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Happy Birthdays (continued)
Let's look at the pros and cons of the promotion as a whole (which, let's
be honest, probably means focusing only on the "big three" prizes you have
to choose from):
PROS:
- Unlike YOAMD, where you only had a CHANCE to win, this time you
are guaranteed to win if you come on the right day. I'm very much in
favor of that. The Dream FastPasses in YOAMD made a select few folks
happy each day, but also made others annoyed that they didn't win. And
your chances were not very good. I visit WDW at least two times per
week, so for the past 18 months I've set foot inside a WDW park 150
times, and yet I've only been awarded FastPasses twice and Mouse Ears
once (granted, the odds of winning are better if you visit very early in
the morning, which we didn't always do). This new promotion very neatly
sidesteps all that.
- There's something simple, almost primal, in the tagline for this
promotion. "Free admission on your birthday" offers a simplicity and
comprehensibility lacking in other recent park initiatives, like say
"wait in line now or get a ticket to return later and wait in a short
line instead, but only if you aren't holding such a ticket from another
ride…unless of course it's after the two hour window…but then again, you
can be within the two hour window if this ride is unlinked from the
other ride." By contrast, this is simple stuff. Come on your birthday,
bring documentation, and get in free. Don't want free admission? Pick
one of these other two prizes instead.
- Unlike YOAMD, where the connections from the promotion to
increased frequency of trips and resultant profits were always fuzzy at
best, it looks like a straight shot to me. Free Admission will drive
traffic to the parks. At Disneyland, there are over 20 million folks
who live within easy driving distance but have no annual pass to the
parks. Surely a good chunk – maybe even a couple million of them (that's
only 10%!) – will want to get in free on their birthday. And when they
come, they will spend money on souvenirs perhaps, and food for sure.
Disney will make money. Moreover, they won't come along. These
infrequent visitors will bring someone along – and that person will have
to pay, so it's not like Disney is giving away the farm. The customers
win (to them, it feels like a 2 for 1 promotion), and Disney wins.
Disney wins especially big, in fact, because one-day customers pay more
at the gate and buy more souvenirs than annual passholders. At Walt
Disney World, there are fewer locals, but I could easily see the
marketing campaign provide that extra last incentive needed to convince
folks to make the trip after all. For them, it may not be the one day of
free admission for one person in the party which convinces them, but
rather, the Family FastPass. That would be especially useful at a park
with a lot of rides such as the Magic Kingdom, and it works for the
whole family (though not, apparently, on more than four rides).
CONS:
- The potential exists that this promotion could cheapen the Disney
experience. Quick: what's a typical place to go for your kid's
birthday? Many folks might say Chuck E. Cheese. It's possible that guilt
by association could set in, making Disney feel like an oversize arcade.
While I think I understand this potential negative, I'm not sure I agree
with it. The psychological link is pretty tenuous. And Disney has done
this sort of thing before, via the State Fair promotions in 1987-1988,
when the park transformed into something you could otherwise visit. For
purists this was a trying time, but when all was said and done, the park
suffered little lasting damage, physically or in the memory of the
visitors.
- The press release makes ominous noises about the parks being
decked out in celebration mode. If done right, this could look
festive (I didn't mind Party Gras as an overlay, for instance). But if
done wrong, this could look pretty cheesy. I do not want to see
Cinderella Castle decorated as a giant pink birthday cake, a sight that
occurred within the past decade but one that I mercifully never had to
see with my own eyes.
- The "celebration" theme, while generic enough to expand beyond
birthdays to other celebrations (first vacation without a stroller! Last
trip before son begins Navy Academy!), is almost TOO generic. It
comes as no surprise that they've kept the look/feel to the YOAMD
banners – blue sky, puffy clouds, and blandness defined. They can do
better.
- Here's a potential downside: what if this marketing scheme is
successful? Why, then you would be stuck with the result: increased
crowds. That's good for the company, bad for the customer, especially if
the crowds mean longer lines.
Of course, the above considerations don't really take into account one of
the most relevant discussion points: what about the annual passholders?
(That's especially true here on MiceAge, where a much higher percentage of
the readership holds an annual pass compared to the ratio you'd find at any
given moment inside the park, riding Splash Mountain).
I don't know about your family, but mine was instantaneously happy with
this promotion. We don't need the free admission, since we bought annual
passes, and we don't really need the FastPasses since we can accrue those
slowly, on visits spread out over several weeks. Unlike tourists, we aren't
in a hurry. That leaves the gift card. The cash value of the prize is so
good, I had to look on the website several times to make sure it really did
apply to annual passholders. It does. So all I have to do is drive to the
park on my birthday, at any part of the day, poke my head in Main Gate, and
receive a gift card for $75 (the cost of single-day admission here in
Orlando) that can be used on merchandise? Amazing! Sure, it's 40 miles away
and perhaps $10 in gas, but look at how much money I'm reaping in
merchandise.
Granted, it's not carte blanche – the gift card won't work on the
"operating participants" (i.e., the stores that Disney doesn't own). And a
moment of reflection brings the realization that Disney merchandise has some
pretty big markups on them anyway, so my $75 card might only cost Disney $15
or $20 in actual costs. If I buy a single meal they've made their money
back.
But what if I don't buy a single meal? What if I show up for just long
enough to spend that free gift card? Well, then, what we've got in practice
is the equivalent of a discount on the price of my annual pass. A pretty
significant discount, in fact. Why in the world is Disney doing this? Partly
the answer must be "because they can't discriminate against local and
frequent visitors," but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt
and also call it an intentional reward for loyalty.
And that makes sense when you remember the economic conditions at the
moment. When the economy tanks, you need the locals to really step up. After
September 11, 2001, they courted WDW locals by installing a lounge for
annual passholders above the Land pavilion (including, apparently, free
sodas). Seen in that light, this makes perfect sense. Rather than drop the
price of the annual pass – an admission of weakness in the cutthroat world
of theme park competition – they instead provide a benefit that functions as
a de facto savings.
In fact, I could even see this program driving those without annual
passes to consider getting one. Sure, the face price of the pass hasn't gone
down, but now you get a free $75 gift card on your birthday, so it's almost
as good as the same size discount on your annual pass purchase. Not too
shabby. Disney, meanwhile, will make loads of money off such converts. When
they convince people to become annual passholders, they get the benefit of
visitors who will come again and again, each time hopefully eating some food
at inflated prices and buying souvenirs. At least every once in a while,
anyway. Now, then, whether or not the overall experience at the parks is
enhanced or damaged by additional passholders is a discussion I'll leave for
another time.
So look again what prizes you have: free admission, a merchandise gift
card, or a Family FastPass. In my book, those correspond exactly with the
three audiences who go to Disney parks: locals without an annual pass,
passholders who visit frequently, and folks who visit infrequently but don't
live nearby (the latter group may or may not have annual passes, but are
likely to choose the Family FastPass). I'll say it again: brilliant. No
matter who you are or what your situation looks like, chances are good that
one of those three prizes is ideal for you, and sounds enticing.
I don't say it often to the marketing departments at Disney parks, but
this time it's warranted: hats off, and nicely done. |
