Disney Expansion Plans??

[Another Voice]

In what urban area that is a tourist destination in the USA could this possibly be done affordably?

Affordability is not exactly the market Disney is going after. Like the cruise line or the tour service, Disney is expecting people to pay above premium prices simply because these resorts will be have the Disney name.

It's not by chance that the Grand Floridian was the resport mentioned as one that will be cloned.

 

[MJMcBride]

Affordability is not exactly the market Disney is going after. Like the cruise line or the tour service, Disney is expecting people to pay above premium prices simply because these resorts will be have the Disney name.

and people do. I know nothing of the tour service, but from what I understand the cruise line is very well done and organized (having been on Carnival it must be better than that)

 

[jayandstacey]

Disney could do very well in the indoor waterpark hotel business.

Right now, the 'pure play' company in that space is Great Wolf Lodge, with maybe 7 locations in the US. They took an early lead two years ago, but faltered and haven't kept pace with competitors. Everyone from Holiday Inn to independant operators are biting - there are now oevr 30 such parks in the US.

The draw? You can charge $400 a night for a hotel room and get away with it - and do it year round. Just like at WDW.

The Wisconsin Dells are saturated, but pretty much the rest of the US is open. And all the other operators lack the Disney extras - shopping, known characters, promotional tie-in to other stuff (like WDW).

Disney could put up 5 of them around Washington DC alone (or maybe one giant one) and, I think, make some good return on their money.

 

[Another Voice]

and people do.

But people treat the cruise line as WDW's fifth theme park. They go on it to prance with the character and eat Mickey shaped food. The cruise is a complete vacation, just like a trip to WDW. There's no competion, no other sights to see.

There's a real question if anyone (as in the normal travelling American public that is the vast majority of Disney's customers, not the people on this board) is going to pay three hundred bucks a night to do the same thing in Salt Lake City. Are visiting Seattle really willing to see Experience Music in the day and then dine with rubber headed characters at night? Will normal people think that Yellowstone is enhanced or trashed by a Brother Bear Water Park?

 

[raidermatt]

I think this is a good idea all they way around.
First, Disney is already in the hotel business. They are all set up and can be ready to go in no time.
They bring Disney to their guests. Remember how we all use to write or say we would go to a Disney Store for our Disney fix? Guests will just check in to a hotel to be immersed. No need to take a cruise. Just stay over night if need be, without having to travel to FL, CA or overseas.
And the brand name will mean security and quality to travelers.
And think of the marketing they could do! Almost endless possibilities between the parks, DCL and Adventures by Disney.
The parks are a different segment than what these will be. I don't see not having this new brand means more park perks.
I think it is a plus all the way around.

Disney operates hotels, yes, but only clusters in a few locations. They don't do anything like what Hilton, Starwood, Marriott, etc. do.

Also, yes, we heard many say they went to the Disney stores for a Disney fix. But Disney still wasn't able to make the stores work.

I'm not saying nothing in these plans could work, just that its got a lot of very legitimate question marks, and Disney's past forays into this kind of stuff have had spotty results at best.

 

[larry_poppins]

Does Disney realize that if they build stand alone hotels all over the place they will have to act like Marriott and HIlton? Better value, better service.

Also they will have to value their customers instead of taking them for granted. All "normal" hospitality companies have "reward programs" for frequent guests. I am partial to Hilton HHonors. If Disney is going to charge $300 for a room and Hilton is going to charge $249 and give me Hilton HHonors points guess where I am going to sleep? I have never understood why Disney does not reward their best guests.

Larry

 

[EUROPACL]

I have never understood why Disney does not reward their best guests.

Larry

Clearly you've never been blessed with the towel hotel animal.

 

[Another Voice]

If Disney is going to charge $300 for a room and Hilton is going to charge $249 and give me Hilton HHonors points guess where I am going to sleep?

You just don't get it.

While Disney will charge more, have smaller rooms, provide fewer services, offer fewer amenities, be more rigid in room assignments, be in less desirable locations, and be staffed by outsourced employees - they'll make up for it by using the word "magic" in each and every sentence of marketing they produce.

 

[TheDogbots]

see they will never do this, because that would mean bringing jobs back to the U.S.A.... phaw! who does that!

hey wait maybe they can bring back the animation divisions, scatter them around the country and put them behind glass for kids to see at the mini-parks!


but for real, at first i thought perhaps this may be an interesting idea... the idea of mini parks intrigued me... but they would have to be the size of DL and have three hotels each to bring a draw... and at that point you are just building another DL.... but if each one was different (ie did not copy anything else in the USA, though Disney sea could be done over here i think) then people would probably come... you could easily build a northern park indoors, you would just build in large "dome" pods that would connect to a central hub. if the total amount of attractions included 50% that were different i think it would work, but only if they achieve 50% originality. i think there would be huge draws to getting in a car and driving 300 miles for the weekend. stick them near major airports, buy tons of land around the mini park and you have room for expansion if it becomes hot... if it doesn't take off move the rides to existing theme parks and sell the place... no money is wasted on development because the content is reusable elsewhere...

I could see this working in Texas, the NE (Albany, NY?), DC area, Great Lakes area (around Toledo, OH?,) perhaps around Salt Lake City, St. Louis, and perhaps up in the NW somewhere. I suppose you could even do one of the indoor parks up in Ontario. I think it is very doable. Since people will drive for the name Disney, they should shoot for areas that have the most travel corridors to population centers (hence naming Toledo rather than Chicago for the great lakes) The key is to make the places not as extreme as WDW, so that WDW would still be the "mecca" of the Disney Pilgrimage, besides WDW would still get 95% of the international travel. the downside is DL may suffer from such a plan, but lets face it DL is in a part of the country no one likes to visit anyway... ::ducks::

The more i think about it, the more i like it... Disney just needs to make sure they can hit the crucial 50% originality mark or there would be no reason to visit the mini park...


Also, the water park idea that someone mentioned is an ok idea, i think that would work better on a mass scale, here in Erie, PA we had the worlds largest indoor waterpark put in about five years ago (yeah I am sure someone beat it within a month...) it does extremely well, and has pretty much destroyed the one classic theme park we had left (which inst much of an accomplishment siince its in the middle of the city, and practically building into the lake because of no room) Disney could easily make a name in this industry, but the question is, would they want to? i think the cheaper prices of competitors would win out in the long run... pay 50 bucks to waterslide with mickey, or 25 to do it by yourself? a waterslide is a waterslide... even when its crushin gusher... or whatever it is called....

OVer all i think Canadianguy was on the right track with his first ideas...

Oh definitely have to add... that though i think it would be neat, i think it would be more logical to concentrate on throwing in new quality attractions into WDW and DL (not just spin and shoots like buzz and the other new pixar ride) rather than building new mini parks... but if they wanted to do both i wouldnt be opposed lol.

 

[raidermatt]

Disney already showed what it can do with a mini-park, and its sitting next to DL giving away free tickets while management continues to try to figure out how to fix it.

Even a "mini-park" is going to cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and they won't have the luxury of relying on an MK or DL to co-market with it.

Something like that just seems WAY to risky for them, especially given the fact that they haven't proven lately that they have the kind of ability needed to even have a good chance to pull something like that off.

A water park... maybe. But like the hotel idea, now they'd be going against established competitors. Plus, does a water park bring the kinds of margins they would be looking for? Water parks don't bring tourists looking to have signature dining experiences and buy plush, they bring mostly kids who don't spend much in souvenir shops. See Six Flags for how that strategy has worked out.

I don't know, I guess some of the things they mentioned COULD work, but I keep coming back to the same point: Are things like this really a better investment than what they could do with their existing resorts?

 

[mark&sue]

I'd like to see something in Spain, but then I am buying a vacation home out there and not so sure what to do with my dvc points. There is always the disney med cruise but not keen on going back to DLP as too french!


Susan

 

[Tinker_]

I may be crazy-- but I really hope they do this! I would be very happy with a character meal restraunt like Liberty Tree Tavern within driving distance! We live in OK, and if something like this was built in TX, we would be there A LOT. AND- it wouldn't stop us from going on our WDW trips-- just help give us our fix!

 

[ursijam]

I think that the much more likely option for the experience would be to tie in the hotel/mini-park into an area that is an established tourist destination.

Take the most of the Adventures by Disney experiences and enhance it with the hotel/mini-park on the front/back-end or in the middle and I think that you would have that as a general destination as well as drive more traffic through Disney as a general travel organizer.

 

[Jakey]

I think this concept would work quite well if properly executed. This may be the reason for so many rumors of parks being built all over the country. Disney is making inquiries about property and doing their research.

Hyatt, Hilton, Mariott, all of these hotel chains are busy building huge resorts and even Vacation Club properties all over the country. Why would anyone want to go to these unthemed properties if Disney built their much more immersive version? I think Disney sees this going on within the hotel and tourism industry and spies a niche they could greatly exploit.

I know for our family, it would not curtail our visits to WDW at all but they would get a lot more of our money if they built something like this near us in Texas. Since we're DVC, it would enhance that as well if they included point use as an option or built a DVC resort as well.

Hyatt Hill Country Resort near San Antonio has been in operation for a number of years now and has a small water park and golf course as its offerings. They are now in the process of building a Vacation Club resort adjacent to it. If they can do this, Disney can do it better!