New survey .. proposal .. Tiered Ticket Prices

[bcrook]

Tickets should be loss leaders. Get people in the parks and then soak em for food, beverages and souvenirs, special parties etc.

That idea is consistent with the tiers and dynamic pricing. They could easily offer "Wanna Get Away" pricing to fill up the parks, restaurants, and hotel rooms. The article I quoted used the airlines as a model.

 

[ArwenMarie]

Do you think ticket sales outside of Disney will continue to be robust? I already see the advantage to going online, picking your days, picking your fastpasses, and then seeing the cost show up on the Disney Website. I could adjust until I got the days and prices I felt worked, and then ask for the days off work.
I do think Disney would love to see everyone go that direction.

I agree. There will be the people like yourself (and many others on this board) who will play around with the dates and prices and tease out exactly what is costing what. But the majority of folks won't even know about the higher prices for certain days. They pick their vacation week first and then book their tickets.

 

[Lisaren]

Optimization from a business standpoint is very important. This is totally hypothetical, but Disney decides the optimum number of guests on any given day is X. This allows for best utilization of park resources and customer satisfaction. That would be a lower than current number for high attendance days and a higher than current number for low attendance days. Now, you need to develop a pricing structure that would move attendance for optimization. If you did that, staffing could be normalized and training costs would go down as most employees could not be year round and a huge increase in cast members would not be required for high traffic times. Now Disney crunches numbers and decides is must make Y amount in ticket sales to pay for full staff at X amount of attendance. Ticket prices would be set to Y = $/x (ticket price equals money needed divided by attendance). This would set the base price for entry. After that number has been determined, the ticket price would continually go up until they find the ceiling to get the perfect number of guests on the busiest days. In many ways, higher prices with lower attendance producing the same revenue is a good deal for Disney. Few employees needed to clean up, fewer unpaid for resources used (toilet paper, paper towels, etc). Scheduling could be optimized and hiring and training could be reduced and employee retention at all staffing positions since seasonal would be a thing of the past. Supposedly customer satisfaction would increase and more satisfied customers are willing to pay more. Of course, much would then have to go away. Multiple day tickets, APs, free dining - all a thing of the past for the simplest of solutions. But a good statistician could take all of than into account and possibly make some moves to even out attendance and make the same or more money with fewer guests. Yes, Disney would be priced out of the common man's pocketbook for many repeat customers, but personally, I have been to Disney twice. I will probably not go again. I felt my dollars were not well spent because of the (what I considered) totally uncomfortable number of people in the Magic Kingdom on the days I attended. Those days were not even listed as a 6 on crowd calendars. For a once in a lifetime trip, yes if at all possible I would pay more to get a much more comfortable crowd level especially in Magic Kingdom and I believe there are enough people like me to make it possible Disney is looking to see if those customers would be more profitable over the long term than return guests that have learned to work the Disney systems.
edited for some grammar mistakes.

 

[PirateD]

I don't think this is about leveling crowds out. I think the goal is to have medium-high crowds every day of the year.

I think this is just a money grab, plain and simple. They want to do a massive price increase on the tickets and the time is now and they are going for it.

We are all going to be paying a lot more for tickets. I expect price hikes on APs as well as another "tier" for out-of-state APs as well.

The reason they are coming up with these tier shenanigans is to muddy the waters, so the news story isn't "Disney raises ticket prices 25%"

I agree. An extra $40 per person is not going to move that many people from peak season. We are already paying thousands of dollars extra for airline tickets and hotel rooms to come for the holidays over what we would pay at other times of the year. It's painful and we hate doing it and wish we could go at a less crowded and cheaper time of year, but we can't. We have two teachers and three kids in school so it's simply not an option. I know Disney is a business and yada yada yada, but it still feels like they are just trying to take advantage of those who can only go at peak times and wring us out of even more of our money (which in my case, as a teacher, is not that much!).

I think that Disney can eventually start pricing people out of peak season, but I'm really not sure how many people they can actually move. We are already on the verge of being priced out ourselves, but it won't move us to a different time of year. We will just have to stop going. I know Disney won't care and maybe that's what they actually want, but we care!

 

[suzimar57]

Well I'm thinking if the Magic Kingdom was $125 for the day, and being the park with the largest amount of rides/attractions, I'd plan to stay the ENTIRE time it was open for a hypothetical day (say, 9am until midnight, bringing the price to just over $8/hour), technically it would be worth it - unlike EP or the Studios (with far less rides/attractions in each park) or worse yet, AK (with less hours/day open and for us, maybe 3 rides we'd go on..)

Yeah, rambling here - what I'm getting at is yes, Disney is a company out to make money and that's exactly what they're going to do - $125/day at the MK is expensive, but with so much more to do there, I'd say it's worth it over any of the other 3 parks (based on hours open & rides/shows available)

 

[Maleficent Dragon]

If this comes to fruition, and it will just like "pre-booking your attractions", the good thing is that none of us are required to pay their prices if we do not like the new process. As a DVC member who receives a "DVC Member AP Rate", I am interested to see how this plays out for us (owners). I will not pay Disney $1300 (as suggested in the initial post) for a 10-day ticket under any circumstances. I will gladly sell my DVC ownership to somebody who feels waiting in long lines is worth that (proposed) amount. I can cruise on a good cruise line for that cost per person and that includes food and entertainment.

 

[mom2rtk]

Well I'm thinking if the Magic Kingdom was $125 for the day, and being the park with the largest amount of rides/attractions, I'd plan to stay the ENTIRE time it was open for a hypothetical day (say, 9am until midnight, bringing the price to just over $8/hour), technically it would be worth it - unlike EP or the Studios (with far less rides/attractions in each park) or worse yet, AK (with less hours/day open and for us, maybe 3 rides we'd go on..)

Yeah, rambling here - what I'm getting at is yes, Disney is a company out to make money and that's exactly what they're going to do - $125/day at the MK is expensive, but with so much more to do there, I'd say it's worth it over any of the other 3 parks (based on hours open & rides/shows available)

Basically they will winnow me down to what we're doing now...... spending a week at the beach topped off with one day in the MK. I can get $105 in value out of one park day there. I can get $125, maybe a bit more. But the other parks are dead to me. I would never pay the price of a second day to do one of those parks. And I probably wouldn't pay it for a second MK day either. I will assume if they go this way it will affect DLR as well, so if it does we might finally find out WWoHP is all about.

 

[kbelle8995]

I actually would pay money to go to Epcot. MK sometimes yes sometimes no. HS has to get Star Wars Land to get me over there. And no matter how much I love the Tigers (and I love the tigers) AK not so much.

I think the tiered ticketing systems sounds like it could be confusing depending on the carry through.

 

[amg35]

I've read this whole thread and I'm confused (not hard to do).

Do you have to pick a park each day and buy the ticket for that park for that day? Or do you just buy the silver package (If that's what your week is) and you can still go to any park on any day - and buy hoppers additionally?

 

[Maleficent Dragon]

I've read this whole thread and I'm confused (not hard to do).

Do you have to pick a park each day and buy the ticket for that park for that day? Or do you just buy the silver package (If that's what your week is) and you can still go to any park on any day - and buy hoppers additionally?

It sounds like you may be required to plan every detail of your holiday in advance, including which park you plan to visit on which day. At some point you will probably be required to book all counter meals. It sounds like the direction Disney might be moving is locking you in to every aspect of your vacation with reservations. Doesnt sound like vacation, does it?

 

[cakebaker]

I've read this whole thread and I'm confused (not hard to do).

Do you have to pick a park each day and buy the ticket for that park for that day? Or do you just buy the silver package (If that's what your week is) and you can still go to any park on any day - and buy hoppers additionally?

Since the only thing we really know is some questions were asked on a survey and they provided a mock up chart, it's impossible to know what the final pricing structure would look like, IF they even change it at all. All the guessing on how it works is just that- pure guessing.

 

[amg35]

Since the only thing we really know is some questions were asked on a survey and they provided a mock up chart, it's impossible to know what the final pricing structure would look like, IF they even change it at all. All the guessing on how it works is just that- pure guessing.

I know it's conjecture. I'm just trying to figure out if it's intended to have people buy a specific park ticket for a specific day (and not be able to change your mind).

 

[amg35]

It sounds like you may be required to plan every detail of your holiday in advance, including which park you plan to visit on which day. At some point you will probably be required to book all counter meals. It sounds like the direction Disney might be moving is locking you in to every aspect of your vacation with reservations. Doesnt sound like vacation, does it?

I'll admit, I don't like the idea of having a ticket for a certain park each day. I know I pick fast passes in advance, but I can always decided I want to visit another park that day instead and chance it with lines (which we did last trip and it worked out fine)...now I'll be stuck with the park I chose months ago no matter what? That I wouldn't like - I'd be okay with a price increase over being forced to choose a park.

Somehow I just don't see it happening that way, unless they get rid of park hoppers??

 

[North of Mouse]

Maybe - just maybe - Disney wants to get everyone all stirred up about this 'rumor' (whatever) and then when they pass another 'across the board' increase, people will settle down and go 'phew' - we did it!! They listened to feedback - no tiered tickets!!!!

 

[WillAustin]

It sounds like the direction Disney might be moving is locking you in to every aspect of your vacation with reservations. Doesn't sound like vacation, does it?

It sounds like a cruise with everything on a schedule. The only silver lining I could see is in the possibility of lower crowds on more expensive days. But then they'd just dynamically lower the price to attract more guests.

 

[ArwenMarie]

I know it's conjecture. I'm just trying to figure out if it's intended to have people buy a specific park ticket for a specific day (and not be able to change your mind).

I can't see this happening, not being able to change. Maybe you could change them, but if there is a price difference you would have to pay the difference when you change the days (just like now with hotels and packages). If they are linked in MDE, this would be easy enough to do.

Another possibility is that the only ticket that will be available with the silver and bronze would be through onsite packages...every other ticket would be gold, therefore the issues of days becomes moot.

 

[cakebaker]

I know it's conjecture. I'm just trying to figure out if it's intended to have people buy a specific park ticket for a specific day (and not be able to change your mind).

And what I'm saying is there's no way to know- although I'd be extremely surprised if they ever went that route. It would certainly put an end to park hopping and I don't see that either.

 

[Maleficent Dragon]

It sounds like a cruise with everything on a schedule. The only silver lining I could see is in the possibility of lower crowds on more expensive days. But then they'd just dynamically lower the price to attract more guests.

I understand what you mean, but cruising and WDW are very different vacations. WDW should not be THAT structured.

 

[Maleficent Dragon]

And what I'm saying is there's no way to know- although I'd be extremely surprised if they ever went that route. It would certainly put an end to park hopping and I don't see that either.

That is what people said about "pre-booking your attractions" and now we know this as Fastpass Plus. If Disney is asking about it, you better bet there is a plan.

 

[cakebaker]

That is what people said about "pre-booking your attractions" and now we know this as Fastpass Plus. If Disney is asking about it, you better bet there is a plan.

Yes and some also predicted the demise of standby lines altogether along with a lot of other things that never came to pass. I see no point in worrying over something that may well never happen. Seasonal pricing? Perhaps. Locking you in to a specific park each day? I'll be the first one to eat my words if I'm wrong ... It will never happen.