My apologies to Mr. Staggs

[Davey Jones II]

I agree with you, but that will never happen. No matter what Disney does, people support them. they grumble, complain, threaten etc. but numbers speak louder than words and disney is more crowded than ever and it seems to get busier and busier each year. they can cut hours, raise prices, cut staff, cut corners etc., but people will continue to go and continue to pay. If I had a nickel for every time I read on these boards:

"I just got back from Disney, so sad it's over, but I am busy planning my trip next month!"
"I am mad at Disney for xyz, maybe after my next 5 trips that I have planned I will re-evaluate"
"I am mad at Disney for xyz, I will do Disney cruise/aulani/disneyland, next year instead"
"well I don't care what they do, Disney is MY happy place and I'm going to continue going! It's still awesome to me."

And on and on. It's not a bad thing, in fact it is wonderful for Disney. They have life long guests who will continue to go week after week, month after month, year after year etc. We still go because we still enjoy it, not sure how long that will last though. People have to decide what their breaking point is, but for many I don't think there is a breaking point and for every family that has had enough and stops going, multiple families will take their place.

I'm sure that's what Disney is assuming...for every family that bails, plenty will take their place. I don't buy it. The parks are currently hot, but today's hot trend is tomorrow's has been. The way to maintain long-term popularity is by consistently offering an excellent product, one that offers good value for the money. Reward people for their repeat business.

Cost cutting, cutting corners are classic "penny wise, pound foolish" ways of killing the golden goose. You may not lose customer loyalty overnight, but the grumblings on these boards should be seen as a canary in a coal mine for this company. Instead, they seem to be dismissing us as a bunch of irrelevant cranks. I've got a news bulletin for this company: we represent your most loyal customers!

I've also read countless posts to this effect:

"We're done with Disney for a while."
"Next time, we're going to Universal instead/Last time, we went to Universal instead."
"Our next trip will be the last one for awhile."
"We're going to try some other destinations/we tried some other destinations."

That's not what I was reading on the boards when I first joined this site.

If they truly had an eye towards the long term, here is what they would be doing: strengthening, not chipping away at, their strongest divisions (like the Parks division) and letting the weaker ones sink or swim on their own merits. You can't endlessly subsidize something that is being undermined by new technology.

Instead, they're robbing the parks to artificially prop up the failing parts of their unwieldly, bloated media empire. Stop trying to buy up the whole world, and you won't have to short change your most loyal customers, or bash the morale of your most underpaid, hardest working employees.

People are coming now. What will happen when they find ever longer wait times, ever fewer CMs to serve their needs? THEY WON'T COME BACK.

They still have a great reputation. That reputation took decades to build, and was estabilished on the greatness of the company founder. They are slowly reversing those gains in public good will. If they gain a bad reputation, that perception will be slow to change, too.

 

[Planogirl]

Yes. Change can be good. . . "New and Improved" sometimes actually is. . . But the customer experience at Disney was, in my opinion, their greatest skill and what set them apart. "Shaking up the business model" is not something I was looking for - I wonder who was? Closest I ever heard was people making comparisons to Uni and saying that Disney was too slow in adding new things or that the things they did add weren't thrilling or innovative enough. . . I can't say that cost-cutting and exclusive parties had a grassroots demand.

I agree. I sometimes see people saying that they're stockholders and all of this is good for them. But is it?

Besides you can lure the first time visitor over and over until you run out. There's a big supply but eventually many will have experienced the place and will no longer be first time visitors. Doesn't Disney want them to come back?

 

[mom2rtk]

I'm sure that's what Disney is assuming...for every family that bails, plenty will take their place. I don't buy it.

I don't buy it either. There is absolutely nothing from keeping those "replacements" from going NOW. Disney wants repeat business AND the new business. I can probably count on one hand the number of days per year the parks are at capacity and there is something keeping replacements from entering. The other 360 days per year? There's nothing keeping them out.

Disney just thinks they can do what they are doing and the crowds (both repeat and new) will keep coming. They might be right. Or they might be wrong. Because of the way people plan their trips, it takes a while for the impact of something like this to show up.

 

[Planogirl]

I'm sure that's what Disney is assuming...for every family that bails, plenty will take their place. I don't buy it. The parks are currently hot, but today's hot trend is tomorrow's has been. The way to maintain long-term popularity is by consistently offering an excellent product, one that offers good value for the money. Reward people for their repeat business.

Cost cutting, cutting corners are classic "penny wise, pound foolish" ways of killing the golden goose. You may not lose customer loyalty overnight, but the grumblings on these boards should be seen as a canary in a coal mine for this company. Instead, they seem to be dismissing us as a bunch of irrelevant cranks. I've got a news bulletin for this company: we represent your most loyal customers!

I've also read countless posts to this effect:

"We're done with Disney for a while."
"Next time, we're going to Universal instead/Last time, we went to Universal instead."
"Our next trip will be the last one for awhile."
"We're going to try some other destinations/we tried some other destinations."

That's not what I was reading on the boards when I first joined this site.

If they truly had an eye towards the long term, here is what they would be doing: strengthening, not chipping away at, their strongest divisions (like the Parks division) and letting the weaker ones sink or swim on their own merits. You can't endlessly subsidize something that is being undermined by new technology.

Instead, they're robbing the parks to artificially prop up the failing parts of their unwieldly, bloated media empire. Stop trying to buy up the whole world, and you won't have to short change your most loyal customers, or bash the morale of your most underpaid, hardest working employees.

People are coming now. What will happen when they find ever longer wait times, ever fewer CMs to serve their needs? THEY WON'T COME BACK.

They still have a great reputation. That reputation took decades to build, and was estabilished on the greatness of the company founder. They are slowly reversing those gains in public good will. If they gain a bad reputation, that perception will be slow to change, too.

And the people that regularly come to this site are the diehards. What does the casual traveler think about all of this? What will they think in years to come? As you said reputations can be hard to repair.

 

[pa. dad]

I'm sure that's what Disney is assuming...for every family that bails, plenty will take their place. I don't buy it. The parks are currently hot, but today's hot trend is tomorrow's has been. The way to maintain long-term popularity is by consistently offering an excellent product, one that offers good value for the money. Reward people for their repeat business.

Cost cutting, cutting corners are classic "penny wise, pound foolish" ways of killing the golden goose. You may not lose customer loyalty overnight, but the grumblings on these boards should be seen as a canary in a coal mine for this company. Instead, they seem to be dismissing us as a bunch of irrelevant cranks. I've got a news bulletin for this company: we represent your most loyal customers!

I've also read countless posts to this effect:

"We're done with Disney for a while."
"Next time, we're going to Universal instead/Last time, we went to Universal instead."
"Our next trip will be the last one for awhile."
"We're going to try some other destinations/we tried some other destinations."

That's not what I was reading on the boards when I first joined this site.

If they truly had an eye towards the long term, here is what they would be doing: strengthening, not chipping away at, their strongest divisions (like the Parks division) and letting the weaker ones sink or swim on their own merits. You can't endlessly subsidize something that is being undermined by new technology.

Instead, they're robbing the parks to artificially prop up the failing parts of their unwieldly, bloated media empire. Stop trying to buy up the whole world, and you won't have to short change your most loyal customers, or bash the morale of your most underpaid, hardest working employees.

People are coming now. What will happen when they find ever longer wait times, ever fewer CMs to serve their needs? THEY WON'T COME BACK.

They still have a great reputation. That reputation took decades to build, and was estabilished on the greatness of the company founder. They are slowly reversing those gains in public good will. If they gain a bad reputation, that perception will be slow to change, too.

What is ODD about all the cost cutting is that it comes at a time when their main competitor is doing all these new things including new rides and a new waterpark. When the new waterpark opens, I'm sure they will offer some new multiday tickets that include that. So it seems like a strange time to watch every penny when your competitor is digging their heels in for a big fight.

 

[Eastern]

I'm sure that's what Disney is assuming...for every family that bails, plenty will take their place. I don't buy it. The parks are currently hot, but today's hot trend is tomorrow's has been. The way to maintain long-term popularity is by consistently offering an excellent product, one that offers good value for the money. Reward people for their repeat business.

Cost cutting, cutting corners are classic "penny wise, pound foolish" ways of killing the golden goose. You may not lose customer loyalty overnight, but the grumblings on these boards should be seen as a canary in a coal mine for this company. Instead, they seem to be dismissing us as a bunch of irrelevant cranks. I've got a news bulletin for this company: we represent your most loyal customers!

I agree. As an example, for our last trip, we did a split stay with Universal instead of just Disney. This trip, we are staying mod instead of deluxe. And I just returned some UT tickets and paid a penalty because they were for longer periods than I plan on going in the future. People are definitely still going, but I do think things are changing.

 

[redsbe]

Time will tell, and if customer service and the value and quality of the WDW visit declines and people walk away with their money WDW will have made a big decision. As I agree as long as the number of visitors and revenue grows (including with recent cost cutting and new added cost events) WDW will continue on that path. I know with our upcoming trip in early June we made a conscious decision to spend no more then need basic needs and will carefully reign in all in park spending beyond what our booked package already includes.

On a related topic, a distant relative recently visited WDW with her partner and 5 old child for the very first time with little planning (I did not even know they were going). Their comments upon return was great the place was and how the parks and staff are so geared to provided an excellent family experience even with busy parks and crowds (and I did send them links to help plan their next visit including this board). Bottom line if majority of paying customers are satisfied, including what appears to be the target audience of new families, WDW is going to continue down its current path.

 

[mom2rtk]

Time will tell, and if customer service and the value and quality of the WDW visit declines and people walk away with their money WDW will have made a big decision. As I agree as long as the number of visitors and revenue grows (including with recent cost cutting and new added cost events) WDW will continue on that path. I know with our upcoming trip in early June we made a conscious decision to spend no more then need basic needs and will carefully reign in all in park spending beyond what our booked package already includes.

On a related topic, a distant relative recently visited WDW with her partner and 5 old child for the very first time with little planning (I did not even know they were going). Their comments upon return was great the place was and how the parks and staff are so geared to provided an excellent family experience even with busy parks and crowds (and I did send them links to help plan their next visit including this board). Bottom line if majority of paying customers are satisfied, including what appears to be the target audience of new families, WDW is going to continue down its current path.

And my hairdresser, who has never heard me say anything remotely negative about Disney told me that her friend was there last week, had an awful time, and will never go back again.

I don't think any one of us knows if we are outliers or representative of a growing change of opinion about Disney.

 

[Murron]

Disney stock over 100 today. Consumers may be unhappy, but the stockholders aren't complaining. That being said, I'm both. A disgruntled consumer but happy stockholder. A conundrum for sure.

 

[shanethesaint88]

Unfortunately I think this is how many major companies are operating now a days. Always trying to maximise profits and they do it at the risk of losing their repeat customers. But they don't care. It's par for the course. When I was working at a grocery store chain in high school they cut almost every full time position. Then made the people who were either losing their job or going to part time sit through a video presentation telling them how much money it would save the company and how great it was.
That is how major corporations operate now a days. Spend as little as possible and charge as much as possible. There is no such thing as customer service anymore.
Unfortunately it seems as Disney as fallen for this trap because of some scared execs due to the ESPN business being extremely shaky. It sucks to see Disney go through this. I think if you are gonna wanna go to the parks from now you are just gonna have to get used to it though. They are gonna operate these parks with the least amount of staffing possible and it is gonna cost you significantly to experience them.

 

[Darcy03231]

After being a loyal WDW customer for over 30 years with yearly (and sometimes 2-3x a year) trips under my belt, I'm in the camp of not going back for a while. Our last trip was in 2013 and I found myself being disenchanted then by the low quality of food, the nickel and diming, and the cutbacks. We may go back once the renovations are done and new attractions are built, but I doubt we'll ever go back to yearly trips again. For me, the value just isn't there anymore. I may feel differently if I still had young children (my "baby" is 23) or grandchildren, but at this point I just can't see spending more to go to WDW for a week than I'll spend going to Sandals La Source Grenada for a week.

Last summer we did 10 days in the Orlando area and had a blast at Universal, Islands of Adventure and SeaWorld, with some smaller area attractions thrown in. We spent a lot less and all decided we had more fun than we did on our last WDW trip. I really thought I'd be a bit sad about not going to WDW, but I didn't even miss it. I had originally planned to go to DTD and we were so busy doing other stuff that no one really felt like going.

 

[Mickey28]

Unfortunately for us, the WDW vets, attendance is at an all time high and the new Disney parks consumer has no experience to compare it to. Like some have said Disney has been offering free dining to lure guests that probably would have never been able to come. Either that or people are emptying their bank accounts because many feel it is a right to take a WDW vacation not a luxury. Either way there is no longer a slow time of year. Disney sees this as a win/win for them, but I feel a lot of these newbies do not have the same nostalgia for Disney that some of us do so the chance for repeat business is less likely. When there is a large correction in one direction there will always be a counter correction just as large. Not sure if it will happen in the next 5 years or 10 years, but there will be a correction and unfortunately I think the damage will have already been done. Disney will have to scramble to get the "old customers" back. I have never been to Universal and we are getting ready to make our 20th trip to WDW this summer. I am going to try to hold judgement until after this trip, but I have a feeling that I am not going to pleased especially since I am spending around $4000 before I even leave home. Universal is starting to look more and more appealing and from what I have read many of the designers that are working on their new attractions are former Disney imagineers that were let go at some time due to costs cuts.

 

[Eastern]

Disney stock over 100 today. Consumers may be unhappy, but the stockholders aren't complaining. That being said, I'm both. A disgruntled consumer but happy stockholder. A conundrum for sure.

Well it takes time for things to sort themselves out. Even the best companies make mistakes sometimes.

 

[TLSnell1981]

They are destroying a brand, that was decades in the making. It makes me sad. Unfortunately, this has been the trend for awhile.


Some were thrilled to see Staggs leave. I wasn't so sure, the replacement would mean improvement. Sadly, my gut feeling was correct. It's likely to get much worse.

 

[ArwenMarie]

Disney will still get the first-timers but the difference will be if those people come back or not. If they go too far with cuts and price hikes, they will create more one-and-dones. When a brand abandons what made them beloved, good things don't follow. I guess the question is are they abandoning what made them beloved...time will tell.

 

[norjack]

Sadly, this is a normal part of the business cycle. It is only a matter of time until Universal, or even another up and comer, will basically copy the old Disney playbook regarding attention to quality, and then the tables will turn. The question is how long it will take Disney to wake up and see that they are costing themselves more money than making by pushing too hard too fast...

 

[redsbe]

Sadly, this is a normal part of the business cycle. It is only a matter of time until Universal, or even another up and comer, will basically copy the old Disney playbook regarding attention to quality, and then the tables will turn. The question is how long it will take Disney to wake up and see that they are costing themselves more money than making by pushing too hard too fast...

Universal is just another corporation with the same mindset, cut costs, maximize revenue, increase profit for shareholders. I highly doubt Universal or any other "up and comer" will do differently, especially considering the huge start up and labor costs needed for the type of huge infrastructure parks like at WDW have already invested over the last 50 years (plus huge marketing and built in promotional efforts and costs). Customer service and quality are declining across all service industries and has been for many years, WDW is just a little slow to the game (although many long time WDW visitors have noticed and complained for a while). The only difference matter is whether enough people walk away with their wallets as by all accounts WDW is seeing profit in the higher cost events and opportunities with the belief (and likely market research) that tells them enough people are willing to pay for a more exclusive and premium experience. Only time will tell if WDW is right, they certainly have access to a large and robust market and user experience data and spending trends to make that determination.

 

[Darcy03231]

Universal is just another corporation with the same mindset, cut costs, maximize revenue, increase profit for shareholders. I highly doubt Universal or any other "up and comer" will do differently, especially considering the huge start up and labor costs needed for the type of huge infrastructure parks like at WDW have already invested over the last 50 years (plus huge marketing and built in promotional efforts and costs). Customer service and quality are declining across all service industries and has been for many years, WDW is just a little slow to the game (although many long time WDW visitors have noticed and complained for a while). The only difference matter is whether enough people walk away with their wallets as by all accounts WDW is seeing profit in the higher cost events and opportunities with the belief (and likely market research) that tells them enough people are willing to pay for a more exclusive and premium experience. Only time will tell if WDW is right, they certainly have access to a large and robust market and user experience data and spending trends to make that determination.

I'm going to have to respectfully disagree here. We went to Universal last summer. We had absolutely wonderful customer service, I found the attention to detail very well done, the food was definitely much better, the rooms were better, the express pass was way better than the fast pass, and there was plenty of "Mummy" dust sprinkled throughout our trip. It was a sharp contrast to our last 2013 WDW trip which was disappointing, to say the least.

 

[redsbe]

I'm going to have to respectfully disagree here. We went to Universal last summer. We had absolutely wonderful customer service, I found the attention to detail very well done, the food was definitely much better, the rooms were better, the express pass was way better than the fast pass, and there was plenty of "Mummy" dust sprinkled throughout our trip. It was a sharp contrast to our last 2013 WDW trip which was disappointing, to say the least.

My point was that Universal is also a corporate entity and as such management or leadership could at any time could place cost savings over quality of experience. Perhaps people with a long history of WDW visits and experienced the high quality of customer service are seeing a decline whereas the service "bar" is lower for Universal. Also plenty of experience issues could be more tied to a specific trip, including timing and crowds, weather, construction, staff cuts or reorganization, ride closures/breakdowns. And although on these boards there seems to a general sense from long time visitors that service quality has gone done, and very likely true especially considering huge increases in crowds in recent years, but views and opinions on these boards are not always representative of many visitors. Maybe today Universal is providing better value and service, but corporate priorities can change quickly and Universal is not protected from such changes into the future.

 

[MaryKatesMom]

But a lot of these special experiences they do make I feel ARE for the repeat customers. You've done Disney for years .. heck maybe this time splurge for a dessert party for a NEW way to enjoy the fireworks.

Sure I did do the Wishes dessert party two years ago and thought it was great! Booked it again for last Easter and guess what they
1) Increased the price substantially
2) moved to non-assigned seating AND put seats along the railing so you can't get a good view unless you line up an hour before the party opens which is 2 hours before Wishes so you lose 2 hours of park time for a higher price.

That is what Disney does. Increase the price and lower the value.