Brian Noble
Gratefully in Recovery
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2004
It occurred to me today that:
If the Parks are closed, how many people want to go to WDW? Even a DVC owner might think twice. Yes the lodging is "paid for", but transportation and food aren't.
On the other hand, if the resorts are mothballed for say, six months (or longer), there might be real cost savings in operations and those savings can be passed on in the form of lower dues. Looking at OKW's resort budget, and rounding a bit:
Administration & Front Desk: $0.82
Housekeeping: $1.50
Member Activities: $0.24
Transportation: $1.09
That's almost half of annual Dues. Forgo collection of some capital reserves (because there is no wear-and-tear) and a closure might well result in real savings to Members in the form of rebated/credited Dues. Some of that isn't going to be pure savings, there is probably some administrative work that still has to happen, but there might be other costs that go down to balance that: utilities would go down, and the management fee is a percentage of operating costs IIRC.
So, the question is: would you feel differently about a long term closure with points expiring if (a) the theme parks were closed anyway and (b) you'd get a non-trivial fraction of your dues rebated?
- It's hard for me to imagine operating the Parks under any form of social distancing.
- Some form of at least intermittent social distancing is likely necessary until herd immunity takes hold.
- Herd immunity isn't going to happen until a vaccine is developed or a sizeable fraction of the population has "earned" immunity by being sick, and probably recently so.
- Most folks are saying a vaccine takes 1.5 years to develop, test, and scale up. Even if we started in January, we are talking mid-Summer 2021.
- Getting everyone sick quickly seems to require over-running our health care system; probably not a good idea.
If the Parks are closed, how many people want to go to WDW? Even a DVC owner might think twice. Yes the lodging is "paid for", but transportation and food aren't.
On the other hand, if the resorts are mothballed for say, six months (or longer), there might be real cost savings in operations and those savings can be passed on in the form of lower dues. Looking at OKW's resort budget, and rounding a bit:
Administration & Front Desk: $0.82
Housekeeping: $1.50
Member Activities: $0.24
Transportation: $1.09
That's almost half of annual Dues. Forgo collection of some capital reserves (because there is no wear-and-tear) and a closure might well result in real savings to Members in the form of rebated/credited Dues. Some of that isn't going to be pure savings, there is probably some administrative work that still has to happen, but there might be other costs that go down to balance that: utilities would go down, and the management fee is a percentage of operating costs IIRC.
So, the question is: would you feel differently about a long term closure with points expiring if (a) the theme parks were closed anyway and (b) you'd get a non-trivial fraction of your dues rebated?
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