WDW Low Attendance Rumor

[lrodk]

Screamsacpe reports on what many have speculated upon regarding WDW's lower attendance numbers this summer. One thing worth noting from the report that struck me as odd, was that in the face of Disney's lower resort occupancy, Universal has been enjoying peak attendance (90% plus vs Disney's 50-70%)at their two on-site resorts. Seems like a bit of role reversal. I'm not quite sure what to make of that.

"While Disney does not reveal it’s true attendance figures, industry analysts report that the WDW resort’s attendance looks to have dropped off about 7% this year. In addition to the parks being a little less crowded, there are also reports that the onsite resort hotels are only between 50-70% occupancy in the middle of the high traffic summer season instead of the normal 90% or higher levels typical in past years. By comparison, earlier this summer Universal reported that their two hotels (Portafino Bay & Hard Rock Hotel) were enjoying 90% or higher occupancy and they are well underway to open their third hotel... The Royal Pacific next year.?

 

[SPAGo 98]

Well having 2 hotels is very very different from having .... however many hotels WDW has.

 

[F.C. Fan]

Very interesting indeed, Universal, IoA, and CityWalk were just totally packed with people when we got their last night at approx. 8 PM(45 min wait for M.I.B., 30 min for Terminator) + there was a 2-3 boat wait for the people waitng to go back to the hotels there.

Also I find it interesting (a previous poster had posted) that DCA on the 4th of July had 8000 people, when on the 2nd and 3rd of July Sea World of Florida had a day in the 21000 person count and also a day of 26000 or more as well.

 

[larworth]

The disparity seems too big, but I don't doubt that the US hotels have been doing better. I don't think it has any reflection on the relative popularity of the parks, only on the value these hotels provide to guests.

Their FOTL prgram has been a huge lure, they are within walking distance of both parks, and they have been more aggressive in discounting. They just have some levers that the Disney hotels as a whole cannot match.

 

[All Aboard]

My gut tells me that there is absolutely no way WDW on-sites are at 50% occupancy this summer, just can't be. Down 7% I can buy. My understanding is that WDW has a year-round average occupancy of 90% (a little lower in the off-season, a little higher in the peak) If so, (and assuming that the summer standard were around 93%) then that would indicate current occupancies of around 86%. Doesn't the 7% figure conflict with the 50% to 70% figure? Both cannot be true.

As for PB/HRH's occupancy, that I can buy also. FOTL, 50% - 60% discounts, a whopping grand total of 1,400 rooms to fill.

 

[hopemax]

Couldn't it be true, if vacationers who normally stayed on-site were staying off-site this year?

 

[wdwguide]

Originally posted by gcurling
My gut tells me that there is absolutely no way WDW on-sites are at 50% occupancy this summer, just can't be. Down 7% I can buy. My understanding is that WDW has a year-round average occupancy of 90% (a little lower in the off-season, a little higher in the peak) If so, (and assuming that the summer standard were around 93%) then that would indicate current occupancies of around 86%. Doesn't the 7% figure conflict with the 50% to 70% figure? Both cannot be true.

As for PB/HRH's occupancy, that I can buy also. FOTL, 50% - 60% discounts, a whopping grand total of 1,400 rooms to fill.

Disney hotel occupancy is very low this year. I've called CRO occasionally this summer to check on this, and they pretty much had available whatever I asked for, which isn't typical of the summer months at all (especially All Stars). It's probably more than 50%, but definitely significantly lower than the usual.

 

[ozmo19]

We had family down in-town a week ago and the hotels on property were dead. Part of occupancy trouble can also be attributed to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. They've had a very tough time filling it since the announcement of it and there is another 1000-1200 rooms, of which many are unoccupied not helping to add to the mix. It's been extremely quiet at Disney this summer. There are so many factors at play, too. Many consumer and industry experts (not Wall St. lunatics who care nothing about anything outside of greed) are attributing the pricing getting out-of-hand at Disney and the lack of anything new. Secondly, corporate travel is down extensively, even though personal travel is going to be above last year's level, even though the press would tend to distort that truth. When you lose thousands of business trips to Orlando every week, there is a lot of hotel spaces to appear.


Locals dig Universal, it's that simple. The buzz around town about the Hard Rock Hotel and Portifino are awesome. They have great dining, cool hotels, and are much better priced compared to Disney's premium hotels. Maybe some people are just realizing that for the normal family, it's becoming to expensive and not worth the price for an all inclusive Disney World vacation. Like it or not, the declining quality is bound to catch up with them and bite them in the rear.

 

[YoHo]

Plus, isn't WDW giving discounts to Fl residents? that would keep park attendence up while lowering occupancy .

There's also the newness factor of the Universal hotels. And I think Universal appeals more to the locals in general. its going to see the same push that Six Flags and others will see as "local" amusment/theme parks draw bigger crowds. Remember the demographics of WDW are not the same as DL, or Six Flags, and I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that Universal Escape has a demographic more similar to Six flags.

 

[ozmo19]

I agree pretty much with you YoHo. Universal, though, splits their demos. CityWalk and the parks might appeal to the Six Flags crowd, but it also at the same time has some of the fanciest business suit and dress wearers at night in town. Places like Emeril's is just a madhouse with local business people at night. That's where I think Universal's success is working for the at CityWalk is the broad appeal, obviously not to families with 6 and 4 years olds, but a cool place to go. I know absolutely no one who thinks that Pleasure Island is either cool or much of any fun.

Discounting? C'mon, the Play 4 Days Pass at WDW for FL Residents. That's a great Disney Deal .. They would never stoop so slow to offer the kind of deal the Universal is doing for the summer. Maybe if they did, it would help the attendence. Maybe if they made new merchandise and didn't recycle the same junk from the previous year, us locals would buy more of it. They appreciate the locals in CA, but since we're a minority in their scheme down here in FL, who cares seems to be the mantra of the company.

We shall see.

 

[YoHo]

As far as Pleasure Island is concerned, Have you seen the thread on the debate board? It sounds like they are as packed as ever, so I doubt that's a particular worry for them.

As to the Discounts. The flip sid eof the coin is that if you Discount too much, you ruin your profits anyway. Certainly there are Fl residents on these boards who have little to no use for Universal in any of its forms. I suspect its just one of those things that some like and some don't.

 

[Galahad]

As an anecdotal backup to YoHo, we are FL residents who don't particularly like Universal. Will probably go over there to have a meal at Emeril's sometime (wish he would have struck a deal with Downtown Disney) but the Universal parks leave us flat. The Disney PAP at the FL rate (especially at renewal time) is a very good deal!

 

[YoHo]

Stupid Emeril.


You know, Jeff Smith's been doing this for like what 20 year? he puts tons of Garlic in and all that, yet Emeril gets a resturant. Oh, don't get me wrong, Emeril's really cool, I just prefer the frug. (my fiancee and I argue about this all the time.)

I'm going to have to keep this a carefully garded secret otherwise My Disney Cruise Honeymoon may very well turn into a UE Emerilfest.

As to why Disney didn't get it. Likely it is because Emeril is not on a Disney Cable channel. Plus, When you have Wolfgang Puck.....

 

[Safari Steve]

Hooray for Jeff Smith!!!!

BTW, WDW currently has 18 resort hotels on property, 19 next spring when POP! Century opens.

 

[Quentin Disney]

As both an APer to Universal and WDW, hands down I would take WDW anyday. The myth that the locals despise WDW is total bull. A lot of locals hang out at P.I., I have talked to locals that go to Epcot that eat just dinner there and the number of locals doing the Millionaire attraction is rather high. There always seems to be someone local in the hot seat. Also, if you have walked in a WDW parking lot, you will see a LOT of license plates from Orange, Seminole, Polk and Ocseola counties.

"Walt Disney World: It's not just for tourists anymore."