Former president of Disneyland resort says WDW doesn't feel magical

[Jrb1979]

This is a post from Matt Ouimet's LinkedIn page

"I just booked one day tickets to the Magic Kingdom for my family. It just didn’t feel very magical. I’m not referring to the price. Much emphasis on upselling; caveats regarding required reservations; signing up for an account; downloading an app; implication that without the “genie” rides my be unavailable; entering everyone’s names on the tickets; etc. I am totally intimidated to think how families do this for multiple day visits.
I get that these are complicated businesses with stressful profitability targets, but I believe that there is a real opportunity if you just take a step back and see this through the eyes of the guests. Make it easier; make it fun; and, you will create more value.
Having fun should be fun."

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matt...o-the-magic-activity-7140090858019700736-yZQd

 

[KYMickey]

I certainly agree and I'm sure many others do also. Most of the magic has disappeared and the way things are going now it doesn't look like it will ever return.

 

[Upatnoon]

This is a post from Matt Ouimet's LinkedIn page

"I just booked one day tickets to the Magic Kingdom for my family. It just didn’t feel very magical. I’m not referring to the price. Much emphasis on upselling; caveats regarding required reservations; signing up for an account; downloading an app; implication that without the “genie” rides my be unavailable; entering everyone’s names on the tickets; etc. I am totally intimidated to think how families do this for multiple day visits.
I get that these are complicated businesses with stressful profitability targets, but I believe that there is a real opportunity if you just take a step back and see this through the eyes of the guests. Make it easier; make it fun; and, you will create more value.
Having fun should be fun."

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matt...o-the-magic-activity-7140090858019700736-yZQd

Well. at least he did have to plan his trip 60+ days in advance and set the alarm for 4 a.m. like the old system

 

[nerdboyrockstar]

Eh.. that's the current state of affairs for both stateside resorts and it's not that different for Disneyland either. In fact, multiple times when I was having issues with the Disneyland app, they would have to go into my Disney World app to fix it.

 

[irlandaise]

This is a post from Matt Ouimet's LinkedIn page

"I just booked one day tickets to the Magic Kingdom for my family. It just didn’t feel very magical. I’m not referring to the price. Much emphasis on upselling; caveats regarding required reservations; signing up for an account; downloading an app; implication that without the “genie” rides my be unavailable; entering everyone’s names on the tickets; etc. I am totally intimidated to think how families do this for multiple day visits.
I get that these are complicated businesses with stressful profitability targets, but I believe that there is a real opportunity if you just take a step back and see this through the eyes of the guests. Make it easier; make it fun; and, you will create more value.
Having fun should be fun."

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matt...o-the-magic-activity-7140090858019700736-yZQd

And note that he was only talking about how un-fun it was to buy tickets! It will be interesting to see what he says after his family actually goes to WDW.

 

[Minnie1222]

This is a post from Matt Ouimet's LinkedIn page

"I just booked one day tickets to the Magic Kingdom for my family. It just didn’t feel very magical. I’m not referring to the price. Much emphasis on upselling; caveats regarding required reservations; signing up for an account; downloading an app; implication that without the “genie” rides my be unavailable; entering everyone’s names on the tickets; etc. I am totally intimidated to think how families do this for multiple day visits.

This person described the process of booking a ticket to Magic Kingdom as not magical. Where did he say the entire WDW doesn't feel magical?

 

[marcar12]

I definitely agree that the upselling and need to pay for Genie+ isn't "magical"... but I love making the reservations, love looking at my account, and love having the app (which I obsessively stalk leading up to my trip). For me the need to plan is a huge part of the fun and doesn't take away from the experience AT ALL.

 

[rdaky]

I definitely agree that the upselling and need to pay for Genie+ isn't "magical"... but I love making the reservations, love looking at my account, and love having the app (which I obsessively stalk leading up to my trip). For me the need to plan is a huge part of the fun and doesn't take away from the experience AT ALL.

Matt Quimet was president of Disneyland from I think 2003-2006. He left and was at to Cedar Parks as their CEO and then left a few years ago, remained on their board until a few months ago. This is not the first time he has made a negative comment about the ease of going to Disney vs a Cedar Fair park. He has several quotes commenting on how much easier or better the Cedar Fair type parks are for families due to needing to plan or money or other reasons. I take his comments with a grain of salt because this really is no different than a former employee of any company proclaiming why their new company is better.

 

[wabbott]

The rest of the comments are worth reading, especially this one.
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matt...o-the-magic-activity-7140090858019700736-yZQd

Tom Boyles
Retired Chief Customer Officer
5d
He will probably shoot me but Matt maybe the one person who could fix Disney!! He was the best leader I had over a 37 year career, 15 at Disney Parks and Resorts.

 

[Nabas]

WDW was the most enjoyable it’s been in decades during COVID.

No FastPass+, no Genie+, no Lightning Lane.

You just got in line and waited with everyone else, without hundreds walking past you in the express line. It was sooo much more relaxing, knowing you just had to wait your turn rather than stressing over whether you should pay more for a “better” experience, or constantly second guessing yourself if you had picked the “right” attraction using Genie+.

And not having to worry about return windows!

 

[fatmanatee]

Matt Quimet was president of Disneyland from I think 2003-2006. He left and was at to Cedar Parks as their CEO and then left a few years ago, remained on their board until a few months ago. This is not the first time he has made a negative comment about the ease of going to Disney vs a Cedar Fair park. He has several quotes commenting on how much easier or better the Cedar Fair type parks are for families due to needing to plan or money or other reasons. I take his comments with a grain of salt because this really is no different than a former employee of any company proclaiming why their new company is better.

This is useful information.

 

[irlandaise]

This is useful information.

But I don't think it makes anything he said inaccurate.

 

[Mamabun]

Disney is far from perfect, but these issues seem like a reach from someone looking for things to complain about.

Much emphasis on upselling; - Would you rather they didn’t tell you about the things you can get? Cedar Point has a skip-the-line service and VIP experiences and paid PhotoPass for extra money like everyone else. Do they not try to sell these things to you?

caveats regarding required reservations; - Reservations are going away very soon, so good job Disney. Weird that he wouldn’t know that.

signing up for an account; downloading an app; - Who doesn’t have an app nowadays? Cedar Point does. And every app makes you create an account. Downloading the app is a problem? What does that take, 10 seconds?

implication that without the “genie” rides my be unavailable; - I’ve never seen any such implication. Maybe they talk up that genie improves your experience, but implying rides wouldn’t be available? What is he talking about?

entering everyone’s names on the tickets; etc. - Seriously? Again, something that takes seconds to do. Does he ever fly? Does it upset him to put names on those tickets?

 

[reddog21]

I find it hilarious that this guy complains about genie plus but it was under his watch the cedar park introduced fast lane there version of genie plus and it's around 100-300 per person per day(surge pricing similar to Universal).

Someone could correct me if Im wront but I'm pretty sure that when we went to cedar point a few years ago we had to put our names on each ticket and were asked ID for just the adults tickets.

Sounds like a lot of sour grapes!!!

 

[KYMickey]

I definitely agree that the upselling and need to pay for Genie+ isn't "magical"... but I love making the reservations, love looking at my account, and love having the app (which I obsessively stalk leading up to my trip). For me the need to plan is a huge part of the fun and doesn't take away from the experience AT ALL.

Having to plan every move and event of your vacation makes it more like work and takes away the spontaneous way that vacations are supposed to be!

 

[KYMickey]

WDW was the most enjoyable it’s been in decades during COVID.

No FastPass+, no Genie+, no Lightning Lane.

You just got in line and waited with everyone else, without hundreds walking past you in the express line. It was sooo much more relaxing, knowing you just had to wait your turn rather than stressing over whether you should pay more for a “better” experience, or constantly second guessing yourself if you had picked the “right” attraction using Genie+.

And not having to worry about return windows!

That's the way it used to be all the time!

 

[Gocanes0506]

Greed wins out. Its hard for anything to feel magical when Disney charges the prices they do for resorts.

 

[fatmanatee]

But I don't think it makes anything he said inaccurate.

The commentary was fine, but him being at Cedar Parks is clarifying about why this was posted in the first place.

 

[sadiecatie]

Matt Quimet was president of Disneyland from I think 2003-2006. He left and was at to Cedar Parks as their CEO and then left a few years ago, remained on their board until a few months ago. This is not the first time he has made a negative comment about the ease of going to Disney vs a Cedar Fair park. He has several quotes commenting on how much easier or better the Cedar Fair type parks are for families due to needing to plan or money or other reasons. I take his comments with a grain of salt because this really is no different than a former employee of any company proclaiming why their new company is better.

I live 20 minutes from a Cedar Fair park. The last time my husband and I went, we spent most of the day trying not to say some variant of “this is better at Disney.” the running joke the entire trip was that this park was “we have Disney at home.”

 

[ChipnDale79]

He's right. so many of us wont admit because we love disney so much, but he's right.