Tokyo/OLC Plans to Copy (Unpopular) WDW Strategies

MisterPenguin

President of Animal Kingdom
Premium Member
Original Poster
See here: Oriental Land Group’s 2024 Medium-term Plan

In which OLC outlines goals to make their company more profitable. Which, from a business standpoint, is standard stuff. But, don't we all know that "Disney is a bizness!" is bad? And isn't OLC supposed to be the anti-Disney that gets it all right? Below is a reprint of the text with commentary from me in red.

April 27, 2022
Company name Oriental Land Co., Ltd.

Oriental Land Group’s 2024 Medium-term Plan
The Oriental Land Group (“OLC Group”) hereby announces its newly formulated 2024 Medium-
term Plan covering the period from FY2022 ending March 31, 2023 to FY2024 ending March 31,
2025.

The OLC Group has positioned the period covered by the 2024 Medium-term Plan as a phase to
recover from the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and execute on challenges for
the future. The new Medium-term Plan will kick-start the Group’s endeavor to establish a system for
flexibly addressing potential environmental changes and achieve “Our Goal for 2030.”

Under the 2024 Medium-term Plan, the OLC Group will give top priority to enhancing Guests’
experience value while at the same time striving to restore its financial performance to put itself on a
path to medium- and long-term growth.

1. Background to formulation of 2024 Medium-term Plan
Conventionally, the OLC Group operated its Parks with an emphasis on welcoming as many
Guests as possible. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, however, the Parks were operated with
limits imposed on attendance, which gave rise to a number of eye-opening insights.

Furthermore, the OLC Group considers it crucial to take flexible actions to address the risk of
long-term business suspension, which has materialized due to the pandemic, in addition to long-
recognized issues such as the shrinking consumer/working-age population resulting from a
lower birth rate and population aging.


2. Goals set under 2024 Medium-term Plan

1) Enhance Guests’ experience value

The OLC Group will aim to offer a comfortable Park environment by bringing down the
daily attendance limit to below the level before the COVID-19 pandemic started. Furthermore,
the Group will take flexible actions to meet diversifying Guest needs and roll out decisive new
measures to help Guests find new experience value, thereby enhancing the value they gain from
experience.

2) Restore financial performance
While taking steady steps to attract Guests back to the Parks, the Group will aim to restore its
financial performance in phases. By expanding its capacity through the opening of Tokyo
DisneySea® Fantasy Springs and attracting Guests at a higher level, the Group will aim to
achieve in FY2024 a consolidated operating profit of at least ¥100.0 billion, a record high
consolidated operating cash flow, and a return on equity (ROE) of at least eight percent.

So far, they're saying that want to make more money. The goal of a business. By providing "value." The kind of value people will pay more for. To wit...

3. Strategies under 2024 Medium-term Plan

1) Theme Park Segment strategy

・Enhance quality of Park experience
By bringing down the daily attendance limit from the pre-pandemic level, the OLC Group
will aim to provide a Park environment that offers consistent comfort whenever Guests visit.
The appeal of the Parks will be further enhanced with the addition of new contents to be
launched during the new Medium-term Plan period including Tokyo DisneySea Fantasy Springs
and the remodeling of existing facilities. Furthermore, the Group will offer new optional
experiences in an effort to meet Guests’ high expectations and needs.
The execution of such measures aims at ensuring high-quality Park experiences, which will
hopefully lead to increased earnings.

They noticed, just like Iger did, that guests are happier in less crowded parks. And so, they're going to limit attendance like they did for the pandemic, and just like WDW and DL are doing. Tho, it's nice they're investing in the guest experience. Both things add 'value.' Why do you want more value?... You can't reduce attendance and make more money unless those that do attend pay higher ticket prices (and more for food and merch).
And what exactly are "new optional experiences" if not upsell/upcharge events and services?


・Seek to even out attendance levels
In addition to setting a lower limit on daily attendance compared with the pre-pandemic level,
the OLC Group will also seek to minimize the difference in attendance levels throughout the
year—that is, across weekdays, holidays, the high season and low season—and raise the overall
annual attendance. The attendance in FY2024 is projected to reach around 26 million.

・Establish efficient Park operations
Reducing the maximum attendance numbers per day from the pre-pandemic level will
enable the OLC Group to better control the use of required resources on an ongoing basis and
establish an operational structure capable of addressing environmental changes.

While they don't say they're going to use surge pricing... I'm expecting it. Costs more in peak times, less in off-peak. Ideally the same number of people show up every day so that you can schedule the perfect amount of CMs to handle it at peak financial efficiency. Just like WDW is attempting.


2) Hotel Business Segment strategy
The OLC Group will make its hotels more appealing by providing Disney Hotel guests with
services more deeply tied to its Parks and strengthened Disney contents during their stay. In
addition, Disney Hotels, which will be expanded to six hotels during the 2024 Medium-term
Plan period, will be effectively leveraged as management resources by the entire resort business
to establish a long-term sustainable earning base.

More perks for those staying in Disney hotels (and with that extra value comes extra costs?).


3) Human resources strategy
With the aim of increasing employees’ job satisfaction and maximizing the performance of
individuals and organizations, the OLC Group will develop human resources and organizations
capable of enhancing Guest services with outside-the-box thinking and driving forward
operational reform. In addition, the Group will also create a personnel system equipped to take
flexible measures against environmental changes and consistently deliver high added value with
a limited number of staff. Another initiative is to improve the digital setting to build a more
comfortable workplace for employees.

We're increasing job satisfaction by eliminating jobs and moving guest services as much as possible to apps.


4) Investment strategy
During the five years from FY2022 to FY2026, Tokyo DisneySea Fantasy Springs, currently
under construction, will open, and existing attractions will be remodeled to increase their
appeal. These measures will serve as stepping stones to rendering a complete revamp of “Space
Mountain” and its surrounding environment, which will propel Tokyo Disney Resort® further
forward.

Furthermore, as part of the Group’s new growth strategy, management resources will also be
allocated to investment for sowing seeds in new fields within and outside Tokyo Disney Resort
as well as for initiatives pertaining to sustainability, including investing in human capital.

END
 
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dennis-in-ct

Well-Known Member
I am reading that people are saying how crowded the park are right now which seems to go against the statements how WDW is limiting attendance to minimize the crowds.

It doesn't sound like guests at WDW are happy right now with the "lesser crowds"
 

BasiltheBatLord

Well-Known Member
A lot of people don’t know TDR actually pre-empted the American parks with a lot of the required reservation stuff. Standby pass has been a major feature of the park experience since the pandemic, although I’ve heard that as of recently it is not being used as much anymore, which is hopefully a step in the right direction.

Aside from that, annual passes are still nowhere to be found, legacy FastPass is dead and buried (signage being removed from parks) and it is still painfully difficult to purchase tickets, especially for foreigners.

Add all this to the fact that Japan is still neck deep in COVID rules and social customs with no apparent interest in creating a real off ramp anytime soon. The new era of big data crowd control is a natural extension of the infamously rigid Japanese bureaucratic style.
 
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MisterPenguin

President of Animal Kingdom
Premium Member
Original Poster
I am reading that people are saying how crowded the park are right now which seems to go against the statements how WDW is limiting attendance to minimize the crowds.

It doesn't sound like guests at WDW are happy right now with the "lesser crowds"

Just think: Every time we've seen park reservation unavailability (usually three day weekends, Spring Break, Easter, and other holidays); that means the parks would have been even more crowded without the attendance cap.

And WDW hits those caps even with surge pricing and blackout dates and no new APs. Imagine just how much more crowded those days would have been!
 

Soleurs

Member
In the Parks
Yes
While they don't say they're going to use surge pricing... I'm expecting it. Costs more in peak times, less in off-peak. Ideally the same number of people show up every day so that you can schedule the perfect amount of CMs to handle it at peak financial efficiency. Just like WDW is attempting.
They’re already doing this. In March 2021, they introduced separate weekday and weekend/holiday prices, which was then further divided in October to a four tier system ranging from 7800 to 9400 per day depending on anticipated crowd levels. This isn’t really a revelation.
 

dennis-in-ct

Well-Known Member
Just think: Every time we've seen park reservation unavailability (usually three day weekends, Spring Break, Easter, and other holidays); that means the parks would have been even more crowded without the attendance cap.

And WDW hits those caps even with surge pricing and blackout dates and no new APs. Imagine just how much more crowded those days would have been!
Maybe it’s time for WDW to increase park capacity.
 

BrianLo

Well-Known Member
No one is complaining about Tokyo Disney Resort because their upkeep and service is impeccable and even in the current climate, we know they are pulling about four new attractions every five years.

Over the course of 15 years (2007-2022) there have been vastly more attractions at WDW built. I think Tokyo was the most laggard for new attractions in the 2010's of all resorts, except perhaps Paris.

I'm very happy with the future plans for the parks, but it comes after an extremely long dry spell. Impeccable maintenance and some great attraction refreshes aside.
 

celluloid

Well-Known Member
Over the course of 15 years (2007-2022) there have been vastly more attractions at WDW built. I think Tokyo was the most laggard for new attractions in the 2010's of all resorts, except perhaps Paris.

I'm very happy with the future plans for the parks, but it comes after an extremely long dry spell. Impeccable maintenance and some great attraction refreshes aside.
Tokyo Disney expanded with the world's most impressive theme park and into a fledged resort in 2001. That explains a lot of that. People had an entire theme park to enjoy and in less than five years got Raging Spirits and Tower of Terror in that park.

That is not even counting the immersive themed hotels that opened in those years you quote, which Disney slacked on building until Star Cruiser.

Define vastly and compare.

Also, the bolded really is not true, because a lot of the things you would count for the four theme parks of WDW in that same time frame, have been added to the TWO amazing theme parks of Tokyo.


Toy Story Mania
Monsters Hide and Go Seek
Soarin'
Beauty and The Beast
Buzz Light Year's Astro Blasters
Philharmagic.
Stitch Encounter
Turtle Talk
BayMax Happy Ride

There were also theaters and show venues created, parades and others that added more than WDW's entertainment changes.

These of course not counting rethemes such as Star Tours, which then you would not count for WDW either,refreshes which were a-plenty.

I don't think there is much of a dry spell there when you compare, it just went from going to what we typically expect from WDW after giving Tokyo being their best of Tokyo Disney Sea, the resort and Raging Spirits and Tower of Terror, both large ticket attraction in the two years before you say the dry spell started.

Pre the last few years of WDW's 4 revenue earning theme parks that went without anything through those same years getting some much needed new attractions, Tokyo still has the numbers of new attractions and venues.


After Everest WDW had quite the dryspell until recently.

And besides the travel costs that might occur, cheaper in cost than WDW's product.
 

BrianLo

Well-Known Member
Tokyo Disney expanded with the world's most impressive theme park and into a fledged resort in 2001. That explains a lot of that. People had an entire theme park to enjoy and in less than five years got Raging Spirits and Tower of Terror in that park.

That is not even counting the immersive themed hotels that opened in those years you quote, which Disney slacked on building until Star Cruiser.

Define vastly and compare.

Also, the bolded really is not true, because a lot of the things you would count for the four theme parks of WDW in that same time frame, have been added to the TWO amazing theme parks of Tokyo.


Toy Story Mania
Monsters Hide and Go Seek
Soarin'
Beauty and The Beast
Buzz Light Year's Astro Blasters
Philharmagic.
Stitch Encounter
Turtle Talk
BayMax Happy Ride

There were also theaters and show venues created, parades and others that added more than WDW's entertainment changes.

These of course not counting rethemes such as Star Tours, which then you would not count for WDW either,refreshes which were a-plenty.

I don't think there is much of a dry spell there when you compare, it just went from going to what we typically expect from WDW after giving Tokyo being their best of Tokyo Disney Sea, the resort and Raging Spirits and Tower of Terror, both large ticket attraction in the two years before you say the dry spell started.

Pre the last few years of WDW's 4 revenue earning theme parks that went without anything through those same years getting some much needed new attractions, Tokyo still has the numbers of new attractions and venues.


After Everest WDW had quite the dryspell until recently.

And besides the travel costs that might occur, cheaper in cost than WDW's product.

I think Astro Blasters is 2004. They added 5 rides in 15 years and 2 in a 10-year "decade" window. If you need to plump up your list with the character interactions, have at it.

I don't know why people are so adverse to this criticism. The 2010 decade was NOT very good for Tokyo. Which is not to say the resort was stagnating, but more treading water. Tokyo Disney Seas is 20 years old. OLC has acknowledged such. The Fantasyland Expansion plans were much later than they had intended, cut back and finally re-expanded again for TDS.

Again, I'm very much looking forward to this decade for Tokyo. Tokyo started and has maintained a much better starting point heading into its stagnant decade than WDW. But it's strongly overdue. WDW's dry run ended in 2017.

Unfortunately my personal bias is my frame of reference for Tokyo started with my first visit in 2011, so I've really been disappointed with this resort's ongoing buildout, perhaps artificially.
 
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tanc

Well-Known Member
From what I understand, it's already a nightmare to get a ticket to TDL since it's like a lottery or you have to reserve a ticket a long time before you go. I hate the park reservation system. I understand it's to "limit capacity" but all you have to do is look up any photo of WDW recently and you can tell it looks almost identical to how it used to. Park reservation also screws over locals since you can't go to Disney on a whim anymore, you have to plan your day a week out or more just to make sure you can have a decent time. It's stupid and I think decreases the value of the annual pass tremendously.

And as stated, you can't "limit capacity" and make as much money unless you up the price on everything. So does that mean TDL will be reaching WDW prices soon? Japan as of right now has awful conversion rates for yen to USD. USD is worth a tremendous amount more than JPY, so I can't see them doing that. They would alienate so many people, since most people going to TDL are just doing 1 day trips. I have a feeling it will just be like a placebo they will use to make people think capacity is better, when in reality it is not. As it stands though, USD to worth so much more than JPY it just isn't anywhere near how expensive the US parks are compared to Tokyo.
(to give you an idea how weak JPY is now, 100 JPY is the equivalent of .77 USD (77 cents) so it is a pretty major difference in buying power.

Now the hotels, I am interested in what that will entail in the future. TDL hotels aren't that great, besides the extra morning hour perk which I don't think is around due to the pandemic but I could be wrong on that. What I do wonder is what incentives will be added to make the hotels better.
 

Soleurs

Member
In the Parks
Yes
From what I understand, it's already a nightmare to get a ticket to TDL since it's like a lottery or you have to reserve a ticket a long time before you go. I hate the park reservation system. I understand it's to "limit capacity" but all you have to do is look up any photo of WDW recently and you can tell it looks almost identical to how it used to. Park reservation also screws over locals since you can't go to Disney on a whim anymore, you have to plan your day a week out or more just to make sure you can have a decent time. It's stupid and I think decreases the value of the annual pass tremendously.

And as stated, you can't "limit capacity" and make as much money unless you up the price on everything. So does that mean TDL will be reaching WDW prices soon? Japan as of right now has awful conversion rates for yen to USD. USD is worth a tremendous amount more than JPY, so I can't see them doing that. They would alienate so many people, since most people going to TDL are just doing 1 day trips. I have a feeling it will just be like a placebo they will use to make people think capacity is better, when in reality it is not. As it stands though, USD to worth so much more than JPY it just isn't anywhere near how expensive the US parks are compared to Tokyo.
(to give you an idea how weak JPY is now, 100 JPY is the equivalent of .77 USD (77 cents) so it is a pretty major difference in buying power.

Now the hotels, I am interested in what that will entail in the future. TDL hotels aren't that great, besides the extra morning hour perk which I don't think is around due to the pandemic but I could be wrong on that. What I do wonder is what incentives will be added to make the hotels better.
A couple things I think need to be said here:
  1. Tickets are dead simple to get now that capacity is up above 5k per day. Hasn’t been any trouble getting tickets since probably October.
  2. TDL will not hit WDW prices because Japanese consumers are significantly more averse to price increases than Americans are. In fact, I don’t see them breaking the ¥10,000 per day barrier any time soon, if ever, because that will be such an unthinkable number for your average Japanese visitor. Instead they’ll monetize more of the in-park experience, raise prices on food and merch, etc.
  3. The Vacation Package and the benefits those entail are why people stay at those hotels for the most part. Or they just really want to make it an extra special day, I know plenty of people who save the extra money for that.
 
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BasiltheBatLord

Well-Known Member
Tickets are dead simple to get now that capacity is up above 5k per day. Hasn’t been any trouble getting tickets since probably October.
I would caveat this with the fact that in most cases it’s still extremely difficult to purchase tickets with non-Japanese credit cards. I know that foreigners are a tiny percentage of attendance, but I still hear from foreigners every single day who are absolutely confounded as to how they’re supposed to buy tickets because the site won’t take any of their cards.

Add this to the fact that the TDR ticket website is absolutely abysmal and has been since they re-opened with apparently zero interest on OLC’s part in making it not crash constantly every time there’s a ticket drop.

In the past you could just buy tickets in-person at a ticket booth or Disney store with any payment option, but this is still not possible.
 

Soleurs

Member
In the Parks
Yes
I would caveat this with the fact that in most cases it’s still extremely difficult to purchase tickets with non-Japanese credit cards. I know that foreigners are a tiny percentage of attendance, but I still hear from foreigners every single day who are absolutely confounded as to how they’re supposed to buy tickets because the site won’t take any of their cards.

Add this to the fact that the TDR ticket website is absolutely abysmal and has been since they re-opened with apparently zero interest on OLC’s part in making it not crash constantly every time there’s a ticket drop.

In the past you could just buy tickets in-person at a ticket booth or Disney store with any payment option, but this is still not possible.
The card thing yeah. Why should they make it work when there’s no tourists? There’s options though, they can go to the Flagship Store in Shinjuku, or they can buy tickets at any convenience store. Or they can buy a Vacation Package, the Reservations site for VPs still processes foreign cards.

The site thing is probably another one of OLC’s “fairness” things. Fairness through incompetence, you can’t complain because the site is broken for everyone, the ones who get through had just as much chance as the ones who didn’t. Or at least, that’s how I imagine it with how much OLC loves to trumpet about “fairness”.
 

david10225

Active Member
I long for the day when COVID restrictions for foreign visitors are lifted. No booster here so I'm out of luck. I have 650,000 airline miles saved to use for a trip and since I'm 66 the clock is ticking louder than the crock after CAPT Hook.
 

IanDLBZF

Well-Known Member
I long for the day when COVID restrictions for foreign visitors are lifted. No booster here so I'm out of luck. I have 650,000 airline miles saved to use for a trip and since I'm 66 the clock is ticking louder than the crock after CAPT Hook.
Your day may be around the corner.
 

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