A theory about DDP...

[golden1]

I was thinking that maybe one of the ideas behind the DDP was to get people sitting down for longer periods at TS restaurants in order to decrease the wait times in ride lines. Many people who use the DDP wouldn't normally eat at certain restaurants because of cost and those people would be eating cs and then riding more rides. What do you think?

 

[bicker]

Yes, that's perhaps part of it, but if that was most of it then they'd offer it to non-Disney resort guests. Rather, I think a good part of it is the desire to provide greater incentive to stay at a Disney resort, and to stay on site for the entire time.

 

[mimif1]

I think it also changes the way people think about eating at WDW. The first time we went, we did all counter service. With the dining plan, we tried restaurants that we had never eaten at before that are now "must do" for us. Ever without the dining plan, we would now eat at those restaurants. Plus, we tried desserts that we never ordered before that now we always get.

 

[crisi]

Yes, that's perhaps part of it, but if that was most of it then they'd offer it to non-Disney resort guests. Rather, I think a good part of it is the desire to provide greater incentive to stay at a Disney resort, and to stay on site for the entire time.

Yep. And take market share away from the competition.

Disney used to be the King of Central Florida. Even with just two theme parks, you'd go down and maybe see Sea World. Then Universal built TWO theme parks, and Disney added hotel rooms up the ya ya. And 9/11 hit and tourism dropped.

So now Disney has a ton of extra hotel capacity and competition. People are going to Orlando (fewer of them, but they still go) and they say "we will spend four days at WDW, two at US, and one at SeaWorld - that's seven days" If they want to throw a day at the ocean in there, or a day at Cape Canaveral, they were giving up one of thier Disney days (who needs to see Epcot, sounds boring). And because they were only going to be at Disney about half the time, why stay on site.

Now Disney provides an "all inclusive" experience that encourages guests not to go to Universal. With Magical Express they don't need a car (which means they are stranded). And who can argue with dining on vacation for $40 a day! What a bargain! On site isn't THAT much more expensive at a Value.

You can see it in Universal's numbers - they are hurting. But Disney's theme park division is sitting pretty. And it appeals to the folks that want an all-inclusive experience.

What it isn't about is filling restaurants - go back in time on this board and check out threads about making ADRs. Even pre-dining plan ADRs (back then calls PSs - Priority Seating) were highly recommended by most people. You had more luck winging it back then, but ADRs were still recommended.

 

[Pedler]

So now Disney has a ton of extra hotel capacity and competition. People are going to Orlando (fewer of them, but they still go) and they say "we will spend four days at WDW, two at US, and one at SeaWorld - that's seven days" If they want to throw a day at the ocean in there, or a day at Cape Canaveral, they were giving up one of thier Disney days (who needs to see Epcot, sounds boring). And because they were only going to be at Disney about half the time, why stay on site.

Now Disney provides an "all inclusive" experience that encourages guests not to go to Universal. With Magical Express they don't need a car (which means they are stranded). And who can argue with dining on vacation for $40 a day! What a bargain! On site isn't THAT much more expensive at a Value.

You can see it in Universal's numbers - they are hurting. But Disney's theme park division is sitting pretty. And it appeals to the folks that want an all-inclusive experience.

That was us last year. We had planned on staying at the Nick Hotel in a Suite, getting a rental car any maybe planning on 4 -5 days at the parks, eating off site etc. Along comes the new ticket pricing where the extra days were for all practical purposes free, (just $8 for the whole family to go from 5 to 7 days.) the Magical Express and the Dinning plan. Next thing I know we are spending 7 nights at the Wilderness lodge, eating all our meals at Disney and in the parks everyday (and somehow got sucked into spending almost $200 on pins and related stuff. ) In short the initial plan had Disney getting around $1,000 of our Florida Vacation dollars. In the end they got almost $3,000. Every dollar we spend in Florida except for lunch at the airport on the way home was spent at Disney. I feel that the goal of the dinning plan, ME and the MYW Ticket pricing was all designed to do just what it did to us. And the beauty of it is that we thought it was just great and had not problem with Disney getting all of the business.

One thing that would be interesting to hear about is how the other businesses such as off site restaurants and hotels were affected by the changes. Universal has clearly been impacted as have the transportation services but have other restaurants and hotels that catered to off site people seen an impact.