The Disneyland Challenge

[guynhawaii]

Aloha,

It's no wonder why Disneyland seems to be consistently crowded. Relatively speaking, it provides premium high quality entertainment...and its size has not kept up with either the demand or its target audience. To make matters worse for the consumer, the Disney Corporation has no incentive to reduce Disneyland's popularity. High demand and low inventory (competition) results in higher prices and higher profit.

When Disneyland was initially designed and built 60 years ago, it's principal target audience was the greater LA area of about 5M people. However, over the past 60 years its target audience has expanded from regionally, to nationally to globally with the advent of airline and automotive transportation, TV, Internet, advertising and modern social media. Meanwhile, the USA population has doubled from about 150M to 300M and the LA area population has increased approximately 400% from about 5M to 20M.

So what is there for Disney to do? They built and updated DCA and are currently expanding the footprint of DL with the construction of SWL and future expansion of Fantasyland.

Unfortunately, DL's expansion with SWL and FL will only accelerate its demand factor.

So how about another gate in SOCAL? Questions are where and how expensive. And does Disney have the financial capacity to design and build another SOCAL gate?

Or, how about even greater expansion of DL?

Thus we have the Disneyland Challenge. What to do about the high demand of their product? Build/ expand even more? If so, where and how about the costs?

Unless our economy suffers from a great shock, I don't see any return to a relaxing day at DL with minimal crowds. IMHO, its a waste of time to complain/vent about the crowds because there is not much Disney can do it about it. They are apparently squeezing pennies to finance SDL and the new projects for both DL and WDW.

They could possibly expand hours and go full throttle with the rides but I would assume the breakdown/ maintenance upkeep for the rides would only increase proportionally with the increase in use.

So unless DLR expands or Disney opens an additional gate in SOCAL, I would only expect the crowds to either remain the same or even progress worse.

What is Disney to do?

 

[AussieCaribou]

I agree that they are between a rock and a hard place. Even limiting entry is contentious (what do you mean that I can't get into the park...I have a ticket!)

They could try the ticketing style such as DLS where you have to purchase a ticket for the exact day you are planning to attend. Thus they could control the number of people in the gates. Getting my rid of annual passes (or at least the payment plan) would decrease the crowds as well.

Of course, either of those choices could limit the profit to the parks.

As I said, rock and hard spot.

I do miss my winter, mid week days of walking straight on attractions. But given how long I have to wait to go nowadays and the travel time, waiting 45 minutes to ride isn't too bad.

 

[HydroGuy]

The third park has been discussed for a number of years and they have land for it across Harbor Blvd somewhere.

The parks are popular and really the only recourse I see for Disney is to continue to raise prices. Every time they raise prices people complain and then continue to pay. Eventually they can control attendance at a high enough price point but so far raising prices does not seem to have slowed attendance growth.

They can expand the parks - like with SWL - but that will draw even more attendance. They also are talking about expanding DCA again behind Tower of Terror. Same deal. Expansion will give the park more space but draw more people.

It is a good problem for Disney to have. Frankly it is a good problem for Disney fans to have as Disney will continue to re-invest in the parks and create more cool rides and cool shows.

 

[GatorChris]

I'm a believer in a 3rd gate. As a DisneyWorld veteran, I can tell you there is something special when you have more than just two gates. Of course, DL can never be as big as WDW. But a third gate would be fantasic! I'm actually shocked that Disney chose to shove SWL into a small corner of a small park rather than give it the land it deserves in a 3rd park. With the acquisitions of Marvel and SW, they could've thrown in some Tron and created a Tomorrowland Park! They could've riffed from the movie of the same name and had a section dedicated to Innovations like they have at Epcot. It could be something really special. But instead, they're choosing to shove another 10K people into parks that are already overcrowded. Just not very smart.

 

[tdhickey]

I believe their answer is to build Star Wars land and raise prices (as previously mentioned), this is the trend and based on my last trip I think it's reflecting in the crowd levels. It seemed a bit eased off compared to my last two trips, still busy, but manageable.

 

[HydroGuy]

I'm a believer in a 3rd gate. As a DisneyWorld veteran, I can tell you there is something special when you have more than just two gates. Of course, DL can never be as big as WDW. But a third gate would be fantasic! I'm actually shocked that Disney chose to shove SWL into a small corner of a small park rather than give it the land it deserves in a 3rd park. With the acquisitions of Marvel and SW, they could've thrown in some Tron and created a Tomorrowland Park! They could've riffed from the movie of the same name and had a section dedicated to Innovations like they have at Epcot. It could be something really special. But instead, they're choosing to shove another 10K people into parks that are already overcrowded. Just not very smart.

DL has not had a major new E-ticket ride since 1995 when Indiana Jones opened. Since then they have revamped Space Mtn and Star Tours. They have added BLAB which is more of a D Ticket ride. Ad they have built DCA (2001) then refurbed DCA (2012). But nothing majorly new at DL. So they needed something new for DL and not just a third park. I think Star Wars Land was the right move for DL.

The rumor suggests a third park for DLR is far away. They have invested so much money in DCA and now at DL for SWL, they will need to take time for those investments to pay off before they spend $5 billion on a new park at DLR. And they may never actually do that. WDW is the only Disney resort with more than two theme parks. Paris, Tokyo and DLR have two. Hong Kong has one and Shanghai will start off with one.

 

[tarheelalum]

I don't see them doing anything that may cut into profits. A 3rd gate would take a lot more money and Disney in China is not doing so well. Nor is ESPN. Disney has already put a lot of money down on the star wars expansion so I just don't see another big investment coming so soon. Also the stock market has been going up for years and it is well over due for another crash so that has to play into there near term decision making. They will probably just keep raising ticket prices to get more profit out of the customers but I do not see them doing anything to reduce crowding. Crowded parks are profitable parks in Disney's corporate view. Just more of the same. Crowded parks and angry park goers but as long as they keep coming back, nothing will change.

 

[StayClassy]

I would actually love to see Disney do a third US accessible park (even though it'll probably never happen) somewhere in the middle like Texas... Or even more north like in Canada... Again I don't see it happening but I'd like it.