Marcie's Corner: Marcie Sets the Record Straight

[Michael]

Originally posted by tangaroa


These are some quotes from an Reuters article that seem to back up woody's position:

Attendance at Disney's parks, which accounted for 40 percent of the company's operating income in its most recent reporting quarter, has improved steadily in the United States in recent months, said spokeswoman Leslie Goodman.

"Business has continued to improve, even though we're not back to same business levels as last year overall," she said. "We've seen many optimistic signs including strong bookings at the resort hotels in southern California and Florida."

While the signs appear positive, the lack of discounts may reflect Disney's attitude that such promotions might not work now, said analyst Dennis McAlpine of McAlpine Associates.

"The main weakness is foreign, and doing promotions isn't going to bring them in," McAlpine said. "I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that things are wonderful."



That seems kind of silly actually. Attendance is higher because of discounts - so they're going to get rid of them? What happens if attendance drops again after June 19?

It definately sounds like they just think the discounts aren't working anymore. If the discounts WERE working - why get rid of them now. And if they weren't working - why still have them?

Discounts work at any theme park no matter how you look at it. Especially a deep discount such as getting an Adult ticket at the child price. The discounts are offered to an audience they believe it will bring guests into the park to generate revenue. You know guests traveling more than 200 miles are going to spend the money since they are on a vacation away from home that is longer than just a day trip.

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by MarcieMI
I would say that was a smart business decision. Wouldn't you?

Doesn't that depend on what the AP holders are spending once they get to the park? If the vast majority of APs are just coming for a few hours and not buying anything, then they are just taking up space. Disney isn't making any money off of them except for the initial annual pass purchase.

BUT, if the majority are buying meals and souveniers on each of their visits, then I would imagine that this business decision would make more sense.

[tangaroa]

Originally posted by Michael


Discounts work at any theme park no matter how you look at it. Especially a deep discount such as getting an Adult ticket at the child price. The discounts are offered to an audience they believe it will bring guests into the park to generate revenue. You know guests traveling more than 200 miles are going to spend the money since they are on a vacation away from home that is longer than just a day trip.

That obviously depends on who you offer the discount to.

DCA discounts have been in place for almost a year now right? I'm guessing most people living in So Cal make a trip out to Disneyland maybe once or twice a year. So the reasoning here is that all of those people have already made their yearly trips to the park - and those people simply can't afford - or aren't interested in making another trip BECAUSE of the discount. So the discounts just don't work anymore.

[Michael]

Originally posted by tangaroa


That obviously depends on who you offer the discount to.

DCA discounts have been in place for almost a year now right? I'm guessing most people living in So Cal make a trip out to Disneyland maybe once or twice a year. So the reasoning here is that all of those people have already made their yearly trips to the park - and those people simply can't afford - or aren't interested in making another trip BECAUSE of the discount. So the discounts just don't work anymore.

But wouldn't you think Marketing looked at what type of redemption the discount offered last year to what they were projecting this year?

[Darkbeer]

Originially posted by MarcieMI
Darkbeer, somehow you seem to suggest that AP's should not be part of DCA's attendance figures. As if somehow AP's do not count or shouldn't be apart of the attendance count.

What I am saying is that you are comparing apples to oranges....

Last year, very few people had AP's to DCA (less than 50,000 using the numbers you provided).

This Year, once again, based on your numbers, 400,000 more folks have AP's to DCA, if each AP visits DCA just three times in a year, that would add over a million visitors to the attendance numbers.(and I think that the average amount of visits to the park in a year is higher than three).

Now, using the Amusement Business numbers, last year DCA had about 5 million visitors.

So, the additional AP attendance is making up over 20% of the current attendance figures, based on the fact you say that DCA attendance is "up slightly".

Also, Disney is promoting and discounting the multi-day park-hopper passes, you can get these new summer (save over 20%) passes at Disney Stores, on line, etc.....

So Disney is trying to get the turnstyle numbers up, but how, by having guests already at the resort and in Disneyland to run over to DCA for a couple of hours. So we have now many folks who used to count just once (at the DL turnstyle), now being counted twice (once at the DL turnstyle, and a second time at the DCA turnstyle). And really, how much more money will these folks spend, they are only going to eat so much in a day, so more cokes are sold at DCA, but now less cokes will be sold at DL....

If you want to see if the current offerings and attractions at DCA are drawing people to the resort, wouldn't a better test be the amount of Single-day DCA only tickets sold?????

How many of those tickets sold last year at this time, compared to number sold this year....

Originally posted by MarcieMI
The general feeling among TDA folks from evaluating how the new park is doing in actual guest counts is that the attendance has stabilized and rebounded enough at DCA that a discount during the summer for the local audience wasn't needed.

So the attendance has stabilized, but how, and why???? TDA has gone out of its way to make sure that the turnstyle numbers are staying close to last years number, but how, not by the increase of sales of tickets, but by getting current Disneyland guests (multi-day folks, and Annual pass holders) to spend a bit of their day at DCA, the AP prices went up $10 for SoCal's and Deluxe's, and were no extra charge for the Premium's. the multi-day passports are being discounted, also bringing in less revenue. These folks are already at the resort, so the amount of food and drink remains about the same, just now spread out over a larger area)

So if you look at the amount of revenue produced by the sale of DCA tickets last year at this time versus this year, how much LESS revenue is being produced???????

[tangaroa]

Originally posted by Michael
But wouldn't you think Marketing looked at what type of redemption the discount offered last year to what they were projecting this year?

I don't quite understand what you're trying to suggest.

Are you saying that they offered less of a discount this year because they figured less people would come out?

[Maxdad]

If the separate gate counts say attendance is up, then attendance is up, whether they go to one or two parks in a single day. Just as often as there are daily park hoppers, there are those who just go for a short visit to just one of the parks; and the two park pass increases overall visitation; instead of maybe five trips per year, they increase to eight (or whatever the number may be). An increase is an increase is an increase.
The idea of a double pass is for this purpose alone: to increase the amount of time a guest is in either park. It really doesn't matter which one, just as long as they buy pins, churros, and whatever. That's where the money is.
Any marketing effort that increases an individual's time in the Resort area is a win, no matter which piece of real estate contains their feet.
My bet is the real profit takes place in Downtown Disney. Any other argument (like Al and his disciples trying to argue attendance numbers) is a waste of time.

[Marcie]

Originally posted by tangaroa


These are some quotes from an Reuters article that seem to back up woody's position:

Attendance at Disney's parks, which accounted for 40 percent of the company's operating income in its most recent reporting quarter, has improved steadily in the United States in recent months, said spokeswoman Leslie Goodman.

"Business has continued to improve, even though we're not back to same business levels as last year overall," she said. "We've seen many optimistic signs including strong bookings at the resort hotels in southern California and Florida."

While the signs appear positive, the lack of discounts may reflect Disney's attitude that such promotions might not work now, said analyst Dennis McAlpine of McAlpine Associates.

"The main weakness is foreign, and doing promotions isn't going to bring them in," McAlpine said. "I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that things are wonderful."



That seems kind of silly actually. Attendance is higher because of discounts - so they're going to get rid of them? What happens if attendance drops again after June 19?

It definately sounds like they just think the discounts aren't working anymore. If the discounts WERE working - why get rid of them now. And if they weren't working - why still have them?

You are mixing the messages here from what the analyst was trying to say. The announcement that Disney was making was primarily referring to no further local discounts for the summer. The analyst was referring to discounts being offered to entice travel to the WDW and DLR from domestic and international guests. That is why he refers to the problem being in the foreign market, which is severaly hurting WDW's business. He is not referring to the current local discount at Disneyland Resort at all.

Just in your statement here alone you say in the first half of your post with the quotes from the analyst that the discounts may no longer be working. Then in the second half of your post who attribute the higher attendance to the discounts. Which one is it? If the discounts are responsible for producing higher attendance numbers (which I'm glad to see that one of you is finally acknowledging that DCA's attendance is higher contrary to Al's report), then why would Disney stop them for the summer season? Unless, Disney feels confident from all of their own internal research that a discount is not needed to sustain the increase in attendance.

Actually, that is the reason of why Disney decided to not offer any discounts for the local market this summer. And using your logic here about discounts no longer having any effect on the attendance, why does Knott's, Universal, Magic Mountain and others offer discounts virtually yearround? Why would it be that a discount that runs for about 6 months at Disneyland Resort would somehow no longer be working, yet be working at all these other amusement parks that seem to never stop discounting?

Doesn't make any sense at all in your arguement. The analyst's comments were referring to something else and you are trying to use his comments to validate your suggestion that DCA cannot even win with discounts any longer and that is why Disney will not offer any this summer. The two are completely opposite.

plpeters70 AP's do spend lots of money at the Resort. Perhaps not as much as a domestic or international tourist, but typically Disney does make a good sum of money off each AP on average. So, getting the bodies into the park whether it is with an AP or a complimentary ticket, there is still food and some merchandise revenue that is generated off each of these guests who didn't have to buy a ticket to get in.

Darkbeer, where in the world did you get this 20% figure on making up DCA's attendance? That is completely incorrect and way too high. Nowhere in my statements did I give you that number.

As to your comments about Disney promoting the discount on the Multi-Day Passports. Of course, Disneyland stands to benefit from more people buying the Multi-Day Passports too. Why is it that Disney discounting the Multi-Day Passport only reflects DCA? Kind of lopsided in the arguement here. Maybe Disney discounted the Multi-Day Passports because domestic travel has suffered badly from the recession last year and 9/11. Disneyland Resort, along with thousands of other tourist destinations around the world had to begin to aggressively compete for travelers with all kinds of promotional offers including discounts. WDW offered massive discounts with the hotel rooms on property. Disneyland offered discounts through the Multi-Day Passports. It is all part of the business to respond to economic conditions that effect all tourist related businesses and each one has to react accordingly to grab a portion of the pie.

I must correct your apparent ignorance on how the ticket media works at Disneyland Resort. When a guest enters their first park for the day regardless if they are a Multi-Day ticket holder or AP, that first count goes to that park for the daily count. When that guest leaves and enters another park in the sameday, their count is reflected as a re-entry and not apart of that 2nd park's daily count.

So, DCA does not benefit in its daily count from those who enter Disneyland first for the day and then wander over to DCA later in the day. The same goes in reverse. That guest is only counted once each day as part of the actual count of the first park they entered. That, in some ways, skews Disneyland's numbers higher and short changes DCA because many AP's and Multi-Day ticketholders go to Disneyland first due to the earlier opening time in the morning. Then head to DCA later in the day. Disneyland gets the count, DCA doesn't.

As far as Disney is concerned they are really only focused on how many people overall are on property in both parks combined that day and not just one of the parks for a daily count. If Disneyland only brought in one day 40,000 people when it was all by itself and now with DCA there are 55,000 people on the same day during the same time period a year later, then that is 15,000 more that wouldn't have been there if it were not for DCA.

I would like to say one other thing regarding attendance numbers. I know there is Galaxie and Westsider and Al who all give their little "numbers" report and so forth as evidence of DCA's failure. However, many say that when they visit the park it sure seems busier than what these alleged numbers portray. The main reason is exactly what I mentioned above. Many Multi-Day ticketholders and AP's visit Disneyland first in the day and then go to DCA later in the day. If someone was to get a hold of the daily count of DCA, they will not see in those numbers the folks who went to Disneyland first. They will only see the guests who entered DCA first for the day. That skews the numbers in a major way. In some cases it could be as high as 2,000 to 5,000 of park hoppers who are jumping from Disneyland where their count was registered first and to DCA where they are considered a re-entry, therefore not being attributed to the actual daily count. So, if DCA shows an actual count of 13,000 on a Saturday, it could actually be closer to 16,000 to 18,000 due to these park hoppers that were counted over at Disneyland.

Kind of deceptive and why these so-called insiders should be careful of what they are saying, because they do not fully understand how the attendance tracking system works. Therefore their information isn't accurate at all.

Darkbeer, you are correct that if Disney wanted to track single-day tickets to see which park is attracting more that is certainly one avenue. Disney already does know that information as they can easily track how many guests have entered each park and on what ticket media. However, that doesn't prove much at all. Disney is going after the Multi-Day ticket counts and that is the area they are working hard to increase - not single day tickets.

Remember, DCA is not here to stand on its own as a destination park separate from Disneyland. It is here to suppliment additional days for guests to stay at the resort longer. That is why the Multi-Day ticket counts are so much more important than single day tickets. Locals are used to fill gaps inbetween peak seasons. Not as a means to carry all of the attendance year round with just single day tickets.

Oh, and revenue is actually up right now over last spring. The stores and to a smaller extent the restaurants in both parks are doing better year-to-date. That is due in large part because more domestic guests are coming to Anaheim over last year at this time.

[plpeters70]

Originally posted by Maxdad
If the separate gate counts say attendance is up, then attendance is up, whether they go to one or two parks in a single day.

But if you're going to look at attendance for the ENTIRE Disney Resort, then the count needs to be substantionally higher than when it was just Disneyland in order to justify the cost of the added park. If they are just getting the same number of people coming that would have come with just Disneyland, or a number only slightly higher, then that probably isn't enough to justify the cost of running two parks.

[Maxdad]

Plp, There you go again... (sigh). :rolleyes:

Ok. Dang it you are right. May as well turn it back into a parking lot.

Jeez.

(PS). Yeah, Marci! You go girl! You have the facts to back up what I'm saying. Especially how counts are counted.