Poor planning for Leap Day? Can anybody say Leap Ears?

[mrzrich]

I touched on this in a thread on the TPAS board, but you guys are much more aware of the historic problems with the special promotions and website issues. Plus more AP holders hang out over here.

I didn't get the E-mail about the Leap Ears. From what I understand many of us did not. This is no surprise, to me, my sister who hasn't had an AP in 2 years still gets a Mickey Monitor and I haven't gotten one in ages.

There was NOTHING about this promotion on the passholder site. I know, I'm there everyday planning fake trips in my head.

So from what I understand, AP holders who got the link in their e-mail were instructed to all enter this link at the same time and crash the website.

I got the link from seeing it here on the DIS, but by the time I got home from work all the Ears were gone. Oh yeah, that was my other beef...Apparently Disney doesn't realize that AP holders have to work to pay for their AP's because the promotion started at 3 PM on a weekday. Apparently all the ears were gone by 3:30.



Anyway, some DISers over on TPAS were asking about the Logistics of Leap Day. See Disney doesn't realize that us Die Hards who are actually going to show up are crazy planners.

We want to know crazy details like:

"Is the monorail gonna run all night?"


or

"Are all the rides gonna run all night? If not, which rides are going to be running all night? What time are the rides that are closing going to close?"

or

"Will there be any special promotions, merchandise, pins, shows, buttons? Etc."


or

"Since dinner's at 6 PM, I'm gonna be hungry by 1 AM. What's going to be available to eat?"

Disney doesn't have these answers yet. A CM on TPAS confirms that the promotions department dreamed this up and has not filtered any further info to the CM's. All they've been told are the park hours are from 6A to 6A.

It has the potential to be awesome, but it also has the potential to be another miss by the promotions department. Big Build up, little pay off.

What are your thoughts?

 

[3BoysRDisneyFreaks]

I am one of the ones going and have started one of the Leap Year threads. I am the only uber planner in the group and I think I am the only one that is going to make it all night.
We are going to be celebrating my mom's 60th birthday, she is a Leap Day baby. That is our main reason. The bonus is that MK is open extra. Personally I don't have any high expectations. I am planning on hitting as much as we can during daylight. I already know that out of the 5 of us in the group, I am going to be the only nut job there at park open at 6am riding rides. I don't plan on wasting any time.
This is a first trip for 2 of the people in our group. I have a feeling 1 will never return due to money, so we are doing it up. Staying at GF and eating CRT for dinner. We just want to have fun.
I hope they have just the basics worked out. Transportation for my group after 'normal' hours is my concern. They don't know the lay of the land like I do. I want to be able to tell them 'go left to the buses' or 'go right to the monorail' when they leave the park...while I am still up playing.
I am not worried about food, but I can see where others would be. For me that is the beauty of gastric bypass...no stomach to be hungry.

I hope people just have fun and go with the flow...it is WDW!

Sarah

 

[mrzrich]

I will be managing my expectations as well. I'm just happy to have the opportunity to be there.

 

[WaltD4Me]

I don't know the answers to any of the questions, but it continues to baffle me that Disney puts out these half baked promotions/celebrations. How can they not, after all this time, anticipate some of the things people want to know? It always reminds me of the President who didn't know the price of milk. Does anyone in Disney promotions actually go to the parks?

 

[Cheshire Figment]

Before Judy and I retired, we were both fairly high level Federal employees. We had a saying: "Until we started dealing extensively with The Walt Disney Company we thought we worked for the largest bureaucracy in the world."

Unfortunately this was something developed by Disney Marketing. They have a history, especially where tickets are involved, to act and announce without having thought out all the ramifications.

On The Hub, the only changes made in the last week or so related to February 29 and March 1 are that the Morning EMH for March 1 has been cancelled, and the park hours now do show 6:00am to 6:00am on the 29th. The parade and show times on the details page are unchanged.

I am fairly certain that there will be a hard close and clearing of Guests from the MK at 6:00am. As far as ticketing is concerned, anyone who enters the MK between midnight and 6:00am on March 1 will be considered to have entered on February 29 (just as a Guest during a carryover Evening EMH that lasts past Midnight).

As far as details concerning transportation, food service, merchandise sales and attractions I really don't thing anyone, including people in Park Operations, really know what is going to happen. I would not expect any reasonably accurate information about anything until at least the 12th of February.

Remember, you got this warning here first!

 

[DreaGirl]

I'm one of those people that started one of those threads as well. My friend and I are both uber-planners and have every other day planned except the day that pushed us to book the trip. We know that we will be in the Magic Kingdom for 24 hours and that's about it!

We were thinking of going over the Poly for a meal, but didn't make an ADR because we don't know if the monorail will be running.

Also, we were thinking of checking out a locker (for our coats/food/water bottle), but wondered if it would be cleared at midnight?

We are also trying to do all the open rides/attractions on the park. This is hard to plan when you don't know what attractions are going to be open in the early morning hours.

We are just going with the flow at this point, but we won't be so "flow going" in a few weeks!

 

[txvjc]

I'm still upset about the Leap Ears...no email when I know they have my address since I have to use it to log into the passholder website (which is horrible anyway, and don't get me started on the Mickey Monitor)...and the number of people that didn't get it seems to be so high...usually when something like these are announced I see people posting about it on Twitter and FB but I didn't know anything about it until HOURS after they "sold out"...and I have a strong feeling that of the 1000 available about 30% of those people won't show up to claim them and about 50% of the rest will end up on ebay

I was also making plans to rent a locker for the day like the pp was thinking...figured I would drop some supplies in there at 6 am at park open and go back as needed...I would assume that the rental would be good for the whole 24 hour period as it is one operating day, no different than EMH

 

[DreaGirl]

I was also making plans to rent a locker for the day like the pp was thinking...figured I would drop some supplies in there at 6 am at park open and go back as needed...I would assume that the rental would be good for the whole 24 hour period as it is one operating day, no different than EMH

Thanks! I've never rented a locker, so I wasn't sure of the protocol.

 

[princessbride6205]

I'm also bummed about the ears. Multi-year AP holder, signed up for every Disney email, obviously we'll be there on Leap Day... What happened to my email?

 

[gr8leg8]

Before Judy and I retired...

wait wait wait....

Retired?!?!

in my head you are a 18 to 20 something surfer guy who works at the water parks...

by the way the same goes for Robo,
except he's a touch older with a geek chic jibe.

 

[Cheshire Figment]

I'm one of the oldest regulars on DisBoards. However, I don't look my age because I don't act my age.

And sometimes at my window I see people who look much older than me come to buy an AP, and when I look at their birthdate to enter it into the computer I find they are at least five years younger than me.

 

[Birdie1981]

Before Judy and I retired, we were both fairly high level Federal employees. We had a saying: "Until we started dealing extensively with The Walt Disney Company we thought we worked for the largest bureaucracy in the world."

Unfortunately this was something developed by Disney Marketing. They have a history, especially where tickets are involved, to act and announce without having thought out all the ramifications.

On The Hub, the only changes made in the last week or so related to February 29 and March 1 are that the Morning EMH for March 1 has been cancelled, and the park hours now do show 6:00am to 6:00am on the 29th. The parade and show times on the details page are unchanged.

I am fairly certain that there will be a hard close and clearing of Guests from the MK at 6:00am. As far as ticketing is concerned, anyone who enters the MK between midnight and 6:00am on March 1 will be considered to have entered on February 29 (just as a Guest during a carryover Evening EMH that lasts past Midnight).

As far as details concerning transportation, food service, merchandise sales and attractions I really don't thing anyone, including people in Park Operations, really know what is going to happen. I would not expect any reasonably accurate information about anything until at least the 12th of February.

Remember, you got this warning here first!

Thanks for the warning! As one of many true Disney planners. I had a feeling announce an event and put plans out later if any. I'm still going anyway, shall be interesting

 

[OKW Lover]

I'm one of the oldest regulars on DisBoards. However, I don't look my age because I don't act my age.

Val & I are often mistaken for people much younger than our actual years as well.

Kind of makes me wonder what the demographic is here on the DIS in general and this particular sub-board.

 

[gr8leg8]

I'm one of the oldest regulars on DisBoards. However, I don't look my age because I don't act my age.

And sometimes at my window I see people who look much older than me come to buy an AP, and when I look at their birthdate to enter it into the computer I find they are at least five years younger than me.

Guess I'll have to adjust my head to you being more like Crush
eternally wise and young at heart...dude