As someone who canât really afford a deluxe resort, boooooooooo
It seems smart on Disneyâs part to do this. With incentives offered to on-site guests dwindling, the early park entry for all resort guests is a positive. And the extended evening hours is a good way to add value to a Deluxe stay without impeding on other guests. (Sure, I get itâŚvalue and moderate guests may feel âleft outââŚ)
This may help reduce daytime crowds somewhat for other guests, and perhaps even help encourage Deluxe guests to choose evening hours over early access, which could improve further the benefit of early access for everyone else.
Disney benefits, because it can help drive more people into Deluxe accommodations.
May feel left out because theyâve had one of their onsite perks taken away!
I feel like a broken record here, but no âperkâ is ever guaranteed. Things change. I remember back when fastpasses were paper, and everyone could get one, then they went digital and onsite guests got preference with an earlier window.
Sucked for off-site guests, but it was Disneyâs right to change it.
It just feels different this time because itâs personally affecting you. (Collective you, not individual you.)
Disney has a responsibility to protect itâs business, and thatâs true whether itâs a private company or publicly traded. They have lost millions from covid, they have to do something, and no matter what they chose, people would be unhappy.
Disneyâs goal is to fill all of their resorts and restaurants and have people staying in the bubble and thus spending money in the bubble. On site guests should have an advantage and people that are willing to pay more can have more experiences. Giving them extra time in the parks does nothing to my experience unless it is closing my parks earlier which I do not think is the case here. If people want to have a problem with being secluded from nighttime park time you should be complaining about parties because those actually close MK earlier for normal guests.
Or it will drive current moderate and value resort guests off site because there isnât any reason to pay 2-4x more to stay in the bubble. Staying off site will also give them more freedom to use their one week in central FL to explore more than WDW, reducing their time w/ Mickey.
If someone doesnât have the budget for a Deluxe to begin with, the funds will not magically appear because WDW starts reducing the on property perks to only those resorts. The end result is that someone will either upgrade for a shorter stay (getting less for their same budget), stay in their moderate/value and complain about their âless thanâ experience, or go off site and give WDW far less of their budget.
BTW, the EMH perk has been gone since March 2020.
Everyone keeps using the term âThe Before Timesâ to describe life before covid, and I actually think it applies nicely here.
Think of Covid as a big do over. What you knew before Covid is over. This is the new Disney. Weâre not going back to the way things were. Not at Disney, not in real life.
For every person that says theyâre done with Disney across the internet, thereâs 3 saying they think itâs a good idea. People practically beat down the door to give Disney $200 pp for 3 extra hours of park time at Boo Bash.
Youâre probably right to a point, but Iâm not happy about it.
Agreed. Iâve been posting the same for the past year.
Disney has stated that they are using COVID as an opportunity to reset and redo some of the out control incentive structure that has been created for guests.
Its a whole new world,
And, fair warning, Iâm pretty blunt and that rubs some people the wrong way, but this is me.
When it was the off site guests that were being excluded, all the onsite people were 100% ok with it, because they were IN the preferred group.
Now that theyâre not, people are upset about the unfairness of it.
Itâs always different when itâs affecting you.
Well put.
Iâm trying not to look at this through what WAS compared to what will beâŚbut rather, looking at how things are now versus what they will be.
Looking backwards leads to interesting conversations where we may lament or laud decisions in the past. No Horizons? Replacing Soarinâ over California to Around the World? I miss the old Figment! We can always find past decisions we are unhappy with. But none of that unhappiness changes the reality of today.
So, right now, looking forward, they are trying to give incentives to on-site guests in a layered fashion. Deluxe guests get better incentives than moderate or value guests. Seems reasonable to me. It is only when a benefit for one HARMS (in a sense) others that I take issue.
All very good points made here. I am someone who stays deluxe and happy about this âupgradeâ and perks. The expense for deluxe is a lot more than mods and values and I think this extra perk is commensurate with the excess expense.
To the person that pointed out it may drive away mod and value guests- I think Disney is really looking to attract new Disney guests (catering to the folks who are big spenders and havenât done Disney yet) and sell them on deluxe. If they can do that they only need to sell 1 deluxe room for every 2 mod rooms or every 3 value rooms to get the same return.
Been waiting to hear details about this, since it was announced months ago. Disappointed that itâs post Oct. 1, as so many things are now. Weâre going in August (and staying in deluxe accommodations). . . oh, well.
I donât dispute that. I just think that people have the right to be upset or annoyed about it. They donât âfeelâ that theyâve had something taken away. They actually have. How they deal with that is up to them, whether they spend the extra to stay deluxe, suck it up and do value/mod without the evening hours (which is what Iâll be doing) or cut their losses and stay offsite.
Related generally to this whole issue, if Disney are trying to get people to stay deluxe by offering less for more money at values and mods, and a large proportion of visitors decide to stay offsite instead, is that going to leave them with empty rooms to fill at those resorts? Genuine question. Do they make enough off the deluxe resorts not to care? Or do they think they are offering enough of an incentive? Obviously I know any answer would just be speculation.
This is what Iâve basically just said I should have read the whole thread and saved myself the bother.
I have a general beef with WDW being too expensive for the average person/family in general, and little changes like this just add to my angst. I canât just pretend the past doesnât exist and that people donât have to pay more for perks now than they did before.
I can also be blunt, so fair warning. I think it makes sense that ONSITE guests get perks that people staying offsite donât get. Otherwise, whatâs the point of paying Disneyâs outrageous premium to stay onsite? I mean $200/night for POP? Really?
My specific issues with these announced âperksâ are:
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They took what had been one hour early entry for resort guests and made it 30 minutes. I DO actually like that theyâve spread it out so that itâs every day at all parks. Maybe that will actually spread everybody out enough that it will work well and everybody that does it will find it of value. Great!
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They took what had been a perk for all onsite guests (EMH) and took it away from everybody but deluxe guests. I have no problem with deluxe guests getting perks that moderates and values donât get. You pay that kind of money, you SHOULD get some nice perks. But, in this case they took an old perk that used to be for everybody staying onsite and have repackaged and presented it as a ânewâ perk. The only thing new about it is theyâre making it more exclusive.
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The thing that particularly bugs me is that theyâre promoting all of this as 50th anniversary âperksâ. Look, I get that Disney took a huge hit with Covid that really screwed with all their 50th anniversary plans but come on. They keep increasing capacity, crowds are getting worse by the day, they havenât opened enough other people eaters (shows, more restaurants), and instead of giving onsite guests NOW something that would be useful and generate some goodwill (the âmorning early entry in particular) theyâre holding for the 50th because they hardly have anything else. Thatâs just lame. And bad business imo. Oh, and they just added another âthingâ for the 50th - a Coco scene in Philharmagic. Wonât debut at WDW until later for the 50th. Meanwhile, Anaheim and Paris(?) get it on July 17.
Be blunt all you want, Iâm not easily offended
At the end of the day, people can complain and have hurt feelings all they want - thatâs their right.
But also⌠Disney doesnât care about our feelings⌠So the energy is wasted and accomplishes nothing but personal stress and damage.