My notes on the DVC focus group I went to (kinda long and probably boring, but...)

[Mickey_Maniac]

OK, Here goes. I will try to walk through the focus group as best I can. My group met on Wed from noon to 1:30. It turns out that there were either 6 or 8 other groups that met as well on different days and times. I am not sure if all were on the same topic or not, but our topic was on the member benefits package and whether or not we knew about them and if they had any value to us.

The moderator of our group was from Disney research. She was a very nice young lady named Karen. We met at the Beach Club convention center in one of the conference rooms. The session was being videotaped and we all got the impression that we were being monitored from another room by at least one (possible more) people. Kind of Big Brotherish a little.

Our group consisted of 8 people. A pretty diverse group to say the least. 4 women and 4 men, a couple older, a couple younger, rest were probably between 30-50. That is a swag on my part, I am horrible with ages.

After we all sat down, Karen had us go around and introduce ourselves and tell where we were from and how long we had been DVC'ers. She then had us go around the table and list verbally the member benefits we were aware of and/or had used previously. From that list we marked off the ones that we thought had any real value to us individually and to the DVC audience overall. Then we went back and marked those we thought did not have any real value.

We talked for a while about what we thought of the different packages. Everything was very well scripted and very well controlled. She tried very hard to keep us on track and not let us wander much. A couple of times we tried to bring up the benefits people had been asking for (like online mgt, ticket discounts, etc), but she stated that they had a policy of not accepting unsolicited suggestions.

She did mention that they had a whole series of focus groups a little while back talking about ticket, meal, and resort wide discounts for DVC members and that Disney Research felt if had a very good grasp of our thoughts on that. Not sure what that means, but there you go.

She asked us at one point what about our memberships we thought had no or very little value. I did sneak in the request to get some form of online account management. She tried to kill that pretty quick but the other group members agreed and we a very short discussion about it. If nothing else, we got it captured on tape so when they review the session, it will be there. One other topic that came through loud and clear (or should have) was the SAB pool hopping situation. As a matter of fact, one of the group members had dropped her DH and DS off at the pool before she headed off to the focus group. They were promptly asked to leave and in a not very nice manner. To put it mildly, she was pretty upset about that.

It was kind of funny, but a couple of times she left the room, ostensibly to check with one of her colleagues to make sure she had covered everything. To a person though, the group all felt it was more to give us a chance to talk freely, all under the watchful eye of the video camera. During these times, most of the topics you guys had listed came up at least once. I could just picture her and the other Disney Research people crouched around a TV monitor, watching and listening to us. Again, kind of Big Brotherish...

Once when she returned, she threw out a few "hypothetical" situations to see what our reactions would be. One being a resort wide 5% discount on all purchases (besides meals), meal discounts at more restaurants (but not all), removal of certain benefits we currently have, etc. That last started another whole side discussion from some of the longer term members about what has already been taken away. She backed away from that one pretty quick.

Well that's about it. All in all, I really didn't get too much out of it other than the free snacks, drinks, and the Disney gift certificates they handed out to everyone who attended. I did ask if the DVC population in general would ever find out the results of this and the other focus groups. she danced around that for a little while and never really did give me an answer.

Sorry I don't have any more positive or definite information for you. About the only thing of any real value that I did get out of it was that DVC management was at least interested enough to put these focus groups together and to listen to us. Maybe we do mean something to them after all.

Any comments or questions, let me know.

 

[momsully]

Thanks for the report. It would be great to hear from someone who attended one of the other groups as well to find out what they talked about.

 

[doubletrouble_vb]

I wouldn't mind a resort wide 10% discount...5% is a bit bogus.

 

[Beth]

I'm kind of surprised you're able to speak freely about the content of the meeting...

Was there no mention of a gag order?

Thanks very much for the recap - nonetheless...

I'm encouraged that they're holding these meetings...

 

[Mickey_Maniac]

Beth,
No there was nothing mentioned about any kind of gag order. We were not allowed to take any notes or anything else (besides a cookie or two) out of the meeting, but at no time were we told that we could not talk about the meetings.

 

[PamOKW]

Thanks for filling us in. Hard to determine what they had in mind. Sounds like the ticket discount won't be happening any time soon.

 

[JimC]

Thanks for the feedback. I gather you found the session less than satisfactory. I guess when Disney says everything they do is by design -- they mean it literally. Hope you enjoyed the rest of your trip!

Disney is paranoid about suggestions because of the law suits against them claiming they used other's intellectual property without compensation. I don't know the validity of the claims, but even if they cannot be sustained, it is distracting and expensive to defend against them.

They discount and perk to increase revenue or push what's not selling, but needs to. Not much different than any other business, except they package it better and sell it with great CMs.

I suspect that if the things we all thought would be great could be justified as an investment that would reduce costs or increase revenue they might act on it. If it is nice for us, but not adding to the bottom line for Disney, it is unlikely that we will see it. Walt's concept of "plussing" is going away, largely I suspect due to pressures from key shareholders to improve stock performance.

Even with no perks it is still a great resort value at our favorite vacation destination and that is what made our decision to buy.

Again, thanks for your efforts to speak on our collective behalf.

 

[Mrs. Snowgod]

Thanks very much for the thorough report. What an intriquing way to conduct this. A little wierd.

 

[sparkspeak]

Thanks for the enlightening report, MM. Their policy of "not accepting unsolicited suggestions" must have been disappointing after all of your research. Were any of the other members of your focus group familiar with this forum?

 

[Maistre Gracey]

Thank you, Mickey_Maniac, for taking the time to keep us informed, as well as attending the meeting. I think you are right on about the "big brother camera" when she left the room.

Hope you had a good trip, and thanx again....

 

[Nanajo1]

Thanks for reporting. By limiting discussion on new perks it sounds similar to the Character Caravan fiasco when management said "It is what the people want" when they suspended EE.
I'll be interested to see if any of what you talked about appears in VM.

 

[CarolA]

The part I find most amazing was that one of the members had just dropped their family off at SAB. Excuse me, are they living under a rock? At this point I can kind of understand the CMs not being real nice about people continuing to assume you can pool hop there. I mean it has been in DVC communications and is in the stuff you get at check in. So my theory is that most members KNOW you can't pool hop there, but are going under the "rules don't apply to ME" theory!

 

[Pa@okw95]

Sounds to me like some things are going to be taken away and they are trying to figure out what.

 

[RobDoc]

I wouldn't mind a resort wide 10% discount...5% is a bit bogus.

This is the other challenge for an organization offering perks. Since there is now no such resort wide discount for any group- some would be delighted with a 5% discount and others would apparently be offended at anything less than 10%.

Thanks for the report Mickey_Maniac, sounds like it was an interesting process.

 

[Chuck S]

Thanks so much for posting the report. I think most of us have wondered what actulally happens at the focus groups. While I'd love a 10% resort wide discount, 5% would probably save as much overall than 10% at "select locations". It would be nice, though, if the discount was at least 7% or 8% so it would be enough to at cover the sales tax. The retailers in our state make a killing on the "no sales tax" days.

 

[Mickey_Maniac]

Originally posted by JimC
Even with no perks it is still a great resort value at our favorite vacation destination and that is what made our decision to buy.

JimC echoes the general feelings of everyone in my focus group. We all had the same opinion that even without ANY member benefits at all, we probably still would have purchased just because we love Disney so much.

 

[PKS44]

On Poolhopping-

what did your group say? On these boards you get a lot of opinions from don't change the poolhopping to people could not care less about the poolhopping...what did your group communicate to management about losing that benefit?

 

[DebbieB]

I'd be happy with any additional discounts. Now that Disney Club is ending, I would be happy if they would even match the DC approx 5% off on passes, it saved us about $15 per AP.

 

[Mickey_Maniac]

PKS44,
Everyone iun my group emfatically (sp?) agreed that the current pool hopping policy regarding SAB is unfair. That was very clearly communicated to the focus group moderator. We all felt that members who stayed at BCV received preferential treatment even though we all use the same number of points. I think the general concensus was that if pool hopping is banned during busy times, it should be across the board instead of specific to just SAB.

 

[BCVOwner2002]

Thanks for your post. I can't wait to see what Disney does with the information. Did anyone say they would contact you again? Annmarie