New plan. Book a 10 day trip. Spend 3 days being a “VIP tour guide” for $250/hr using my liner knowledge. 12 hour days, that’s $9k. Pays for the trip.
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I have a friend that does this. Disneyland local. Not sure how much she charges.
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Paywall 
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It still opens, even in “reader” as a subscriber article.
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Sorry! Hopefully someone else can share!
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Hmm. When I looked at it earlier it showed up without a subscription.
Try this.
It will pop up a subscribe notice but if you x that out you should be able to read it.
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Mobile phone version has no reader choice to it seems listening is a thing.
I didn’t opt to listen.
I’ll try later on laptop.
This one worked.
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I want to be haughty and pretend to be outraged, but man…saving $600 an hour x7 would make DH very happy.
Good for them finding something that’s mutually beneficial, especially if Disney hasn’t outright condoned it.
That being said, Disney can kick anyone out for any reason. I’ll stick to my regular VIP tours.
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I mean sure, I don’t begrudge anyone anything. But this really is not providing anything more than you’d get with an $18 subscription to TP and a little bit of planning.
Maybe this could be a new revenue stream for @len …
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So, this is what I should do when I retire apparently 
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This works
So it’s what I thought - outside companies providing the same service as Disney but at a lower cost.
I see it’s discussed as “tolerated” but I really do think that it’s against TOS for ticketholders. I’d be interested to read the fine print.
The difficulty for Disney would be in enforcing that, proving that this is what they are doing. I suppose if they aren’t linecutting it would be extremely hard to do so it’s easier to let it go than fight it.
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Exactly! And while it comes as second nature for a lot of people here, it can actually be very intimidating and anxiety inducing for non-planning type people. Especially when you bring in G+, LL’s BG1, stacking etc.
At the end, everyone is just trying to enjoy their vacation with the least amount of stress.
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Is it really the same service though? The big value to me of the Disney VIP service (not that I’ve ever experienced it) is the fact that you basically have no lines, you get quick transportation between parks via backstage areas, etc.
Getting someone to make your dining reservations for you and make your LL reservations and a plan doesn’t seem like nearly the same thing. It’s more like a travel agent who comes with you.
Again I’m not begrudging anyone who decides to get this - my main observation is that pretty much anyone here could do a really good job at that, and that’s a decent chunk of change.
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Good point. Not quite the same.
I suppose it’s more someone exploiting their TP membership (or similar) to make $$ off it.
I suppose this is true.
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It’s not really a “little bit” of planning these days. There’s a LOT to figure out with VQs, ILL$, G+ - complicated “when can I book next” rules, etc. and that’s not even getting into “advanced” techniques (DB/DM) and tools like BG1. It’s all overwhelming. I was adept at FP+, with a “little bit” of planning, even for our very first trip, but prepping for our June trip (first one with G+) has been much much more overwhelming.
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It doesn’t seem nearly as in depth, and I’m hoping (it does look like) that the third party guides don’t charge nearly as much for their services. I wouldn’t pay it, can’t even afford it, but it seems to fill a nice gap for people who want a little VIP without the full VIP.
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I’ve been saying for years that there was a huge jump between admission and VIP tours with nothing for the in between.
They had a few group tours that did things like “headliner” attractions or “little kid” tours where it was mostly Fantasy Land attractions ect. Those were around $250 iirc and was the only middle ground I could remember. I can’t even find them anymore, though admittedly I haven’t tried very hard as I don’t like sharing tours.
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