Disneyland fans had been eagerly awaiting news of what Disney planned to do with the Disneyland Annual Passholder Program after CEO Bob Chapek talked about its reimagining back in March 2021, saying:
“In a non-COVID environment, it would have been a pretty tough [decision] to make, because they just keep renewing and renewing, but when you start lapping a year without anybody going for an annual pass program, that gives you the chance,” Chapek continued: “We’re going to use that, though, in order to have an even better guest experience at Disneyland and manage the crowd so that no matter what day you go to Disneyland, you can have an extraordinary experience.”
It was back in January 2021 that Disney officially announced that they were completely cancelling the Disneyland’s Annual Passholder program promising that new membership options would be available in the future. Refund options were available to those that were entitled to them.
On May 13, Disney announced that the Disneyland Annual Passholder Program will be replaced with a “Loyalty” Repeat Visitor Program. It sounds like a bit of a mouth full and no real details of what this program actually includes have been released as of yet. We will keep you informed of new details regarding this.
There appears to have been disappointment from a large number of previous Annual Passholders since the announcement. The original reasoning behind the cancelling of the program was put down to continued closures and uncertainty over reopening plans due to COVID-19. However, Chapek’s recent comments appear to focus more on the importance of the returns to the shareholders:
In an effort to “get an adequate return to our shareholders for the type of experience that we do give to our guests”.Chapek said that a new “park loyalty and affinity program” was being designed for Disneyland resort that would be a “frequent visitor program”, encouraging multiple visits from local guests.
VOTE NOW
So, this week’s Big Debate asks, Will You Miss The Disneyland Annual Passholder Program? We are aware that a large majority of our readers live in Florida and therefore it is likely you have never owned a Disneyland Annual Pass but I thought it was an important question to ask. You have three options below to choose from:
- Yes
- No
- Was never an option for me (location, money, etc)
I usually keep the polls as simple as possible and have added the third option there for anyone who feels that suits them the best. Although we aren’t clear about the details surrounding this new “Loyalty” Repeat Visitor Program I am guessing everyone will have a gut reaction to the news.
My predictions for this poll are that a majority of people will say ‘Yes’ as well as ‘Was never an option for me. I can’t see many people will want change of this likely magnitude but I guess we will just have to wait and see.
CLICK HERE and don’t forget to share this with your friends and family. Leave us your comments on this below or on our Facebook page and as always we will include a number of these to hopefully summarise the debate in our Results article which will be published soon on Theme Park Tourist.
