Https://wdwnt.com/2021/06/disney-confirms-details-on-early-park-entry-and-extended-evening-hours-for-deluxe-resorts/

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As someone who can’t really afford a deluxe resort, boooooooooo

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It seems smart on Disney’s 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 it…value and moderate guests may feel “left out”…)

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.

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May feel left out because they’ve had one of their onsite perks taken away!

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I feel like a broken record here, but no “perk” 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 Disney’s right to change it.
It just feels different this time because it’s personally affecting you. (Collective you, not individual you.)
Disney has a responsibility to protect it’s business, and that’s true whether it’s 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.

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Disney’s 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.

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Or it will drive current moderate and value resort guests off site because there isn’t 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 doesn’t 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 “less than” experience, or go off site and give WDW far less of their budget.

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BTW, the EMH perk has been gone since March 2020.

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Everyone keeps using the term “The Before Times” 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. We’re not going back to the way things were. Not at Disney, not in real life.
For every person that says they’re done with Disney across the internet, there’s 3 saying they think it’s a good idea. People practically beat down the door to give Disney $200 pp for 3 extra hours of park time at Boo Bash.

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You’re probably right to a point, but I’m not happy about it.

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Agreed. I’ve 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,

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And, fair warning, I’m pretty blunt and that rubs some people the wrong way, but this is me. :woman_shrugging:

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 they’re not, people are upset about the unfairness of it.
It’s always different when it’s affecting you.

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Well put.

I’m trying not to look at this through what WAS compared to what will be…but 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 Soarin’ 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.

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All very good points made here. I am someone who stays deluxe and happy about this “upgrade” 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 haven’t 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.

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Been waiting to hear details about this, since it was announced months ago. Disappointed that it’s post Oct. 1, as so many things are now. We’re going in August (and staying in deluxe accommodations). . . oh, well.

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I don’t dispute that. I just think that people have the right to be upset or annoyed about it. They don’t ‘feel’ that they’ve 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 I’ll 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.

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This is what I’ve basically just said :joy: I should have read the whole thread and saved myself the bother.

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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 can’t just pretend the past doesn’t exist and that people don’t have to pay more for perks now than they did before.

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I can also be blunt, so fair warning. :joy: I think it makes sense that ONSITE guests get perks that people staying offsite don’t get. Otherwise, what’s the point of paying Disney’s outrageous premium to stay onsite? I mean $200/night for POP? Really?

My specific issues with these announced “perks” are:

  1. They took what had been one hour early entry for resort guests and made it 30 minutes. I DO actually like that they’ve spread it out so that it’s 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!

  2. 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 don’t 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 “new” perk. The only thing new about it is they’re making it more exclusive. :woman_shrugging:

  3. The thing that particularly bugs me is that they’re promoting all of this as 50th anniversary “perks”. 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 haven’t 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 ‘morning early entry in particular) they’re holding for the 50th because they hardly have anything else. That’s just lame. And bad business imo. Oh, and they just added another “thing” for the 50th - a Coco scene in Philharmagic. Won’t debut at WDW until later for the 50th. Meanwhile, Anaheim and Paris(?) get it on July 17.

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Be blunt all you want, I’m not easily offended :grinning:

At the end of the day, people can complain and have hurt feelings all they want - that’s their right.
But also… Disney doesn’t care about our feelings… So the energy is wasted and accomplishes nothing but personal stress and damage. :woman_shrugging:

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