MagicBands...a plea (or a lament)

I want to make a plea to everyone who has an on-site trip coming up soon.

It is clear that Disney is only pushing the slow-selling MagicBands as options for those staying on site. Occasionally, they will swap out one, but in general, for weeks upon weeks they keep offering the same boring choices, and never the choices we care about.

But when I go and look at shopDisney.com for the full list of options? There are lots of great ones, and several new ones I’d not hesitate to choose.

So, here’s my plea. Clearly, Disney wants to rid themselves of their current stock of on-site offerings before they bring in the ones we actually want. So, please take a moment to go order the ones for your on-site stay so that they clear out the inventory ahead of my December trip. That way, I can pick from the NEW offerings they will be forced to add. Is that too much to ask?

Think of all that I’ve done for YOU.

(No, wait. Don’t think about that…it might otherwise ruin your charitable spirit. Forget I even mentioned it.)

Or…put another way…why can’t on-site guest be offered a better selection? Actually, all I want would be Dark Green and White added to the options, and I’d be perfectly content. :confused:

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Alternate theory. They’re offering only the most basic and/or least popular options for “free” in the hopes that you’ll shell out additional dollars to get what you (and the spouse and kids) really wanted to begin with. And let’s face it. Compared to the small mortgage you’ve already paid for your dream vacation, what’s another $15 to $30 apiece for that special Magicband?

Tell me you weren’t thinking about buying them anyway.

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That’s not just an “alternate theory”…that’s the obvious theory. They have a bunch of ones they can’t sell, and only offer those knowing you’ll pay the big-bucks for the nicer ones.

But they can’t fool me. I’ve already BOUGHT nicer ones for both me and my wife. That’ll show 'em! :wink:

Thing is, if you are staying on-site, even if you spend the money on ones you paid full price for, they still give on-site guests their free ones in addition.

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Which ones are you seeing? All I could see the other day was Stitch, Fancy Nancy, Vampirina, and rainbow retro Mickey. I like the rainbow retro, but not the others. I also wish they would put the black one into circulation. I need a black one

Yeah, I have a garland of them at home. Actually two garlands. A Magicband 1 and a Magicband 2. The sucker Magicbands are in a safe in their original boxes.

You could just decorate a plain one to your liking. They sell skins you can add. To me, magic bands aren’t that big of a deal. No one sees it but myself and my family, so I just get a colored plain one. I’m happy with purple.

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Pretty much the same. There as a day when the new 2020 Mickey one showed up, that I like, but there wasn’t one my wife liked. It was gone from the options the next time I looked (but is available on shopDisney).

What we really want to do, since these are extras, and we’re going during the Christmas season, is get a red and green one, swap the pucks in them, so we have a Christmas look…but not with the horrible lime green they have there. I want the dark green.

We also would be fine with white, but they have never offered white.

Gray is an option, because the puck could go into any band.

But there is time before our trip…so I keep hoping better ones show up…but the solid color ones have remained unchanged since I started looking months ago.

We chose ours last week (all boring plain colors – you’re welcome) and the options other than plain seemed so random. Why don’t I have access to every magic band if I want to pay for it from MDE? Why offer these specific paid ones? Obviously not the biggest issue, it just seems odd to me.

One thing though, my DS has changed his mind about 10 times already about what he wants for an upgraded MB. If he wants to spend his money down there and upgrade at least he’ll get what he want.

Thanks. Now if just umpteen more follow suit…

I really enjoyed having the decorative magic bands this time. The first two trips we had just the colors. It took right up until hte trip to get them, however, b/c they usually didn’t even have enough special ones in stock for us to get 5, let alone 5 that we wanted. I think it was just luck that we happned to get good ones. And I would have chosen some differently if I’d had more options. I just didn’t want to go pay more at the store.

The only thing I have to add to this discussion is that I don’t understand why they have significantly more options in park than they offer either at shopdisney or the preorder options when staying on site. This is obviously one souvenir you want before you hit the parks. They should make all the options available online before arrival. Don’t get me wrong I understand the whole “you can only get it in the parks” scheme for merchandise. I’m just saying that’s not the greatest for Magicbands.

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Hmm…maybe that’s it, though. Maybe by making people choose from MBs that they know a lot of people don’t want, then when they get to the parks, people will be more willing to pay a premium for the special ones?

Still, in the end, if they offered more premium ones to on-sites guests ahead of time at a discount, I would think they would end up selling more that way and make more profit.

This is why I think, ultimately, it is just Disney wanting to have a way to clearance out the ones not selling well…and occasionally throw in a pre-release. (Although, even then…what’s the deal? the SWGE is still considered pre-release after this long? Who are they kidding?)

I selected all plain, boring colors this time - you are welcome.

The thing I found frustrating is I searched daily for MONTHS this summer to get the Sorcerer Mickey for DS2 and another special band for DS1 (but really that Sorcerer Mickey was my white whale). Everything it took me months to nail down over the summer - using a split stay so I had two chances - has been freely available this go around. I get that they introduced it and basically got slammed but still.

What does pre-arrival exclusive mean?

I think it means, “We made a bunch of these, but don’t believe we’ll be able to sell them on-site, so we’ll just make them a choice for on-site guests to choose from to get rid of them.”

:wink:

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:joy::rofl::joy:
Your an excellent interpreter ryan!

Thanks. I took Disney-ese as my foreign language in college. :grinning:

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Fancy Nancy???
Is this her? And more importantly… is she color blind?

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I usually go with plain, but last trip I ordered/decorated from Magic Your Brand. Dozens of creative options, and a lot cheaper than those fancy ones offered by Disney. But I am on Shop Disney constantly, and one day I stumbled upon an Aristocats Marie band that I could pre-order for ten bucks. It seemed reasonable to me, and it’s adorable. That same band is now $24.99. I don’t understand the Magic Band pricing structure at all …

We used to LOVE Fancy Nancy when my daughter was little! She just loves being fancy!

When Julia was small she would have died to have this MB. But she’ll be 16 on this trip… not so much into Fancy Nancy now :wink: