Annual pass changes coming........

[lovethattink]

Could these changes be partly in response to minimum wage increases at the FL parks for 2016?

 

[GreatLakes]

I haven't read all 21 pages so I very well might be repeating what others have stated but it appears that Disney wants to cull the herd of locals. If they are less profitable then vacationing guests as is always stated increasing the prices this much will have two positive effects for Disney.

1. You will have less locals renewing their passes so the number of people in the parks, especially on weekends and holidays, goes down.
2. You will be getting more profit out of the decreased number of AP holders on the front end to mitigate the relative loss you have from them when they are visiting the parks.

I thought from the beginning that one of the effects we would see from the customer facing portion of the MyMagic+ initiative was a larger discrepancy between being an onsite and offsite guest. They really want to offsite guests to feel like they are missing something that the onsite guests get as a way to upsell them for their next trip down. The parking increase is a way to really make them feel it and gives the marketing team another thing to use when selling onsite packages.

Time will tell if they overplayed their hand or not but based on their profits and attendance over the last 5 years every time they have made a change like this the effects have been positive despite all the complaining here.

 

[Wood Nymph]

Without reading 22 pages, could someone tell me how much the increase is for the Annual Pass?

Thanks.

 

[jessicag13]

Without reading 22 pages, could someone tell me how much the increase is for the Annual Pass?

Thanks.

here you go.

Here is my Comparison Chart of old/new WDW Passes Prices/Benefits I posted on other forums last night (DIS was down):



Sources:
https://disneyvacationclub.disney.go.com/discounts-perks-offers/ticket-tour/walt-disney-world-pass/
https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/florida-residents/passholder-program/
https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/m...enefits/WDW-AnnualPass-Blockout-Calendars.pdf
https://shop.omniticket.com/wdw/renewal/index.cfm

 

[smiths02]

Just wanted to give an update. I am in the park today. My AP expires next April. It cost me $101 to upgrade. I got all my photo pass photos we have already made. They said I was the first person to do it today! I have 2 more trips planned so good deal for me!

So our APs expire in June. We are going in Feb and June. If I go to Guest Relations in the park when we get there in Feb, I can upgrade just my AP (our family has 3) and essentially pay $101 for Memory Maker for our Feb and June trip?
That might be worth it.

 

[DisneyQueen1320]

Could these changes be partly in response to minimum wage increases at the FL parks for 2016?

I doubt it, but if this is true I have no problem with the increase. Disney is still a great value.

 

[lovethattink]

I doubt it, but if this is true I have no problem with the increase. Disney is still a great value.

We get our money's worth out of our AP! No doubt there.

But I will not be renewing TiW since the restaurants we ate at mostly this year were not included with TiW. (The Star Wars character meals and Rebel Lounge and QS that never were included.)

 

[BeerMe]

Every time Disney jacks up ticket prices, I think - WOW. There will be a back lash and people will stop going. I'm always wrong. We buy passes every couple of years. The last ones we got were in 2/13 and I paid $550 IIRC. We just got new passes (certificates) a couple of weeks ago. If we had waited we would have paid more. But we still would have gotten them.

 

[asbyrneva]

Pretty sure some families have always been priced out even in Walt's era, so is that a change? Seeing how crowded the parks are and have been for a while I'm not sure that many are priced out. Not sure they could handle a lot more volume in the parks

Of course there have always been families that can't go to the parks. Remember what D ticket E ticket originally meant? You paid per ride! Some families had little ticket booklets and got a couple rides and some got big thick ones and rode everything!

Not discounting other posters that this is a jump in price and some folks will be on the bubble but as AngiTN says this is a for profit business and Disney definitely understands what the market will hold.

 

[DisneyQueen1320]

We get our money's worth out of our AP! No doubt there.

But I will not be renewing TiW since the restaurants we ate at mostly this year were not included with TiW. (The Star Wars character meals and Rebel Lounge and QS that never were included.)

I agree 100%. I was going to purchase it, but it's not worth it.

 

[AngiTN]

I doubt it, but if this is true I have no problem with the increase. Disney is still a great value.

Of course there have always been families that can't go to the parks. Remember what D ticket E ticket originally meant? You paid per ride! Some families had little ticket booklets and got a couple rides and some got big thick ones and rode everything!

Not discounting other posters that this is a jump in price and some folks will be on the bubble but as AngiTN says this is a for profit business and Disney definitely understands what the market will hold.

This is how I see it when it all boils down. It's a good value. $80 is a lot to some, sure. But I tried to look at it as a per visit increase. I'd be willing to bet most AP holders here visit more than 10 times over the year. That is an $8 increase per visit, less if you visit more. Broken down per visit I believe an AP is still a very good value. The one * I can add to this is for those who want both coast passes. That DL/WDW AP is crazy expensive now. The people who planned to purchase that do have a reason to complain without question. Not that anyone can't complain if they want to of course.

 

[mercydisney]

If I already have annual passes do I automatically get the photopass?

 

[asbyrneva]

So I get its a jump in price but Im with AngiTN about the reaction.
Lets do a little math:
Assuming we look at the regular AP and that nobody gets those without staying at least 10 days. 10 Days has always been the minimum total stay over a year that it makes sense to buy an AP rather than regular tickets. So Old price was 654 and new price is 749, a jump for sure. But at 10 days the old price per park day was $65.4 and the new price is $74.9. A price increase of less than $10 a day.

Now most of us are with AP would be in the parks more than 10 days to "optimize" our pass. So the cost per day is even less and the increase spread out over the numbers of park days will be even less. For our family we will do at least 15 park days this year. My cost per park day with my old AP was $43.6. assuming I buy a new one and don't take advantage of the renewal rate and but at $749 my 15 park days would cost me $49.9.
I pay over $12 for an hour and a half movie so this increase isnt going to change my mind about getting an annual pass.

Will the increase change some folks minds , yes. But my guess is it wont dramatically change most peoples.

 

[JOE DELL]

So pretty much if you have the regular AP now that becomes the Platinum and the Platinum now becomes the Platinum Plus?

 

[mick1229]

I'm over it....I had my fun..I won't renew,it's not just the recent increase its a combination of so many factors that have occurred over the past 5-10 years... bottom line is the whole "Give less and Charge more" motto that has prevailed.At a certain point you just start feeling like a sucker. Just my opinion I certainly don't begrudge anyone else going,please go and have a blast.., just for me and my children I think we will be better served saving the money and going to Universal going forward

 

[marciemi]

Okay, also probably answered but if we have a current AP when we renew next (even if switching from Premium to Platinum Plus or Regular AP to Platinum), we will still receive the renewal rates?

 

[MrInfinity]

I haven't read all 21 pages so I very well might be repeating what others have stated but it appears that Disney wants to cull the herd of locals. If they are less profitable then vacationing guests as is always stated increasing the prices this much will have two positive effects for Disney.

1. You will have less locals renewing their passes so the number of people in the parks, especially on weekends and holidays, goes down.
2. You will be getting more profit out of the decreased number of AP holders on the front end to mitigate the relative loss you have from them when they are visiting the parks.

I thought from the beginning that one of the effects we would see from the customer facing portion of the MyMagic+ initiative was a larger discrepancy between being an onsite and offsite guest. They really want to offsite guests to feel like they are missing something that the onsite guests get as a way to upsell them for their next trip down. The parking increase is a way to really make them feel it and gives the marketing team another thing to use when selling onsite packages.

Time will tell if they overplayed their hand or not but based on their profits and attendance over the last 5 years every time they have made a change like this the effects have been positive despite all the complaining here.

In addition, the relative increases of the Regular AP ($95) vs Plus AP ($50) tells me that locals do not tend to hit the Water Parks as much as tourists. Locals come for the MK or Epcot and are less likely to visit all 4 parks or especially the water parks. We also got evidence of this last year when we saw the MK price for a single-day walk-up ticket go up for the first time above the rest of the parks.

For me, the APs didn't make sense before and they still won't now, even after having seen the MYW tickets and now finally the AP prices all go up. For our trip, 7-Day tix are running us $310 after taxes, so even on the "before" pricing even getting two trips out of an AP would not be a savings. You really have to want to go a lot before the AP will be worth it. Around 3 tourist trips per year or a bunch of weekends if you're local.

 

[marciemi]

We bought my son a Regular FL Resident AP on Saturday. They switched to this yesterday (he activated & used the pass Sat & Sun) so we went to Guest Services to see if we could possibly upgrade his to Platinum (to get the MM). Guess I should be really glad that they did it for us for free since that looks like it saved us $120? And now we can all use his MM until we renew the rest of our passes next summer?

 

[WillAustin]

This price increase is such a small percentage of our total spent at Disney it is very insignificant all things considered. $80 just won't price us out

I told DH and he said, that's all? I was expecting more.

For my family it ends up almost $600 more.

 

[huey578]

Passes that were already active prior to the changeover - meaning they weren't certificates - will retain their previous benefits and terms.

Passes that are activated after the changeover - even if they were certificates purchased prior to it - will be part of the new system.

So, what you were told and what you read is correct. But it applies only to passes that were already active prior to 10/4.

@ravenclawtrekkie, just to confirm... I have a AP-DVC certificate. I plan on activating on next month- Nov 14th. When it gets activated, I will have a Platinum Pass? TIA