FP+, the wait times are in the design. I think.

[JeremyGNJ]

Me either!!! But I'm hoping (maybe I'm too optimistic) that at some point we here will all figure out the new pattern and the new way to manage to get ourselves to the top of that darn curve.

There will be no way to "figure it out". It's a mathematical formula to ensure even distribution.

 

[chrismb22]

On a positive note, very few companies in the world could get their customer base to pay to help gather that data......

Actually, any company with a marketing department would be using any data they get from customers, and by definition (most) customers are paying customers. Normally, you just don't know what dAta is being analyzed. In this case, it's out in the open.

 

[surferdave]

You guys can pretend to be physicists, mathematicians and philosophers all you want. I think the great Yogi Berra summed up the problem.

 

[LBarLRanch]

I just wanted to comment that Disney knows what it is doing. The company is a leader in "big data" collection and analysis. It will be interesting to see it in person. We are heading there Monday.

 

[mom2rtk]

I just wanted to comment that Disney knows what it is doing. The company is a leader in "big data" collection and analysis.

Yes. And now they are the leader in "big lines".

 

[monkistan]

yes, they know what they're doing. that doesn't mean that what they are doing is good for you or me.

creating more uniformity of crowds in the park is good for them. it's also probably good for people who came to the park and felt the couldn't get on anything.

it's bad for people who tried to strategize their park visit around being in places where others weren't to minimize ride waits.

this is harder with the new system. a lot of people keep saying: 'Have faith, Disney will fix this.' All I'm saying is that this is possibly the fix, but for a different problem.

(sent from my phone. sorry about the grammar)

 

[mom2rtk]

yes, they know what they're doing. that doesn't mean that what they are doing is good for you or me.

creating more uniformity of crowds in the park is good for them. it's also probably good for people who came to the park and felt the couldn't get on anything.

it's bad for people who tried to strategize their park visit around being in places where others weren't to minimize ride waits.

this is harder with the new system. a lot of people keep saying: 'Have faith, Disney will fix this.' All I'm saying is that this is possibly the fix, but for a different problem.

(sent from my phone. sorry about the grammar)

Yep. That about covers it.

 

[JimmyV]

I just wanted to comment that Disney knows what it is doing. The company is a leader in "big data" collection and analysis. It will be interesting to see it in person. We are heading there Monday.

They may know what they're doing from a mathematical standpoint with their computer modeling, but they may not fully appreciate the vagaries of human nature. If we assume that FP+ is designed to redistribute crowds and we also assume that crowd levels remain constant, then by lessening the line at headlined attractions, they necessarily have to increase them elsewhere. But this assumes that people would prefer 60 minute waits at headliners and 30-40 minute waits at secondary attractions instead of 80 minute waits at headliners and walk-on to 15 minute waits at secondary attractions. By the end of the day, the former might have you waiting in line for a shorter aggregate amount of time, but the average guest might perceive the latter to be better. When the guest goes home to tell their friends about the trip, they might say one of two things. Either:

-It was great. The lines for Space Mountain and Thunder Mountain were really long. But that was to be expected. The waits at the other rides were no problem at all; or
-It was disappointing. We waited in long lines for everything.

If a typical guest perceives 30 minute lines to be just beyond their tolerance level, yet all lines are 30+ minutes, then Disney will have failed the "human nature" test by flattening out all the lines to this level even if by doing so it shrunk the lines at headliners and shrunk the aggregate amount of time spent in line each day. Personally, I would prefer to see long lines at headliners (even insanely long ones) and short lines elsewhere as long as there is a coping strategy that allows me to avoid the insane line. FP- gave me that. But Disney thinks that I would prefer shorter lines at headliners with the trade-off being that I cannot escape certain of those lines due to tiering. First of all, Disney is wrong in that belief so it isn't fair to jump to the conclusion that they are always right. Secondly, I haven't seen any evidence that their changes have dramatically shortened anything. Shrinking a 90 minute line down to 80 minutes is gaining little if now, rides that used to be walk on are now hitting 30-40 minutes in length.

 

[Rhiannona]

As of now the best experience is
RD and ride everything you want in the morning VIA standby.
- if staying in same park FP+ for major attractions in the afternoon.
- if going to secondary park hit FP+ up as soon as you get into second park (if you cannot book in advance)

Or, on a rainy day visit any park except Epcot or DTD


Or, I don't know a crazy thought. Try something new, or something you haven't seen in awhile. You may find it refreshing and add a touch of Disney Magic into a day.

 

[WillAustin]

Secondly, I haven't seen any evidence that their changes have dramatically shortened anything. Shrinking a 90 minute line down to 80 minutes is gaining little if now, rides that used to be walk on are now hitting 30-40 minutes in length.

People keep trying to say that's OK because so many people are going through the FP+ line now, so it's better. The FP+ limits and tiering keep FP+ from being a real plus in a guests overall wait time. And it certainly isn't better if you encounter FP+ return lines that are 15-30 minutes long on busy days as some have reported.

 

[JimmyV]

Or, on a rainy day visit any park except Epcot or DHS.

I actually prefer Epcot as my park on rainy days. The queues are all indoors (except for Maelstrom when it's crowded) and the Future World pavilions like Living Seas and Innoventions are great places to kill lots of time waiting for the storm to pass. Same with many of the shops in World Showcase like in Japan or the UK.

 

[MaryKatesMom]

Here is the way I look at it.
The headliners are running at capacity anyway. (FP- or FP+)
What I expect to be happening is the wait time for SB on the rides that did not have FP- to be longer especially in DHS and Epcot where tiering is in place.

In Epcot there are only two rides that absolutely needed a FP so as not to waste 2+ hours of your day on line. Now you can only pick one of these plus two other attractions that never needed fast pass espesically if you rode later in the day (I am looking at you Spaceship Earth and Mission:Space).

My thoughs exactly.

As of now the best experience is
RD and ride everything you want in the morning VIA standby.
- if staying in same park FP+ for major attractions in the afternoon.
- if going to secondary park hit FP+ up as soon as you get into second park (if you cannot book in advance)

Or, on a rainy day visit any park except Epcot or DTD


Or, I don't know a crazy thought. Try something new, or something you haven't seen in awhile. You may find it refreshing and add a touch of Disney Magic into a day.

I'm not sure RD will be the same. With FP+ now starting at 9 AM to 10 AM I think there will be a bump at 10 AM. On peak days you could hit multiple SB lines to get on what you want but the crowd levels rise exponentially and with it SB lines.

There isn't really anything I haven't seen or tried. Really how many times can you watch the Hall of Presidents because that is the only thing without a big SB line.

 

[redrosesix]

They may know what they're doing from a mathematical standpoint with their computer modeling, but they may not fully appreciate the vagaries of human nature. If we assume that FP+ is designed to redistribute crowds and we also assume that crowd levels remain constant, then by lessening the line at headlined attractions, they necessarily have to increase them elsewhere. But this assumes that people would prefer 60 minute waits at headliners and 30-40 minute waits at secondary attractions instead of 80 minute waits at headliners and walk-on to 15 minute waits at secondary attractions. By the end of the day, the former might have you waiting in line for a shorter aggregate amount of time, but the average guest might perceive the latter to be better. When the guest goes home to tell their friends about the trip, they might say one of two things. Either:

-It was great. The lines for Space Mountain and Thunder Mountain were really long. But that was to be expected. The waits at the other rides were no problem at all; or
-It was disappointing. We waited in long lines for everything.

If a typical guest perceives 30 minute lines to be just beyond their tolerance level, yet all lines are 30+ minutes, then Disney will have failed the "human nature" test by flattening out all the lines to this level even if by doing so it shrunk the lines at headliners and shrunk the aggregate amount of time spent in line each day. Personally, I would prefer to see long lines at headliners (even insanely long ones) and short lines elsewhere as long as there is a coping strategy that allows me to avoid the insane line. FP- gave me that. But Disney thinks that I would prefer shorter lines at headliners with the trade-off being that I cannot escape certain of those lines due to tiering. First of all, Disney is wrong in that belief so it isn't fair to jump to the conclusion that they are always right. Secondly, I haven't seen any evidence that their changes have dramatically shortened anything. Shrinking a 90 minute line down to 80 minutes is gaining little if now, rides that used to be walk on are now hitting 30-40 minutes in length.

ITA with all of this. I think they are missing some really key points in the psychological effects. It's the same as Bob Iger assuming that with more free time between rides (ie. they have to wait around for their next window to open), guests will spend more money shopping in the parks -- but as somebody commented in another post, why would they assume that guests would have more money to spend simply because they changed the ride queuing system? And if people are not having a great time in the parks, why would they want to spend money buying souvenirs at all? Sure they might want a Mickey tshirt but if they don't become a Disney fan they'll be just as happy getting one for much less money at Walmart. Ditto for staying onsite -- why would people spend more to "stay in the magic" if their experience is not that much better than another theme park in the area ie. it's not magical.

So if they don't manage this properly, they're going to see cuts spending in more places than they might expect.

 

[MaryKatesMom]

ITA with all of this. I think they are missing some really key points in the psychological effects. It's the same as Bob Iger assuming that with more free time between rides (ie. they have to wait around for their next window to open), guests will spend more money shopping in the parks -- but as somebody commented in another post, why would they assume that guests would have more money to spend simply because they changed the ride queuing system? And if people are not having a great time in the parks, why would they want to spend money buying souvenirs at all? Sure they might want a Mickey tshirt but if they don't become a Disney fan they'll be just as happy getting one for much less money at Walmart. Ditto for staying onsite -- why would people spend more to "stay in the magic" if their experience is not that much better than another theme park in the area ie. it's not magical.

So if they don't manage this properly, they're going to see cuts spending in more places than they might expect.

If FP+ diminishes our park experience and I can't go on anything we love more than once. I see less value in spending money on room and board.
Yes we spent the money on AP's.

We have a trip planned over Easter and one over Memorial Day. I'm going to see how Easter goes, my BC WV CL room is very expensive. I can easily move my flights on SW to Ft. Lauderdale and stay at the Ritz Carlton's Club Level for much less over Memorial Day weekend. We love South Beach and if all I can do is walk around and eat at TS restaurants and lay by the pool. I can do that for less and much better quality food.

Meaning once you take the "Theme Park" out of a "Theme Park Vacation". There are other options.

 

[2Tiggies]

Meaning once you take the "Theme Park" out of a "Theme Park Vacation". There are other options.

And there you have it folks!

 

[JeremyGNJ]

Meaning once you take the "Theme Park" out of a "Theme Park Vacation". There are other options.

Except for the fact that Disney knows you're full of crap, and you'll come anyway. (and if not you, someone else) ONLY if people actually stop coming would they add value or lower prices, and I see no signs of people not coming...just complaining about it.

 

[GrtWtNorth]

I sometimes wonder if all the FP+ forum posts are a social experiment to see if any guests will shift their spending to Universal, Legoland, Seaworld or Busch Gardens.

I'm sometimes shocked by how many forum participants can be so critical of Disney's management, but so few forum participants spend time and money in non-Disney theme parks.

I'm a fan of all theme parks and most amusement parks. Most have experimented with different types of virtual queue systems. And made changes that upset online forum participants. But attendance continues to grow across the board. Loyalties and spending don't appear to vary much despite all the online grief.

Disney's biggest risk is that MDE and FP+ were expensive to implement. As a shareholder, I hope the savings from staff management efficiency improvements and reduced FP machine maintenance cover the additional costs borne by IT support and guest services.

Years ago, Universal scrapped their terminals that allowed off-site guests to select reservation times (for free) for their ride reservation system. Now, Universal's system operates without prescribing ride return times. It might not be as elegant at moving crowds, but people are still paying a premium for the service. And Universal doesn't have to maintain those finicky self-serve terminals.

 

[norybell]

They may know what they're doing from a mathematical standpoint with their computer modeling, but they may not fully appreciate the vagaries of human nature. If we assume that FP+ is designed to redistribute crowds and we also assume that crowd levels remain constant, then by lessening the line at headlined attractions, they necessarily have to increase them elsewhere. But this assumes that people would prefer 60 minute waits at headliners and 30-40 minute waits at secondary attractions instead of 80 minute waits at headliners and walk-on to 15 minute waits at secondary attractions. By the end of the day, the former might have you waiting in line for a shorter aggregate amount of time, but the average guest might perceive the latter to be better. When the guest goes home to tell their friends about the trip, they might say one of two things. Either:

-It was great. The lines for Space Mountain and Thunder Mountain were really long. But that was to be expected. The waits at the other rides were no problem at all; or
-It was disappointing. We waited in long lines for everything.

If a typical guest perceives 30 minute lines to be just beyond their tolerance level, yet all lines are 30+ minutes, then Disney will have failed the "human nature" test by flattening out all the lines to this level even if by doing so it shrunk the lines at headliners and shrunk the aggregate amount of time spent in line each day. Personally, I would prefer to see long lines at headliners (even insanely long ones) and short lines elsewhere as long as there is a coping strategy that allows me to avoid the insane line. FP- gave me that. But Disney thinks that I would prefer shorter lines at headliners with the trade-off being that I cannot escape certain of those lines due to tiering. First of all, Disney is wrong in that belief so it isn't fair to jump to the conclusion that they are always right. Secondly, I haven't seen any evidence that their changes have dramatically shortened anything. Shrinking a 90 minute line down to 80 minutes is gaining little if now, rides that used to be walk on are now hitting 30-40 minutes in length.

This is so exactly right (and very well put).

A few years ago, I took my first trip to Disneyland. It was a very short, last-minute trip, so I didn't get to plan much at all. I figured, hey, I was solo, knew about rope drop and FP and MMH, it was a slow time of year, how much planning would I really need?

I rode all the headliners with FP, or I waited in long lines for them (which I was prepared to do, because I wanted to experience the major highlights and knew I'd have to wait for them). But pretty much everything else was a 20-30 minute wait. And it really, really colored my experience. I didn't have a very good time at all, because waiting in all those mid-sized lines felt like such a slog. And let's face it: if you're a first-time visitor, without nostalgia and happy memories adding value to everything, would you consider all WDW's mid-level rides to be worth 30-minute waits? (I love them all so much that I can't really answer this question, but it wouldn't surprise me if plenty of folks said no.)

There were rides I would have liked to experience a second time, but I didn't, because I was sick of waiting in lines. I had planned to spend my evenings in the parks, but I didn't, because I was burned out from waiting in lines.

Back in the '70s and '80s, my family visited FL every year. But we only went to WDW once every few years. Because of the lines. And when we did go, we would go at RD, leave by lunch, return to our Vacation Villa (pre-DVC days) to cook lunch, spend the afternoon by the pool, cook dinner, watch TV and go to bed. It wasn't until after FP hit the scene that we started visiting very regularly, spending a lot more time and money in the parks. I hold out hope that, if they go with one of the options they are surveying about (the rolling 3rd FP+, maybe), they can somehow get things back to a point where you can at least easily ride the secondary rides (with that extra FP+) with as little wait as we used to be able to do SB. If they can't get there, and wait times on all the secondary rides remain 15+ minutes for most visitors even in the slow times of year, I would imagine that plenty of true WDW regulars will severely curtail their visits, and many more newcomers will walk away thinking, way too many lines, we don't need to do this again!

 

[redrosesix]

I sometimes wonder if all the FP+ forum posts are a social experiment to see if any guests will shift their spending to Universal, Legoland, Seaworld or Busch Gardens.

I'm sometimes shocked by how many forum participants can be so critical of Disney's management, but so few forum participants spend time and money in non-Disney theme parks.

I'm a fan of all theme parks and most amusement parks. Most have experimented with different types of virtual queue systems. And made changes that upset online forum participants. But attendance continues to grow across the board. Loyalties and spending don't appear to vary much despite all the online grief.

Disney's biggest risk is that MDE and FP+ were expensive to implement. As a shareholder, I hope the savings from staff management efficiency improvements and reduced FP machine maintenance cover the additional costs borne by IT support and guest services.

Years ago, Universal scrapped their terminals that allowed off-site guests to select reservation times (for free) for their ride reservation system. Now, Universal's system operates without prescribing ride return times. It might not be as elegant at moving crowds, but people are still paying a premium for the service. And Universal doesn't have to maintain those finicky self-serve terminals.

Since we had a short trip last year and most of it was offsite with our team in a much less expensive hotel (nice, clean but a hotel like any you'd find in North America) we had planned 17 days on Disney property with a minimum of 7 park days. After reading all the threads in January, we changed it all up, cancelled a week at the disney resort and stayed in our own timeshare for a change (rather than renting it out at a premium). And bought 3 day passes for US and a pass for SW. Great decision! We also got outside Orlando twice and plan to add some overnights next year. Based on our experience in all of the parks in February, we've also decided to stay onsite at US next year. Just 3 days will be at Disney since it's the most convenient for my daughter's competition.

And since I've been browsing the US threads, I'm noticing a lot more people there who say they normally only stay at Disney but they're planning US for next year -- just like us. The lines at US weren't crazy horrible this year during Pres Week -- they were pretty much the same as wdw had the week before that. But with the early entry and EP I think we'll have a better time there than at Disney.

I wonder if the people who only go to wdw are angrier than others simply because they pretty much have all of their eggs in one basket -- they don't feel like they have alternatives. We're also looking in to going to DLP if we skip the competition some year, since Europe isn't much farther away for us.

 

[Squidgyness]

I wonder if the people who only go to wdw are angrier than others simply because they pretty much have all of their eggs in one basket -- they don't feel like they have alternatives. We're also looking in to going to DLP if we skip the competition some year, since Europe isn't much farther away for us.

Quite possibly this might be a factor here. I know one of the reasons I'm feeling angry is likely because even though I've spent a lot of time in other parks in Orlando (and sea world is my favourite!) because we live in the uk, cost and travel time would necessitate a 14 day trip really, and we can't afford that. If we lived in the states, we'd be booking to go back to Orlando and just visit US, SW and other attractions like the KSC.

As it stands I'm just hoping Disney gets their act together sometime in 2014 so they at least compete for our attention in the future, because as it stands they just aren't in the running for any future trips we might make.

Anyway, apologies if this was OT. I'll let the thread take its course.