Some great Sentinel Articles

[anim8or98]

Wow. I never thought I'd put "great" and "Sentinel" in the same sentence!

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/tourism/orl-asec-decade040202.story?coll=orl-home-headlines


http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busi...ns02040202apr02.story?coll=orl-home-headlines

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busi...st02040202apr02.story?coll=orl-home-headlines

One is about Disney Decade Plans that never happened.

One is about "What's coming" for Orlando theme parks.

One is about Disney Quest.

 

[kenjean]

Quote: "And executives point to recent surveys showing that typical theme-park guests spend only 3. percent of their time on rides."

I guess the other 97% is spent standing in line.

 

[jfap]

Egg-zactly!!!

I was just getting ready to make the same comment when I read your post.

I sometimes wonder,though, at how scientific the figures are.

 

[kenjean]

My statistics teacher had a saying, "Statistics is an art form. The numbers are as accurate as you want them to be"

 

[All Aboard]

That misplaced period after the 3 leads me to believe that it was supposed to be 30 percent.

The best nugget from that article is:

"Their strength is creating fantasy illusion. I can go anywhere for a thrill ride. But I can only take my kid to Small World at Disney; there's nothing else like it," Linkenheimer said. "And it doesn't have a lot of expensive technology."

Linkenheimer is the president of the American Coaster Enthusiasts (which, I believe, has something to do with being enthusiastic about thrill rides.)

 

[daannzzz]

"And executives point to recent surveys showing that typical theme-park guests spend only 3. percent of their time on rides"
This is the kind of "survey" information that is so irritating. How did the come by this figure? Is that what the gusts themselves say or is this done through other measuring means. In any case the quote above makes it sound like it is the guests decision to spend only 3 percent of their time on rides. Hmmm. Yes.... "We don't need to build new rides. It's obvious by are survey numbers that they don't really want to go on rides that much." !!!! Sigh.

 

[hopemax]

Let's see there are 24 hours in a day and 60 minutes in an hour so people have 1440 minutes each day. If people are averaging only 3% of their time on the rides that means 43.2 minutes a day. Now while there are exceptions, like IASW, Splash, Pirates most "rides" are under 5 minutes (not including time spent in line). Shows on the other hand are longer, but the survey is talking about "rides" not "attractions" so they're probably is another category for the time spent in "shows." So 43 minutes, and if the "ride" is an average of 4 minutes long, that's 10 rides per day on average. I think that makes sense for the "average" theme park guest.

 

[larworth]

Some interesting food for debate.

The '90s were an attractions arms race. That has led them [the parks] to a level of sophistication and COST where they would rather not be," said Bob Rogers

"I don't buy the idea that it's always got to be new hardware," Gault said

There is no way in the creative, imaginative market that we have today to really predict how fast things will change that might affect how a planned attraction might do in 10 years," Disney World President Al Weiss said

The perception is they invested too much in expensive to build and maintain attractions. We’ve talked about saturation being a factor, but this implies they also may now see it as too inherently risky and…

These days, amusement is increasingly a buyer's market. Staying ahead of an easily impressed constituency is giving way to keeping up with an increasingly disenchanted one whose expectations are rapidly rising

...no longer a good business model. Too expensive today to try to “wow and amaze” people with hard assets?

Coincidentally, I recently had some additional correspondance with M. Sklar. The one theme he picked up on was my concern about declining capital investment. He commented how many of their most popular attractions were not their biggest budget. He acknowledged how expensive developing ride based attractions was and ended by encouraging me again to check out Philarmagic (no mention of SPACE).

Neither of these does anything to counter my fear that the days of the mega E ticket are past (at least fewer and farther between).

 

[FriendsOfEeyore]

Putting aside discount and hopper passes:

Assuming:

You pay $52 to get into the park
Only ride the "rides"
The average person spends 43.2 minutes on "rides"
You spend 8 hours in the park

Result is that you only paid like $4.68 to ride the rides. See Disney is a bargin after all!!!!!
Man, the shows, shopping, and all that walking around really costs you some money.

sorry

Edward

 

[raidermatt]

Assuming the "3.%" is not a misprint (?), Hopemax has outlined how 3% could easily be accurate. Nothing wrong with that. The key is, how is that information used?

At WDW and DLResort, more than other amusement/theme parks, guests DO want more than just new rides. Main Street at DL and MK is a big draw, yet its not a ride. Same with the castles. So hopefully, the point is that while new rides do need to be added, there also needs to be significant amount of attention paid to the overall park/resort experience. Themeing, story-telling, etc. And perhaps there are cases where the $100 million for a new ride could be better spent on an immersive, less than "thrilling", story type ride that only costs $30 million. (Pirates type vs. Rock n Roller Coaster). At least a portion of the remaining $70 million might be better spent on things like Main Street.

I think that's really what many of us have been saying all along.

Of course, I don't know if that's what will actually happen, but its a nice thought.

While I'm hoping Space is a great attraction, one that is well-themed, immersive, and all those other words we love, I don't think every new attraction has to have that kind of monetary investment to be something of which Disney can be proud. I'm fine with "Space"-scale attractions not coming rapid-fire. But I'd like to see more from the "smaller" scale newer attractions, like Aladdin and DR.

I actually find the tone of the first article and comments encouraging, since it hints not at refusing to spend money, but rather at making better use of that money to target their corp audiences.

 

[Sarangel]

Interestingly enough, what the 'future of the themeparks' article seems to be saying is the same thing we've been saying all along about both the parks and the movies -- Disney (in order to *be* Disney) must tell a good story to captivate its guests. That's all we want, but they don't seem to realize that. I doubt any of us would complain about 'another cheap spinner' if it were integrated into a story that unfolded as we entered and rode the attraction.

The 'Nightmare' overlay to the haunted mansion didn't seem to be all that difficult to achieve, but was a wonderful experience for the holidays and had lines all day long while it was up.

Sarangel

 

[wdwguide]

Interesting article, although there are a few mistakes.

Weiss is predicting a big buzz when Epcot's "Mission: Space" thrill ride -- originally announced by Eisner as part of the Disney Decade -- opens in 2003.

Not true; plans for the Space pavilion predates the Disney decade by more than eight years. In fact, it is mentioned in the promotional material that was released when EPCOT Center first opened way back in 1982.