How many people will stay off property and/or vacation elsewhere?

[ArcticWildMan]

After reading comments by more than one person about the new Disney packages and lack of room only discounts, I'm curious how many people are going to stay off property or not even go to Disney at all. I want to see how many folks are going to do as Mary Waring says and let their feet do the talking.

 

[pooh6890]

I used to go to Disney 3 times a year with NO discounts until I found the Diz. I am pretty stupid when I could have gotten Fla Res. Discounts and AAA. Unfortunately it would not be the same for us to go to Disney and NOT stay in a Disney resort, so rack rates or not, we would go. As a Fla resident, I am sure we will continue to have our little discounts at certain times of the year. Most people book packages anyway so it probably won't make any difference to most of them out there. Just us who know the in's and out's of AP's and codes.

 

[PugLover]

I have never been an AP holder nor will I ever be.... that being said:

My DH and I travel quite a bit for pleasure. A few years ago we priced out some Disney vacations (using the disney website) and laughed right out loud at the prices. For the quotes we were getting we easily could have gone to Europe or a Sandals, which was exactly what we did!

The FTP came along, learned about it from a tv commercial. It made the trip seem more reasonably price was for what you were getting. Unless another great package deal comes along we probably wont do Disney again until we have children or if we decide that is where our family vacation with my mom and sister will be next year.

 

[daannzzz]

I love staying at the Disney resorts and will go if there are no discounts. I will however stay at the All Stars and Moderates with maybe a night or two at a deluxe. I have certain limits I will pay for certain resorts. It is in their best interests to discount deluxe resorts as I am happy to pay more than I would for the moderates but I won't pay rack rate except when sharing with others who will split the costs.

 

[Tiffany]

Originally posted by ArcticWildMan
After reading comments by more than one person about the new Disney packages and lack of room only discounts, I'm curious how many people are going to stay off property or not even go to Disney at all. I want to see how many folks are going to do as Mary Waring says and let their feet do the talking.

You did not have my choice. Which is go but stay at the S/D. That is what we are doing on our upcoming trip. We had the YC at $207 plus tax a night with a come back rate but the S/D is running a $99 plus tax a night special. So we canceled the YC and are staying at the Dolphin. Also stayed at the Dolphin in Aug of 2002 for the same reason. Was able to get a better deal at the Dolphin then the YC.

 

[ArcticWildMan]

Originally posted by Tiffany
You did not have my choice. Which is go but stay at the S/D. That is what we are doing on our upcoming trip. We had the YC at $207 plus tax a night with a come back rate but the S/D is running a $99 plus tax a night special. So we canceled the YC and are staying at the Dolphin. Also stayed at the Dolphin in Aug of 2002 for the same reason. Was able to get a better deal at the Dolphin then the YC.

Oops, sorry. I just lumped the Swan/Dolphin crowd in with the "off property" group. I know they aren't off property, but they are a non Disney hotel, so it accomplishes the same thing (takes money away from Disney resorts)

 

[Tiffany]

Originally posted by ArcticWildMan
Oops, sorry. I just lumped the Swan/Dolphin crowd in with the "off property" group. I know they aren't off property, but they are a non Disney hotel, so it accomplishes the same thing (takes money away from Disney resorts)

True that they are not run by Disney but with their location you cannot consider them "off property". I would never consider staying "off property" due to inconvience of traveling back and forth. But, I have stayed at the Dolphin before and will be again if their rates keeping beating the YC.

 

[LvsTnk]

I voted that I will go anyway, but I will not be making 4 trips a year. I think it is time to start trying some other places.

We also went to DL over Easter, and it was just a half an hour to Hunington Beach. Airfare was much cheaper for us to Ca. and we got buy 3 get 2 days free hoppers with unlimited fastpass, a breakfast, an ESPN game card worth 10 bucks, and luggage tags for $120 per person. Great deals are available at hotels within walking distance to the parks but we stayed at the GC. We are planning to do a full week next spring break and combine a few days at the ocean.

 

[susy]

You don't have my choice listed.

I don't know what I will do!

Right now we have five nights booked at WL woods view for 244.29 (including tax) for Thanksgiving. A discount would be nice as we could apply the savings to our next trip (2 months later). Now, if there are no discounts, we probably will not go 2 months later, so Disney will get the same amount of money from us either way. Does that make sense?

It would be nice to say, "Oh , I will just stay at the mods or values", but realistically, the values are really not worth (by any stretch of the imagination) the rack rate. I am not saying that the other Disney resorts are.

With only my DH working and me in grad school, we don't exactly have all this money to throw their way (even though we do have all the money put aside for this trip).

The bottom line is that all we can probably afford at rack rate will be the values (if we want to go often enough to make the Ap's worth it) and I 'm not sure I want to pay those rates.

We are passholders and Fl residents. I hope Disney doesn't forget the loyalty we've shown since we were kids.

 

[CaliforniaDreaming]

I voted off-site. That could be Swan/Dolphin, Wyndham Palace, Caribe Royale, Portofino Bay, or the Hard Rock Hotel. Since we're DVC Members, half of our trip would still be at a "Disney resort," but since we "own" it we don't really have to worry about discounts as much!

 

[crystalb]

I don't know that I would say the heck with them. But I would go with what hotel offers the better situation for us at that time, whether that be on-site or off-site.
So far we have stayed on-site for convenience. But I am not committed to staying on site if I was able to get a much better deal off site.
Had the S/D Labor Day rate began one day earlier, we would be there rather than WL.

 

[CaipiraBob]

I recently priced out an offer for a HAL cruise vacation compared to the trip to BC Concierge previously planned. We found we could get an S class cabin on the Zuiderdam for the promo for the time we wanted to go for $500 less than Disney for a week.

We no longer plan to visit the BC Concierge.

We'll see what happens later with the other plans we have, but there's simply waaay too much competition out there to ignore.

 

[BHFAN]

We'll probably stay off site or the S/D or explore other places in this great country. I'm tired of waiting on AP rates (no more AP for me. I've learned a big lesson) or FL resident rates. 1/2 of the fun of Disney is in the planning for me and if I don't know where I'm staying so close to a trip, a lot of the fun is gone. They don't owe us anything. But a yes or no on those discounts would be nice. As nice as the FTP was, it did someone with APs no good.
Oh, yeah, that's right! They already have my $ so why would they care??
Yes, I believe they are sending us a message. I'm going to send them one back.

 

[patsal]

I'll go anyway, but stay at a lower level of accomadations. I buy AP's for the discount I get on admission, the other perks are just that, perks. There is no guarantee of special rates just because I have an AP. While it is nice to stay at a deluxe for moderate pricing, I never count on it. I've always just booked what I could afford on weekends (we own DVC) and if discounts became available I'd either apply it to save money or upgrade and pay the same. Seems like many people bought AP's to get a discounted room rate without that being anything that Disney guarantees and then they cry foul when they don't get it. The only thing that is for sure with an AP is that you have a year of park admission paid. If you are taking a trip for 8 or more days and plan to use the themeparks everyday it is worth it, if not another type of admission media may suit you better.

 

[DebbieB]

I also will go but will stay at a lower level of accomodations. I wanted to stay at BW, I was willing to pay $199-$225 a night. Instead I have booked CBR with a AAA rate ($118) and even if the AP's come out I will still stay there now that I've thought of all I could do with the money saved. I tried to book the Swan but it's sold out for my dates.

 

[Eeyore1954]

My DW and I have always done package trips to WDW and we'll continue to do so. Before we discovered the DISboards and Mousesavers, we paid rack rate -- not knowing any better. We love staying onsite and enjoy using Disney packages like FTP.

 

[madscrapper]

There are so many great places to stay in the Orlando area and most are a bargain compared to Disney.. We've stayed twice in a FW Cabin and loved it...but we stayed off site at Marriott Grande Vista and Marriott Horizons, both of which offer much more room and the pool areas at Horizons are great. ..and both were less money than a discounted cabin. Yes, I understand that staying on site can make you feel a little more "magical", but without a discount, I can make my own magic off-site.

Jeannine

 

[Gary M]

Patsal, we've had AP's for several years and didn't buy them for resort discounts, but with 3 or 4 trips a year to WDW, it was a great deal. I think it would be stupid, not to use AP's, if you spent 20-30 days per year at WDW. After saying that, I need to say, I would not go to WDW that often, if we didn't get room only discounts. We have gotten AP room discounts, but as often, it has been other discounts, such as Jolly Holidays(doesn't exist now) package, which included a dinner and show. The room discount was very good and with dinner and show the total was much less than the rack rate. Some excellent packages included minature golf(which we never used) or some packages had passes to the sports place at WDW. We also have used just plain codes for the general public, for room only discounts. Which came first for us the AP or room only discounts? In our case, the room only discounts came first, after a couple trips to WDW we found out about AP's and have had them since. Since we found out about the AP's we have gone to WDW more often.

There is no way that I will pay the rack rate and I do not want to stay off property, so good bye WDW if no room only rates. I'm sure Disney will not miss me. I loved the winter trips to WDW, but life will go on without them, if they don't change their offers.

 

[DebbieB]

I'm reworking my itinerary now that we're staying at CBR. Another factor - I think we will be having more meals in the food court rather than sitdown locations. More money they have lost and I've saved!

 

[billybaruch1]

This is a great topic! I'm impressed with the balanced approach most everyone seems to be taking.

I was ready to predict upwards of 75% would be claiming to be mad and would be voting against Disney with their feet. I was also ready to predict just about all those DIS boards posters would eventually calm down and spend the same amount of money at WDW in the future as they have in the past.

I still predict the latter. I may be naive, but I say Disney is making the right moves - the right moves to insure its continued health/growth, if not the most popular on this forum. People will not boycott, no way. They will cope and make adjustments.

I don't go to WDW very often, and before about 2 months ago, I had never heard of codes and so forth. I just figured WDW was expensive - far out of the reach of average families. I'm going soon on the FT package. I have no idea about the future.