Originally Posted By CarolinaDisneyDad I was reading about the price increases at WDW this year and began wondering. I'm not a financial wiz so I was hoping you guys could shed some light on what's is going on. I just don't understand why prices are being raised while at the same time discounts are being increased to try to get people to come. Shouldn't supply and demand make the price fluctuate up and down. Why raise and discount rather than just lower price now and then raise it later when demand returns? Under the current method do prices ever decrease? It is starting to feel like a car lot or airlines where you never know if you paying the same as the guy on the ride beside you. It makes something that should be exciting (booking a WDW trip) into an exercise in deal hunting.
Originally Posted By MPierce Prices will never go down on food, and beverages at WDW. That's where they are really sticking it to folks. They offer the room, and ticket discounts to get you into the parks where they hope to sell you stuff. The free dining is being used to keep the attendance up right now. The outragious prices of food, and beverages is all designed to make the DDP look like a bargain. Even with the heavily discounted merchandised Disney still makes a good profit. The Mouse is definetly going to price some folks out.
Originally Posted By CarolinaDisneyDad But I understand the food theory better than the room and ticket theory. At the same time that they are offering room discounts they are raising prices on those same rooms. It makes no sense to me.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 it's about creating the 'perception' that one is getting a deal. The American consumer now only buys thigs when they get a deal ( blame the auto industry with their rebates and the unholy empire of Walmart for this) So will someone spend $220 / nite for a specific hotel room straight up -- or do they get more excited when the room is 'marked' at $440 / nite and 50% off ? Yes they pay the same thing but look at 'the deal' they got
Originally Posted By CarolinaDisneyDad I guess but it seems like they create a mistrust of their pricing.
Originally Posted By SuperDry I think the main thing is that it keeps the long-term trend of the park tickets going the way they want them to. They raised the single-day, single-park ticket 5.33%. In order to adjust for the reduced demand caused temporarily by the economic conditions, they institute discounts to counter the price increase. They can adjust the discounts as they go along throughout the year with much less bad publicity and trouble than a once-a-year increase in list price. Plus, next year, they can raise them another 5.33% and that will also be under most people's radar. But, if they did nothing this year, then next year they'd have to increase tickets 11% all at once to get to the same price point, and that would certainly attract a lot more bad attention. Also, look at the AP prices. With the current "15 months for 12" promo, they are effectively giving a 20% discount. But, they've not lowered the list price, and since it's not good for renewals, there's not an overall impression that the value of an AP has gone down 20%. When the economic downturn ends, they can simply remove the renewal discount, effectively raising the price by 20%, but without actually doing so, as all they need to do is quietly announce that the special promotion is over. I think what they're doing at WDW with regard to pricing is very smart from a business perspective.
Originally Posted By dshyates Disney's pricing is just exhausting and confusing. I wonder if they are ever going to reach the breaking point where people just give up and go somewhere else?
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< I wonder if they are ever going to reach the breaking point where people just give up and go somewhere else? >>> I doubt if there's any single spot at which this would happen to many people at once. Well, it will certainly be bad PR when a single-day, single-park ticket exceeds $100, but since most people don't buy tickets that way, it may not be that big a deal. Certainly, for each individual and each family, there's a breaking point, beyond which the proposition of a WDW vacation becomes "too expensive," even if it's only 5% more than last year. But the thing is, that breaking point is different for everyone. I think Disney has been and will continue to be very successful in measuring public demand and the price elasticity of at WDW vacation. They'll continue to increase list prices for tickets every year, but will also continually make fine tuning adjustments to the various room packages, DDP, and other discounts available. These can be done seasonally, and also on a limited-inventory basis such that although a particular discount plan can be advertised as being valid for 6 months, they can actually adjust the number of rooms available for a particular promo on a daily basis without anyone being the wiser. So, I think they'll be able to back off from the price increases before they become too much for the public at large.
Originally Posted By davewasbaloo It is not the prices going up that annoys me. It is the prices going up while the experience is chipped away at. If the live entertainment, shopping as a form of entertainment, a mix of unusual menu items etc. were to continue to be available, I would not balk at the prices going up. But the subtractions in quality over the last 10 years with the prices going up means the Baloos have hit the tipping point.
