News Round Up 2016

[eXo]

As skier_pete notes, EMH works multiple ways. If a park has early hours, I don't go that day, because frankly, crowd calendars have proven that the morning influx will last most of the day.

And as far as staying on site goes, LSLS, I fundamentally disagree that they think they can just remove these perks and charge for them. Your assumption is based on a survey that you simply read about. You have no context for that survey or any idea if it will even bear fruit. Surveys don't equate to change. They exist solely so marketing and budgets departments can figure out what people think of various ideas. But if it shows up on this board, ya better watch out, all the chicken littles will start decrying the falling sky while cursing Disney for doing it. Even worse, something like this comes along and we can't even objectively discuss it without a boatload of assumptions from the last surveys getting trucked in and dumped on everyone.

As I have said before, Disney's hotel business is their bread and butter at WDW. They aren't going to do something that jacks it up for them. They will raise the cost of the room by a flat $15 WAY before they ever choose to actually give people the option of "adding on" the $15 upcharge. How do you know the $15 upcharge survey wasn't for offsite people? Stay offsite, but enjoy onsite perks for $15 a day. You know what that does? It makes families says, "Well, for $15 more we get all this.... or we could just stay onsite and get it all without the upcharge... lets stay onsite.

Consumer psych 101.

 

[LSLS]

As skier_pete notes, EMH works multiple ways. If a park has early hours, I don't go that day, because frankly, crowd calendars have proven that the morning influx will last most of the day.

And as far as staying on site goes, LSLS, I fundamentally disagree that they think they can just remove these perks and charge for them. Your assumption is based on a survey that you simply read about. You have no context for that survey or any idea if it will even bear fruit. Surveys don't equate to change. They exist solely so marketing and budgets departments can figure out what people think of various ideas. But if it shows up on this board, ya better watch out, all the chicken littles will start decrying the falling sky while cursing Disney for doing it. Even worse, something like this comes along and we can't even objectively discuss it without a boatload of assumptions from the last surveys getting trucked in and dumped on everyone.

As I have said before, Disney's hotel business is their bread and butter at WDW. They aren't going to do something that jacks it up for them. They will raise the cost of the room by a flat $15 WAY before they ever choose to actually give people the option of "adding on" the $15 upcharge. How do you know the $15 upcharge survey wasn't for offsite people? Stay offsite, but enjoy onsite perks for $15 a day. You know what that does? It makes families says, "Well, for $15 more we get all this.... or we could just stay onsite and get it all without the upcharge... lets stay onsite.

Consumer psych 101.

Wait, the survey? I never talked about that survey. All I have said is that if they feel they could get rid of the EMH without substantially impacting the people staying on site all while charging a ton more for the extra hours (and by substantially I mean it would be a net increase in revenue), I think they would. I don't know their numbers or if it would. I know your stance, I know others. I don't really have one yet because I just don't know enough about the revenue/behind the scenes dealings (despite where you are trying to label me). But honestly I've wasted way too much time making other people's arguments. Honestly, I could care less. I could care less about EMH, and I could care less if they want to charge people to stay after closing (so long as it is truly after closing). I'm in the same boat as skier, the only reason I even care about them is to know which park not to go to. Get rid of them, that still doesn't impact on vs off site for me.

 

[eXo]

You said

A.) It has been rumored to be going away

That rumor was from a survey.

And then said

B.) Why would Disney give it away for free if people shell out $150 a night for it?

And I was simply making the case that EMH and this summer party hour thing, whatever they call it, are not the same and that EMH wasn't technically free.

The rest of our discussion sourced from the fact that we seem to have different takes on how Disney prices things to entice people. If you don't have a horse in the race, that's fine, neither do I. I'm simply discussing business here as it applies to their current model.

 

[Spacedog1975]

We stayed at the Hilton Lake Buena Vista over Thanksgiving and chose it for the EMH and proximity to Disney Springs. Never ended up using the EMH hours though...

I thought only Swan & Dolphin offered EMH beyond the Disney owned hotels. Can't find the designation on the Hilton site.
Does anyone have a complete list of hotels/resorts offering EMH, etc?

 

[Maineiak]

I thought only Swan & Dolphin offered EMH beyond the Disney owned hotels. Can't find the designation on the Hilton site.
Does anyone have a complete list of hotels/resorts offering EMH, etc?

Hilton DID offer it, through 2015. We noticed that there was no indication that it was continuing into 2016, which we though was interesting. I haven't looked since though. It is still listed here though: http://www.mousesavers.com/downtown-disney-hotels/

 

[Eoghann]

I can see that. I was on the "losing" side of the "argument" btw

We however will be doing morning EMH because we are all early risers anyway (due to wake-up-at-the-crack-of-dawn young kids). We are still deciding on how to handle nighttime EMH...completely avoid? Or go anyway? (we may end up needing to take significant mid day breaks for kid naps...so extended hours though crowded may be helpful). We'll see

I would say the only other perk discussed really was onsite transportation which honestly I don't see as a huge perk. Offsite hotels have shuttles. And we are generally the type to rent a car anyway so it wouldn't be entirely out of character. But for this trip, we're not and relying on onsite transportation convenience.

What "perk" makes you choose to stay onsite?

I have found that using the crowd trackers to pick the "quiet" park and doing rope-drop results in getting more done than the extra magic hours in most cases. Honestly if I didn't have DVC access I don't think there's anything they could offer me onsite that would make me pay full price for a Disney hotel. The biggest benefit is probably just the easy park access

 

[sachilles]

I love the evening hours, but not the morning hours. My son is 7. We usually get park hoppers, nap after lunch and then hit the emh park until close. For his age segment, most of the kids his age have crashed, and have moved on to their hotel. That leaves all the kiddy rides for us. He has no problem staying up late. We stay cool, and take advantage of all the short lines in the under 48" ride segments. I think our record is 17 consecutive turns on the barnstormer, with zero line.

 

[soniam]

I had a different experience - I noticed less confusion overall. There is always confusion at the first point with people who don't understand the system, but there is no longer the issues of people not realizing they need to tap a second time, and struggling to find their tickets (that they just had out 30 seconds ago).

I was talking about confusion at the first point. It seemed to be worse than our last trip. There were a lot of large groups that were causing confusion too. What annoyed me, was when there was a problem, instead of having people come to the side to fix the issue, they blocked both touchpoints, so that no one could get by I rarely, if ever, heard a CM ask someone to move to the side to fix the issue.

 

[rteetz]

Rivers of light float testing

https://twitter.com/reivenxo/status/712393908135829504

 

[luisov]

Here's an update on Zootopia's box office performance so far. So apparently this is the most successful animated film ever in China, earning a very impressive $173,023,395 only in that country. The film is reaching $201,000,000 in the US, staying as the top film for third week in a row. Foreign total is reaching $395,600,000. The worldwide total gross so far is $600,254,233.

The film has surpassed previous hits by Walt Disney Animation like Wreck it Ralph or Tangled, and is expected to surpass 2014's Big Hero 6 in the next couple of weeks.

 

[bbmassey]

Here's an update on Zootopia's box office performance so far. So apparently this is the most successful animated film ever in China, earning a very impressive $173,023,395 only in that country. The film is reaching $201,000,000 in the US, staying as the top film for third week in a row. Foreign total is reaching $395,600,000. The worldwide total gross so far is $600,254,233.

The film has surpassed previous hits by Walt Disney Animation like Wreck it Ralph or Tangled, and is expected to surpass 2014's Big Hero 6 in the next couple of weeks.

So your telling us that the Frozen overlay is being put on hold for ZooNorway?

 

[rteetz]

Photo update

Rivers of light update


http://www.orlandoparksnews.com/2016/03/rivers-of-light-update-testing-lotus.html?m=1

 

[jade1]

I have found that using the crowd trackers to pick the "quiet" park and doing rope-drop results in getting more done than the extra magic hours in most cases. Honestly if I didn't have DVC access I don't think there's anything they could offer me onsite that would make me pay full price for a Disney hotel. The biggest benefit is probably just the easy park access

Agreed. Avoiding EMH is a very popular touring method.

 

[Sweettears]

Your deluded if you think they are "giving away" EMH. People pay for it as part of their, generally, over priced rooms. All those "perks" are factored into your hotel bill. Not to mention those "free" perks encourage people to stay onsite rather than offsite. So these perks they are "giving away" according to you, do exactly what i said in my reply - put butts in rooms. Butts in rooms = money. Money is the endgame on EVERY decision, but that doesn't mean that blatantly charging for something niche automatically equals more money in the long run.

Your typical family is going to see stay onsite, and it's perks, as a justifiable expense as they derive slight benefits from it throughout their stay. Start removing things like EMH and upcharging it to the tune of $150 a night per person, and you are talking about enough money to add multiple days to the end of a vacation versus 1 evening of lower lines and ice cream.

Will some people take advantage of the $150 premium? Sure. Will it be anywhere near the number of people who choose to stay onsite due to perks like EMH? Impossible.

This is a way to make extra money in between EMH nights. For that matter, it doesn't compete with EMH at all. It goes later, it has a limit on ticket sales (versus, hey, all the thousands of resort guests are welcome), and they add in the snacks to make it feel a bit more "special"

Bar none though, EMH is *NOT* free right now. And calling it free is a huge blind spot to the way their pricing works. That's like calling the magicbands "free".

If EMH goes anywhere, I can see it being removed as a perk on the value resorts as a way to push people to moderates and deluxes. Similar to Universal's extra benefits on their higher end hotels.

Don't forget to add in the proposed resort fee.

 

[luisov]

So your telling us that the Frozen overlay is being put on hold for ZooNorway?

They can always re-purpose Br'er Fox and Br'er Rabbit

 

[TXStormtrooper]

I spent some time looking at currently scheduled EMH versus the dates this is offered on and only found 2 Wednesdays where MK's EMH evening hours overlapped with this. I don't know if they will remove EMH from those days, or allow resort participants to stay later as well (just without the free ice cream and other ticketed goodies). I can see the $150 folks being upset though if people from all over the resorts are gunking up their premium time.

Either way, calling this the death of EMH is hyperbole. There are still early emh hours for Mk during this time period, and all the other parks still have emh nighttime hours as well.

I'm not sure where you are seeing those Wednesdays. The dates listed on the Disney World website are all Thursdays with the exception of one Sunday.

 

[rteetz]

Rumor

Soarin reopens at Epcot with the old film in its new digital form before the new film comes online. It seems the new film will come online June 17th but the ride will open before that with the old film first.

 

[Budshark]

Rumor

Soarin reopens at Epcot with the old film in its new digital form before the new film comes online. It seems the new film will come online June 17th but the ride will open before that with the old film first.

Need a star tours type rotation. You never know what you'll get!

 

[djm08150]

News

D-Luxe Burger opening in May at Disney Springs

https://disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog/2016/03/d-luxe-burger-opening-this-may-at-disney-springs/

I'm excited about this one. I love me a good burger.

When I saw this on our permit map I was so excited. I love burgers!!!

 

[EricInPA]

They can always re-purpose Br'er Fox and Br'er Rabbit

Zoorocco!