Mathmagicland
Disneyland - the original since 1955
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2014
Everyone is entitled to share their thoughts & opinions here - this is mine.We will make the best of it too and go to parks etc but limit any more money given to Disney. Not the cast members fault but it is Disney and D23’s fault. I am unclear why they would think that hanging out in a basement of a concrete and glass structure in earthquake central without hygiene and limited bathrooms for 8+ hours is a happy place to be. My time is woth more than that so it is disrespectful. 40000 people? Thats what is wrong. I cant imagine the health exposure you would have. Thousands of dollars to stand around? Sorry for those who have done it in the past and even more so for those who think we need to pay those dues. Sad that was accepted as the norm and tolerated without adequate corrective action. Company is probably not ISO certified. Poor Anaheim. No one spending money if they are in line. Normalized deviance is very much a problem for Disney. The Expo experience and plan thus far is unacceptable and they really need to create truthful disclosures. Hmm. Class action? Response from the manager is discouraging sounds like we should not bother with lines at all.
So excited for and proud of the Legends being inducted and very upsetting to likely miss that one. Was the main reason we bought tickets. Unfortunate their induction will be forever linked with recall of all these issues.
The grieving process for those without any reservation and for whom the realization of all the lost income in planning for this is why we are so very disturbed. Will take some time for us.
Re spothero we use it all the time in DC. Awesome app and way better customer service than Disney.
To level set - I do not work for Disney and never have, and yes I too was frustrated with the reservation process yesterday. Having thought a lot about the experience, and having read your post (and other comments both here and on other sites & channels), I feel compelled to respond and share my thoughts.
1 - True, it did not go well but in fairness to Disney they were trying to address feedback and comments from past expo attendees regarding lines and distribution of passes by providing an advance booking process this year. Disney has done this every expo, tweaked the processes a bit based on guest feedback.
2 - they never said everyone would get the passes they wanted, and anyone whose done a D23 event or other con knows those are very popular and most book up quickly. Same goes with getting tickets to ComiCon which I’ve heard stories about but never tried to attend, or Anime Expo and the special ticketed events there each year which my DS attends so I have first hand knowledge. There are always more attendees than seats in most any panel. At least Disney clears the rooms between panels, unlike ComiCon, so we have opportunities to get into later panels.
3 - Personally I have to also find a bit of fault with those who took up more than one spot in the queue by logging in with multiple devices or multiple browsers or had multiple people trying on multiple devices for the same passes...as well as those solo who booked two spots only to try to sell one of them to someone who didn’t get a spot. All of that contributes to the situation. In the parks, we get one spot in line; why should it be OK to have multiple spots in the virtual queue? Unfortunately that is a fact of the process until there is a way to limit each badge to only one spot in the queue.
4 - there are definitely a lot of learnings for Disney and their third party virtual queue vendor with the way it played out, and way to contribute to the solution is to provide constructive feedback. Yes, I will be sending some in to them.
5 - as someone who has willingly camped out in the basement the past two expos, I do not agree with your description and that has not been my experience. It was not an unhealthy environment and there were not 40,000 people in the basement. Disney now provides the basement to allow people an indoors place to wait overnight, because for the 2013 Expo people were lining up all around the convention center outdoor areas. We’d chat with people in line around us, all kindred souls, and also seek out fellow DIS folks somewhere in line, make new friends, see people we now knew as we wandered the convention floor or were in line for panels.
6 - while the reservations are new for the Hall D23, except for sorcerer, we have never known how many stage passes they’d give out for any session, so it is hard to know how to compare this expo to the last one, until we are there and see how it goes.
7 - as I’ve shared a couple of times in this thread, and as others have noted post- reservation process, there are stand by lines and no reservations do not need to mean a bad expo experience. Last Expo I did the entire 3-day expo with only one store pass and no stage or talent passes. I’d hit 3-5 panels each day, got to two stores, did the whole show floor more than once, and did a Talent central signing. It can be done with some advance planning, much like a Touring Plan in the parks where not everybody or every ride has a fast pass and it’s always better to be there for rope drop.
So, I will still be there, I will again be in the basement, I will miss my store pass, and I will see how it goes with the stand by lines again this year.