CJR
Well-Known Member
This is what I'm thinking too. It'll give them a yearish to work out kinks before the 50th, as well as get it in and out of the headlines before then too. It'll probably come up in the new fiscal year.
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Ticket price increase / FP+ changes coming?
- Thread starter GhostHost1000
- Start date
This is what I'm thinking too. It'll give them a yearish to work out kinks before the 50th, as well as get it in and out of the headlines before then too. It'll probably come up in the new fiscal year.
lentesta
Premium Member
One of the benefits to Disney in marketing to the top 20%/10%/5%/1% of American households by income is that those groups tend to benefit disproportionally from gains in the economy, and are better insulated from downturns.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
You’re thinking too low. SeaWorld has charged a minimum $10 for single use Quick Queue. Disney could easily charge that. I also think they should tie the price to your personal spending patterns. Spend more, pay more. Staying at Galactic Starcruiser with reservations at Savi’s and Oga’s and just built a droid while gnawing on a Ronto Wrap? He’s an offer to buy a Rise of the Resistance FastPass at a nice premium that reflects your Star Wars obsession.
NomeKing88
Member
If I were in charge of this mess, I would simply limit Fastpass to Resort Guests only (and better yet, ADRs too). It wouldn't matter what type of resort you'd stay at either, you'd be able to book fastpasses on check-in day, check-out day, and all the days in between.
A month before your trip, you can book 3 fastpasses a day per park, same as it is now, and ADRs too if you want (everyone else can get a ressie day of, because booking an ADR 6 months in advanced is INSANE. The only change I'd make to FastPass is that you would only be able to FastPass an attraction once for that day. If you want to ride it again, get in standby. That way, more people get a chance to FastPass the popular attractions. Also, I'd lower the amount of fastpasses available so that it's only 50% of an attraction's capacity. If there's gonna be 2 lines for a ride, might as well make their throughput even.
I know non-resort staying guests would get the short end of the stick with this scenario, but by shrinking the pool of people who have access to FastPass, the system wouldn't be so overloaded and standby lines would move so much faster! Also this would be a win for the resort, as the demand for the motels/hotels would increase. This would continue their trend of building more resorts and overall increasing resort capacity. IDK just some armchair theme park resort managing.
A month before your trip, you can book 3 fastpasses a day per park, same as it is now, and ADRs too if you want (everyone else can get a ressie day of, because booking an ADR 6 months in advanced is INSANE. The only change I'd make to FastPass is that you would only be able to FastPass an attraction once for that day. If you want to ride it again, get in standby. That way, more people get a chance to FastPass the popular attractions. Also, I'd lower the amount of fastpasses available so that it's only 50% of an attraction's capacity. If there's gonna be 2 lines for a ride, might as well make their throughput even.
I know non-resort staying guests would get the short end of the stick with this scenario, but by shrinking the pool of people who have access to FastPass, the system wouldn't be so overloaded and standby lines would move so much faster! Also this would be a win for the resort, as the demand for the motels/hotels would increase. This would continue their trend of building more resorts and overall increasing resort capacity. IDK just some armchair theme park resort managing.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The system is overloaded because the parks are overloaded. Shuffling the deck chairs doesn’t fix that fundamental problem.
NomeKing88
Member
Oh I would absolutely build more attractions too lol Build it out! Build it out!
donsullivan
Premium Member
If I were in charge of this mess, I would simply limit Fastpass to Resort Guests only (and better yet, ADRs too). It wouldn't matter what type of resort you'd stay at either, you'd be able to book fastpasses on check-in day, check-out day, and all the days in between.
A month before your trip, you can book 3 fastpasses a day per park, same as it is now, and ADRs too if you want (everyone else can get a ressie day of, because booking an ADR 6 months in advanced is INSANE. The only change I'd make to FastPass is that you would only be able to FastPass an attraction once for that day. If you want to ride it again, get in standby. That way, more people get a chance to FastPass the popular attractions. Also, I'd lower the amount of fastpasses available so that it's only 50% of an attraction's capacity. If there's gonna be 2 lines for a ride, might as well make their throughput even.
I know non-resort staying guests would get the short end of the stick with this scenario, but by shrinking the pool of people who have access to FastPass, the system wouldn't be so overloaded and standby lines would move so much faster! Also this would be a win for the resort, as the demand for the motels/hotels would increase. This would continue their trend of building more resorts and overall increasing resort capacity. IDK just some armchair theme park resort managing.
You don’t seem to understand that on any given day over 50% of the people in the parks are not staying at a Disney operated resort. To just dismiss all those people as ‘not worthy’ is among the worst suggestions I’ve seen in this thread.
NomeKing88
Member
I don't think non-resort guests would be viewed as "not worthy". I just think Fastpass should be treated as a perk for people spending their money to stay on property. I mean, if you're gonna hand over $200+ for a clean motel room, it would be nice to get an exclusive perk like that.
Not that any of this matters, I don't think Disney would ever do this because FastPass+ gives them so much data on guests behaviors from an operational standpoint. They have no idea when off-site guests will visit their parks until they book that FastPass or make that reservation. They gotta know when to cut staffing, etc.
ehh
Member
This makes sense to me too, but when would they need to announce it?
I'm assuming there can be no overlap between the current FP system and the paid FP system. So that means at least 90 days out to avoid Club-level guests from booking into the paid window. Maybe a bit more than that so Club-level guests can reconsider their resort room choice. But also not so far out to scare families away.
lentesta
Premium Member
Disney already holds back some day-of FP capacity as a hedge against ride breakdowns. It's why we have same-day FP drops when everything is running smoothly.
One way they could offer start offering paid FP is instead to sell those day-of FPs to people who're balking at, say, 60-minute waits for 7DMT when they're there.
That would fit nicely into the Disney Genie demographic, which is people who're trying to minimize their wait in line by using the app. And it wouldn't affect anything at all about the advance FP booking process for anyone.
If paid FP isn't the reason Disney is spending $ to develop Disney Genie, then where's the revenue stream that justifies the millions they're spending to develop yet another theme park app?
Over time, as the pressure to increase revenue goes up, I'd expect to see more of each ride's advance FP capacity allocated to the paid tier. That would give them time for the transition period you've noted.
General Mayhem
Well-Known Member
I say just start charging for all of FP+ like Express at Universal. It's weird to me with the current market that it's remained a free service for 21 years. I personally wouldn't mind if they charged out the wazoo for it like Express does on busy days because then less people would use it.
RSoxNo1
Well-Known Member
Fixed that for you.
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ehh
Member
Hadn't considered this type of transition. Sounds like this might also be good to start during a (relatively) slow period when the 60/30-day allocation could be pulled back slightly without much issue/detection.
Pricing might also need to be a bit higher than I was initially thinking to throttle demand appropriately. I was thinking the system would be more along the lines of getting some money from everyone, rather than higher amounts from certain demographics.
The optics of "You can now add hard-to-get Fastpasses starting today!" are a whole lot better than "You need to pay starting MM/DD, start saving!"
solidyne
Well-Known Member
Can you put "xPass" in boldface so people won't have to toggle back and forth to spot the difference, as in a Highlights Magazine puzzle?
Took me like five minutes!
doctornick
Well-Known Member
Many people, including myself, find that building detailed plans for a vacation is a huge part of the fun and anticipation of travelling.
I would never begrudge anyone for preferring a particular vacation style, but I always find it funny when some folks think that "everyone" hates doing stuff like planning a vacation, developing an itinerary, scheduling meals, etc.
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
It's safe to assume most consumers don't like making spreadsheets and booking every meal or experience months in advance for their vacation.
Yes, I'm sure you and some others do, but it's equally ridiculous to assume most do.
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
They already do that at Disneyland Paris.
One time use of all FP attractions for the day will set you back over $100 on days of expected higher attendance. Unlimited? $171. PP.
ehh
Member
$171 per person is a bargain compared to VIP tours (over $3500 for 7hrs most days of the year, max 10 people). I'd expect the price to be much higher in WDW, if such a thing is offered at all.
doctornick
Well-Known Member
I've never made a spreadsheet in my life for a vacation. People are prone to ridiculous overexaggeration. Knowing what park I'll be in, having a few rides planned at rough times and having a meal reservation is far from having every second of a day mapped out. There's plenty of stuff we do on a whim but having plans for many "big" things - including the "must do" rides that we are gonna want to do anyway - takes a lot of the stress off during the vacation because we know the major elements are in place.
But again people are different. I find it odd that people would go to a place like Disney and not have at least a bare bones set of plans. That said, I don't know if "most" people plan out vacations - I'm sure it's a big spectrum from people who do actually have spreadsheets and virtually every second of the whole day mapped out to those who just decide to drive to Disney one morning on a whim.
(Also, I'd rather spend my spare time thinking about my next trip to Disney and what I'll be doing there than, I dunno, what I'll be eating for lunch tomorrow at work. Part of the fun of a trip is the anticipation of it and the excitement before you go. YMMV)
As an aside, I think the telling part of your post is really when you say "months in advance" - I think that's what bothers most about WDW, in the large lead times for much of the booking. And let's face it 6 months for dining is indeed pretty crazy. If those kinds of reservations where not opened until much closer - like a few weeks or a month - than I think a big chunk of the folks who complain about the pre-planning would at least judge it as a reasonable timeframe to book stuff and be less bothered. Just my hunch.
Jon81uk
Well-Known Member
Tours, events, after-hours and all the other up-charges. If the app suggests your perfect schedule for a thrill-seekers day includes booking the after-hours event to get shorter lines then more people become aware of these additional ways to spend money. Or that your perfect princess package isn't complete without Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique etc. Just thoughts on how the app could be used to try to sell existing up-charges.
I do think that some kind of paid queue jump like SeaWorld and Universal offer is likely in the future and I hope it will be well restricted so actually the standby line moves quicker than the free FastPass.
Over here in the UK at the major theme parks the fast-track passes are around £7-10 per ride ($10-14) or there are expensive packages of multiples or unlimited etc. The slightly higher price does mean not too many people utilise them.