Wow, leave it to Rich to get a good thread going. But this is an important thread of discussion. The idea of 'value', OKW larger but farther out being equal to BWV smaller, but in the middle of the action is very valid. 'Value' is whatever we as individuals are willing to pay for something. Cost was also mentioned but I don't think was analyzed in full. It 'cost' Disney xxx dollars to build VWL resort. They only have so many rooms, and the seasons have to be the same across all resorts so you can calculate the total number of points the resort would have based on the rooms (studio, 1-br, 2-br) and the seasons, based on any initial point values you assign. You can then do a simple geometric regression to determine cost vs value. Let's say Disney perceived the 'value' as being equal to OKW and wanted to set the point scale the same as OKW. Doing the math then might show they would need to charge $80/point to recoup their costs. Since HH and VB are not sold out, it would be hard to justify $80/ point for new sales there. Obviously, if they left HH/VB at the old $67/point, and moved only VWL to $80/point, nobody would buy VWL but would buy HH/VB and expect to use the points elsewhere. (We've been down that road many times)
So Disney needs to keep the cost of points the same at all locations, HH/VB/VWL. This means, to get the total $$$'s they need to meet their costs, they have to require more total points so they can sell them at a lower price. So the progression might be to go 1 additional point/night higher than OKW, but that might only bring the selling point down to $79 each, still too high for HH and VB if they ever want to sell anymore of those. So you do the next step, and the next etc until you get the balance you need. When they got to the same point scale as BWV's they would probably have to stop because if it were higher, the 'value' to members of more points per night there than at OKW or BWV's might not be high enough to promote sales. So with a point scale stuck at no higher than the BWV's rate, they calculate their costs and determine the sales price has to go to $72, the largest one time jump ever. This may be the best 'value vs cost' combination that was available. Being newer than BWV's and probably more expensive to build, the VWL's costs were much higher and they had to do a balancing act.
Now the real question, which I believe is reflected in Rich's original post, is what will happen when BCV's are completed. My guess is that they can't justify charging more points per night than at BWV's as people will not perceive any greater 'value' there than at BWV. So they will have to raise the original purchase prices from the current $72/point. Of course, if HH and VB are not sold out by then, another price increase would hurt those sales even more.
It's probably a tough balancing act. But to have VWL's point structure lower than BWV's, which many of us would have probably considered a more equitable 'value', might have required a much higher point sale price than the raise they did have, and that would hurt sales at VWL, HH and VB combined.
Let's just hope they're watching their 'costs' on BCV's and this doesn't get out of hand where their 'costs' start to far exceed the 'value' the members 'personally' receive.
Caskbill
