Brian Noble
Gratefully in Recovery
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2004
- Messages
- 19,220
I'm pretty sure that it dates at least to 9/11, if not before.I think Disney had already realized it prior to Covid, but the pandemic probably convinced anyone who needed convincing.
Way back in the day---before fracking became a thing that drove the price of oil through the floor---Kevin Yee had an article at MiceAge that reported on a (claimed) Disney-internal study that asked the following question: At what price is oil (and hence air travel) so expensive that WDW is no longer a viable vacation destination? The number was a lot lower than you'd think. (But also pretty far from where we are now: $160/bbl in 2009 is about $250 today.)And to think: pandemics only represent one of so many risks out there!
But it's not a bit you flip. DVC Members have such a large sunk cost that they'd tough it out a lot longer than other random guests---especially as that cost becomes non-recoverable. Yes, there is a point at which even they balk, but that's farther out than when other guests stop coming in the same numbers. Plus, some of those Members will rent their points out for anything they can get, because something is better than nothing. We saw this during the Great Recession, when it was a fantastic time to be someone renting DVC stays.But they also have to think if its so terrible some people will just stop paying...
