Saturday Feb 8th Magic Kingdom was shoulder to shoulder

[elaine amj]

Am at MK today and it is insanely crowded. There’s evidently a cheer competition in town. But yeah, there are so. Many. People. Here.

It was not all that bad at DHS today. I was there from noon to 3pm and it was quite easy to move around. Even in Galaxy's Edge.

 

[Krisshay13]

My niece is there with cheerleader comps this past week. They are in parks Sat to Mon.... She just sent me a pic in front of the castle....said they will be there until 2AM...….I guess they are doing an after hours thing for the cheerleaders. They've never been before so, I can't wait to hear how it was.

 

[hereforthechurros]

Regardless of “credentials”, most folks believe their own bank accounts. Travel is up nationwide bc many have more disposable income.

Wages have hardly grown enough to afford everyone Disney vacations regardless. Just going by the numbers. Disney released numbers themselves that says attendance is pretty much the same.

I own my own business. Last year was the second worst on record. Husband received a standard small cost of living wage adjustment. We still managed six trips to WDW and it wasn’t because of any change in the economy.

 

[hereforthechurros]

Outside of Christmas, the two busiest days I’ve experienced were in January and February. Seem the jig is up with them being quiet months and has been for a while! Better to plan for that nowadays than to be disappointed.

 

[midnight star]

Seem the gig is up with then being quiet months and has been for a while! Better to plan for that nowadays than to be disappointed.

That's honestly the smartest way to go. I get no one wants to be smothered in crowds, but Disney is just crowded. There really isn't a low crowd time anymore. There's marathons, cheer comps, school trips, tourist groups, random school holidays in neighboring states. Same with DL. Just do your best to plan for them. If it's not as crowded, that's a win. If it is, you're prepared for it.

 

[xipotec]

WDW has just gotten very good at getting the word out on the less traveled times.

Rooms are still cheaper this time of year and people are taking advantage to sneak in cheaper trips.

attendance may actually be down during peak times due to pricing and word getti NV out on the street about crowd levels.

as a previous poster said, they have gotten better at spreading out the crowds.

 

[lorenae]

I really think the crowded feeling comes from, well, the crowds. But not because there are a ton of more people there per day, although that has increased. I really think it’s because of the “parties” and DAH. They shortened the park hours a huge amount on a day to day basis, so instead of having a range of times for people to come and go, from 8 AM EMH to 11 PM, with the much shorter hours people don’t tend to come in staggered times or leave at staggered times, so everyone is there at the same time.

Having parks close at 8 PM is really crazy with the amount of people there these days.

 

[wilkydelts]

Wages have hardly grown enough to afford everyone Disney vacations regardless. Just going by the numbers. Disney released numbers themselves that says attendance is pretty much the same.

I own my own business. Last year was the second worst on record. Husband received a standard small cost of living wage adjustment. We still managed six trips to WDW and it wasn’t because of any change in the economy.

Using only your personal story as the end all be all standard and reference point for ALL people who visit Disney seems very near sighted. Many people save and build to go, some just have expendable income, and many are now able to go to do the uptick in the overall economy and their personal finances. Today's economic growth has had an effect on countless people even if you are not personally growing from it.

 

[wilbret]

Wages have hardly grown enough to afford everyone Disney vacations regardless. Just going by the numbers. Disney released numbers themselves that says attendance is pretty much the same.

I own my own business. Last year was the second worst on record. Husband received a standard small cost of living wage adjustment. We still managed six trips to WDW and it wasn’t because of any change in the economy.

Looks like you are in Michigan or general vicinity? I’d say regional bias is at play. Everyone from there is moving...here. Might not be bright and sunny there, yet. Hopefully it picks up.

I’m in the construction products biz, my category was up 20%. My product is in, well, every single thing that is built, lol.

Point being, consumer confidence is sky high right now. Plus, this is not a politics board, so Mickey Mouse!!

 

[elaine amj]

The whole week was relatively uncrowded. Then Saturday was the one day MK was open until 10pm instead of 8pm. So naturally it was packed. And Epcot has the Festival so busy all weekend.

 

[wilbret]

That's honestly the smartest way to go. I get no one wants to be smothered in crowds, but Disney is just crowded. There really isn't a low crowd time anymore. There's marathons, cheer comps, school trips, tourist groups, random school holidays in neighboring states. Same with DL. Just do your best to plan for them. If it's not as crowded, that's a win. If it is, you're prepared for it.

yep! And I believe Disney will continue to improve how they manage the crowds, from opening new rides and maybe even a new park, to simply improving the fast pass system.

New Universal park may help in the near future? (Might make it worse, lol...)

 

[hereforthechurros]

Using only your personal story as the end all be all standard and reference point for ALL people who visit Disney seems very near sighted. Many people save and build to go, some just have expendable income, and many are now able to go to do the uptick in the overall economy and their personal finances. Today's economic growth has had an effect on countless people even if you are not personally growing from it.

The person I was responding to shared that personally their bank account was up so I responded with my personal experience. Agreed neither are universal. But if you read through this entire thread, you’ll see many reasons for crowds this time of year: cooler temps, avoiding the holidays, avoiding Star Wars hoopla, WDW offering discounts and incentives for foreign travelers and youth groups, shorter park hours, longer waits due to less ride capacity and CM staffing. Per Disney’s own figures, attendance being up is not one of them.

I’ve experienced it myself years ago in February on what I expected to be a 1/2 weekend which was really a 9/10 at the end of the day.

And while credentials and education may not matter to some I get great info from my husband who has a masters in Econ & business, has been an Econ professor, and is a senior economist who meets with everyone from Fortune 50 companies to mom & pop shops to measure inflation, track wages and benefits, etc. so I trust his pulse on the economy which is obviously an extremely complicated matter not dictated by one metric.

Reminder I have never said the economy is doing poorly, this all started because I said the economy booming was a “stretch.”

 

[hereforthechurros]

Looks like you are in Michigan or general vicinity? I’d say regional bias is at play. Everyone from there is moving...here. Might not be bright and sunny there, yet. Hopefully it picks up.

I’m in the construction products biz, my category was up 20%. My product is in, well, every single thing that is built, lol.

Point being, consumer confidence is sky high right now. Plus, this is not a politics board, so Mickey Mouse!!

I actually moved from the west coast to the Midwest! Glad your industry is seeing success. I would never wish hard times on anyone. Luckily we are fine and still high in the percentage for income in this country. We were 10 years ago and still are now.

No one has mentioned politics at all.

You want low crowds go in September!

 

[WoolBaby]

We were at Epcot yesterday and AK today. It was insanely busy. Cheerleaders everywhere both days. They were well behaved - they were just everywhere. If you spit, you would hit one of them, It was the adults who were super cranky, I noticed, cursing about all the cheerleaders. Wait times for FOP hit 235 minutes today. Everything was a long wait yesterday and today.

We were here at the same time 5 years ago and it was nothing like this. With the insane crowds, the extremely long wait times, the disappointment of having to miss our ROTR ride on Friday due very poor performance / conflicting ADR (our boarding group got called 3 mins before dinner ADR at MK so no way would we have made it back in the hour that they gave us plus it took BOG 50 mins from our ADR at 6 PM to seat us so we missed HEA fireworks), the changes for VAH, and the short park hours, this has already not been a great trip so far.

I’m trying to scale back on my expectations, but Disney is not a cheap vacation And doubly so given the exchange rate for Canadians. I love Disney but it Is hard when so much planning goes into a trip and when you spend tens of thousands of dollars on an 8 day trip, it is hard to not have expectations. Our last trip, we did everything we wanted and repeated a few experiences. We are barely getting anything done this trip due to the crowds. I know: this is the new normal and I need to get used to it.

i could use the same amount of money in an 8 day WDW trip for a trip to Europe and have a beautiful vacation complete with amazing service and good food (sorry, I think the food at Disney is bad compared to what I am used eating for the same price). I have a value-driven personality. Right now, the amount of return / enjoyment I am getting for the amount of money I am spending Is very low.

i will likely come back to WDW one day, but not anytime soon. Our last trip was so magical while this trip has been... not magical. But I am thankful that this a first world problem.

 

[KateKJ]

Thank you to those in this thread giving honest accounts of the crowds and the experiences this week. I think it's helping me temper my expectations for my Spring Break trip. Honestly reading some of the FP threads you almost get the idea that it's easy to refresh your way onto all the rides you want, exactly when you want to ride them. This thread has been a bit of a reality check for me. I haven't even been able to book FPs yet b/c I'm staying off-site, so I'm keeping my expectations low and will try to just enjoy the overall experience instead of being disappointed that I can't ride everything I want and get 10 FPs a day

 

[elaine amj]

Thank you to those in this thread giving honest accounts of the crowds and the experiences this week. I think it's helping me temper my expectations for my Spring Break trip. Honestly reading some of the FP threads you almost get the idea that it's easy to refresh your way onto all the rides you want, exactly when you want to ride them. This thread has been a bit of a reality check for me. I haven't even been able to book FPs yet b/c I'm staying off-site, so I'm keeping my expectations low and will try to just enjoy the overall experience instead of being disappointed that I can't ride everything I want and get 10 FPs a day

Refresh was interesting this week. FPs are definitely more heavily used than ever before so they are correspondingly harder to get.

But refresh still works in many ways - you just have to click it so many more times. Even for "easy to get" rides. I couldn't even get a last minute Beauty and the Beast FP at noon today!

And I was shocked when at times the app showed pretty much no availability in the entire park (can't remember which park, but probably DHS). Just keep refreshing though. I was even able to get a last minute Toy Story Mania and Star Tours for the same day (today). I eventually cancelled them as DH wanted to just stroll around DHS today.

On top of that, Grand Floridian Cafe was actually reservations only today! I thought this was a walk up restaurant?! Especially at 10:30am! I wonder if it was Sunday brunch ppl? (BTW, the food is excellent).

 

[Donzie]

We were at Epcot yesterday and AK today. It was insanely busy. Cheerleaders everywhere both days. They were well behaved - they were just everywhere. If you spit, you would hit one of them, It was the adults with that were super cranky, I noticed, cursing about all the cheerleaders. Wait times for FOP hit 235 minutes today. Everything was a long wait yesterday and today.

We were here at the same time 5 years ago and it was nothing like this. With the insane crowds, the extremely long wait times, the disappointment of having to miss our ROTR ride on Friday due very poor performance / conflicting ADR (our boarding group got called 3 mins before dinner ADR at MK so no way would we have made it back in the hour that they gave us plus it took BOG 50 mins from our ADR at 6 PM to seat us so we missed HEA fireworks), the changes for VAH, and the short park hours, this has already not been a great trip so far.

I’m trying to scale back on my expectation, but Disney is not a cheap vacation And doubly so given the exchange rate for Canadians. I love Disney but it Is hard when so much planning goes into a trip and when you spend tens of thousands of dollars on an 8 day trip, it is hard to not have expectations. Our last trip, we did everything we wanted and repeated a few experiences. We are barely getting anything done this trip due to the crowds. I know: this is the new normal and I need to get used to it.

i could use the same amount of money in an 8 day WDW trip for a trip to Europe and have a beautiful vacation complete with amazing service and good food (sorry, I think the food at Disney is bad compared to what I am used eating for the same price). I am a value-driven personality. Right now, the amount of return / enjoyment I am getting for the amount of money I am spending Is very low.

i will likely come back to WDW one day, but not anytime soon. Our last trip was so magical while this trip has been... not magical. But I am thankful that this a first world problem.

I had gone at this time for 4 years straight and wanted to do this year. DW said nope, crowds are getting to be too much for her and she didn't want to pull our kids from school. I didn't push and planned a school's out trip. Thank goodness we were not there the last 2 days or she may not have ever wanted to go again. Everything you feel she has seen the last several years. Cost versus crowds and overall fun is not there for her anymore. I am planning a last week of May trip, not expecting the crowds to be any better than what you experienced, though. But I and the kids refuse to give up just yet. Not sure how many more times I can convince her this is a worthwhile vacation expense.

 

[elaine amj]

I had gone at this time for 4 years straight and wanted to do this year. DW said nope, crowds are getting to be too much for her and she didn't want to pull our kids from school. I didn't push and planned a school's out trip. Thank goodness we were not there the last 2 days or she may not have ever wanted to go again. Everything you feel she has seen the last several years. Cost versus crowds and overall fun is not there for her anymore. I am planning a last week of May trip, not expecting the crowds to be any better than what you experienced, though. But I and the kids refuse to give up just yet. Not sure how many more times I can convince her this is a worthwhile vacation expense.

The crowds just don't bother me too much really. We spent last week there and also did Epcot on NYE and DHS/MK for Dec 30. With FPs and careful planning, we didn't wait much in any lines.

This past week we did a chilled out, no major rides trip and didn't wait in any lines really. Except for the Tangled lantern photo - I insisted on waiting 30 mins for that haha!

 

[CastAStone]

All 9s and 10s on Sunday again.


One problem with Disney using ticket pricing to spread out the crowds is that their revenue per guest is lower in the “off-season” but the parks Are still packed. Then Disney doesn’t want to extend hours because with lower prices per ticket, they want to save that money somewhere else.

It’s not great.

 

[maxiesmom]

Using only your personal story as the end all be all standard and reference point for ALL people who visit Disney seems very near sighted. Many people save and build to go, some just have expendable income, and many are now able to go to do the uptick in the overall economy and their personal finances. Today's economic growth has had an effect on countless people even if you are not personally growing from it.

There is no massive economic growth. Most people I know are very leery with regards to the economy. Disney is getting better at filling the parks by various means. Making hours shorter, luring people in with discounts.