Another cut back at Disney World?

[manning]

By Robert Johnson | Sentinel Staff Writer
Posted August 6, 2002


In a first for Walt Disney World, an entire hotel will be closed while the resort's restaurant area is renovated.

The 2,112-room Caribbean Beach Resort will close from Sept. 8 until the Christmas holidays.

All 700 employees will have a chance to apply for other jobs, temporary or permanent, at Disney World's theme parks and other resorts while the Caribbean Beach is dark, spokeswoman Rena Callahan said.

There's no guarantee that all employees will be able to find jobs comparable with the ones they have at Caribbean Beach, she said.

"They will be expected to come back to the Caribbean Beach in December," she said.

Disney World has never closed a hotel while it renovated a restaurant, Callahan said, but in the case of Caribbean Beach, the same kitchen serves room service, too, so guests would have to go off property to get food.

"Our guests are accustomed to a certain level of service, and we can't have a resort open without a restaurant," she said.

Caribbean Beach, which opened in 1988, is a midpriced hotel similar to Disney's Port Orleans, which closed for several months last fall after the post-Sept. 11 travel slump. That was a cost-cutting move, but Callahan said that the closing of Caribbean Beach is "the opposite of cost-cutting."

She described the renovation as an investment but would not say how much would be spent.

"We're putting a lot of money into the new restaurant."

The new eatery, called Shutter's at Old Port Royale, will seat 128 customers for table service. It will be carved out of the existing restaurant area, which includes a 308-seat food court, similar to the counter establishments in shopping malls. But Callahan said it's necessary to close the food court, too, during the table-service work.

"It sounds like they just don't want guests to be disturbed by all the work going on," said Gary Slade, publisher of Amusement Today in Fort Worth, Texas.

But Duane Vinson, research analyst at Smith Travel Research in Nashville, Tenn., said he has never heard of any major hotel property closing entirely during a restaurant renovation. "It sounds extreme," he said.

Disney World has a total of about 22,000 hotel rooms, and Callahan said that closing Caribbean Beach may make things cramped before it reopens. "We know there will be times when demand will exceed capacity," she said.

Robert Johnson can be reached at 407-420-5664 or

 

[Another Voice]

The real issue is why they have to lie about all of this. Their audience isn’t stupid, but Disney treats them like a four year old that has to be tricked into getting his hair cut.

The Caribbean Beach is being shut for capacity reasons, just like Port Orleans was last year. If they want to tweak the restaurants at the same time – fine. But to lie about “maintaining guest service” is frankly rather insulting. The people making reservations are adults with credit cards; they will accept an honest explanation.

 

[MelissathePooh]

This was pretty interesting for us over the weekend, especially because we had a reservation for carribean beach for Sept. 20, but it doesn't seem much like a rumor or news by now, maybe because we have a reservation at Animal Kingdom Lodge now.

Old news - yawn

 

[Bstanley]

Considering that Disney had just blurted out to the world that hotel bookings were down at WDW it would have been so easy to plan ahead - announce it a month or so ago, stop taking new reservations and say something like...

"You know we've decided to close this resort during an historically slow period while we did a major rebuild/upgrade on the Old Port Royale food court and restaurant area because the construction would force guests to leave the resort to eat, and because the comings and goings of the construction equipment would be right under their windows and all the work would be within view of the pool area. We regret the inconvenience."

Then transfer the people with existing CBR reservations to another moderate with a bit of a price break to make them happy, perhaps give them some choices of discounts at a character breakfast or similar 'bribes' and turn the whole thing into an example of Customer Service instead of an example of confusion and CYA.

 

[All Aboard]

I'm wondering about this one too. WDW is offering the lowest price on moderates this fall ($79 to AP & FL res) that I have seen in 4 years. I very recently booked four weekends between labor day and the end of the year. Two of those weekends are at the moderates. The rates at the All Stars are also very low at $49. If WDW is offering these rates at the same time CBR is closed down, it certainly points to some shortcomings in bookings. Interesting to know if general economic woes or on-site discontent is the biggest contributor.

 

[Another Voice]

Yes, hammering and sawing can be a problem. Yet that doesn't keep Disney from shutting down the Grand Floridian when they had to replace the siding like the time I stayed there and my entire building was covered with scaffolding and plastic tarps. Nor did Disney shut down Dixie Landings the time I was there when that food court was closed for refurbishing. Nor was the Contemporary closed the time when the entire hotel was being renovated (including all the restaurants and shops) and the convention center was being added onto. And the sounds of construction sure didn’t close down the Wilderness Lodge when the heavy cranes just outside my room started working on the condos at seven in the morning.

My point is that Disney has always done these types of renovations without having to shut down an entire resort. And they NEVER would shut down all those hotel rooms for something as trivial as a hundred seat restaurant.

And how is the last minute closing of an entire resort – one that many people have already paid for – any “customer service” oriented? Surely if the project is so complex (three to four months) and so utterly disruptive to everyone, would not have Disney planned this beforehand????? Why the sudden need to build a “surprise” restaurant? Why not tell everyone six months in advance and have Central Reservations book the resort accordingly?

Treat the guests like grown-ups about these things. It's so much easier then doing all this tap dancing.

 

[WDWHound]

The closing of the entire resort just to add a restaurant does seem strange to me as well. Still, I can see this as a good decision. They are claiming construction will degrade the magic, and they don't want to offer a sub par experience. Fair enough, even if they have never done it this way before, it seems like the right approach to me. BUT this only works if they give reasonable notice to those booked there. Just deciding one day that they are moving ahead in 4 weeks becuase attendance is light does not cut it.

 

[raidermatt]

I still think that WDW was smart in deciding to close the entire resort when they had plenty of capacity elsewhere to accomadate the previously booked guests at moderate resorts for the same price. The "plenty of capacity" issue is what distinghues the previous examples you listed Another Voice.

Given what we know, I think Scoop is right.

Though I don't think it would really hurt to go ahead and say that its the combination of the disruption and lower than normal occupancy that is the reason for the closure.

I know they don't want to give up any ground becaue then customers will ask for more for the relocation, but given the situation, this probably isn't the time to nit-pick with customers. (not that it ever is, its just that Disney is in a precarious position right now...)

 

[manning]

This posted from resort board. it is edited due to length. basically this is what they were offered.

Here is what I was offered.

To move over to another Moderate Resort.
Or for $10.00 more a night, I could go to the AKL.
For $20.00 more a night, I could go to the Polynesian.

Wow, I got the Polynesian for $109.00 a night. I am so excited about what I got. I will be there for 15 nights. i also have all of my new confirmation numbers as well. Maybe it is worth a try for those of you who will be there for the Holidays, to go ahead and make that call. Oh, I also said to the CA, well maybe I should just cancell my trip.... I said Geeze Disney sure is going to loose alot of money from me, with shopping, eating in the parks, the dinner show's etc. That all adds up.

The special dept. did tell me that they are starting to run out of rooms to offer for the Thanksgiving holiday. I would push on Disney "NOW" to make your Holiday ressie's.

 

[airlarry!]

It is in the middle.

M. AV is absolutely right about the reasoning behind this decision. If you add up the factors, it makes no sense to do it the way they did it. While it may be lying or puffery or spin, the reason is the same: they are using the diminished occupancy time to upgrade a restaurant (and trying to hide the diminished moderate occupancy). They are NOT upgrading a restaurant causing the CBR to close.

But Scoop has one point. I personally would never admit that bookings are down. It was okay to say it in the light of Sept 11 (when much of PO was shuttered) -- but to say it now with The Street breathing down Ei$ner's neck? Not even he and his Evil Henchmen are that stupid.

'Course that is why Scoop may have a point but in my humble opinion we should take his source(s) here with a grain of salt. This move will actually cost the company money by exchanging some limited ressies for either higher priced resorts or at a discount to moderates. And there is no coincidence that it is happening during the slowest part of the year...

 

[raidermatt]

I personally would never admit that bookings are down. It was okay to say it in the light of Sept 11 (when much of PO was shuttered) -- but to say it now with The Street breathing down Ei$ner's neck? Not even he and his Evil Henchmen are that stupid.

But they've already admitted it to The Street. They did so in the earnings call. The only question is whether the 10% decrease for 4Q bookings is accurate, or if it's actually worse.

The Street can already figure out that the occupancy levels are the reason they are closing the resort. (imho)

I really think they don't want to say this to the guests who have booked because if the guests feel this was a closing mainly for Disney's benefit, the guests will demand more in compensation (most of them didn't listen to the earnings call or read about it...).

From the post manning quoted, it looks like they are being more than fair with at least some guests (hopefully all). But they sure don't want to be put into a "give away the store" position.

 

[Lewisc]

I'm sure low bookings made the decision to close the resort easy. The restaurant renovations is causing them to close the kitchen which means NO FOOD NOT EVEN ROOM SERVICE. If the bookings were high they may have set up some type of temporary kitchen, continental breakfast etc but it's easier just to move the people.

 

[airlarry!]

Good, good points, Matt and Lewisc. I still say that what we are hearing is a spin job for a resort that was lacking in bookings...but you know what? The more I think about it, the more it is a smart move to take a resort that needs to be shuttered b/c of lack of demand and use it to refurbish and restore it.

They did the last restoration while I was there (I was present for the tail end of it) and they were inundated with complaints from guests there. (I only had one...some idiot was repairing the big lighthouse...and set off the foghorn around midnight--and it stayed on until 4 in the morning or so. I could give you a long story about how I had an early b-fast at Donald's and tried in vain to get someone to even look at the problem and got transferred to CRO in TAMPA! Someday I will relate that story!)

Maybe it is better to take a lemon and make lemonade out of it.

 

[Another Voice]

Quick rumor update - the CBR going to close because they didn't book enough rooms during that period (more closings coming in Spring probably), so WDW decided to use the down time to upgrade the restaurant. All "Moderates" are getting sit down resturants to comply with the Mobil/AAA Guide standards and for a possible "readjustment" of the resort classifications.

I don't mind that they are closing a resort for occupancy reasons. I could even see closing a resort for for major renovation work (which they've never done in the past). But why do they need to flat out lie to people about the reasons why they are doing things?

And about saying that bookings are down - if a publically traded company is supposed to lie to its stockholders when the chips are down, how are the stockholders supposed to beleive the company when they say everything is going great? Or has Disney just been lying to us all along...

 

[Another Voice]

Disney statement is that they are shutting down the Caribbean Beach Resort specifically so they can build the “new” restaurant. Everyone knows otherwise and such statements only call into question Disney’s truthfulness – at a time when The Company can least afford to have its reputation put in doubt.

To save themselves a little perceived embarrassment (gee, busy is down), they are doing some heavy damage to their image.

 

[Josiah Harper]

...CBR already *had* a sit-down restaurant called the Captain's Tavern, if I'm not mistaken. I've eaten there before (though the meal was disappointing). Granted, the servers scurry from the Food Court kitchens to bring your entrees to your table, but a table service restaurant has existed at the resort.

What about Captain's Tavern didn't comply with the guidebooks?

Though I'm often reluctant to agree with AV (possibly because I simply hate to believe what's being said), I have a gut feeling that Disney is concealing the truth in this situation. And with the rather nebulous statement in the news accounts that Disney will allow cast members to apply for other positions sounds like a conniving way to rationalize some lay-offs that--well--aren't *exactly* layoffs.

Joe
***MAKING MEMORIES***

 

[d-r]

I'm not sure what it had to do with guide books, but Capt. Tavern wasn't originally built with the hotel, but was added later and shared the kitchen with the food court - the renovations will also go into the food court.

 

[DVC-Landbaron]

I guess we'll just disagree on the definition of "lying".

Well! Now we have it! I understand perfectly now. And while we’re at it, can we agree on what the definition of “is” is?

The point is they came out with something that was less than the whole truth. And what’s important to remember is the weight each aspect of the “truth” has on the entire plan. In other words, what was the ultimate, driving factor in the decision making process. Your posts have an annoying habit (to me at least) of painting a picture through innuendo, and connotation. You have a subtle way of trying to make ALL Disney decision innocuous and customer driven. The way I read it you’re saying, “Picture if you will….”

A board room. A Disney board room. Disney executives sit around the mahogany table. A very angry man addresses the room talking to no one and everyone at the same time. In a voice that is near the top of its level he shouts, “Damn it!!! It’s gone on long enough!” A fist pounds down on the table adding an exclamation point and driving his message home. “CBR NEEDS a sit down table side service restaurant and I mean she needs it today!!!” The younger execs look a little frightened. The shouting, red faced man continues, “And I won’t have our dear, dear guests staying there through the ruckus!!” Another fist slams down. A young exec sheepishly says, “Pardon me s-s-sir, b-b-b-but the numbers are d-d-down a little, so m-m-maybe we could close the place while the renovations are being done?” The red-faced man sits down and exhales loudly. “There!!”, he says, “someone is finally using his head. Boy!! Am I glad we’re finally building that restaurant!! And are we lucky that we have the room to move our dear sweet guests around!!”

AV and I (and a myriad of others) see it as slightly different. Again, “Picture if you will…”

A board room. A Disney board room. Disney executives around the table. A very angry man addresses the room talking to no one and everyone at the same time. In a voice that is near the top of its level he shouts, “Damn it!!! It’s gone on long enough!” A fist pounds down on the table adding an exclamation point and driving his message home. “How in the heck am I going to cover this one up!!?? The numbers are down AGAIN and I’ve got to close Port Orleans once more!?!?!” A young exec sheepishly says, “How about CBR instead? I mean, we can close the whole thing and… well… here…”, he hands a dusty folder to the shouting man. “Hmmm,” Mr. Red-faced says, “we were planning a restaurant renovation two years ago? Really? Well… Hmmm... Yeah… It just might work… OK!! Fine!! Here’s the way we’ll spin it …”

See the difference?

Now, back to your first point. That’s the way I define ‘Lying”. Do you have another way?

 

[manning]

Thedscoop, you don't have to lie, just don't tell them everything. Don't think for a minute that everything was revealed on that conference call.

 

[Peter Pirate]

Who really cares?

This is a business decision, probably like many of late, that was hastily made and accomplished with what was thought to be the path of least resistence. Only Disney geeks and perhaps those affected care whether it was a "lie" and even those affected will mostly end up better off...

Scoop's premise is correct IMO, but the whole notion that anybody cares that a resort is being closed down for any reason seems silly. The only pertinent point here, and I think we all agree, is that to some degree (more or less) this was a decision influenced by low bookings...