NEWS: DVC's 4th TV Ad - dispelling the "myth "?

[DVC Mike]

DVC advertising has become a growing presence. Ads are appearing on the weather.com when you lookup the weather for Orlando, and other web sites. People have noticed a few TV ads for DVC.

The Orlando Sentinel published an article about DVC's 4th TV ad.


Disney Vacation Club has grown rapidly in recent years, adding members and locations at a dizzying rate. But now the Walt Disney Company's Celebration-based time-share arm is trying to get over a uniquely Disney hurdle:

Persuading new buyers that Disney Vacation Club is about more than visiting Disney's theme parks.

That challenge is at the heart of a new television commercial Disney has begun airing in several key markets across the country. It is only the fourth TV spot the company has produced to promote its time-share division.

Dubbed "Little Travelers," the 60-second version of the commercial opens with children talking about the places they have been through their families' Disney Vacation Club memberships. Viewers hear about the Grand Canyon, Costa Rica and England before any reference to a theme park. They are treated to images of the Eiffel Tower and Venice canals instead of Cinderella's Castle and the Epcot ball.

Sybil Woolfork, Disney Vacation Club's director of marketing, said the television commercial aims to remove one of the "key barriers" keeping potential time-share buyers from considering Disney's program.

"It really does help to dispel the myth that Disney Vacation Club is only Disney," Woolfork said.


Full article here:

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/custom/tourism/orl-disney0908apr09,0,7749659.story

[DVC Mike]

Guests who visit WDW (or DLR) are bombarded with advertising about Disney’s best kept secret. Each park has multiple DVC booths. DVC has sold well to those guests who regularly visit Disney parks. They are DVC’s best sales prospects.

With the expanded advertising, DVC is trying to persuade potential buyers that DVC is more than just visiting Disney parks. True, there are DVC resorts at Vero Beach and Hilton Head Island, and one being prepared in Hawaii. But the bulk of the DVC resorts are located next to Disney parks, and DVC as a timeshare is uniquely able to deliver it’s best value for Disney vacations.

Can DVC “remove one of the ‘key barriers’ keeping potential time-share buyers from considering Disney's program” and “dispel the myth that Disney Vacation Club is only Disney”? It’s quite a challenge for DVC, in my mind, to switch from its unique niche as a Disney-focused timeshare to a general timeshare such as Marriott, Hilton, etc.

I guess there are those that respect the Disney brand and legendary customer service that will consider DVC and ask for more information. I wonder how many buyers purchase DVC specifically for the “over 500 getaways”?

Thoughts?

[gblast123]

Mike,

These are excellent points you make!!

What they don't say in the AD is how little DVC gives you for the points you use!!

I suspect that DVC, when it was first envisioned 15 years ago, didn't realize the impact of the internet and it's effect on the ability of members to sell their excess points to others.

Without the internet, and sites like Mouseowners, many members would be at a loss for what to do with their timeshare points. After banking points for a year or two, what would you do...assuming you couldn't rent them to others? Naturally, you would use them for cruises, and other things.

Disney makes a triple profit when using points for Cruises and the other Adventures, etc.

First, they make a HUGE profit by selling the DVC membership...Second, they essentially buy the points at below market value via Cruises, etc (the point values are substantially less then paying cash), and Third, they use the traded DVC points to rent as hotel rooms...(at an unimaginable cost per point).

That is what is called "Win, Win, Win" for Disney.

The problem with the Disney Adventures is that they have to compete on the open market with places like Abercrombie and Kent and other high end tour operators, that have a reputation for excellence that surpasses Disney.

I think that Disney envisioned DVC as a captive audience for these (DCL and Adventures) but never realized that the internet opened up DVC usage to non-members in a way which cause two severe problems as well as a number of benefits. It is the tension between the problems and the benefits which is probably causing some internal conflict. They seem to be trying to walk a fine line between harvesting the "golden honey" without killing the bees.

Unanticipated problems
1) It increased the utilization to nearly 100% of the available points.
2) Effective competition for hotel rentals.

Unanticipated benefits
1) Renters and publicity driving increased sales of DVC (ie free marketing)
2) Increased revenue from additional renters and families.
3) Increases DVC sales from people who rent out points and buy thousands of points (people paying for the privilege of being marketing reps for DVC).

The new Ad campaign is aimed more at DVC members than at the general public, IMHO.

David

[carolina_yankee]

It's an interesting article. Thanks, Mike.

I think Disney is going to have to expand DVC to more significant off-site locations if they really want to dispel the myth that DVC is just for the parks. It seems like most people either won't use II because they want the parks, or because they can get a better deal outside the DVC system.

Disney has also reduced the trade out options, haven't they? Which is kind of surprising if they want to market the non-Disney uses of DVC.

Curious. Maybe they're checking interest for more off-site locations?

Dirk

[Kynna]

I guess there are those that respect the Disney brand and legendary customer service that will consider DVC and ask for more information. I wonder how many buyers purchase DVC specifically for the “over 500 getaways”? [/FONT]

Thoughts?

This was us, we knew we wanted to buy into DVC for the Disney Vacations because we had ALWAYS had outstanding service (big sell for DH) And I can't go two years without a dose of Disney or I get VERY cranky. That said, If they didn't offer the getaways elsewhere we wouldn't have bought. There are going to be years where we want to take the kids to see other parts of the country and the world when the exchange rate gets better. We would like to tie in some trips with what they are studying in school.

We use the points to force us to budget for vacation. Also if we had a year that we couldn't afford a big trip we figured we would use our trade to head to Galveston or something close by.

Right now since we are new members I can't imagine going anywhere else. :beatinghe

Personally I would rather have 20 DVC Resorts to visit in other locations and not deal with II at all but that is what is available.

[harmrose22]

Maybe this is not accurate, but my understanding of DVC when I bought it was that while I had the option to us my points at places other than WDW, it was not a great use of points. I thought that in order for DVC to be "worth it"if you will, that the best use of points was on Disney hotels near Disney parks. I also thought that getting a II exchange was hard to do and not to be counted on???

So, if these are the case, then people who do their research (I know that this does not mean everyone as some people will get go to at a booth or visit and buy on the spot) will not have that "key barrier" removed. Plus, for some people such as ourselves, we knew we could buy a contract, get to go to Disney every year and that if we wanted to go elsewhere, we could either:

1. Bank points to take a bigger Disney trip the next year.
2. Rent our points for that year. - This is especially appealing if one wants to go somewhere else that may be pricier.
3. Take 2 vacations that year. - The usual Disney and something extra.

If I am wrong on this, then I apologize.

[DVC Mike]

Maybe this is not accurate, but my understanding of DVC when I bought it was that while I had the option to us my points at places other than WDW, it was not a great use of points. I thought that in order for DVC to be "worth it"if you will, that the best use of points was on Disney hotels near Disney parks. I also thought that getting a II exchange was hard to do and not to be counted on???


It's true that the best "value" (in terms of just getting the "most bang for your buck") is using your points to book DVC resorts. Compared to the rack rates for DVC rooms via CRO, you'll break even in a reasonable amount of time.

Using your points for the Disney Collection (other Disney resorts and DCL) is not as good a value as using your points for DVC resorts. In many cases, you will get a better deal by paying cash (using AP and AAA discounts for Disney hotels, for example). Of course, if you don't have the cash but have the points, it still may be "worth it" for you. The same goes for Adventures by Disney.

As for the World Passport Collection (trading via II), it's much better (again, from a purely financial standpoint) to purchase another timeshare to trade with, given the cost of DVC. A lot of members agree that people should not purchase DVC with the intent of using it to trade out a lot -- in direct contradiction to the DVC TV ad. The big reason is you can probably just rent another timeshare at a cost less than the "value" of your points. Again, if you don't have the cash but have the points, it still may be "worth it" for you.

[Kynna]

For us it was never about saving money but about someone from DVC approving the resort we trade for. We had always experienced high standards at Disney and expected that the resorts that we would trade would be at minimum decent.

We have paid top dollar for hotels in parts of the country that we weren't familiar with because it got good online reviews and in our opinion ended up being disgusting. Paid for a cheap room to "get us by" and found it charming. It's comforting to think that research has been done. At least that is what we were told when we bought in.

[AZeno]

For us, the only the reason we purchased DVC was because of the perceived security brought by the Disney brand.

In evaluating the purchase we anticipated that we would be going on vacation each year, and for the most part, the majority of those vacations would be to Walt Disney in Orlando. The feature of being able to use our DVC ownership as part of an exchange was an added bonus.

We didn’t look at this from a financial standpoint, but again, by the perceived security brought by the Disney brand, both from a financial and vacation value standpoint.

The idea was to utilize our ownership to visit Disney World once in a while and than utilize our points to visit DL, DLP, Hong Kong, and Toyko. The funny thing is that we haven’t encountered that situation yet.

We’re sitting on 350-points which at the time of purchase, I felt was ample to visit Disney World, use an exchange and bank a few points. But the reality of the situation is that we have used our points repeatedly to visit Disney World. We’ve had plenty of really great visits, and never enough points leftover to bank.

We still have delusions of one-day using our points for an exchange, but the reality of the situation is that we would have make a paradigm shift in our vacation planning.

But I am glad to see Disney begin to market DVC as other than an Orlando destination, I think this speaks to the longer term plans to build and operate DVC resorts around the globe.

[Av8ncowboy]

Mike.
Its nice to see that you will be there when we arrive at WDW, unfortunately we own at celebration world resort and are trying to plus it to DVC...
Looks like your weather should be perfect:clappingh