New Balance Reservation Time?

[Nicole786]

I was wondering for those who were at the expos for Tink/Marathon Weekend how it went with the New Balance sneaker reservation times. I plan to get to the expo when it opens, and I'm wondering what kind of reservation times are we looking at?

Thanks!

 

[StarGirl11]

The reservations line generally forms well before hand or at least it did at Tink. They started giving slots out at 8:30 on both Thursday and Friday. And keep in mind on Thursday the expo didn't open until 2:00 in the afternoon. So if you want to get the shoes you may have to get over to the expo area before the expo actually opens.

Again that's Tink I don't know how the Marathon weekend went. I just know the later you showed up the further back in the groups you were. And the less shoe size selection you had. So it might be worth it to get there early, get your slot and come back later in the day. Since they do send out communication when your time is up. And if your in the first group that is when the expo opens.

 

[pxefig]

I went the very forst day of the expo. For Tink the expo and shoe sales opened at 2. The line to sign up for times started at noon. I was in line at 11 am. To give you an idea, by the time the line started moving at noon, I was smack in the middle of it. I received my text to get my shoes at the expo at 4:06. There was still a pretty good selection of sizes at styles- my friend and I both managed to get the sizes and styles we were looking for. Overall, I was pretty pleased with the set up. The hour waiting to sign up for a time was an amount of time I was willing to wait for. I like that I didn;t have to stand in line at the expo for hours to get shoes, the way I heard it was last year. I don't think I would of bothered if that was the case.

 

[fruitcakes24]

I went down to the NB line at about 8:30am (Friday) and it was so, so, so long and decided not to wait.

We were staying at the DL hotel, so I walked back by at 9:20am and literally walked right up to the podium to make an appointment. The confirmation had an estimated wait time of 4 hours, so we went to breakfast, expo, DTD (non-park day for us). They do give you a link in the confirmation to check which group they are on and inventory levels.

Received notification at 1pm to head to the NB booth at the expo and after waiting behind about 5 people, tried on the shoes, went straight up to pay. Easy, easy, easy!

I was completely fine with the 4 hour wait between appointment and sign up because of our schedule for the day and the close proximity of the expo to DTD/Hotel. Had it been at WDW, I would not have wanted to stay at WWOS for 4 hours waiting for the shoes.

 

[pxefig]

I was completely fine with the 4 hour wait between appointment and sign up because of our schedule for the day and the close proximity of the expo to DTD/Hotel. Had it been at WDW, I would not have wanted to stay at WWOS for 4 hours waiting for the shoes.

Agree with this statement completely! I will be going to the Princess half as well but I knew Tink was the only time I wanted to try for shoes because of how easy it is to go back and forth between places. We were staying at the Grand Californian and once we got our texts we walked back to the expo in under 5 minutes. Disney World being so large just doesn't have that flexibility.

 

[fruitcakes24]

Agree with this statement completely! I will be going to the Princess half as well but I knew Tink was the only time I wanted to try for shoes because of how easy it is to go back and forth between places. We were staying at the Grand Californian and once we got our texts we walked back to the expo in under 5 minutes. Disney World being so large just doesn't have that flexibility.

I wish they would do initial sign-up online, but of course they want us to stay and continue spending money

 

[dburg30]

Well you threw marathon in there. I was there for the first day expo at WDW for marathon weekend. Took first bus from resort only to find out expo actually opened about an hour early that day. So I was in line around 940.. Think I got my number (742) around 1130 or so. My number came up around 430 or so. Glad I had plans to leave the expo, go eat at epcot, meet my sister, drop off stuff at hotel, go back to expo...

I assuredly did NOT stick around and spend more money. Actually with that amount of time waiting in line, I spent far less then I was going to. Had other stuff I wanted to look at, but was so fed up at that point.

I think the idea was a good one, but they needed to a) give some sort of idea when your return time was, and b) somehow speed up the sign up process. It just seemed like people were taking an awful long time to sign up on the tablets.

 

[fairestoneofall]

i bought mine during Marathon weekend. we came in on Wednesday and, by the time we got there, the line (to sign up) had been closed for awhile. DH and i went back to the expo on Friday night, in the last hour it was open. about 10 minutes before closing, i walked up and was able to buy a pair without jumping through any hoops. thankfully, my size was still available.

obviously, i could've been out of luck. i wasn't dead set on getting a pair, just figured i'd ask on a whim. all in all, it took about 5-10 minutes total to get my shoes, try them on, and pay.

 

[Nicole786]

Thank you guys so much this helps a lot! We don't get to disney until the 23rd but we'll be in Orlando (universal) starting the morning of the 21st. I don't want to cut in on the limited universal time we have, but I might give it a try if I can line up in the morning and get a return time for about 5-6PM.

Thanks again!