Search

[mhguy77]

Have any of you watched the issues that have arisen in DL over the new additions Galaxys Edge?  Seems the park did not receive the crowds they expected for the billion dollar Star Wars addition, infact when the cracked open the new land June first the bottom dropped out of the park.  Attendance is way down and they are trying to lure folks in.  The internet is a buzz over displeasure for several things DL has done, raised the tickets reported to be 150 per day now as prime time ticket prices, they have built new parking structures but are charging 38 per day to park.   Disneyland had also blocked many of the passholders for fear of punishing crowds but these have been lifted and they have not recouped.  Walt Disney World is opening their Galaxys Edge next month and the hotel reservations are very soft from reports in Disney.

Did Disneys new land fail this hard?  Did the world of Star Wars clash with the formula at Disneyland?  Did Disney finally hit the ceiling with the entrance fee and the audience rebelled?  Whatever the issue its interesting to watch it unfold. 
Any opinions?
It may just be time to book a Disney Trip.........  I bet you will get a good deal in a month or so if WDW addition also flops.

[mg]

I think that opening the new land without the flagship ride is the main issue. Also, people talked up that there would be insane crowds so people stayed away expecting it to be crazy.

We're going to Disneyland in December and I'm actually happy that it's flagship ride won't open until January.

[Swoosh]

Considering they blacked out all of the APs except the top tier, what did they expect?   Next month will be the real test once they get unblocked

[chittlins]

It's got too expensive across the board, tickets, lodging, food, ect and you are looking at 1k for a family of 4 for a single blanking day. They wanted over 400 bucks for a night at Grand Californian room for a mid week stay in October, early Oct  only half a weenie in the bun at that. Iger will.stay long enough to get the company in rocky trouble. He was supposed to gone by now but decided there was no one that could replace him. Some of the movie remakes have been lack luster. He is trying to milk the @#%$ out of the tried and true and new is fading out of view.

[ttroyer210]

It will not be dead at all at WDW when Galaxy's Edge opens. They made a big mistake opening up a not completed land at DL and blocking out APers because a majority of their guests are local and passholders they will wait until it's done to go. Different situation in Florida.

[chittlins]

It will not be dead at all at WDW when Galaxy's Edge opens. They made a big mistake opening up a not completed land at DL and blocking out APers because a majority of their guests are local and passholders they will wait until it's done to go. Different situation in Florida.

Oh, when both are fully open, I will go to LA for it there, during the week in an extremely off season part of the year


I will not attempt at WDW, I'll only go there for the new coasters in Epcot and WDW and will not be till those and Universal's new Jurasaic Coaster is open as well.

[chittlins]

Here is the price via Disney for a two night stay at Paradise Pier with two day, one park tickets for a family of 4, two adults, two children(17 and 15) for the second week of Oct Wed night to Fri morning.

Drum roll please.......
$2,283  and some change.

No park hopper or max price or food package. That gets you to over $2,600 and its best to buy the 3 day/one park per day with early morning access with the two nite stay with the park hopper and max pass at that point. Add in some food, one quick meal and one sit down and some other snacks and souvenirs and it'll be 3, 500 in a blink.

[sirwillow]

I've actually got a video posting about this exact thing in just a bit.  Way to early to write this off as a Star Wars thing.

their crowds in summer have been massively down the last couple of years while up the rest of the year due to their tier pricing, making it really expensive to visit in summer.  The last couple of years people have said that summer is now their off season due to it.

The vast majority of their annual passes, outside of the expensive ones, are blocked until the end of August or early September, and a very large portion of Disneyland's attendance is from locals and passholders.

Their advertising has delivered a message very easily misunderstood- that the entire park was going to be massively overwhelmed, overcrowded and that you needed a reservation to get into the parks themselves.  I've got several family and friends that were confused by this and that I had to explain that reservations were only for Star Wars, not the rest of the parks.  They also didn't believe me that the crowds weren't huge and didn't want to deal with them.

And then yes, they haven't opened up the second main attraction in the land- and just announced again that it is delayed.  Though honestly outside of park fans I don't think that most of the general public are aware of or affected by that so much.  They just see the land as a whole.

there are a few other things, but really the issue isn't Star Wars, it's that the park leadership, management, and advertising have all combined to reinforce that this summer isn't the time to visit.

[mg]

... and its best to buy the 3 day/one park per day with early morning access with the two nite stay with the park hopper...

Not that it makes a huge price difference, but if you are staying on property you get early access every morning of your stay.

[sirwillow]

Here is the price via Disney for a two night stay at Paradise Pier with two day, one park tickets for a family of 4, two adults, two children(17 and 15) for the second week of Oct Wed night to Fri morning.

Drum roll please.......
$2,283  and some change.

No park hopper or max price or food package. That gets you to over $2,600 and its best to buy the 3 day/one park per day with early morning access with the two nite stay with the park hopper and max pass at that point. Add in some food, one quick meal and one sit down and some other snacks and souvenirs and it'll be 3, 500 in a blink.

Only one major major problem with that- why stay at a Disney hotel when there are lots of good hotels around and across the street from the parks?  There are only 3 Disney hotels in CA (compared to 27+ in Florida), and all 3 of those are on the price scale of the Grand Floridian or Animal Kingdom Lodge.  There are no moderate or lower Disney hotels, so it's not a fair comparison.

For our Oct trip, we have 5 of us staying 6 nights in a 2 room suite across the street and we're paying a bit over $800 for it.  and all of those hotels around the parks can sell official Disney tickets with the extras that are offered. (Disneyland doesn't do a meal plan)

I will agree that their park tickets are overpriced at this point, and I'm grateful someone else is covering that for us.    But when it comes to lodging, Disneyland is a far different kind of beast than WDW and needs to be approached differently.  Including food- lot of it within easy walking distance of the gates if you want to save money there.

[Okiebenz]

I went to DL back around 1988.  Have thought I would like to take the wife and kid out there, but I guess not.  No way I am paying that much to stand in line for hours on end.

[chittlins]

... and its best to buy the 3 day/one park per day with early morning access with the two nite stay with the park hopper...

Not that it makes a huge price difference, but if you are staying on property you get early access every morning of your stay.

Thats not how it is marketed on their website, it isn't listed till you get to three day tickets. I'm just conveying the cost via staying at Disney. In Paris, we paid basically 85 US each for a one day, two park ticket for a cool Tuesday. We got several rides in Space Mountain, two on Crushes coaster, two on ToT, two on Aerosmith, 3 trips on Big Thunder, no one wanted to reride Indy, oof. We rode everything we wanted, only pirates was the only major ride down. We liked Alice's Labyrinth the Dragon under the Castle as nice touches. They'll jack the two park price way up in Paris once they add Marvel, Star Wars and Frozen lands to Studios.

[mg]

Thats not how it is marketed on their website, it isn't listed till you get to three day tickets. I'm just conveying the cost via staying at Disney.

It's not listed on the ticket page.

On property guests get Extra Magic Hour each day and it rotates between Disneyland and California Adventure. This alone is a huge reason why we stay on property. Virtually no wait in Cars Land for an hour is priceless with kids that are huge Lightning McQueen fans.

https://disneyland.disney.go.com/guest-services/extra-magic-hour-early-admission/


The morning that you get with 3+ day tickets is a Magic Morning and only happens on the Disneyland days and not California Adventure.

[cowboy]

I actually liked DL much better than DW just because it seemed like we could do a lot and not have to stay on property. We went to the park that didn't have the "extra hour" so while the hotel guest were at CA we basically had all the big e-ticket rides complete at DL before noon. Same with CA the next day.

We did pay the $10 extra and used the Disney App to reserve ride times, food, etc. download pictures (we hit every photo spot too had about 50 Disney photos at the end of the day).

DW really caters to their resort guest, where DL seems to allow regular park visitiors to have some cool perks without staying at the property.

Jay