As rivals struggle, Disney widens gap

[Kelly B Disney]

I have long thought that the quality of service, quality of people and personalities at Universal overall was never up to what you get at the Disney Parks or resorts. I've stayed there ,ate at the hotels there, been there many times over the years...

I have seen people and had experiences more than once in Universal with some of the WORST workers with the worst attitiudes anywhere!. They don't seem like they try to hire quality people there at all. Even in the higher end restaurants/bars in the hotels. The guest services in the park was a nightmare to deal with. The very people who are supposed to be handling the utmost in customer service.I base this on several times dealing with them. The CM's at Disney are head and shoulders above them from bathroom attendants to the waiters in Jiko and Flying Fish to the bartenders at Carribean beach Resort... I think if Universal invested in quality hirings and customer service from people who take pride in themselves and their jobs I would feel more comfortable at their parks but I don't. And I am from Jersey people!!! I live 30 mins from Manhattan and I am not a snob-- just want what I want when on vacation...

I like the Univesal parks I really do. The rides are great but the parks are without a doubt dirtier than Disney and the people that work there and go there seem less appealing than you see at disney. I don't feel real safe at City Walk at times. I also attribute this to that campaign on tv awhile back that someone mentioned when the little girl said she was going to hurl if she saw another princess...WTH is that? It's a children's theme park and they all are after all .... That whole campaign they ran was in the spirit of trying to break down what many who love disney hold dear...the make beleive --the magic. Universal seems to cater to a different kind of people and their staff only proves that --in my personal experience... I will go to Harry Potter and really look forward to seeing it but stay at Disney and spend most of my time at Disney parks and only eat at their restaurants. I go to Orlando 3-5 times per year and have basically stopped going to Universal alltogether.

 

[skiingfast]

I think the biggest difference, is the time spent or worthiness of where you would spend a vacation. As a previous poster mentioned US is just a diversion from WDW. It's too much a day trip out of the resort like the beaches of Kennedy Space Center.

It the same as in Anahiem, people who come for a solid trip goto DL 3 or more days and to Universal or Seaworld to fill in their Disney trip.

So drawing people to univesal is a three day trip at most, park, park, waterslide. While Disney is a 5 day at least, parkx4, waterslide,golf, boating, ect. You don't want to spend 2 days travel for 3 days. But for 5 days two days travel sound great that's a 7 day week. While WDW draws from vacationers who wold spend full days driving. Universal needs day tripers. It draws from a population of maybe 20M while WDW is pulling people from a pool of 250M. You can in fact guess that a large percent of people going to Universal and WDW that did'nt drive, are spending 5 days in WDW too.

I think that the difference in the experience come down to a simple perceptions. Disney makes an experience and let the money follow. Where as Universal want the money up front to have an experience.

 

[mrsR123]

Kudos to the Pirate for an outstanding post. Reading it felt like old times.

 

[ChrisFL]

I think the biggest difference, is the time spent or worthiness of where you would spend a vacation. As a previous poster mentioned US is just a diversion from WDW. It's too much a day trip out of the resort like the beaches of Kennedy Space Center.

It the same as in Anahiem, people who come for a solid trip goto DL 3 or more days and to Universal or Seaworld to fill in their Disney trip.

So drawing people to univesal is a three day trip at most, park, park, waterslide. While Disney is a 5 day at least, parkx4, waterslide,golf, boating, ect. You don't want to spend 2 days travel for 3 days. But for 5 days two days travel sound great that's a 7 day week. While WDW draws from vacationers who wold spend full days driving. Universal needs day tripers. It draws from a population of maybe 20M while WDW is pulling people from a pool of 250M. You can in fact guess that a large percent of people going to Universal and WDW that did'nt drive, are spending 5 days in WDW too.

I think that the difference in the experience come down to a simple perceptions. Disney makes an experience and let the money follow. Where as Universal want the money up front to have an experience.

Part of that is because Disney has tried many ways to keep guests from venturing off Disney property....they added tons of hotel rooms, they built MGM studios so people wouldn't go to Universal, they built Animal Kingdom so people wouldn't go to Busch Gardens...

...then they added Magical Express, so people wouldn't want to rent a car for anything, and then they have their ticket deals so it's just cheap enough not to want to leave their property.

I still believe the reason Universal hasn't succeeded in Florida as well as it should have is their marketing has for a looong time been suspect at best.

They don't know how to attract the families who go to Disney World all the time and still attract the thrill seekers who would usually go to Ohio, or some of the other East coast parks.

However, Harry Potter is going to change a lot of that I believe. I agree with the previous poster who said people probably skipped IOA due to all of the construction...it isn't the same as people going to DL and DCA, because again, Disney is the main attention grabber in both situations...people would venture back to WDW before going to IOA when there's a huge chunk of the park being refurbished, then plan to go to IOA next year when it's got everything open.

 

[skiingfast]

Part of that is because Disney has tried many ways to keep guests from venturing off Disney property....they added tons of hotel rooms, they built MGM studios so people wouldn't go to Universal, they built Animal Kingdom so people wouldn't go to Busch Gardens...

...then they added Magical Express, so people wouldn't want to rent a car for anything, and then they have their ticket deals so it's just cheap enough not to want to leave their property.

I know that it is often cited that Disney built the studio park to foil Universal. In truth Universal Studio was built quickly off the Califoria designs just like MK off of DL's. The Disney park opened before USF and it had to be in the works to develop attractions foriegn to Disney for quite a while.

Also I don't think Univeral originated the design of an movies based amusment park. It had actual studio tours while disney had rides based on movies. Universal blended the two in its Califorifornia movie lot.

Regarding busch Gardens and AK. It's not the only, amusment park/zoo. And I mean it is like amusment park with a zoo. When AK first opened they were saying it's like a zoo with rides.

ME may of fixed other problems too. Disney needed parking. And lots of money was going to shuttles and taxis that weren't theirs to control.

As far as building hotels. I think that was disney's idea in 1955. They just had some troubles for a long time and didn't get back to business until Eisner got there.

It does speak volumns that people are seeing commercials for Universal again. Myself included. That will make a difference.

 

[Peter Pirate 2]

Kudos to the Pirate for an outstanding post. Reading it felt like old times.

Thanks. I have been feeling a bit nostalgic lately.

 

[AprilLizbeth]

I have to say that I think that the recession is finally leveling out the cost of a Disney vacation. Somewhat like the housing market here in Florida, over the last few years there has been and exponental increase in prices overall at Disney World. Tickets and particularly hotel prices have shot up to an unafordable level for some people. I hope that Disney is forced to keep discounts comming and prices lower. You just arent going to lure in customers in a recovering economy by saying "Well thats it! The discounts are gone and now we are returning to ungodly prices. Book now!"

 

[skiingfast]

I have to say that I think that the recession is finally leveling out the cost of a Disney vacation. Somewhat like the housing market here in Florida, over the last few years there has been and exponental increase in prices overall at Disney World. Tickets and particularly hotel prices have shot up to an unafordable level for some people. I hope that Disney is forced to keep discounts comming and prices lower. You just arent going to lure in customers in a recovering economy by saying "Well thats it! The discounts are gone and now we are returning to ungodly prices. Book now!"

It's interesting that in this thread to consider the pricing aspect. DL relies a lot on ticket pricing schemes as food and hotels are less of the revenue from those guests. While in WDW they offere more hotels or dining offers
but not ticket only deals. It speaks a lot to how they focus keeping guests on site.

It's also interesting that WDW gate entries went up just a hair, while DLR had impressive results when considering the economy and the construction around the resort.

 

[Jolly Ole Bert]

For Universal, having their parks 7 miles from WDW can be both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, you're located in one of the top tourist destinations on the globe. While on the other hand, it is inevitable that people will always, always compare you with Disney. I wish more people would leave out the Disney factor and appreciate Universal for what it is. Sometimes I wonder if US & IOA would be better off in a place such as Branson, Myrtle Beach, or Nashville, so that way the parks could stand alone as unique, and out from under Mickey's shadow. As hungry as Nashville is for a theme-park after the tragic (*stupid) loss of Opryland, I've wondered how the Universal parks would have done if built someplace like that rather than in Mickey's backyard. Sure, you'd have the seasonal factor and not the nice Central Fla weather. But the quality of theming, atmosphere, and service would stand head & shoulders beyond that of regional parks. Universal definitely deserves silver or bronze in the entire theme-park industry when it comes to theming and quality. Our family grew up going to Six Flags parks, Dollywood, etc. And obviously those types of parks cannot hold a candle to Disney or Universal.

 

[skiingfast]

I am sure that universal was built to cannabalize Disney park goers. Orlando was nothing special until Disney showed up. When the tourist industry was well established Universal came in. They in quite a sense asked to be compared.

Of course the best US park is in Japan and not next to TDL. I've also heard that since Universal owner NBC partnered with Blackstone Group they have wanted to build a lot more parks. I think they have a few in the works but all I can think of is somthing at Dubailand and in South Korea.

 

[ChrisFL]

I know that it is often cited that Disney built the studio park to foil Universal. In truth Universal Studio was built quickly off the Califoria designs just like MK off of DL's. The Disney park opened before USF and it had to be in the works to develop attractions foriegn to Disney for quite a while.

It's well known that MGM was built hastily in an attempt to beat Universal to the punch....It stemmed from Michael Eisner, formerly being the had of Paramount and already had a deep disdain for Universal as a competitor...there was plans to add a movie ride to EPCOT Center, then that ride, eventually named the Great Movie ride, instead became the center piece for Eisner's pet theme park project...

Too bad there was barely any attractions when it opened...only the Great Movie Ride and the Studio Tour...no Muppets, Star Tours or even Sunset Blvd. existed when MGM Studios first opened...but it still opened nearly a year before USF did.

 

[skiingfast]

It's well known that MGM was built hastily in an attempt to beat Universal to the punch....It stemmed from Michael Eisner, formerly being the had of Paramount and already had a deep disdain for Universal as a competitor...there was plans to add a movie ride to EPCOT Center, then that ride, eventually named the Great Movie ride, instead became the center piece for Eisner's pet theme park project...

Too bad there was barely any attractions when it opened...only the Great Movie Ride and the Studio Tour...no Muppets, Star Tours or even Sunset Blvd. existed when MGM Studios first opened...but it still opened nearly a year before USF did.

No it's not well known, it's assumed by many because of the similar park theme. Eisner didn't like Univeral is a tale of its own.

The fact is WDW was stagnant since opening Epcot and they were looking to expand but didn't have the means or internal cooperation. Because of business problems disney wasn't making much money in the early 80's and was pretty ripe to move upward when Eisner came in. Eisner allowed disney to form strategy for better or worse.

He didn't just try to screw everyone he competed with in the media business because he was with Disney. He was incentized to create value in the company anyway he could. This is why in the 80s Disney started to expand businees in movies, tv, parks, merchandise and anything else they could.

It is not mentioned that Disney started a cruise line or built castaway cay because Eisner didn't like Arison or Kloster, the founders of Carnival and Norweigen Cruise Lines.

It's just easy link that Eisner worked for this company and that, who was a competitor with this party and that. So obviously he had nothing but hate for all of them.