Are WDW parks really overflowing with trash?

[Cheburashka]

LOL, Disney was closed on both coasts for long periods of time (not to mention overseas). I travel for a living and if you don't think all the fast food companies have taken advantage of the Covid more than Disney then you are nuts. McDonalds kept shoving food out the window the whole time with minimum staffing. ]]

Disney World in Orlando was only closed for about 4 months. McDonald's prices and Disney prices are in different universes, and therefore should be held to different standards of guest satisfaction. For Disney to charge what they do, and still leave the parks a mess, is outrageous.

 

[Cheburashka]

It’s a notorious corporation tactic to keep workers on as part time. Could they solve a portion of their staffing problem by offering full time to staff currently working? There’s people who want more hours and would love to become a full fledged employee.

Remember custodial doing cute things like
View attachment 590446

I had a custodian do that for me in March. Very nice memory!

 

[Cheburashka]

Here now. Yes, I have seen garbage overflowing. They are definitely short staffed. It’s a bit of a disappointment. My biggest irritation, however, is people putting garbage in the recycling cans. I saw it over and over again.

You don't really think these overworked custodians are going to be carefully separately disposing of the recycling and the trash? They're probably dumping all of it in the trash, just to save time. I'm a teacher & that's what the custodians at my school do. We have special recycling bins, and the school is all about recycling & we teachers teach & train & remind kids to separate trash & recycling properly, and then after school I'll work late and watch the custodians dump both trash and recycling into their big trash can. I don't blame them at all because they're understaffed & underpaid and barely have time to do that. The custodians & housekeepers at Disney World probably do the same thing for the most part, especially now if things are as bad as is being reported.

 

[Grumpy Mouse]

A damaged reputation is hard to mend. But is their 'reputation' damaged?

As long as DPEP revenue keeps increasing - as long as demand keeps increasing - Bob Chapek's answer will be NO.

I'd like to think the story will change over the next couple of years, but given the Disney customer's propensity to hand over the wallet no matter the 'challenges' - I have my doubts.

 

[bsmcneil]

Not usually a fan of this guy but the comment at :42 (which I've linked to) feels sadly prescient...

 

[Tigger's ally]

You realize Disney was closed by order of law? and that Mcdonalds and other fast food were considered "essential" business's and allowed to stay open? I think you kinda missed the point of what I was saying.

You missed my point all together. Lots of companies have been taking advantage even more than disney. Way more.

 

[thingaboutarsenal]

I hope you are posting them on disneys twitter site and facebook and everywhere else that the exec's might see this. Disgusting!

I don't have any social media accounts so I am not. This and reddit are the only things I use.

 

[Kickstart]

CEO Bob Chapek has publicly stated:

We took the opportunity to revisit sort of our legacy operations to improve the yield because it is the ultimate in a capacity-constrained environment but also to improve our guest experience where we've had an opportunity to look at things like pricing and ticketing outside the constraint of an ongoing concern and ongoing business when we shut down for a year. So that really gave us the opportunity to say, when we emerge, how do we want to emerge and how does that fit our yielding strategy and our guest experience strategy?​

I suspect he's mostly focused on "our yielding strategy" and less focused on "our guest experience strategy".

This ^ exactly.

This isn't about living wages, providing benefits, people not cleaning up after themselves, etc. While those are all factors (or potential solutions), the root cause here is Disney made a deliberate decision to not prioritize guest experience. The market is demanding more pay/benefits/whatever and Disney has decided to not meet those demands at the expense of customer experience.

Something so basic as keeping the park clean...for the company that set the bar on customer service and guest experience.
I really don't get it. There's really no excuse for a company that's selling an expensive, premium, experience to their customers... unless that's not their thing anymore.

I'm very disappointed, but glad I saw this thread. I'm planning a large family trip for next June, and the plan is to just do WDW. If things don't improve we may split time at Universal.

 

[annadreamsofdisneyworld]

This is getting really discouraging. I'm so disappointed in Disney. Every day I'm getting less excited about our trip.

 

[sparky68]

This is getting really discouraging. I'm so disappointed in Disney. Every day I'm getting less excited about our trip.
[/QUOTE]
Sad to say, it is going to take a lot of people deciding it isn't worth their vacation dollars for Disney to change. Right now Disney is banking all the money from a population eager to travel. Next year they may be looking at a very different situation if the park experience continues to deteriorate

 

[BroadwayHermione5]

But none of the pictures in this thread are caused by guests not picking up after themselves. They did, there was just nowhere to put it. The question I have is if you are a business who prides themselves on cleanliness and a high standard regarding park appearance and you let this go on, what else are you letting slide?

I understand that this isn't what the thread was about. I was simply responding to someone else that I agree with them on the fact that people also don't leave places as they found them. I absolutely agree and if I had seen that I would have told someone. Even if the next available CM was in attractions, I would have told them.

 

[TiggerBouncy]

Staff cannot be everywhere at every minute. If the policy is to check every hour, they check and see the can is half full, and just after they leave a group of people with loads of trash arrive, it will stay a mess for at least 59 minutes.

I struggled on this one for a while... I am one (as anyone here can attest) to give Disney every benefit of the doubt where possible. Too much in many people's eyes...

But here is the thing.... Disney has been in this business for a long time. If checking every hour, you see a mess like this happening around lunch more than a few times, you maybe increase the checks between those hours, or add another trashcan nearby where guests can see it.

Can this still happen even after you do that? Sure.... but over time you should get pretty good at predicting it, and Disney has been doing this for 50 years now.

Not saying it should never, ever happen.... surprises can always happen... but it should be pretty darn rare - more than we see right now.

I will give Disney a partial pass. It's very difficult right now for them to find the staff - they are trying. They are still having re-opening pains, and no one can predict how things are going to work right now. With rumors abounding that mask requirements may come back and even more strict guidelines again, they do not want to overhire CM's. I would not want to be the person in WDW in charge of staffing figures right now. Anything you do, you lose.

But it's on them to fix this, and quickly. Of course they can only fix what they know about, so keep reporting it. (hopefully the CM's who have to clean it up are also reporting to their management).

 

[cakebaker]

they are trying

But they really aren't. They are only hiring part time custodial staff so they can avoid paying benefits. Do you know of anyone willing to work for $14 an hour, part time, no benefits and most likely a schedule that won't allow you to take on a 2nd job? Nevermind that the job is emptying trash cans and cleaning up after others all day long. I don't.

I always say Disney should charge what the market will bear, but it's a 2 way street. They need to pay what the market demands as well.

 

[BrianL]

But they really aren't. They are only hiring part time custodial staff so they can avoid paying benefits. Do you know of anyone willing to work for $14 an hour, part time, no benefits and most likely a schedule that won't allow you to take on a 2nd job? Nevermind that the job is emptying trash cans and cleaning up after others all day long. I don't.

I always say Disney should charge what the market will bear, but it's a 2 way street. They need to pay what the market demands as well.

Yeah, and the very least they could do is put out some extra garbage bins, even if they aren't matching. That would at least help and cost barely anything.

 

[DLgal]

I'm going to Orlando in August with a friend and for the first time ever, NOT going to visit Disney property. We're just doing Universal. I've heard things there aren't much better, BUT we can do Universal with a military discount for half the cost of Disney, so at that price point, we will take our chances. Disney is simply charging too much for the experience there right now and neither of us were feeling it this trip.

As things stand, I am ABSOLUTELY DONE paying full price for Disneyland as well. If we go back in the coming months, we will use either the CA resident discounted tickets or our allocation of military salute tickets until a new annual pass type option is available.

 

[Malfie Cent]

Those pictures are really disheartening

 

[TiggerBouncy]

But they really aren't. They are only hiring part time custodial staff so they can avoid paying benefits. Do you know of anyone willing to work for $14 an hour, part time, no benefits and most likely a schedule that won't allow you to take on a 2nd job? Nevermind that the job is emptying trash cans and cleaning up after others all day long. I don't.

I always say Disney should charge what the market will bear, but it's a 2 way street. They need to pay what the market demands as well.

Trust, but verify right? So I looked and you are correct. I only see advertisements for part time custodial. I admit, that one is a head scratcher. But I am not in the WDW executive circle. I can't tell you what they are thinking. There are a few possibilities:

1. The problem is not as widespread as we think it is. A few posts on the boards are not a 360 picture of the problem in general.
2. They do not know about it; the problem is masked by middle management.
OR
3. They believe they are properly staffed, but the staff is not being utilized effectively and are working on a plan to address it.

As much as people on this board like to scream that it's all profits and stock holder and stuff, if there is one thing I can tell you for certain having worked as a contractor for Disney; they are FIERCELY protective of the brand name. That has not changed with the change of management. They have a lot of hiccups right now that they are suffering from growing pains due to the pandemic... but at the heart of the company, that core remains. At least on the contract side. You won't convince me that if someone walked into the upper management circle with pictures of trash and evidence that they are not staffed appropriately to the current situation that they would not authorize hiring a dozen or two more people - that's drops in the bucket - in the name of stock holders who wouldn't even see that small an operational blip and would in effect have zero impact on the stock price. So as much as people want to blame that; that's not it. It's one of the 3 above.

 

[cakebaker]

Trust, but verify right? So I looked and you are correct. I only see advertisements for part time custodial. I admit, that one is a head scratcher. But I am not in the WDW executive circle. I can't tell you what they are thinking. There are a few possibilities:

1. The problem is not as widespread as we think it is. A few posts on the boards are not a 360 picture of the problem in general.
2. They do not know about it; the problem is masked by middle management.
OR
3. They believe they are properly staffed, but the staff is not being utilized effectively and are working on a plan to address it.

...They have a lot of hiccups right now that they are suffering from growing pains due to the pandemic

Or

4) Hiring part time allows them to not have to include benefits. It's very common tactic for businesses to take. There really is no other reason to be hiring part time help. WalMart has to be one of the worst that does this, but many of them do. It's singlehandedly one of the biggest cost cutting measures they can implement.

I've seen enough posts over just the last few days that leads me to believe it is a big problem. Pics are from different days, different areas of the parks. It would seem that last jump in capacity has made a huge difference. I don't think this has been going on for long and by now these pics have undoubtedly been shared with WDW enough that not knowing is no longer an excuse. Perhaps they'll see what the result of their choices in hiring is and will make adjustments.

These "hiccups" are a problem they created, not the pandemic. They have deliberately chosen to ramp up capacity beyond their ability to handle the crowds, both in sanitation and crowd control. Had they increased the ability to handle crowds before inviting the crowds, we'd be seeing a much different picture right now.

 

[Malfie Cent]

Trust, but verify right? So I looked and you are correct. I only see advertisements for part time custodial. I admit, that one is a head scratcher. But I am not in the WDW executive circle. I can't tell you what they are thinking. There are a few possibilities:

1. The problem is not as widespread as we think it is. A few posts on the boards are not a 360 picture of the problem in general.

I'm one of the weird people that do consider and overflowing garbage can, with garbage scattered around the ground "a problem in general". Even if it is just one can in one park, that doesn't matter to me. The pictures show that it isn't just one single can though, it is clearly happening in multiple areas around the parks. Yeah, that is a problem.

 

[BrianL]

I'm one of the weird people that do consider and overflowing garbage can, with garbage scattered around the ground "a problem in general". Even if it is just one can in one park, that doesn't matter to me. The pictures show that it isn't just one single can though, it is clearly happening in multiple areas around the parks. Yeah, that is a problem.

Yes, it doesn't appear to be an isolated issue. I am willing to say that sometimes things happen and if Disney corrects quickly - i.e. immediately - then okay. If we continue to see photos of overflowing trashcans though, that is a major concern. The cleanliness of the parks has always been one of the major differences you got with Disney and it's not something they should compromise on.