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I know, it sounds silly, but my friend says it's totally true!

This Cm friend of yours, could he find the parks Ok?

[Maarten]

I know, it sounds silly, but my friend says it's totally true!

This Cm friend of yours, could he find the parks Ok?

It sounds very stupid haha. Though there have been quite a few stories about people visiting the Studios and wondering where the castle and Space Mountain were. I also read somewhere that in the early days of Hong Kong Disneyland some Chinese guests apparently walked up and down Main Street and left the park again under the impression they had seen it all. I'm not sure if there's any truth in that though.

[Aladar]

I'm sure it is true!! There's a lot of stupid people in this world!!

[mattboywonder]

I'm sure it is true!! There's a lot of stupid people in this world!!

I heard about a guest at Universal Islands of Adventure asking a Team Member outside the Jurassic Park Adventure "Is this the ride with Ellen?"  and the Team Member said yes!!  They obviously meant the Universe of Energy at Epcot - that was naughty

[dagobert]

I had the opportunity to chat with someone who has ties to TWDC about the lack of advertising of DLRP in Germany.

Here are some quotes:

We've always been told that Germans do not vacation in France hence why they only account for 2% of tourists at the resort - that less than half the number from Italy and less than a fifth the number from Spain. The decision was always not to throw marketing money into Germany/Austria/Switzerland as it would not be effective.

Depends on your definition of many. In 2011 just 312k Germans visited DLP - that is just 0.4% of the total population. The comparable figures for Spain are 1.4m Spaniards representing 3% of the total population. The comparable figures for Italy are 624k Italians representing 1% of the total population.

There is absolutely no point in wasting marketing budget of the Germanic countries - they just aren't interested in DLP - they prefer beach holidays and domestic theme parks - that is what the research has shown. It has been that way since the park first opened.

I think we all expected more from unification - sadly East Germany is still lagging a long way behind its Western counterpart in just about every socio-economic metric. Successive governments have failed to create jobs in the east. A country with a population of 81m (the most populous in Europe) with major cities like Frankfurt and Stuttgart being only half a days drive away should be sending more folks to DLP.

The failure of Germany to embrace DLP will forever be a headscratcher to me - but I don't see it ever changing.

Paris gets c.28m tourists annually - and Americans and the British are the two largest constituents - c. 4.9m of each. Very few Americans are converted into DLP visitors (c. 200k) whereas 2m Brits visit DLP (and that is down massively over the last few years). It is easy to assume that Americans skip DLP due to the presence of DLP in their home country (and a significant number of the American visitors to DLP are actually European-based servicemen and their families).

Compare that to Germans - c.2m visit Paris annually - so only 15% of that number visit DLP. A similar number of Italians visit Paris but DLP gets 33% of that number.

Disney has been popular in Germany ever since the park opened - it hasn't changed. It just isn't as popular as in Spain or Italy.

<<Now an Austrian hotel chain is operating two hotels at DLRP that are aimed towards Germans with special deals.>>

Both of Vienna International's hotels have less than 400 rooms each - that is compared to 5,800 rooms owned by Disney. Magic Circus and Dream Castle only need to fill an inventory of 290k rooms annually - that isn't a lot compared to the 2.1m room nights that DLP needs to fill annually.

The 5 resorts and Davy Crockett Ranch will always be what sunk DLP - the cost of construction combined with the operating costs will always be the noose around their necks.

On the real problems with leisure and tourism advertising is that it usually takes a long time to take seed (if you think that a lot of folks plan vacations a year out - even short breaks) and it can cost a lot to maintain a visual presence in the market.

I get your point and don't necessarily disagree but DLP needs to focus their limited resources in markets where they can easy convert marketing spend into visitors - that has historically been the UK, Spain, Benelux and Italy. If the economy was better and DLP gave marketing a larger budget then I'm sure they would go after Germany, Switzerland and Austria - and probably even further east too.

<<I'm far from being an expert on tourism, but I now it relies heavily on the economy and unfortunately it is on a very bad level in Spain, while it is stable here in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.>>

But Spain has been a basketcase for years - unemployment up above 20% has been the new norm for that country - and they still send more guests to DLP than Germany.