I can’t speak for anyone else but I’m actually saddened by the changes at Disney. I don’t want to be a Disney hater. It was a simple and magical trip for my family for years. Not simple as in plain or cheap…..simple in that I knew how to make it magical. I knew when to be online to get those fast passes, the best time of day to get them. I knew that I should make sure that my fast passes were in the same park as my dinner reservations and that I wanted to exit Be Our Guest after park closing so that we could walk out in a nearly empty Magic Kingdom (so make sure that reservation is around 9pm). Disney suddenly changed the rules.I've come to the conclusion that people like to hate on Disney because they are a big and easy target. And no matter what they do, change things, don't change things, people will complain, often the same exact people complain about both. It's incredibly frustrating and no wonder Disney has quit trying to please. It's an impossible task any more. People can't be pleased. It's almost like they no longer want to be pleased, they just want to complain.
In the same way they seem to like to pretend that the tourism industry is ok everywhere else. That housekeeping in all other hotels is back but Disney is the only place where it's cheap and not back. That only Disney is raised room rates. That only Disney has taken away things and lost customer service. I don't get it. Maybe folks really don't get out and go anywhere else? I know we do. And you are right. Rates are sky high all over. Housekeeping is not back in hardly any hotel we stay at. I know we stay regularly in a fairly nice boutique hotel, so happened to be featured in a show on Magnolia Network in just the past few weeks, on a regular basis, when attending sporting events in a neighboring city where we hold season tickets. So we stay about 1 weekend a month. There's no housekeeping during our stay. Rates are on par with a Disney deluxe, regular room. Can go higher if it's a really popular game series. But, we pay for the convivence of no traffic in and out of the event. Much like folks pick to pay for Disney resorts. We have gotten to know the staff and really like them and know they are doing their best and know how understaffed they are, just like everyone everywhere is.
They changed other things over the year…..Wishes became Happily Ever After, the Plaza changed their menu, sometimes my room had chocolate covered strawberries when we arrived/sometimes it didn’t, buses went from the hotel to Epcot and then they didn’t. There were lots of changes and we grumbled a little but we still went. We didn’t love the earlier changes but they didn’t change our overall experience too much.
These changes….the getting up at 7 and still struggling to get LL, buses that arrive far less frequently than in the past, no buses from the parks to DS, no park hopping until after 2 (then something akin to a second rope drop crowd), etc. are too much. It Isn’t so much that Disney isn’t making the trip magical, it’s that they prevent me from making it magical. It took years to learn the ropes and once we finally knew how to plan the trip perfectly they burned the rope.
In the past my husband and I talked about going to Disney once he retired. We planned for a different trip that wasn’t child centered but we absolutely planned to go. We were going to walk around Epcot holding hands, maybe have a couple of drinks, find a shady spot and people watch for a while. I never thought we would have to worry about getting a park reservation for Epcot so that we could have lunch at Le Cellier. They have just made so many ridiculous rules and the seem to be constantly changing things to the guest‘s disadvantage. If they want to charge more that’s fine….everything costs more these days but to charge more for what is clearly an inferior experience is what has led my family to say goodbye to Disney. It’s not because we are haters but because we know when we are getting less for more.