This Is How Disney World Could Improve the Guest Experience

Walt Disney World Resort might seem as busy as ever, but a declining guest experience is risking the future of the Central Florida Disney parks. In the last year, the theme parks were ghost towns during typically packed seasons like spring break and Labor Day weekend. To lure guests, the Mouse offered unprecedented discounts on Disney Park tickets, VIP Tours, and Disney Resort hotel rooms during the notoriously crowded summer season.

Walt Disney once said that his theme parks “will never be completed” and “will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.” Over the last few decades, Imagineers have honored his wishes, replacing the old with innovative new experiences while restoring pieces of history, like the Carousel of Progress and “it’s a small world.”

However, as Walt Disney World Resort grows, the guest experience is declining. To ensure the longevity of Magic Kingdom Park, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and Disney Springs, higher-ups must start listening to the real experts–the guests.

From this Walt Disney World Resort regular’s lips to Bob Iger’s ears, here’s how the Central Florida Disney Resort could improve the guest experience.

Improving the Walt Disney World Theme Park Guest Experience

Disney Genie+ and Lightning Lanes

Let’s start with the obvious… Disney Genie+ and Individual Lightning Lane should crawl shamefully back to whatever cave they came from. FastPass+ set Walt Disney World Resort apart from other Central Florida theme parks. Unlike Universal Orlando Resort, where guests are guaranteed to wait hours for every popular ride unless they spend hundreds on Universal Express, Disney made an equitable system for guests willing to put in some planning hours.

Any skip-the-line system will increase standby wait times. But watching guests rush through the FastPass+ queue for Soarin’ beside you hurt a little less when you knew that would be you on Test Track in a few hours. Now, it’s pay to play, and no one is winning.

Disney Park Capacity

After years of vocal complaints, Disney Park Pass Reservations are finally gone for good for most guests, as are the frustrating Park Hopper timing rules. However, the Disney parks are way too crowded. Just because the fire code lets you pack 40,000 people into Magic Kingdom Park doesn’t mean you should. No one wants to spend $200 to ride four rides, catch a glimpse of Mickey Mouse from one hundred feet away, and wait three hours for a parade spot.

It’s a pipe dream to expect Walt Disney World Resort to forfeit a significant revenue stream to help wait times decrease, but we’re manifesting here.

More Mobile Planning

Mobile Ordering and Mobile Checkouts are game changers. Their ongoing rollout and expansion is a welcome time-saver. While we’re at it, select tables at Quick Service restaurants should be reserved for Mobile Orders only. There’s nothing like holding a tray with four full cups on it and seeing every table full of guests charging their phones without any food in sight!

Other things could go mobile, too. The Virtual Queue system for high-volume attractions like TRON Lightcycle / Run and Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind is great, but too many could skyrocket the standby line for other rides. But how about surprise Virtual Queues for select roped-off parade viewing areas or exclusive character meet & greets? These exceptional magical experiences are rarer now that every theme park is crammed full but could return with pop-ups on the My Disney Experience app.

Changes at the Disney Resort Hotels

It’s harder to swallow the inflated price of a Disney Resort hotel when so many amenities disappeared as costs increased.

Magical Express

Reader, if you’ve made it this far, you knew this was coming. There was nothing like the simplicity of walking through the Orlando International Airport with nothing but your carry-ons and personal items in tow, scanning your MagicBand, and hopping on an air-conditioned bus to your Disney Resort hotel. You’d grab a snack or go for a dip in the pool, and your bags would be delivered to your room before you knew it. Checking bags at the hotel instead of lugging them through a massive line at the airport made the sadness of returning home a little more bearable.

Uber and Lyft work fine. Booking a shuttle through Mears is effectively the same as riding the Magical Express after they took luggage delivery away, just without the Disney travel DVD playing. Renting a car isn’t as bad now that Disney Resort hotels no longer charge for parking. But the “Disney Bubble” is a valuable part of the experience for most guests.

It would not be easy to rebuild the airport infrastructure and business contracts that made the Magical Express possible, but it would mean a world of difference to Walt Disney World Resort guests.

Early Theme Park Entry

Early Entry is a contentious topic for Disney Resort hotel guests. This writer thinks it’s great not to keep track of the schedule of Extra Magic Hours days for Magic Kingdom Park, EPCOT, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and Disney’s Hollywood Studios. It was exhausting when one Disney park offered an extra hour in the evening, and another offered an extra hour in the morning the following day.

However, 30 minutes just isn’t enough. Sure, leave the Extended Evening Hours for Deluxe Resort hotel guests. But there’s no reason Magic Kingdom Park, EPCOT, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and Disney’s Hollywood Studios can’t open an hour early for Disney Resort hotel guests daily. For Walt Disney World Resort, it’s just a schedule shift. But for guests, hour-long Early Entry would mean the chance to do more than one thing before getting trampled by the rope-droppers.

Disney Springs

Credit: Disney

Bring the Disney Back

It’s great to have so many little Disney stores spread throughout the shopping & dining complex, but it’s less exciting when they all sell the same things. Unique merchandise at each shop would entice visitors to spend longer at the outdoor mall–and spend more money doing so.

Magical Cohesion

Non-Disney experiences like the Coca-Cola Polar Bear meet & greet and Aerophile are fun add-ons, but knowing which companies officially partner with Disney is hard. Professional photos at Coca-Cola used to be included with Memory Maker, now they cost an extra $50. Some entertainment offerings and experiences are bookable on the Walt Disney World Resort website, while others aren’t. Collaborating to offer event schedules, reservation slots, and other information about Disney Springs tenants on the My Disney Experience app would make the “Disney Bubble” run more smoothly.

More Free Experiences

Disney Springs is the land of the free at Walt Disney World Resort–free parking, free admission, free samples… Throughout the years, Disney has offered scavenger hunts with small prizes like buttons or stickers that bring guests into stores they might not normally shop at or invite them to explore seasonal decorations. Santa meets for free at Once Upon a Toy during the holidays. Disney Springs will soon perform a free nighttime drone show for the first time in almost a decade!

More of this, please. Sure, guests spend money on food and merchandise after buying Disney theme park tickets, but going to Disney Springs is basically about spending money. Freebies that give the illusion of getting a steal make the reality easier to accept.

Please don’t take these suggestions as a sign of bitterness or constant negativity; Walt Disney World Resort is still The Most Magical Place on Earth for me. But when you really love something, you want it to be better, right?

How could Disney World improve the guest experience? Share your thoughts with Inside the Magic in the comments section.