So this is old news to Disney World apostles - WDW has apparently raised the price of double strollers by $13.00 (single ones by $5.00 ) making the double ones now $31.00 a day to rent. Is this a declaration of war, as parents seem to think it is? And have they hired on the extra manpower they undoubtably need to handle the flood of complaints? They’d better have.

What were they thinking? I ask this question often of Walt Disney World and many times it seems like their left hand doesn’t know what the right one is doing. Call 1- (407) WDISNEY  six times with a question about future discounts at resorts, ticket prices, or WDW policy and you’re likely to get 6 different answers. If you try to pin them down about things you need to know and you are likely to be frustrated. Are the CMs (employees) uninformed, or have they been instructed to be intentionally vague?  And is this because Disney is just getting too big and uncontrollable, or is there method to the madness?

Maybe Disney had no idea the wrath they would incur and that whoever sets the prices for things at WDW made a giant mistake. Maybe prices will go back down and it will be “off with their heads” for some marketing people. Could happen, but my guess is that they knew what they were doing and don’t care.

I think they would like to jam more people, not strollers, into the parks and they see how much room the double strollers are taking up and who is using them. Most of them are used by people with 2 little ones, but it seems an increasing number are rented by people who want something to haul around their coolers and other stuff, and who have an older child who might want to periodically climb aboard.

You be the judge. Is WDW being greedy or practical?

What were they thinking? Was it “Those people are such suckers that they will pay anything for a stroller” or “Maybe if we raise the price of those giant things people won’t rent them as much” ? Or maybe a little of both. Either way, maybe they just consider it a win/win situation. After all, these people are so addicted to WDW that it won’t affect  business; right?

I don’t know. It doesn’t affect me and I just find it amusing. We’ll never know what they were thinking because they never tell us. But we might get a clue watching how they react (or refuse to react) to the complaints. I guess I’m just selfish because I hope they stick to their guns.

Or is this all just a rumor....

Sunday, April 6, 2008