holds true. If guests aren't willing to or don't want to spend on those peripheral experiences, then they have to raise prices on hotel rates for Mods and Values, or increase ticket prices twice a year, and lower costs at restaurants, and focus more on the recurring guests of DVC.
EDIT TYPOS: I swapped out some key words in that first paragraph!
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