A nonjudgmental discussion about No-Queue Character Greetings at DLP

[scrapbookersdis]

In Just remember, it may seem bad for you when you're part of a 'scrum', but just imagine how awful it is for the Character who is in the centre of it.

It must be sometimes downright frightening.

Unfortunately, just as we've all heard before, there's always going to be somebody to spoil things - and really that's a reflection of people in general as opposed to Disney itself

But Disney has the experience and knowledge to protect people from much unnecessary spoilage. If guests are made unhappy by the scrums at DLP (and most of the people on this thread seem to feel that way), all character greetings should be queue-based. However, what I wonder is whether many DLP guests don't mind the scrum, don't complain about it, don't worry about it. If that's the case, the queues aren't needed.

It seems to me it doesn't matter what nationality you are there will always be some one who seems to think its ok to push in front no matter how many people are there before them

I agree 100%.

I didn't start this thread to point the blame at anyone. I started it to see if I could figure out if there is in fact another way of looking at group experiences -- other than being dominated by the awareness of the question, "Who's next in line?"

Having been there in January, we didn't witness a real scrum. All the groups were small. In fact, the one that really impressed me wasn't a scrum at all. My son and I were the only ones waiting for Donald near Town Square. Donald was with another group, and it was fair to assume we were next, since we were the only other people. Until I saw another family approaching from across the street. They were right in my line of sight and were headed straight for Donald.

"Oh no," I thought. "They wouldn't." They did. But what truly struck me was the mother's face. She was *not* being rude. Because rudeness implies that you are doing something you shouldn't. The expression on her face was joyful. "Who's next?" did not exist for her. It's the mindset that is different. Sort of like a culture for whom belching is a compliment to the cook. If they belch, they are not being rude. In other cultures, belching is considered rude. I believe that disregard for "who's next" is not rude in some cultures. This is what I want to understand.

We saw similar instances of this mindset in other situations -- at the breakfast buffet at Hotel Cheyenne, at the bus stops, even just looking at merchandise in a shop that was slightly crowded. I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I just think it's a Thing. And it's good to be aware of cultural Things when you visit another culture.

One person here said that children in some cultures wouldn't queue for a slide at a playground. In other cultures, the children would. That's not a case of one being rude and the other not. It's just a difference in mindset. I wonder if, for those who don't tend to queue, the idea of fretting about taking turns would be equivalent to the idea of having to take a number to use a slide at a playground. It would spoil the fun and the spontaneity.

 

[adminjedi]

A character meal would have been the perfect solution --

Not necessarily. We were just at DLP for a week. We had dinner at Cafe Mickey, which we really enjoyed by the way. I could not believe how many people allowed their children to "crash" other family photos when they could see the characters would come to each table for special time with each family.

 

[goodmorningirl]

I just wanted to jump in and say I am an avid visiter of WDW and I am taking my first trip to DLP this May. I was really hoping to meet the characters and get autographs (yes, I am an adult, but I love the characters). I'm becoming kind of discouraged. Will people physically push you to get to the characters? I'm just wondering because I'd like to be as prepared as I can be.

 

[Isila]

oh yes, they will. Be ready for that.

 

[Happy Tappy]

I just wanted to jump in and say I am an avid visiter of WDW and I am taking my first trip to DLP this May. I was really hoping to meet the characters and get autographs (yes, I am an adult, but I love the characters). I'm becoming kind of discouraged. Will people physically push you to get to the characters? I'm just wondering because I'd like to be as prepared as I can be.

It is a problem, there's no hiding from that. But for every bad experience you read on here, there's probably 10 good experiences not being heard.

If character interaction is important to you make sure you go to the arranged meets. There are arranged meet and greets for many of the characters and people have to queue for these.

As already mentioned, Cafe Mickey is a must as the characters will visit every table (even if there are only big kids eating! ).

 

[ICECUBEQUEEN]

On our 2 trips to DLP we have experienced character scrums and they are the one thing I always come home moaning about!

I much prefer organised meet and greets and character dining, which gives you a much more relaxed approach to meeting characters.

On our first trip I got so fed up with trying to wait in turn to Pinocchio we just gave up, everytime we got kind of close to the front of the scrum another family would jump in front of us, people just dunno how to queue!!

On this trip we tried to get a photo with Emilo and again waited patiently for our turn but eveytime we got anywhere close another family would jump in front. There was another English familt standing with us and we ended up chatting about the front of some people just pushing in and not having any manners. We said that if our children didnt get a chance soon, we would team up our familys as a barricade to get our children in next (good old English team work there ) In the end Emilo could see our children being pushed further and further back through the the queue and beckoned us forward and asked those that had pushed in to move back and let us through!

Eventhough I think organised meet and greets and character dining is the way to go, sometimes you can only meet some characters in these scrums as they dont seem to appear elsewhere in the parks or in the restaurants. So you need to decide are they really worth the scrum or not? lol

 

[Vala]

If guests are made unhappy by the scrums at DLP (and most of the people on this thread seem to feel that way), all character greetings should be queue-based. However, what I wonder is whether many DLP guests don't mind the scrum, don't complain about it, don't worry about it. If that's the case, the queues aren't needed.

I think a lot of people don't complain because they push in and get what they want. On Saturday I was in the crowd to meet Tiana. You would not believe how many adults told their kids to squeeze through and got in front, it was okay, they could go. Yeah, the 25 other kids are just standing there for giggles and because the weather was so nice.

I absolutely don't mind the general group of excited adults and kids running up because they see their favorite characters. I've seen that in all parks, and hey, happened to me as well. Can happen to anyone, and that's alright.
But parents telling their kids to just go and squeeze in because "they're only little" and stuff like that, that is just downright rude.

I'm not even sure if this is cultural.
In my opinion a lot of people have adapted to that rudeness because they don't want their kids missing out.

Not necessarily. We were just at DLP for a week. We had dinner at Cafe Mickey, which we really enjoyed by the way. I could not believe how many people allowed their children to "crash" other family photos when they could see the characters would come to each table for special time with each family.

Agreed.

I was at the Inventions brunch Sunday. They sat me in the first booth near the entrance. Three times when characters were with me families that just entered told their kids to "go and see Mickey/Minnie/Chip" although the characters clearly were with me. Chip was even sitting down and looking at my photo album!

Mickey did a picture with them and then apologized to me. But Minnie and Chip both firmly sent the families to their tables and motioned they'd come and see them. I had never seen that happen before and was really impressed.

I just wanted to jump in and say I am an avid visiter of WDW and I am taking my first trip to DLP this May. I was really hoping to meet the characters and get autographs (yes, I am an adult, but I love the characters). I'm becoming kind of discouraged. Will people physically push you to get to the characters? I'm just wondering because I'd like to be as prepared as I can be.

Yes, they will. And if you're solo adult be prepared that a lot of families will think that they have the right to push their kids in front of you. At least that's what keeps happening to me. Because a solo grown up can't possibly wait to meet the characters!

I've even had characters passing by me and totally ignoring me at the character meals.

If character interaction is important to you make sure you go to the arranged meets. There are arranged meet and greets for many of the characters and people have to queue for these.

I'm not really sure if I'd say "many" meet and greets.

There's Mickey, Pooh and one princess in Disneyland and Mickey, sometimes Minnie in the front lot and then Buzz in the Studios. Plus I think they're opening a Ratatouille and an Alice meet and greet now. So not really much compared to what the US parks have.

And the lines are moving at snail's pace. I've heard people complaining about Princess Fantasy Faire in Anaheim a lot. But I've never waited more than 45 minutes there, and you meet three princesses. Sunday the wait for the one princess in Paris was 1.5 hours!

 

[DLPdaft]

Its definitely the queue wait times which put me off the queued meet n greets. Even if you're first in line for the Princesses you could be waiting 45 minutes from the time you start queueing until you meet one Princess. I find the wait times in the Studios are generally less, simply because the queue line area is not anywhere near as big as the ones in the main park.

We had 2 character meals a week ago, Friday evening at Cafe Mickey and Sunday brunch at the Steakhouse, and did not see any child trying to crash the characters at any tables. We have in the past, but have also seen the characters very firmly put their hands up and shoo said children back to their own table.

I think I must be getting immune to the scrums, its lovely to have an orderly queue moving quickly (I have seen this a couple of times over the last 4 years) but we also cope well in the scrums and will usually get our photograph and autograph with no real problems. I can totally understand how small children would be worried and scared in scrums though, and if my DD didn't want to be part of those, we'd concentrate on the queued meets in the Studios, and character meals (oh and the DLH at 4pm on the weekends ).

I was surprised and very disappointed that Woodys Roundup queued meet n greet had stopped in March, its been going for a couple of years now hasn't it? This was a great opportunity to meet a handful of characters in a quiet area of the park and with an organised system.

 

[Vala]

I think I must be getting immune to the scrums, its lovely to have an orderly queue moving quickly (I have seen this a couple of times over the last 4 years) but we also cope well in the scrums and will usually get our photograph and autograph with no real problems. I can totally understand how small children would be worried and scared in scrums though, and if my DD didn't want to be part of those, we'd concentrate on the queued meets in the Studios, and character meals (oh and the DLH at 4pm on the weekends ).

I've usually done well too. I've survived way too many conventions to worry about that. But there's this part of me that says "it could be so much less hassle", you know what I mean? There's be someone else who's not standing their ground as good as me and they'll miss out for one reason or the other.

For example when I was trying to get Tiana's and Naveen's autographs at the beginning of the month there was this little German girl who obviously did not understand any other language. She was tiny and kids kept pushing in front of her. She was almost at the point of crying already. (Why the parents let her go in front alone I so do not know.)

I was lucky and caught Tiana's attention because she remembered me from the New Generation show day before. So she signed my stuff and got Naveen for a picture. When they were done with me I introduced her to "my little friend" and Tiana at once turned her attention to the girl. You could so see her face lighting up.

In an orderly line she would have just waited and it would have been her turn eventually. But in that scrum...

Her family saw me standing near the Sword in the Stone platform a little later by chance. The father actually came up to me and thanked me profusely for intervening. He said it was their first trip and the scrums really put a damper on the whole thing for them. They only knew Florida and absolutely did not expect that madness.

And that actually something I've been really wondering about. How much do those scums put off the "casual visitors"?

We had 2 character meals a week ago, Friday evening at Cafe Mickey and Sunday brunch at the Steakhouse, and did not see any child trying to crash the characters at any tables. We have in the past, but have also seen the characters very firmly put their hands up and shoo said children back to their own table.

It was really bad at Cafe Mickey earlier this month and it started happening on Saturday as well. Saturday I finally saw Pinocchio shooing a kid back. At the beginning of the month it was horrible. The characters would even leave their route to go back to other tables, and even adults would crash the characters.

I was surprised and very disappointed that Woodys Roundup queued meet n greet had stopped in March, its been going for a couple of years now hasn't it? This was a great opportunity to meet a handful of characters in a quiet area of the park and with an organised system.

Yes, it was. I only have vague memories (boyfriend doesn't like characters so when he's around I normally don't get to meet many) but I was really sad when I went first week of March and it was gone. Some of my best memories with characters are from there.

I've had good luck at DLH in the mornings too. There's usually a couple of surprise visitors near the character photo stop there. It's still a scrum, but nowhere as bad as when the Character Express comes in.

 

[m-tinkerbelle]

forgive me and correct me if I'm wrong but...
those character meet&greet currently at the parks... don't they have some kind of "photopass" thing with a photographer taking the picture for you?

We've always been put off from those photo opportunities (photographer or not) because of the long queues. But if they were just normal "photographer-free" queues for all the characters everyone would be taking a pic , and autograph and would keep going and the queue flow would be fast
Besides, I think more people than normal go to these "queued" meet&greets because that's the only chance you have to get a picture free of any "photobombing" from other guests.

If there were more queues for other characters (AND more characters around at the same time) I guess it wouldn't be just Mickey and Buzz lightyear the ones who gathered ALL the attention and the queues would be shorter

At DL and WDW I had several pictures taken with Mickey in many different costumes and locations and I don't remember queueing long for that (even when it was Mickey). The longest queue I remember was for Ariel and her grotto (yes, it was long ago), and it had a photographer taking the pic, which probably slowed things up.
If they can manage to set a good queuing system it shouldn't take any longer to take a pic with a character at WDW or at DLP

Maybe some sort of mix of "photopass" and a "fastpass" so that you get your "appointment" for each "top popular" character would be a good idea?

I would be extremely pleased if they finally sort this out with whatever solution they find.

Also, another thing that put us off as adults was reading some posts (I don't remember if it was here or in another DLP -related forum) about adults coming up to a face character to have a pic taken and the "character" saying that the guest was too old for that. I found that so harsh that I never thought it was worth queuing if we were going to end up with a nasty remark like that and ruin our day XD. That's something else, they need to "educate" the face characters so that that never happens anymore.
It struck so hard in our minds that we've always found that worse than the scrums, shoving and pushing of other guests so we decided to stay away from the meet & greets. We even decided to stay away from character breakfasts & meals because of that. A bad experience like that with a character would completely KILL our disney trip ;(. We'll probably give the characters a chance on our next trip. It'll be our fifth time at DLP and we never had a pic with a character.
I know this last huge paragraphy was kind of OT, so sorry for that, but I felt I had to let it out.

I hope someone from DLP reads this thread!

 

[Roon]

Hello, our last three visits my son hasn't really been bothered with the photos, (growing up), but I have seen families just waiting and waiting so long and people not really bothering to take notice. The poor little children's faces when they think it is their turn and it doesn't happen. The only time we had a bad experience with autograph and photo was in the Disneyland Hotel and Pluto just seemed to be ignoring my DS all the time, it really was heartbreaking but I just think they cannot see too well.

My experience of feeling that I shouldn't really be in the place and "it's only for kids" was when my DS and DH were on a ride and I was waiting I saw an opportunity to do a pin trade with a cast member at one of the shops in Adventureland and she said these pins are only for the children, but I wanted the pin for my DS. Put me off wanting to pin trade really, to be refused like that made me a little embarrassed.

 

[Vala]

forgive me and correct me if I'm wrong but...
those character meet&greet currently at the parks... don't they have some kind of "photopass" thing with a photographer taking the picture for you?

I don't think so. At least I can't remember.
The only photographer I remember is at the Auberge character meal.

There are photo stops in the hotel now where they have a professional photographer take your picture. They will give you a piece of paper with a number. That you take to the hotel store and you can buy the picture if you want. Problem is they don't do this a la Photopass card, you have to buy the actual picture. You don't get the JPEG. That's 15 Euro per picture if you choose 5x7 size. If you buy more it gets a little cheaper.

They were handing out flyers in DLH on Saturday for some kind of discount card that you could buy for 35 Euro. You could buy 7 photos at several locations with that one and it would just deduct the money per photos.

Also, another thing that put us off as adults was reading some posts (I don't remember if it was here or in another DLP -related forum) about adults coming up to a face character to have a pic taken and the "character" saying that the guest was too old for that. I found that so harsh that I never thought it was worth queuing if we were going to end up with a nasty remark like that and ruin our day XD. That's something else, they need to "educate" the face characters so that that never happens anymore.

I so agree to that.

I didn't have a character say anything yet. However, like I said elsewhere it does quite frequently happen that a character would completely bypass me at a meal. On Friday Eric shortly left Ariel alone with me (he went to show the photographer one of my pictures) and you so could tell that she was completely at a loss what to do with me. She barely got a word out and was staring at me wide eyed when he said he'd be right back.

The worst experience in that respect was when the waiter at Auberge (when I went earlier this month with my boyfriend) decided it was funny it ask who of us would get the crayons and the drawing stuff they give out. Boyfriend was not amused at all.

That's one thing Paris is completely lacking in. In the US parks no one will bat an eyelid if I am in line for princesses or squeal "the chipmunks!" all over Town Square. Paris sometimes gives me the feeling that they want the characters to be there for the kids only and it's wrong of me to want a picture with a character.

My experience of feeling that I shouldn't really be in the place and "it's only for kids" was when my DS and DH were on a ride and I was waiting I saw an opportunity to do a pin trade with a cast member at one of the shops in Adventureland and she said these pins are only for the children, but I wanted the pin for my DS. Put me off wanting to pin trade really, to be refused like that made me a little embarrassed.

The bolded part is exactly what I was trying to say above.

For pin trading there are indeed special lanyards for kids only. You may have caught one of those by accident. But not everyone knows that, and that person was really unnecessarily rude about it.

 

[thehails]

I so understand what you mean about the queuing thing. The last time we went to DLRP was 2 years ago which was our 4th visit and we had given up taking the children to see the characters outside of the character meals as they just ended up being upset because people constantly pushed in front of them,& they ended up being totally bewildered by it.

it was such a relief to go to WDW and have everybody wait their turn. That works for me

Really pleased to hear that things have started to improve in DLRP as we are hoping to go back again this year.

looking forward to my next disney fix