When Will Disney World Be Too Expensive?
Fans of pointing out the sticker shock of a visit to Walt Disney's (NYSE: DIS) largest theme park resort got some fresh ammo last week. The debut of Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser -- an immersive two-night lodging experience that starts at roughly $1,500 per person for a family of four -- arrived with Tuesday's "maiden voyage" at Florida's Disney World.
The early reviews from paying customers have been generally positive, but it's not as if the bar has to be high for the high-end Star Wars-themed adventure to be a sold-out success. There are just 100 cabins available on Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser every two nights, or less than 0.3% of the total available rooms at the resort's more than two dozen resort hotels. Even if every bed and bunk were spoken for on the new big-budget experience, it would still be just 0.1% of the number of guests that clicked through a turnstile at one of the resort's four theme parks in pre-pandemic times.
Prices are inching higher on hotel rates, admissions, and concessions, but Disney is not alone with an itchy trigger finger on the pricing gun. A controversial premium queue platform that rolled out at Disney World in the fall is also another pressure point for diehard fans, but the media giant is only following the product map that most of its rivals have been cashing in on for years. Disney was never cheap, but is it now too expensive? If it's not there yet, is it close to the tipping point? Let's talk about when we will all agree that the House of Mouse has gone too far.
Source Fool.com
