WDW Annual Pass Timing Speculation

[tidefan]

I put it slightly differently: They don't feel the need to offer bulk discounts on admission, because (a) they have sufficient demand by people willing to pay day-ticket prices to accomplish their attendance and financial goals, and (b) they are (presumably) concerned that offering a bulk discount would lower profitability.

They can sell new out-of-state APs. They are choosing not to. That's disappointing to those who might visit often enough such that a bulk discount would pay off. But for now, Disney is content to let those people choose to come less often, pay the higher day ticket rates, or both.

Now this, I can agree with in that I fully expect that is their current thinking.

However, I am of the personal belief that this is some very "short-term" thinking and ignores the long game that Disney has (mostly) always excelled at in the past. It took 40-60 years to build their theme park empire by carefully cultivating an "experience" that people felt when dealing with the product. Like it or not, that came with certain expectations. And really, the AP availability isn't even one of the top factors in much of this. The product is just not the same as it was 10 years ago. Personally, I chalk that up to a bunch of people that put a lot more emphasis in the "where will our corporation be a year from now" than "where will our corporation be 10 years from now" and putting much more faith into mathematical models than maybe some of the psychology of strategic management...

 

[gmi3804]

I put it slightly differently: They don't feel the need to offer bulk discounts on admission, because (a) they have sufficient demand by people willing to pay day-ticket prices to accomplish their attendance and financial goals, and (b) they are (presumably) concerned that offering a bulk discount would lower profitability.

They can sell new out-of-state APs. They are choosing not to. That's disappointing to those who might visit often enough such that a bulk discount would pay off. But for now, Disney is content to let those people choose to come less often, pay the higher day ticket rates, or both.

I suppose they’re not as concerned about the growing number of guests like me, who’ve been using their DVC memberships for the onsite accommodations, doing more resort-heavy stays, spending relatively little time (and, by extension, money) in the parks, and venturing off-site more often than they ever used to and discovering in the process that they’re still having a great time.

 

[Brian Noble]

I am of the personal belief that this is some very "short-term" thinking and ignores the long game that Disney has (mostly) always excelled at in the past.

We've both been around these boards a long time. Every single time some price goes up, some offering is cut, or some experience is "degraded," the sturm und drang is predictable: "This time they've gone too far! It will be the straw that breaks the camel's back!"

It hasn't happened yet. Not once. And, when Disney is over-extended, they throw out a few discounts (FREE DINING!) and it's like throwing chum to sharks.

Could this finally be it? Maybe. But Disney is fanatical about measuring guest sentiment, precisely because they are worried about goodwill as a tangible asset. It's entirely possible that they know more about us (at least, in the aggregate) than we think.

I suppose they’re not as concerned about the growing number of guests like me

It would appear they are not.

I've been thinking about this myself. Have I reached "escape velocity" from Disney's gravitational well? Maybe.

I spent two weeks at Saratoga Springs last year for E's spring break, and we invited M's brother and his family to join us for the first week--I had RCI deposits to soak up, and DVC was leaving RCI, so I figured why not? This year, we are going back to Orlando, but staying at one of the Marriott Vacation Club resorts and hitting up Universal instead.

M and I were talking just yesterday about whether we'd be going back to WDW and DVC anytime soon, and we're not sure. February '24 is already booked at our favorite diamond-in-the-rough in Palm Beach Shores. March '24 is going to be with both R and E in New Orleans once my booking window for that opens in April.

That puts us to May '24 as the next possibility and we do have an Interval search running for the DVC resorts plus the Marriott at DLRP. But that search also includes Marriotts in Marbella, Aruba, and St. Thomas; the Hyatts in Key West; and a few other odds and ends for the same time. Between you and me, I'm rooting for one of the "Not Orlando" options. As other DVC Members realize that there is a big world out there in which they'd just as soon vacation, they will also likely realize that holding DVC points to do non-Park trips is tying up more capital than necessary, at which point selling makes sense.

The good news for Mickey is that there are other families ready to take our place, because they keep making more families with young kids. Those families will happily buy those points and do their decade-or-two love affair with the theme parks before doing the same thing.

 

[tidefan]

We've both been around these boards a long time. Every single time some price goes up, some offering is cut, or some experience is "degraded," the sturm und drang is predictable: "This time they've gone too far! It will be the straw that breaks the camel's back!"

It hasn't happened yet. Not once. And, when Disney is over-extended, they throw out a few discounts (FREE DINING!) and it's like throwing chum to sharks.

Could this finally be it? Maybe. But Disney is fanatical about measuring guest sentiment, precisely because they are worried about goodwill as a tangible asset. It's entirely possible that they know more about us (at least, in the aggregate) than we think.

Good point. In fact, I'd even say that a course correction is in place just in the fact that they had to replace the CEO. That doesn't happen without good cause and while yes, a lot of that was on the media and distribution side, it definitely has an effect on the parks. However, I don't remember this amount of disquiet amongst their fandom? Also, there are a lot more external pressures (mainly in the form of Universal) than were perhaps there 10 or so years ago. Now, I agree they are good about measuring guest sentiment, but I am perhaps thinking that THEY think that they are so good than they can continually approach the cliff and walk along the edge. It only takes one time to fall off the cliff...

That puts us to May '24 as the next possibility and we do have an Interval search running for the DVC resorts plus the Marriott at DLRP. But that search also includes Marriotts in Marbella, Aruba, and St. Thomas; the Hyatts in Key West; and a few other odds and ends for the same time. Between you and me, I'm rooting for one of the "Not Orlando" options. As other DVC Members realize that there is a big world out there in which they'd just as soon vacation, they will also likely realize that holding DVC points to do non-Park trips is tying up more capital than necessary, at which point selling makes sense.

The good news for Mickey is that there are other families ready to take our place, because they keep making more families with young kids. Those families will happily buy those points and do their decade-or-two love affair with the theme parks before doing the same thing.

We've definitely changed our vacation plans. Mainly with going to Aulani, which we very much enjoy, but yes, there are only so many years you can go to HHI, VB, and Aulani and have holding the membership make sense. I mean, I have loved all of our trips to Aulani, but at some point, you've exhausted everything about the property and it's the location that draws you back, and for that, you are right, MVC Ko Olina Beach Club is probably a much more economical solution...

 

[Jrb1979]

We've both been around these boards a long time. Every single time some price goes up, some offering is cut, or some experience is "degraded," the sturm und drang is predictable: "This time they've gone too far! It will be the straw that breaks the camel's back!"

It hasn't happened yet. Not once. And, when Disney is over-extended, they throw out a few discounts (FREE DINING!) and it's like throwing chum to sharks.

Could this finally be it? Maybe. But Disney is fanatical about measuring guest sentiment, precisely because they are worried about goodwill as a tangible asset. It's entirely possible that they know more about us (at least, in the aggregate) than we think.


It would appear they are not.

I've been thinking about this myself. Have I reached "escape velocity" from Disney's gravitational well? Maybe.

I spent two weeks at Saratoga Springs last year for E's spring break, and we invited M's brother and his family to join us for the first week--I had RCI deposits to soak up, and DVC was leaving RCI, so I figured why not? This year, we are going back to Orlando, but staying at one of the Marriott Vacation Club resorts and hitting up Universal instead.

M and I were talking just yesterday about whether we'd be going back to WDW and DVC anytime soon, and we're not sure. February '24 is already booked at our favorite diamond-in-the-rough in Palm Beach Shores. March '24 is going to be with both R and E in New Orleans once my booking window for that opens in April.

That puts us to May '24 as the next possibility and we do have an Interval search running for the DVC resorts plus the Marriott at DLRP. But that search also includes Marriotts in Marbella, Aruba, and St. Thomas; the Hyatts in Key West; and a few other odds and ends for the same time. Between you and me, I'm rooting for one of the "Not Orlando" options. As other DVC Members realize that there is a big world out there in which they'd just as soon vacation, they will also likely realize that holding DVC points to do non-Park trips is tying up more capital than necessary, at which point selling makes sense.

The good news for Mickey is that there are other families ready to take our place, because they keep making more families with young kids. Those families will happily buy those points and do their decade-or-two love affair with the theme parks before doing the same thing.

For now Disney excels when it comes to families with littles due to the amount of attractions with no height requirements. What Disney also does well is marketing. To go a long with that your average person only knows Disney or Universal and maybe their local park. That has always amazed me. The amount of parks in the US and how few people know about them.

IMO all of that will change with Epic Universe

 

[tash439]

We have a trip planned at the end of April and I’m hoping…fingers crossed,,,that APs will come back and we can upgrade our tickets while there.

 

[kilik64]

I suppose they’re not as concerned about the growing number of guests like me, who’ve been using their DVC memberships for the onsite accommodations, doing more resort-heavy stays, spending relatively little time (and, by extension, money) in the parks, and venturing off-site more often than they ever used to and discovering in the process that they’re still having a great time.

Fact of the matter is they dont NEED you in the parks right now to make money. Just look at the last qtr financials for the parks, making money hand over fist and they havent sold AP in what almost a year?

Looks like this summer is light on resort stays hence the dining thing they are doing, maybe it will eventually lead to them bringing back AP at some point.

Another thought too is that once they DO come back, how many people who buy them will renew every year even if they end up not going as much as they thought or planned since they dont want to risk losing them that one year the go a ton and make it totally worth it? Ole DIS resetting expectations on AP.

 

[hethj7]

We just renewed and may not get enough days to “pay out” this next calendar year, but certainly the thought of not having the option to buy weighed on our decision to renew.

 

[gmi3804]

Fact of the matter is they dont NEED you in the parks right now to make money.

True, but they’d like make more money if there were people in my room that went to the parks every day.

 

[grumpy06]

We have a trip planned at the end of April and I’m hoping…fingers crossed,,,that APs will come back and we can upgrade our tickets while there.

 

[grumpy06]

We also have a tripped planned at the same time to Saratoga and hoping for the same outcome

 

[tash439]

We also have a tripped planned at the same time to Saratoga and hoping for the same outcome

We aren’t staying on our DVC points this trip. We will be at Caribbean Beach for a quick weekend getaway! We love SSR though! That’s our home resort!

 

[Pooh's World]

Now this, I can agree with in that I fully expect that is their current thinking.

However, I am of the personal belief that this is some very "short-term" thinking and ignores the long game that Disney has (mostly) always excelled at in the past. It took 40-60 years to build their theme park empire by carefully cultivating an "experience" that people felt when dealing with the product. Like it or not, that came with certain expectations. And really, the AP availability isn't even one of the top factors in much of this. The product is just not the same as it was 10 years ago. Personally, I chalk that up to a bunch of people that put a lot more emphasis in the "where will our corporation be a year from now" than "where will our corporation be 10 years from now" and putting much more faith into mathematical models than maybe some of the psychology of strategic management...

It's the short term thinking of Iger/Chapek.

When I had the Disney Annual Pass I would always talk up Disney to friends and strangers. Disney was getting free positive word of mouth advertising and I was basically a Disney representative.

But now I have nothing positive to say about Disney, I will even say negative things about their cheap ways and lack of loyalty to their biggest supporters.

So they lose good will and are hurting themselves in the long run.

But this is the exact arrogant and cheap attitude they had when JK Rowlings offered Harry Potter to them first. They said they would put one or two rides in fantasy land or something and wouldn't create a whole land for her. She went to Universal and Universal became a monster competitor because of Harry Potter Land. Reactively they ended up spending just as much money to create Pandora and Star Wars Land. But the Long Term damage was done as Universal was a little above Sea World level before they added Harry Potter but now are serious competition.

 

[Loro]

Disney Tourist Blog made a prediction of either post April 2023 or late August 2023 (IIRC). I would be thrilled if that were the case for a Sorcerer Pass, but I'm not counting on it either. I do think as summer nears, Dis will get an idea of guest flow and what any potential economic factors are in play.

I do think the will have to be near "desperate" before opening up sales. Unfortunately.

Tom's (Disney Tourist Blog) original guesses have been January after Marathon (didn't happen), and after Spring Break/Easter season in April. The April date has always made sense to me. Not quite as busy until Summer, although there is very little downtime anymore. Late August gets brought up for a similar reason, after kids are back in school and the "downtime" hits. Either would make sense logically, but it is really about capacity...

So... that brings up my question as to why people are saying "They can't sell APs now because the parks are too full".

Don't know that I've ever bought that argument.

The parks are technically not as crowded in total number of guests as pre-pandemic, but they are too full right now for the amount of cast members they have, which if they don't negotiate in earnest with the unions they are soon going to have an even bigger problem with. Penny-wise, pound-foolish as the saying goes. They are missing CMs in so many areas still thanks to their shortsighted reaction to the pandemic and Chapek being ... Chapek.

Hopefully they can hire more CMs soon, and offering CMs more (a living wage as an example) would go a long way towards helping that. Lack of enough CMs is the biggest reason capacity is still limited, and things like APs aren't still a permanent fixture and the DDP aren't back yet. Hopefully soon.

Edit: I also have a theory that Genie+ is actually hurting capacity a bit as compared to Fastpass+, but I don't have the data to back that up. If it does, genie+ may actually be costing Disney more money than it earns.

 

[Brian Noble]

I'm going to guess that the money Disney spends on marketing ("Patrick Mahomes, you just won the Super Bowl! What are you going to do next?") might help the company weather the negative word of mouth from a handful of former APers.

I also have a theory that Genie+ is actually hurting capacity a bit as compared to Fastpass+

The particulars of a virtual queue scheme do not change overall park capacity. Capacity is just how many people per hour can get through an attraction--and that's a function of staffing and operational efficiency. I don't see how G+ could change operating efficiency unless the CM at merge is starving the CMs at load, and that's not happening.

 

[Bibbidi_Boo]

I honestly think at this point Disney doesn't know what to do anymore since they know the second they start selling them its going to crash the system and be a disaster.

 

[thanxfornoticin]

I honestly think at this point Disney doesn't know what to do anymore since they know the second they start selling them its going to crash the system and be a disaster.

I'm not sure about crashing the system, but I agree it could be a disaster - and that they're not sure. Could be another situation where they start selling them and have to cut it off after a couple days because they've reached a limit they don't want to exceed. THAT will make some people REALLY ticked off if they happen to miss it!

 

[ajsamett]

I'd say sell out in hours, not days. Probably why they are waiting so long so they have enough inventory to have enough to make it last at least most of the day

 

[Pooh's World]

I'm going to guess that the money Disney spends on marketing ("Patrick Mahomes, you just won the Super Bowl! What are you going to do next?") might help the company weather the negative word of mouth from a handful of former APers.

The particulars of a virtual queue scheme do not change overall park capacity. Capacity is just how many people per hour can get through an attraction--and that's a function of staffing and operational efficiency. I don't see how G+ could change operating efficiency unless the CM at merge is starving the CMs at load, and that's not happening.

Nope. Won't. They have been doing the going to Disney World thing for years.

It's just the small mindedness of Chapek/Iger.

Think about it it, they had 100,000 plus AP's who were paying them $1400 a year to be walking representatives for Disney.

Now not only do they not get that money but you have people who are trashing Disney's greedy ways.

I can't recommend Disney to anybody now. It's actually cheaper to take a European vacation plus spend a day or two at Universal than hand over your money to Disney.

 

[CoachBeard]

I live in so cal and have a magic key. I’d like to buy an AP for WDW. If I was able to I’d go at least 2 more times (shorter trips) before my next big trip in 2024.