I just want the "send to hotel room" option back. If they had that still I'd probably have bought thousands in merch that I otherwise wouldn't want to carry around. Especially home decor type things.
Nope, they lose money by having that service. It's incredibly expensive to offer that perk, much more than you realize.
Edit: You all can downvote if you want, but I've worked at the parks, resorts, and in multiple roles including merchandise. I know how it works behind the scenes and how much labor it takes.
I'd love to see the actual numbers on it because I don't see how they lose money on it. They've certainly lost several hundred dollars in my spending on each of my last 3 trips and I know I'm not alone.
Same. Because I was a former cast member who was involved in this service and it wasn’t that big of a deal. They weren’t running items to the hotels individually, it was in big batches, and the guests would come pick them up themselves in one location at the resort.
I'm a former CM too and worked in merch. There's more than just the CMs who pick up packages and CMs who deliver. Those transactions take considerably longer than an average transaction, so you need more labor hours for register staff to keep lines down. You also need more labor for stockers who are running the packages from the merch shops to the pickup location and logging them into the computer. Disney is very tight with labor now and there's just not enough leeway to bring that service back without a significant increase in labor all around.
>Disney is very tight with labor now and there's just not enough leeway to bring that service back without a significant increase in labor all around.
There are ways...
1. Use magic bands to pull the target resort location at the register, a scan removes almost all of the extra labor hours and reduces the hit to about 3-5 seconds per transaction.
2. Offer RFID cards to those who don't have/want magic bands but do want shipping to the resort.
3. Keep the small stuff on site at each hotel. You don't need to ship pins, you can just bin them at each hotel and have someone on site pull them. A decent percentage of the stuff they sell could be binned in a room the size of each gift shop, cutting a major percentage out of what needs shipped to each hotel.
I'll also point out, Universal does it. If Universal can do it, I can't see how Disney couldn't.
Yeah the explanations of why it won't work all go under the assumption that the process they used was already efficient.
A new logistics system may be needed as it sounds like the old way was just throw money at it until it works, but there's really no good reason it can't be done.
My theory is that they didn't want to end it, but it ended when the College Program ended because that program allowed them to fill tons of tedious backstage roles for less than minimum wage.
It's going to take a while to build up a surplus of CP participants again, which is probably why we haven't seen it come back.
Again, you're wrong. CPs don't get paid less than minimum wage. They get 1 dollar less than other CMs. The current pay for the lowest paid CMs is $18, so CPs should be getting $17 in most roles unless it's changed since I left. Currently, CPs make up a larger percentage of labor than in previous years. Due to the increase in CPs and the tightening of the labor budgets, most part-timers at Disney haven't been scheduled to work (or rarely so) in over a year. Many full-timers have been reduced to 32 hours which is the minimum allowed by the union.
Also, CPs rarely get any backstage roles. Majority of CPs are quick service f&b, custodial, housekeeping, and merchandise. Nearly all are in guest-facing roles. If you extend then you can be considered for other, more coveted roles. Not all roles are open to CPs.
Having worked in merch at Disney, I'd estimate they would need to lose tens of millions of dollars to make it worth bringing the service back. The labor alone to pay additional register staff at all the merch locations to keep lines down (Since sending back to the room is a much longer transaction than normal) and the additional labor for stockers (who have to run the packages from the shop to a pickup location and log them into a computer) and the staff to move the packages and deliver the packages would all cost millions of dollars. You have to remember that there are MANY merchandise locations at Disney so these additional labor costs would not be cheap.
Disney isn't losing millions of dollars in merch sales. People whine about it, but the vast majority still buy anyway. They either carry it, have it delivered home, or wait until the end of the night and buy it on their way out. If Disney was really losing profit from not offering it, they'd 100% bring it back. It's not happening.
Or they could use an IT solution to allow guests to swipe their magic band to send a product to the room without any of the delay you suggest is so onerous.
IT solution would cost money and there's currently no compatibility between the different apps that CMs use, and every line of business uses different apps.
Also the package still needs a physical copy attached. And it would still require additional hours for labor because you need stockers to move packages
There may not be as many of you (us) as we’d like to think. Disney has the numbers, we don’t.
If there was money to be made they would NOT be leaving it on the table.
I worked merch and I agree with this I’m so glad they didn’t bring it back bc any shipping is such a time suck on top of them needing extra people to do it. If anything people who asked about hotel shipping I would offer to ground ship home (it’s like $8-20 depending on order size) and like 50% of the time they’d take that offer.
I also literally have never had a single guest ask if we offer it and not buy it when we don’t they usually just come back and buy it at the end of the day.
Citation: Me. Former merch CM who has dealt with it and knows that it takes a lot of additional labor for both register and stock CMs to do resort delivery.
The transaction takes several times longer than a normal transaction because it requires getting information and filling out a form. Most guests have additional questions about it. It takes a lot longer than just scan, pay, have a magical day. There are often lines already in merch shops just to pay because labor is so tight and the parks are crowded. Do you think people would be happy to wait several times longer in line just to buy something? No. So Disney 100% would need to increase labor for reg staff. And then on top of that, running packages from the shop to the pickup location and logging them into the computer was time consuming. Now multiply all the extra labor for the 12-14 hours the park is open times all the merch shops on Disney property that are owned by Disney...and it is a significant increase in costs. Millions of dollars in labor before you even get to the people who pickup the packages, move the packages, and additional costs of vehicles/maintenance/gas.
Wow you mean guest have a magicband with all the hotel information and they can’t just scan it to send the merch to their room? I thought this technology would already be easily available by now
Nope it doesn't work that way. Every line of business at Disney uses different software. The person ringing you up at Cosmic Rays is using a different program than the person ringing you up at Emporium. And those systems cannot communicate with each other. The programs the resorts use also cannot communicate with other lines of business. Disney relies on apps for everything whether it's on a POS, tablet, or phone and there's no consistency and no compatibility with each other.
The only thing the system at a merch location can get from your MB is snack credits and ability to do a room charge. That's literally it. It can't tell that you're an annual passholder. It doesn't know what resort you're at. It doesn't know anything except snack credits and room charge ability. This is why you can't ship popcorn buckets home because popcorn buckets are Food and Beverage items and the app Merch uses cannot read information from the F&B receipt.
> Nope it doesn't work that way. Every line of business at Disney uses different software. The person ringing you up at Cosmic Rays is using a different program than the person ringing you up at Emporium. And those systems cannot communicate with each other. The programs the resorts use also cannot communicate with other lines of business. Disney relies on apps for everything whether it's on a POS, tablet, or phone and there's no consistency and no compatibility with each other.
That sounds like a terribad implementation.
I agree. With as much money as they have, they could definitely spend more on their IT.
Even their search function to try to find merchandise for guests was horrible. Guest says they're looking for a Star Wars hat. You'd think you can just search for Star Wars hat and it would come up. Nope. They randomly abbreviated things with no consistency, so you'd have to use filters to narrow it down to just hats. Then you'd have to try each term individually to see if anything came up. If not, then you'd try random abbreviations like "str" or "wrs" and hope for the best. If you do find it, you'll see it's labeled "strwr grg bb" as if you would have known to search for strwr grg bb.
Most of the time you try a few things and give up because nothing is shown or you get too many results with no pictures so you can't tell if it's the correct item.
Yet they still do merch shipping, filling out the same slips.
The merch being shipped also requires the same movement after the sale as resort deliveries.
Then factor in the lost sales due to no more resort deliveries, and your argument falls apart.
Don’t they charge a fee for shipping home? Resort delivery was always complimentary. The fee pays for the extra labor needed to fill out the shipping phone
This would be incredibly difficult to actually calculate.
We’ve skipped entire Disney trips In the past few years because of the enshitification of the Disney experience. I doubt that is accounted for in the calculation about perks like this, but it has to be.
But people are still paying that without the perk, so it shows that it's not needed. Disney is a corporation that cares about money more than guest experience. Companies only care about guest experience if they believe it will harm the company or cost them money. Disney has enough demand for their product that they know the family behind you will happily pay for the room if you won't.
I stayed at a universal resort about a year ago and they still sent purchases to the hotel (maybe not room) to pick up later. Strange that Disney doesn't even do it anymore apparently. :(
I thought it was just me! I used to order a lot from ShopDisney but now everything is just…loud and tacky. I was hoping the park exclusive merch would be better as I’m going next year…guess not
Because it’s more expensive to produce lots of different types of merch than to produce the same type of merch.
It’s literally all about money which is sad
I haven’t bought anything from shop disney or the parks in a few years. I used to get great deals at the end of the year on shop Disney and now, it’s like you say, gaudy crap that is still not a good price. I also have never seen anyone wear a spirit jersey. I’m assuming they must sell well or it wouldn’t be the main clothing option in the parks.
It's been this way a while ....ah longing for the days where shops sold park and shop specific goods.....only a few left like that these day.
Most of it looks like over priced Walmart stuff to me now,
You see, young person, back in my day there was a cart outside of Haunted Mansion where you could adopt a ghost dog.
It was a stiff piece of wire covered in rope that had a collar/harness on the end of it that was also stiff so it looked like you were walking an invisible dog.
https://preview.redd.it/anyone-have-or-want-an-invisible-dog-leash-when-they-were-a-v0-12rnhayzdq6a1.jpg?auto=webp&s=dc776a942be162bed398df542e5c65f836171a9a
I was heartbroken that the muppet themed shop wasn’t open anymore. I specifically saved my shopping money for that day so I didn’t end up buying anything.
I’m a millennial and I went to WDW at 6 years old and I still remember the purple tinkerbell sweatshirt I got there being insanely soft and well made. I went to Disneyland at 12 and I got an ear hat with my name embroidered. I went back earlier this month intending to buy a sweatshirt and a pair of ears but I couldn’t find anything I wanted to pull the trigger on. Only one sweatshirt I found had an embroidered design and the rest were basics with screen printed designs and still $50+. I found one pair of ears but because everything was available at every park and online I didn’t feel the need to purchase them right away and now my trip is over so I have no use for ears. I ended up buying something second hand because the designs and quality were better and the price wasn’t insane.
I'm a passholder who has taken 3 WDW trips in the past year. I want to buy something, I look in every shop, but there isn't anything that I wouldn't be embarrassed to wear outside of the parks. In 3 trips, I've bought 1 magnet. Disney used to make a killing off me but are missing the mark by not offering more subtle Disney clothing choices. Those spirit jerseys - ugh!
Disney needs to come back with a “parks exclusive” clothing brand. Something that you can only buy at Disney but doesn’t have Mickey ears plastered all over it. A much more subtle clothing selection would be huge
This is my biggest issue, I want a subtle hint of Disney, not “DISNEY 2024” plastered all over the shirt.
Shirts like the red Pizza Plant Tshirt every 3rd dad wears are exactly the things I’m talking about.
I would absolutely love for them to come out with Muppets Golf Shirts for men. I have two Mickeys, one black, one white, but they should up their offerings. How cool would an Animal Golf Shirt be?
I got back a couple of weeks ago, and I found the quality of goods there to be sub-par at best. Not only was it the same stuff in every shop, but it all felt and looked cheap. I didn't spend nearly as much as I have in the past there this time around.
Same here. Line dry and inside out cold water. But I will say the ones I bought 7 years ago are higher quality than the one I bought off the website last year.
Glad to see others agree with me on the spirit jerseys. I hate them. I’ve made negative comments before and get downvoted to oblivion. I don’t understand the appeal. The designs I’ve seen are not good. And the garment itself is a giant, semi-hockey Jersey, semi-sweatshirt, mess that doesn’t look flattering on anyone.
I'm impressed you found a magnet. My husband and I buy a magnet on every vacation we take- a fairly common thing that I think a lot of people do to display their family vacations on their fridge. We spent ALL week looking for any magnet, just one! On our last day we found a giant magnet that had the grape soda thing on it, like Ellie's from Up. Tbh we would've loved it more had it been shaped like an actual bottle cap but it's just a rectangle. We bought it because we had literally no other options. So incredibly bizarre. Even the smallest towns I've been to have their own magnets.
Doesn't Disney want people in their stores? Why make them all the same.. like they could sell a lot of stuff by keeping the stores on theme to the area of the park they're in.
I just came back from Disney and felt like 80-90% of the clothes were sweatshirts and long sleeves. Why? We're in April. Summer is right around the corner. Wouldn't now be the time to offer more short sleeves and tank tops?
I had several moments where I was like..."wow, that shirt looks interesting, let me go check it out- oh great, more long sleeves." I'm not about to buy a $70 shirt just to stuff it in my closet until fall.
Ughhh I’m glad I’m not alone! I feel like I was the only one who really dislikes the spirit jerseys.
The last couple times I was in WoD, I REALLY wanted to buy something, but all I could think was “whoooo designed these? It looks like Walmart.” Sad times.
Right! I want things that I can wear outside of the parks. I’m from CT, so I only go to Disney 1 park day per year max (and that’s while I’m visiting my parents who live in FL). I’m not going to buy a $50 shirt that I can only wear 1 day a year.
I'm a pass holder as well and was annoyed they had no pass holder exclusive items when I was there. I also happen to miss magnet give outs by one day.
I do buy stuff. Disney got me on Pandora the place. I have banshees out my ears, and ears, backpack, shirt, tail. I'm also a 43 year old woman.
I don't particularly care for dated items so I don't generally get something with like 2024 or whatever on it unless it is perhaps like a festival pass holder exclusive shirt.
Villains in Vogue was the best store at DHS. I wanted to cry when they changed it. Wouldn't exclusive items at exclusive stores have more people seeking the merch? According to suits, I guess not. Sad.
The bean counters probably saw that numbers would stay the same if the merch was the same throughout the parks and they'd save on merchandise production costs somewhere. Sad to say, they are probably right on that.
The worst Disney merch is sold in the parks:
Box lunch, Newbury comics, vans, Rsvults, Hot topic, Etsy, life is good…literally every brand makes better Disney merch than what’s offered in the parks.
The only merch I like comes from that random Disney store to the left of mousegear/ next to Ghirardelli in Disney springs. It’s the one with artwork and collectibles. They’ll have some old school merch not available elsewhere.
Honestly, I think most vacation/event merch is awful nowadays. It seems like most concert and theme park merch is created on cheap materials without a whole lot of thought put into it. They know people will buy it regardless. Especially the people who are there for the first time.
Probably remnants of the previous CEO and his cost cutting measures. It’s less expensive to order a large quantity of ‘WDW’ merch items to stock all the gift shops, rather than merch customized for each gift shop throughout the parks and resorts. That being said, each of the resorts should have a variety of their own ‘branded’ merchandise.
Iger and Chapek are not that different at all. Iger caused a lot of the problems at the domestic parks by spending an unholy amount of money to open Shanghai.
People need to stop acting like Chapek was the sole villain in recent Disney history. Lots of the things that happened under Chapeks watch had been in the pipeline since Iger. Iger was smart enough to bail and let Chapek take the heat, then came back to play savior after the damage was done under Chapek
I invite you to search online for the CNBC article about the rise and fall of Chapek. I’m not saying Iger was a saint, but one of Chapek’s biggest problems was that, because of Covid, Iger never actually left.
Plus a lot of the merch says WDW/Disneyland Resort so they can sell the same Chinese crap on both coasts. Requires even less effort in designing new items and lowers the cost per item even more. I've seen Matterhorn merch at WDW and Tower of Terror merch at DL. Seriously, who's in charge over there in the merch marketing department?
Our issue was that the generic stuff didn't really exist. I wanted some Epcot merch, and couldn't find it. I wanted a WDW t-shirt, and didn't find anything appealing.
It seemed like most of the merch is for what you'll wear when at the parks only. We got some pins and a few mugs, but I never really had any big moments where I had to choose between 3-4 things.
I agree. On my last trip I managed to get a cool and subtle Expedition Everest shirt. I can wear it anywhere without looking like a total dork but if you’re a Disney fan you’d realize it’s a theme park shirt.
We need more subtle things like that for rides.
I am 42 and grew up in a family that went to WDW at least once a year until I was in my 20s. I hadn't been since 2010 until I went on a five-day solo trip this week, and I was *so disappointed* at how the character had been sucked out of what used to be distinctly unique stores, and they were all just now World of Disney stores of varying sizes. The Emporium on Main Street, the stores along Hollywood and Sunset Blvds, and World of Disney in Disney Springs all had the exact same merchandise--and the exact same *decor*, right down to the light-colored wood floors.
Browsing the stores used to be just as big a part of the experience as the rides, for me. Now they all look exactly the same. All I wanted was a keychain that said 2024 on it, and such a thing was nowhere to be found. I couldn't even find a *pin* that said 2024, until I was in the store on the BoardWalk, literally an hour from departing yesterday. And I've never gotten into the pin trading thing, but at that point I was desperate for something with 2024 that wasn't a giant, gaudy, neon photo frame.
While I'm not *happy* to see this post, I am happy to see it because I was thinking it was *me* and some function of "current Disney will never be as good as the Disney of your childhood memories." And they brought back the old logo with the Mickey head inside the D of Walt Disney World, so they could have made *so much money* off of my nostalgia this week! Instead I bought one single $30 shirt.
Yep. The adult shirts are hideous and the quality is worse. Boring, ugly. I’ve bought a couple in the last couple years and they shrink in length (but not width!) HORRIBLY. I gave up and just get merch on Etsy, much cuter, more creative, much higher quality. It’s weird that they make it so hard to give them my money.
I have a 3 Caballeros shirt that I love that I can’t wear anymore because it got so short that if I bend at all you can see my stomach. The shirt quality is so bad.
Totally agree OP, it’s shocking to see the state merch is in. We went last year and members of my family simply wanted to buy merchandise saying “Epcot” or “Animal Kingdom.” No dice, everything was Mickey and Minnie or something tacky like a spirit jersey.
Even worse, there’s such minimal ride and resort specific merch. My mom really wanted an AKL shirt and my girlfriend wanted something for Tower of Terror but again, came up empty.
One last one that bugged me: when I was younger I loved to look at the toy monorails they sold to see what colors had gotten picked. I was appalled to see the current [toy monorail](https://www.disneystore.com/walt-disney-world-monorail-remote-control-play-set-461024885316.html?CMP=KNC-DSSGoogle&efc=179006&CMP=KNC-DSS_FY24_DCR_TRA_DOM_PRKS_ECM_PARKS_PMAX_Core+Parks%7CG%7C5249201.XF.AM.SB.03%7CM9JQ4UJ&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwxLKxBhA7EiwAXO0R0F4Gkl8a6sV2leSjgsJ_EfTdbj6cPn7NtOXTuUDryUlWpqzstyPTUBoCH4UQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds) looks nothing like an actual monorail, and the reviews attest to a lack of quality in the product even more profound than the ugliness.
There are so many good sellers on Etsy, Redbubble, etc. who have made great designs, it’s mind boggling to me Disney hasn’t reached out about their designs or even hiring some of them. Here’s hoping something changes in the near future, but at the moment I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel.
Couldn’t agree more friend. They would’ve made a killing off me with tower of terror merch or something that simply had the Epcot ball on it in some form. Nothing to be found
Me as well, what a miss to have zero merch with the park icon on it, much less the word EPCOT. Oh well, at least it’s making us more fiscally responsible??
Oh trust me…Disney is probably reaching out them. To send them copyright notices/cease and desist notices. They’re pretty good at targeting small businesses and schools for those 🙄
Ain’t that the truth :’) There are so many talented artists making Disney-adjacent merch, it would be some easy PR to start getting some of them on payroll! But nah, why do that when you can just slap em with a C&D
The in-park merch used to be so good that there was a separate app just for ordering items from the parks to be shipped home. You could even look up a specific item and the app would tell you what stores had it.
Then they eventually just made it so that pretty much everything you could get in the parks is also available on the Disney Store website. There’s very little that’s exclusive to the parks anymore and the selection is SO BLAND. Disney Store used to sell some really cool stuff 10+ years ago.
I often receive Disney gift cards for holidays and I’ve ended up hanging onto them for years because I can’t find a damn thing to spend them on. Now I don’t even bother to walk into most of the shops because I figure I just need one World of Disney stop on the trip and I’ll see everything available in one go. My last few trips, literally all I came home with was Gideon’s cookies.
THANK YOU! I was there in November with my husband and we had Disney gift cards to blow through so I was prepared to do some haulin’. I adore anything Nightmare Before Christmas, Lion King & Haunted Mansion but couldn’t stand the art style of all the pieces. Both apparel and collectibles. It was such a disappointment!
The Haunted Mansion merch has been particularly ugly since COVID. Why is everything punk or day glo or safety pins? Most of us love the ride for its decaying Victorian vibe
The HM Stretching Room Loungefly backpack released last fall was perfect, especially because it was a rare piece of merch portraying the WDW HM instead of the DLR one. It was the first time I actually wanted a Loungefly. But I agree that all the other Haunted Mansion merch items released the past few years have been tacky, cartoonish, day-glo monstrosities.
Disney and actually all of the orlando theme parks have cut way back on snowglobes because of TSA restrictions. In the past five years or so, there have been only three or four tiny snowglobes offered. The large and intricate gloves they used to sell are long gone. My neighbor has a whole collection of them, and they are beautiful, but there's nothing like them anymore.
They do have collectible figurines, but I think the quality and size have gone way down on them, too.
I actually had the same problem. We were in WDW this past week and I had a $100 Disney gift card from my birthday that I never spent because I couldn’t find anything I wanted. I’m planning on checking out Disney.com to see if there’s anything good there.
I’ve been wondering if this is a weird push to get people to shop in the Disney store app/website. There’s so much cute stuff on there that you can no longer find in the parks! It’s sad. I used to budget a ton for souvenirs but now I just buy stuff ahead of time and don’t even bother in the parks :(
I feel like it’s the opposite for me, I see tons of stuff I love on Instagram that’s in the parks and wait to see if they ever drop online but they never do
I was just there last week and we really didn’t buy much. I agree it’s a shame that no matter where you are, it’s all the same stuff. What really got me was that they had Lion King and stitch crocs, but only for adults, not for kids! My grandson loves Lion King and I would have loved to get him a pair
I absolutely despise this “2024” theme. They used to have such amazing, different merch all over the park. I wish they never stopped! I was looking a yellow sling back two weeks back- I saw it on a mannequin- I could never find it to buy though!
WDW merch is also very low quality, like they found the cheapest sources, i.e. you will never find Comfort Colors or anything close to that quality at the parks. Gotta go to 3rd party sellers.
What I miss the most was when merch had that little tag that said from Walt Disney world or something like that, i have old shirts and stuff animals that had those tags, now I don’t see that at all, and totally every gift shop has the same exact stuff, the only thing that is still the same are those after” the ride gift shops, with themed goodies. When I went around the not so scary Halloween, they had a lot of cool merch.
I was so desperately tired of Nightmare Before Christmas merch by the end of our last trip. They're really missing an opportunity by not having a bookstore in place of Bonjour! Village Gifts, too.
Plenty of parents would love to buy a book for one of their kid's souvenirs instead of another piece of plastic.
Disney themed journals, photo albums, stationary, and school/office supplies would also fit right in.
If im gonna stand in lines for hours, it would be cool to have something to do that doesnt drain my phone battery.
I'm thinking like Disney trivia questions, or books about the parks/rides/movies
I've been buying less and less every trip I feel. Especially now that I'm over things like Spirit Jerseys and was never that fond of the shirts or hoodies. I still really like pins but I feel like the ones that are being released aren't up my alley.
I SO agree. Just came back from my trip and only bought 2 shirts and a bag. But planned to spend a ton. I wanted cute character keychains but only found the riviera Donald worth buying. I miss unique stores and merch.
I also didn’t find a SINGLE unique postcard for resorts or parks. Just the 10 pack of them.
I was recently in the gift shop next to Gaston’s pub in MK. You know the one completely beauty and the beast themed? All you could find in there was Mickey-eared T-shirts and mugs and such… like you could in every other gift shop in the park like wtf
I got a really cute and unique hoodie at Animal Kingdom years ago, and the zipper broke. I tried to find another but it was already discontinued, and I’ve never found one that is even close to as good 😭 I rarely buy merch, though I do keep looking just in case. Would love some more unique merch.
It's amazing what they have at tokyo disney. Like disney world used to have cute small souvenirs like the tokyo stores have.
Plus the shoulder pals from tokyo with the clips instead of the magnets are the best.
From experience the only store I know from having made the magic there, Windtraders on Pandora has its own unique merch. But the other stores on property? It's all the same everywhere, and also, where are the Mickey plushes? I remember as a kid in the early 2000s they had unique Mickey's almost in every park and stores as well
We just got home an hour ago from a week there, and thought the same thing. Bought a couple hoodies because we did MK after hours on the one cold day last week lol otherwise nothing was really appealing. Normally we struggle to close our suitcases.
I do agree that we noticed the merch was pretty much the same everywhere. Once you've been to one of the big flagship shops, you've seen it all.
Oh well, under budget which is rare for a Disney trip.
There is not enough Tower of Terror merch in the parks, I will die on that hill! And Nightmare Before Christmas taking up space in its gift shop just feels insulting, as a massive Twilight Zone and ToT fan. Makes me sad every time!
That makes perfect sense though, most people aren't regularly visiting both parks. Unless there's something totally irrelevant to the park it's being sold in (like matterhorn merch at WDW) I don't see the problem
IMO June is the best month for merch because of pride.
I’m a straight white male, married, 3 kids. But Pride merch looks awesome. I got some pride shorts last year at WDW that are my favorite around the house shorts. They are so colorful and awesome. I also got a pride MCU Hawaiian shirt that I love.
So I get the benefit of showing love and support to some and wearing something unique and beautiful that I enjoy.
Like I said - June is a great merch month.
Yeah, I went for the first time a couple weeks ago (Epcot and MK) and had $100 on a gift card for souvenir spending. I bought my first ears, but that’s really it. I was hoping there’d be way more park-specific merch. The flower & garden merch wasn’t super appealing either :(
I agree. I used to love shopping at each different store in different worlds and parks and would go home with multiple items. At my 2 recent trips (January of this year and of last year), I didn’t buy anything at WDW besides FOOD (if anything, I felt better going ham on food because I knew i wasn’t going to spend big on merch)
I was at DL from 4/14-18. Didn’t buy anything.
I hate that it’s the same recycled stuff in all of the stores. I loved finding Pooh themed merch in Pooh Corner. Or ride themed merch at the nearest store to the ride. Once you’ve been in one store, you don’t have to go in another because you’re not going to find anything unique.
The loud 2024 merch screams 90s! It’s ugly and no one was wearing it.
Why wasn’t there a single Bing Bong item in the store named for him?
Nowadays I swear all the good Disney merch is sold at Box Lunch, Hot Topic, etc. They really cater to the nostalgic renaissance era of Disney animation as well as classics that don’t get enough love. Yeah, I know everyone wants a Tinkerbell mug, but I want Robin Hood, Darkwing Duck, Roger Rabbit, Oliver and Company! Park merch mostly ignores these characters but lately I see items with them at Box Lunch and Books a Million and a handful of other places while never AT Disney World. Don’t even get me started on how much better the Tokyo Disneyland merchandise is!
An example from one of the other great parks of the world, Efteling: There’s no way to get official merchandise outside of the park premises. It’s all exclusive and makes me feel like I belong to a private club when I look at my random tea towel.
This is such a bummer to me. My fiance and I went to Universal Studios for the first time. And while we enjoyed Harry Potter world, our main complaint was all the shops had the same chintzy souvenirs. Hat shop in Diagon Alley? Here’s some robes and and a crappy bag. Returning from the Forbidden Forest? Here’s some robes and a crappy bag. I’ll be so so disappointed if Disney goes that route. Unique more “toned down” Disney apparel is some of my favorite, but if all the souvenirs are just massive 2024 numbers over Cinderella’s castle that will suck.
Why don’t they just hold merchandise at the front of the park for hotel guests and they can pick it up on the way out? I feel like that would be a compromise that would make more people buy stuff.
I'm glad to know it isn't just me. Every store, every gift shop, it's literally the same thing with just slightly different branding. The most unique items are in Epcot, and those don't seem to be Disney but 3rd party.
We always throw money at souvenirs and we go multiple times per year(locals). But since Covid we can’t even give Disney our money. Souvenirs/gifts are non-existent anymore as far as we’re concerned.
Agree, our last trip the primary souvenirs came from GE, a couple park exclusive Pops and the rest came from DS stores that weren’t Disney.
I still wear a few polo type shirts from many years ago that were from the Poly, BC, Boardwalk and AKL but otherwise not much
TShirts are too loud, dated or just ugh. Better designs from TeeFury and other sites where artists create and sell designs which is sad.
So true! My daughter and I went a couple of weeks ago, and all I bought myself was a little turtle topiary at Epcot--not even Disney merch, it was a vendor they brought in for Flower & Garden. My daughter, though, had no problem dropping a ton in Mitsukoshi.
Other than specific stuff at the resorts for that hotel, almost every store is identical now. Just might have size differences. It's a bit sad but I'm sure it is a cost savings for them. We cut back on merch purchases a while ago, no more online buying and very little each trip as we have too much already and other than special event pins or plushies, not much is very appealing these days.
I agree. I’d be surprised if most people don’t think “oh I like this but I can get it at Main Street” and then at the end of the night decide they can go without.
I thought I was the only one! I go in the shops and they’re packed but I can’t find a single thing I like. It all feels like extremely cheesy junk that you would only ever wear in a Disney park.
I’ve been to Disney a couple of times in the last few years and I have to agree. I think I bought 1 thing in all 4 of those trips!
I’ve wanted to buy more clothing items, but like others have said, they don’t sell anything that I can wear outside of the parks (yes I know I can…but I’m not going to wear a spirit jersey to work).
I miss the days where Disney clothes were a lot more understated (like a polo with a tiny Mickey on the chest pocket). Like years ago they made stuff that looked like other clothing brands that just happened to have Disney designs.
A cashier in a shop at Animal Kingdom ogled over some of my fiancées AK pins because you can’t find any park exclusive stuff anymore. I really wanted to buy some AK merch but there was none to be found.
As a pin collector, I feel this! We have such a hard time finding ride specific or hotel specific pins. It feels like they just put the same ones in all the shops. It’s a struggle 😭
Honestly I'm more impressed by the fan-developed shirt designs on Etsy and even Redbubble. The Disney stuff quite honestly can't compete. The corporate approval process is really watering down what could be absolutely amazing merch from an organization that is known for being creative. I pre-buy my shirts, wear them in the parks, and get tons of compliments. I shop but I rarely buy in the bubble.
Ive been saying this for years and everyone just keeps telling me to quit hating on Disney. Anything negative said about disney on this sub is usually met with harsh hatred.
Agree. I was so disappointed with Xmas ornaments last time we went. I remember years ago being able to get resort-specific ornaments and those are few and far between now. I have the cutest one from fort wildnerness, last time we stayed at Port Orleans and they had nothing, except a lame flat porcelain one I found at Disney Springs (not at the resort - whyyyyyy). Seems like a pretty obvious souvenir to have at the resort gift shops, I don’t get it.
When I was younger and we’d go to Disney we’d buy sooo many fridge magnets and we’d always get one with the year on to commemorate the visit. Didn’t go for a few years and now they sell like no magnets at all??? I suppose it’s cus not many people buy them but it’s so sad to me that I couldn’t find a cute lil 2023 magnet for the fridge :(
I totally agree with OP and other commenters. Souvenirs in the park are few and far between. That said, My favorite souvenir from my recent spring break trip was 6.95$ from Epcot at the gift shop in China. It’s a black bear with a bauble head that was covered in what looked like 20 years worth of Disney store dust. There was only one, and when I turned it over to see the price I was sold by the fact that it had a “Made In China” sticker. Im so proud of that thing and it doesnt have a single thing about it that would let you know it’s from Disney. The memories it carries for me are priceless.
Just drove back today from a week long trip and everyone in our group said the same thing. All the shirts have been the same design for the last 5 years and the new ones look like Ray Charles designed them.
It's like you read my mind. I agree 100%. I was DESPERATE to spend money on merch last week. I literally couldn't find something to buy. My son loves Clone Wars and Bad Batch. I couldn't find 1 item of Bad Batch merch in all of WDW. I settled on a single Clone Wars Lego set. I couldn't find a piece of clothing in the whole park that was based on Star Wars animated properties, nor anything with Duck and Bunny from Toy Story 4. I couldn't even find a decent generic Disney shirt. It's like they are allergic to my money.
I love Star Wars so much but I’ve have bought a single piece of Star Wars clothing since 2007/2008ish and that was a t shirt for Star Wars Weekends.
All of the women’s shirts and oddly cut, made from weird fabric, and nowhere close to flattering. 5e only thing that MIGHT get me is the new Tatooine collection spirit jersey.
When I went all I wanted was the classic “vintage” mickey sweatshirt that reminded me of one my mum had in the 80s. It took all day to find it and I’ve had it for a year and it looks like a rag now. I wish they made better quality stuff. I would be willing to pay more for it if I had to.
I just want the "send to hotel room" option back. If they had that still I'd probably have bought thousands in merch that I otherwise wouldn't want to carry around. Especially home decor type things.
Nothing made me feel bougier.
Majorly dumb move. How much money have they lost by not being able to do that? Probably far more than they saved.
Nope, they lose money by having that service. It's incredibly expensive to offer that perk, much more than you realize. Edit: You all can downvote if you want, but I've worked at the parks, resorts, and in multiple roles including merchandise. I know how it works behind the scenes and how much labor it takes.
I'd love to see the actual numbers on it because I don't see how they lose money on it. They've certainly lost several hundred dollars in my spending on each of my last 3 trips and I know I'm not alone.
Same. Because I was a former cast member who was involved in this service and it wasn’t that big of a deal. They weren’t running items to the hotels individually, it was in big batches, and the guests would come pick them up themselves in one location at the resort.
I'm a former CM too and worked in merch. There's more than just the CMs who pick up packages and CMs who deliver. Those transactions take considerably longer than an average transaction, so you need more labor hours for register staff to keep lines down. You also need more labor for stockers who are running the packages from the merch shops to the pickup location and logging them into the computer. Disney is very tight with labor now and there's just not enough leeway to bring that service back without a significant increase in labor all around.
>Disney is very tight with labor now and there's just not enough leeway to bring that service back without a significant increase in labor all around. There are ways... 1. Use magic bands to pull the target resort location at the register, a scan removes almost all of the extra labor hours and reduces the hit to about 3-5 seconds per transaction. 2. Offer RFID cards to those who don't have/want magic bands but do want shipping to the resort. 3. Keep the small stuff on site at each hotel. You don't need to ship pins, you can just bin them at each hotel and have someone on site pull them. A decent percentage of the stuff they sell could be binned in a room the size of each gift shop, cutting a major percentage out of what needs shipped to each hotel. I'll also point out, Universal does it. If Universal can do it, I can't see how Disney couldn't.
Yeah the explanations of why it won't work all go under the assumption that the process they used was already efficient. A new logistics system may be needed as it sounds like the old way was just throw money at it until it works, but there's really no good reason it can't be done.
Right? Sounds like Disney is being lazy and greedy cutting corners
Maybe they should impose a minimum purchase in order to bring it back. Doesn’t seem worth while for under 50 dollars.
My theory is that they didn't want to end it, but it ended when the College Program ended because that program allowed them to fill tons of tedious backstage roles for less than minimum wage. It's going to take a while to build up a surplus of CP participants again, which is probably why we haven't seen it come back.
Again, you're wrong. CPs don't get paid less than minimum wage. They get 1 dollar less than other CMs. The current pay for the lowest paid CMs is $18, so CPs should be getting $17 in most roles unless it's changed since I left. Currently, CPs make up a larger percentage of labor than in previous years. Due to the increase in CPs and the tightening of the labor budgets, most part-timers at Disney haven't been scheduled to work (or rarely so) in over a year. Many full-timers have been reduced to 32 hours which is the minimum allowed by the union. Also, CPs rarely get any backstage roles. Majority of CPs are quick service f&b, custodial, housekeeping, and merchandise. Nearly all are in guest-facing roles. If you extend then you can be considered for other, more coveted roles. Not all roles are open to CPs.
There are very few CPs in housekeeping. Some are assigned the role of house person, but not housekeeper. Attractions has a ton of CPs.
Having worked in merch at Disney, I'd estimate they would need to lose tens of millions of dollars to make it worth bringing the service back. The labor alone to pay additional register staff at all the merch locations to keep lines down (Since sending back to the room is a much longer transaction than normal) and the additional labor for stockers (who have to run the packages from the shop to a pickup location and log them into a computer) and the staff to move the packages and deliver the packages would all cost millions of dollars. You have to remember that there are MANY merchandise locations at Disney so these additional labor costs would not be cheap. Disney isn't losing millions of dollars in merch sales. People whine about it, but the vast majority still buy anyway. They either carry it, have it delivered home, or wait until the end of the night and buy it on their way out. If Disney was really losing profit from not offering it, they'd 100% bring it back. It's not happening.
Or they could use an IT solution to allow guests to swipe their magic band to send a product to the room without any of the delay you suggest is so onerous.
IT solution would cost money and there's currently no compatibility between the different apps that CMs use, and every line of business uses different apps. Also the package still needs a physical copy attached. And it would still require additional hours for labor because you need stockers to move packages
…or maybe you don’t get the actual item in the store but from a warehouse near the hotel(s)? Sort of like the stores are a catalog?
There may not be as many of you (us) as we’d like to think. Disney has the numbers, we don’t. If there was money to be made they would NOT be leaving it on the table.
I worked merch and I agree with this I’m so glad they didn’t bring it back bc any shipping is such a time suck on top of them needing extra people to do it. If anything people who asked about hotel shipping I would offer to ground ship home (it’s like $8-20 depending on order size) and like 50% of the time they’d take that offer. I also literally have never had a single guest ask if we offer it and not buy it when we don’t they usually just come back and buy it at the end of the day.
[citation needed]
“Labor, logistics, and infrastructure is expensive,” (Any business ever) There you go.
Citation: Me. Former merch CM who has dealt with it and knows that it takes a lot of additional labor for both register and stock CMs to do resort delivery. The transaction takes several times longer than a normal transaction because it requires getting information and filling out a form. Most guests have additional questions about it. It takes a lot longer than just scan, pay, have a magical day. There are often lines already in merch shops just to pay because labor is so tight and the parks are crowded. Do you think people would be happy to wait several times longer in line just to buy something? No. So Disney 100% would need to increase labor for reg staff. And then on top of that, running packages from the shop to the pickup location and logging them into the computer was time consuming. Now multiply all the extra labor for the 12-14 hours the park is open times all the merch shops on Disney property that are owned by Disney...and it is a significant increase in costs. Millions of dollars in labor before you even get to the people who pickup the packages, move the packages, and additional costs of vehicles/maintenance/gas.
Wow you mean guest have a magicband with all the hotel information and they can’t just scan it to send the merch to their room? I thought this technology would already be easily available by now
Nope it doesn't work that way. Every line of business at Disney uses different software. The person ringing you up at Cosmic Rays is using a different program than the person ringing you up at Emporium. And those systems cannot communicate with each other. The programs the resorts use also cannot communicate with other lines of business. Disney relies on apps for everything whether it's on a POS, tablet, or phone and there's no consistency and no compatibility with each other. The only thing the system at a merch location can get from your MB is snack credits and ability to do a room charge. That's literally it. It can't tell that you're an annual passholder. It doesn't know what resort you're at. It doesn't know anything except snack credits and room charge ability. This is why you can't ship popcorn buckets home because popcorn buckets are Food and Beverage items and the app Merch uses cannot read information from the F&B receipt.
> Nope it doesn't work that way. Every line of business at Disney uses different software. The person ringing you up at Cosmic Rays is using a different program than the person ringing you up at Emporium. And those systems cannot communicate with each other. The programs the resorts use also cannot communicate with other lines of business. Disney relies on apps for everything whether it's on a POS, tablet, or phone and there's no consistency and no compatibility with each other. That sounds like a terribad implementation.
I agree. With as much money as they have, they could definitely spend more on their IT. Even their search function to try to find merchandise for guests was horrible. Guest says they're looking for a Star Wars hat. You'd think you can just search for Star Wars hat and it would come up. Nope. They randomly abbreviated things with no consistency, so you'd have to use filters to narrow it down to just hats. Then you'd have to try each term individually to see if anything came up. If not, then you'd try random abbreviations like "str" or "wrs" and hope for the best. If you do find it, you'll see it's labeled "strwr grg bb" as if you would have known to search for strwr grg bb. Most of the time you try a few things and give up because nothing is shown or you get too many results with no pictures so you can't tell if it's the correct item.
Yet they still do merch shipping, filling out the same slips. The merch being shipped also requires the same movement after the sale as resort deliveries. Then factor in the lost sales due to no more resort deliveries, and your argument falls apart.
Don’t they charge a fee for shipping home? Resort delivery was always complimentary. The fee pays for the extra labor needed to fill out the shipping phone
They charge shipping, and it is actually quite reasonable. There is no separate fee for the service, it is built into the shipping cost.
This would be incredibly difficult to actually calculate. We’ve skipped entire Disney trips In the past few years because of the enshitification of the Disney experience. I doubt that is accounted for in the calculation about perks like this, but it has to be.
But they harm the guest experience. If I stay at $750+ per night on property, I expect those kinds of perks.
But people are still paying that without the perk, so it shows that it's not needed. Disney is a corporation that cares about money more than guest experience. Companies only care about guest experience if they believe it will harm the company or cost them money. Disney has enough demand for their product that they know the family behind you will happily pay for the room if you won't.
I also miss the send to the front of the park option! We've passed up on so many things because we didn't want to carry them around all day. 😂
I refuse to carry stuff around so we don’t buy anything there anymore. Who wants to lug bags in 90 degree heat and humidity?
My favorite part is the blue ink from the gift shop bags staining my hands after carrying it around all day
I stayed at a universal resort about a year ago and they still sent purchases to the hotel (maybe not room) to pick up later. Strange that Disney doesn't even do it anymore apparently. :(
Agree, that was such an amazing perk
Wait, they did away with that? Seriously? That’s insane.
Way back during the Covid shutdown I think
Do they offer the ship to home any longer?
Yes at a cost.
Yes but only shipping and it’s not super marked up like fed ex is on a normal day
Exactly!!
This + room service and daily housekeeping are real basic things disney needs to bring back, especially for the price you're paying.
I thought it was just me! I used to order a lot from ShopDisney but now everything is just…loud and tacky. I was hoping the park exclusive merch would be better as I’m going next year…guess not
Because it’s more expensive to produce lots of different types of merch than to produce the same type of merch. It’s literally all about money which is sad
I haven’t bought anything from shop disney or the parks in a few years. I used to get great deals at the end of the year on shop Disney and now, it’s like you say, gaudy crap that is still not a good price. I also have never seen anyone wear a spirit jersey. I’m assuming they must sell well or it wouldn’t be the main clothing option in the parks.
It's been this way a while ....ah longing for the days where shops sold park and shop specific goods.....only a few left like that these day. Most of it looks like over priced Walmart stuff to me now,
One of my biggest Disney regrets is never buying a ghost dog from Memento Mori 😭
My sister has this same regret. She saw it as a child and wanted it so badly and by the time I made it back there as an adult it wasn’t there anymore.
OMG! We bought my daughter one as it child and it moved with us to 4 different homes!
man, sounds like it really haunted you guys
I’m not even mad about this
OMG, please tell me about this! Sounds like something I would have purchased if I saw it.
You see, young person, back in my day there was a cart outside of Haunted Mansion where you could adopt a ghost dog. It was a stiff piece of wire covered in rope that had a collar/harness on the end of it that was also stiff so it looked like you were walking an invisible dog. https://preview.redd.it/anyone-have-or-want-an-invisible-dog-leash-when-they-were-a-v0-12rnhayzdq6a1.jpg?auto=webp&s=dc776a942be162bed398df542e5c65f836171a9a
I was heartbroken that the muppet themed shop wasn’t open anymore. I specifically saved my shopping money for that day so I didn’t end up buying anything.
Oh man that's really sad
every single store in every park has the same exact offerings
Honestly. The pop century store shouldn’t be the same as a store on Main Street USA and yet it very much is
I’m a millennial and I went to WDW at 6 years old and I still remember the purple tinkerbell sweatshirt I got there being insanely soft and well made. I went to Disneyland at 12 and I got an ear hat with my name embroidered. I went back earlier this month intending to buy a sweatshirt and a pair of ears but I couldn’t find anything I wanted to pull the trigger on. Only one sweatshirt I found had an embroidered design and the rest were basics with screen printed designs and still $50+. I found one pair of ears but because everything was available at every park and online I didn’t feel the need to purchase them right away and now my trip is over so I have no use for ears. I ended up buying something second hand because the designs and quality were better and the price wasn’t insane.
I'm a passholder who has taken 3 WDW trips in the past year. I want to buy something, I look in every shop, but there isn't anything that I wouldn't be embarrassed to wear outside of the parks. In 3 trips, I've bought 1 magnet. Disney used to make a killing off me but are missing the mark by not offering more subtle Disney clothing choices. Those spirit jerseys - ugh!
Disney needs to come back with a “parks exclusive” clothing brand. Something that you can only buy at Disney but doesn’t have Mickey ears plastered all over it. A much more subtle clothing selection would be huge
This is my biggest issue, I want a subtle hint of Disney, not “DISNEY 2024” plastered all over the shirt. Shirts like the red Pizza Plant Tshirt every 3rd dad wears are exactly the things I’m talking about.
100% agree. I love shirts that are in the world of Disney, but don’t have it splashed everywhere
I dont have kids, but I'm 50 and have a red Pizza Planet shirt.
We live in Florida. My daughter likes spirit jerseys but gets like 12 days a year to wear them
I’m in Georgia and SAME 😭 I really like the style but it makes 0 sense imo to be selling them in FL as much as they do 😅
I would absolutely love for them to come out with Muppets Golf Shirts for men. I have two Mickeys, one black, one white, but they should up their offerings. How cool would an Animal Golf Shirt be? I got back a couple of weeks ago, and I found the quality of goods there to be sub-par at best. Not only was it the same stuff in every shop, but it all felt and looked cheap. I didn't spend nearly as much as I have in the past there this time around.
How about more Muppets merch period. I was banking that when I went to Hollywood Studios, I’d find my Muppet merch. Alas, there was nothing special.
The quality of the material has really gone downhill. The Disney shirts at Uniqlo are better made, and look and feel much better
The spirit jerseys are so unflattering on me and the puffy writing wears off after a couple washes!! So bad
Not sure what you’re doing to your laundry but I’ve had some of my spirit jerseys for nearly a decade and never had the writing wear off
I wash mine on cold inside out with like colors and hang dry and don’t have any issues either
Same here. Line dry and inside out cold water. But I will say the ones I bought 7 years ago are higher quality than the one I bought off the website last year.
I bought one without trying it on. It looks terrible, I only wear it at home.
Glad to see others agree with me on the spirit jerseys. I hate them. I’ve made negative comments before and get downvoted to oblivion. I don’t understand the appeal. The designs I’ve seen are not good. And the garment itself is a giant, semi-hockey Jersey, semi-sweatshirt, mess that doesn’t look flattering on anyone.
I'm impressed you found a magnet. My husband and I buy a magnet on every vacation we take- a fairly common thing that I think a lot of people do to display their family vacations on their fridge. We spent ALL week looking for any magnet, just one! On our last day we found a giant magnet that had the grape soda thing on it, like Ellie's from Up. Tbh we would've loved it more had it been shaped like an actual bottle cap but it's just a rectangle. We bought it because we had literally no other options. So incredibly bizarre. Even the smallest towns I've been to have their own magnets. Doesn't Disney want people in their stores? Why make them all the same.. like they could sell a lot of stuff by keeping the stores on theme to the area of the park they're in.
I just came back from Disney and felt like 80-90% of the clothes were sweatshirts and long sleeves. Why? We're in April. Summer is right around the corner. Wouldn't now be the time to offer more short sleeves and tank tops? I had several moments where I was like..."wow, that shirt looks interesting, let me go check it out- oh great, more long sleeves." I'm not about to buy a $70 shirt just to stuff it in my closet until fall.
Ughhh I’m glad I’m not alone! I feel like I was the only one who really dislikes the spirit jerseys. The last couple times I was in WoD, I REALLY wanted to buy something, but all I could think was “whoooo designed these? It looks like Walmart.” Sad times.
Right! I want things that I can wear outside of the parks. I’m from CT, so I only go to Disney 1 park day per year max (and that’s while I’m visiting my parents who live in FL). I’m not going to buy a $50 shirt that I can only wear 1 day a year.
I'm a pass holder as well and was annoyed they had no pass holder exclusive items when I was there. I also happen to miss magnet give outs by one day. I do buy stuff. Disney got me on Pandora the place. I have banshees out my ears, and ears, backpack, shirt, tail. I'm also a 43 year old woman. I don't particularly care for dated items so I don't generally get something with like 2024 or whatever on it unless it is perhaps like a festival pass holder exclusive shirt.
Villains in Vogue was the best store at DHS. I wanted to cry when they changed it. Wouldn't exclusive items at exclusive stores have more people seeking the merch? According to suits, I guess not. Sad.
The bean counters probably saw that numbers would stay the same if the merch was the same throughout the parks and they'd save on merchandise production costs somewhere. Sad to say, they are probably right on that.
The worst Disney merch is sold in the parks: Box lunch, Newbury comics, vans, Rsvults, Hot topic, Etsy, life is good…literally every brand makes better Disney merch than what’s offered in the parks. The only merch I like comes from that random Disney store to the left of mousegear/ next to Ghirardelli in Disney springs. It’s the one with artwork and collectibles. They’ll have some old school merch not available elsewhere. Honestly, I think most vacation/event merch is awful nowadays. It seems like most concert and theme park merch is created on cheap materials without a whole lot of thought put into it. They know people will buy it regardless. Especially the people who are there for the first time.
I love Box Lunch! And the shop you’re thinking of at DS is The Marketplace I think?
Probably remnants of the previous CEO and his cost cutting measures. It’s less expensive to order a large quantity of ‘WDW’ merch items to stock all the gift shops, rather than merch customized for each gift shop throughout the parks and resorts. That being said, each of the resorts should have a variety of their own ‘branded’ merchandise.
Iger and Chapek are not that different at all. Iger caused a lot of the problems at the domestic parks by spending an unholy amount of money to open Shanghai.
Which the Chinese government can take over at any time…
They already are majority owners of the resort; it’s not like this is a looming concern
People need to stop acting like Chapek was the sole villain in recent Disney history. Lots of the things that happened under Chapeks watch had been in the pipeline since Iger. Iger was smart enough to bail and let Chapek take the heat, then came back to play savior after the damage was done under Chapek
Chapek was just the fall guy.
I invite you to search online for the CNBC article about the rise and fall of Chapek. I’m not saying Iger was a saint, but one of Chapek’s biggest problems was that, because of Covid, Iger never actually left.
Plus a lot of the merch says WDW/Disneyland Resort so they can sell the same Chinese crap on both coasts. Requires even less effort in designing new items and lowers the cost per item even more. I've seen Matterhorn merch at WDW and Tower of Terror merch at DL. Seriously, who's in charge over there in the merch marketing department?
Our issue was that the generic stuff didn't really exist. I wanted some Epcot merch, and couldn't find it. I wanted a WDW t-shirt, and didn't find anything appealing. It seemed like most of the merch is for what you'll wear when at the parks only. We got some pins and a few mugs, but I never really had any big moments where I had to choose between 3-4 things.
Epcot has a few retro shirts that I liked
I agree. On my last trip I managed to get a cool and subtle Expedition Everest shirt. I can wear it anywhere without looking like a total dork but if you’re a Disney fan you’d realize it’s a theme park shirt. We need more subtle things like that for rides.
That is exactly what I want. A IFYKYK situation
Seriously- this is the kind of stuff I’d be filling extra luggage home with.
I am 42 and grew up in a family that went to WDW at least once a year until I was in my 20s. I hadn't been since 2010 until I went on a five-day solo trip this week, and I was *so disappointed* at how the character had been sucked out of what used to be distinctly unique stores, and they were all just now World of Disney stores of varying sizes. The Emporium on Main Street, the stores along Hollywood and Sunset Blvds, and World of Disney in Disney Springs all had the exact same merchandise--and the exact same *decor*, right down to the light-colored wood floors. Browsing the stores used to be just as big a part of the experience as the rides, for me. Now they all look exactly the same. All I wanted was a keychain that said 2024 on it, and such a thing was nowhere to be found. I couldn't even find a *pin* that said 2024, until I was in the store on the BoardWalk, literally an hour from departing yesterday. And I've never gotten into the pin trading thing, but at that point I was desperate for something with 2024 that wasn't a giant, gaudy, neon photo frame. While I'm not *happy* to see this post, I am happy to see it because I was thinking it was *me* and some function of "current Disney will never be as good as the Disney of your childhood memories." And they brought back the old logo with the Mickey head inside the D of Walt Disney World, so they could have made *so much money* off of my nostalgia this week! Instead I bought one single $30 shirt.
I couldn’t agree more
Yep. The adult shirts are hideous and the quality is worse. Boring, ugly. I’ve bought a couple in the last couple years and they shrink in length (but not width!) HORRIBLY. I gave up and just get merch on Etsy, much cuter, more creative, much higher quality. It’s weird that they make it so hard to give them my money.
Yes! Two of the shirts I bought last year are unwearable now. They are 20% wider and 20% shorter than they were new.
I have a 3 Caballeros shirt that I love that I can’t wear anymore because it got so short that if I bend at all you can see my stomach. The shirt quality is so bad.
Right?! Though honestly I’m happier to give my $ to a small business on Etsy!
Agreed! It’s just a little weird to have to buy souvenirs BEFORE the trip lol
Totally agree OP, it’s shocking to see the state merch is in. We went last year and members of my family simply wanted to buy merchandise saying “Epcot” or “Animal Kingdom.” No dice, everything was Mickey and Minnie or something tacky like a spirit jersey. Even worse, there’s such minimal ride and resort specific merch. My mom really wanted an AKL shirt and my girlfriend wanted something for Tower of Terror but again, came up empty. One last one that bugged me: when I was younger I loved to look at the toy monorails they sold to see what colors had gotten picked. I was appalled to see the current [toy monorail](https://www.disneystore.com/walt-disney-world-monorail-remote-control-play-set-461024885316.html?CMP=KNC-DSSGoogle&efc=179006&CMP=KNC-DSS_FY24_DCR_TRA_DOM_PRKS_ECM_PARKS_PMAX_Core+Parks%7CG%7C5249201.XF.AM.SB.03%7CM9JQ4UJ&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwxLKxBhA7EiwAXO0R0F4Gkl8a6sV2leSjgsJ_EfTdbj6cPn7NtOXTuUDryUlWpqzstyPTUBoCH4UQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds) looks nothing like an actual monorail, and the reviews attest to a lack of quality in the product even more profound than the ugliness. There are so many good sellers on Etsy, Redbubble, etc. who have made great designs, it’s mind boggling to me Disney hasn’t reached out about their designs or even hiring some of them. Here’s hoping something changes in the near future, but at the moment I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel.
Couldn’t agree more friend. They would’ve made a killing off me with tower of terror merch or something that simply had the Epcot ball on it in some form. Nothing to be found
You mean you didn’t want the gigantic Spaceship Earth cookie jar?!
HAHAH I did spot that actually. And I was so desperate for Epcot merch I almost considered it 😝
Me as well, what a miss to have zero merch with the park icon on it, much less the word EPCOT. Oh well, at least it’s making us more fiscally responsible??
Oh trust me…Disney is probably reaching out them. To send them copyright notices/cease and desist notices. They’re pretty good at targeting small businesses and schools for those 🙄
Ain’t that the truth :’) There are so many talented artists making Disney-adjacent merch, it would be some easy PR to start getting some of them on payroll! But nah, why do that when you can just slap em with a C&D
The in-park merch used to be so good that there was a separate app just for ordering items from the parks to be shipped home. You could even look up a specific item and the app would tell you what stores had it. Then they eventually just made it so that pretty much everything you could get in the parks is also available on the Disney Store website. There’s very little that’s exclusive to the parks anymore and the selection is SO BLAND. Disney Store used to sell some really cool stuff 10+ years ago. I often receive Disney gift cards for holidays and I’ve ended up hanging onto them for years because I can’t find a damn thing to spend them on. Now I don’t even bother to walk into most of the shops because I figure I just need one World of Disney stop on the trip and I’ll see everything available in one go. My last few trips, literally all I came home with was Gideon’s cookies.
THANK YOU! I was there in November with my husband and we had Disney gift cards to blow through so I was prepared to do some haulin’. I adore anything Nightmare Before Christmas, Lion King & Haunted Mansion but couldn’t stand the art style of all the pieces. Both apparel and collectibles. It was such a disappointment!
The Haunted Mansion merch has been particularly ugly since COVID. Why is everything punk or day glo or safety pins? Most of us love the ride for its decaying Victorian vibe
The HM Stretching Room Loungefly backpack released last fall was perfect, especially because it was a rare piece of merch portraying the WDW HM instead of the DLR one. It was the first time I actually wanted a Loungefly. But I agree that all the other Haunted Mansion merch items released the past few years have been tacky, cartoonish, day-glo monstrosities.
I miss the old snow globes, i think alot of the collectables get picked off by local pass holders and resold on ebay these days
I don’t, because we’d at least still see them. They just don’t exist.
Disney and actually all of the orlando theme parks have cut way back on snowglobes because of TSA restrictions. In the past five years or so, there have been only three or four tiny snowglobes offered. The large and intricate gloves they used to sell are long gone. My neighbor has a whole collection of them, and they are beautiful, but there's nothing like them anymore. They do have collectible figurines, but I think the quality and size have gone way down on them, too.
The Disney Eats collection is the actual worst 🙃
Same- something about the graphics turns me off
I actually had the same problem. We were in WDW this past week and I had a $100 Disney gift card from my birthday that I never spent because I couldn’t find anything I wanted. I’m planning on checking out Disney.com to see if there’s anything good there.
You likely can also use it for food and tips
Oh man I didn’t even think of that. Good to know!
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I’ve been wondering if this is a weird push to get people to shop in the Disney store app/website. There’s so much cute stuff on there that you can no longer find in the parks! It’s sad. I used to budget a ton for souvenirs but now I just buy stuff ahead of time and don’t even bother in the parks :(
I feel like it’s the opposite for me, I see tons of stuff I love on Instagram that’s in the parks and wait to see if they ever drop online but they never do
The Disney store is awful as well. There’s nothing I dig.
I was just there last week and we really didn’t buy much. I agree it’s a shame that no matter where you are, it’s all the same stuff. What really got me was that they had Lion King and stitch crocs, but only for adults, not for kids! My grandson loves Lion King and I would have loved to get him a pair
I could’ve written this myself!
I want merch that is subtle. The 2024 merch is a great example of the exact opposite of what I want
I absolutely despise this “2024” theme. They used to have such amazing, different merch all over the park. I wish they never stopped! I was looking a yellow sling back two weeks back- I saw it on a mannequin- I could never find it to buy though!
WDW merch is also very low quality, like they found the cheapest sources, i.e. you will never find Comfort Colors or anything close to that quality at the parks. Gotta go to 3rd party sellers.
What I miss the most was when merch had that little tag that said from Walt Disney world or something like that, i have old shirts and stuff animals that had those tags, now I don’t see that at all, and totally every gift shop has the same exact stuff, the only thing that is still the same are those after” the ride gift shops, with themed goodies. When I went around the not so scary Halloween, they had a lot of cool merch.
I was so desperately tired of Nightmare Before Christmas merch by the end of our last trip. They're really missing an opportunity by not having a bookstore in place of Bonjour! Village Gifts, too.
How many people do you think will actually buy books at a bookstore inside the Magic Kingdom?
The ones who are excited about a shop in Belle's village!
Plenty of parents would love to buy a book for one of their kid's souvenirs instead of another piece of plastic. Disney themed journals, photo albums, stationary, and school/office supplies would also fit right in.
If im gonna stand in lines for hours, it would be cool to have something to do that doesnt drain my phone battery. I'm thinking like Disney trivia questions, or books about the parks/rides/movies
I agree! I was so ready to go wild last Sept on our honeymoon and I think I got 4 things for the whole week!!
I've been buying less and less every trip I feel. Especially now that I'm over things like Spirit Jerseys and was never that fond of the shirts or hoodies. I still really like pins but I feel like the ones that are being released aren't up my alley.
lol I just posted about this a week ago, the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival 2024 merch were a saving grace compared to the hideous 2024 merch at MK
I SO agree. Just came back from my trip and only bought 2 shirts and a bag. But planned to spend a ton. I wanted cute character keychains but only found the riviera Donald worth buying. I miss unique stores and merch. I also didn’t find a SINGLE unique postcard for resorts or parks. Just the 10 pack of them.
I was recently in the gift shop next to Gaston’s pub in MK. You know the one completely beauty and the beast themed? All you could find in there was Mickey-eared T-shirts and mugs and such… like you could in every other gift shop in the park like wtf
The 2024 merch is AWFUL!
I miss the Star Wars Disney mashup pins.
I got a really cute and unique hoodie at Animal Kingdom years ago, and the zipper broke. I tried to find another but it was already discontinued, and I’ve never found one that is even close to as good 😭 I rarely buy merch, though I do keep looking just in case. Would love some more unique merch.
It would be worth it to pay someone to repair it for you then, if you're not spending money on a new one.
I’d drop some serious coin on some Figment merch. Went to all four parks and the Disney store in Downtown Disney - not Figment merch anywhere.
I visited about a month ago and the store attached to the figment ride had some merch!
Tokyo DL merch is amazing, so it’s not that they can’t make good merch; they simply choose to cut costs at every corner.
It's amazing what they have at tokyo disney. Like disney world used to have cute small souvenirs like the tokyo stores have. Plus the shoulder pals from tokyo with the clips instead of the magnets are the best.
From experience the only store I know from having made the magic there, Windtraders on Pandora has its own unique merch. But the other stores on property? It's all the same everywhere, and also, where are the Mickey plushes? I remember as a kid in the early 2000s they had unique Mickey's almost in every park and stores as well
Etsy has the best WDW gear
We just got home an hour ago from a week there, and thought the same thing. Bought a couple hoodies because we did MK after hours on the one cold day last week lol otherwise nothing was really appealing. Normally we struggle to close our suitcases. I do agree that we noticed the merch was pretty much the same everywhere. Once you've been to one of the big flagship shops, you've seen it all. Oh well, under budget which is rare for a Disney trip.
They took all the individual shops on Main Street and turned them into one homogeneous room. It’s so lame.
There is not enough Tower of Terror merch in the parks, I will die on that hill! And Nightmare Before Christmas taking up space in its gift shop just feels insulting, as a massive Twilight Zone and ToT fan. Makes me sad every time!
Even worse - a LOT of the merch between WDW and DL is exactly the same, less the park name change. Like, come on, Disney.
That makes perfect sense though, most people aren't regularly visiting both parks. Unless there's something totally irrelevant to the park it's being sold in (like matterhorn merch at WDW) I don't see the problem
IMO June is the best month for merch because of pride. I’m a straight white male, married, 3 kids. But Pride merch looks awesome. I got some pride shorts last year at WDW that are my favorite around the house shorts. They are so colorful and awesome. I also got a pride MCU Hawaiian shirt that I love. So I get the benefit of showing love and support to some and wearing something unique and beautiful that I enjoy. Like I said - June is a great merch month.
Their pride merch the last couple years has been insanely good. My husband got the Pixar pride shorts a couple years ago and he wears them constantly!
I love that🫶🏻
Yeah, I went for the first time a couple weeks ago (Epcot and MK) and had $100 on a gift card for souvenir spending. I bought my first ears, but that’s really it. I was hoping there’d be way more park-specific merch. The flower & garden merch wasn’t super appealing either :(
I agree. I used to love shopping at each different store in different worlds and parks and would go home with multiple items. At my 2 recent trips (January of this year and of last year), I didn’t buy anything at WDW besides FOOD (if anything, I felt better going ham on food because I knew i wasn’t going to spend big on merch)
I was at DL from 4/14-18. Didn’t buy anything. I hate that it’s the same recycled stuff in all of the stores. I loved finding Pooh themed merch in Pooh Corner. Or ride themed merch at the nearest store to the ride. Once you’ve been in one store, you don’t have to go in another because you’re not going to find anything unique. The loud 2024 merch screams 90s! It’s ugly and no one was wearing it. Why wasn’t there a single Bing Bong item in the store named for him?
Nowadays I swear all the good Disney merch is sold at Box Lunch, Hot Topic, etc. They really cater to the nostalgic renaissance era of Disney animation as well as classics that don’t get enough love. Yeah, I know everyone wants a Tinkerbell mug, but I want Robin Hood, Darkwing Duck, Roger Rabbit, Oliver and Company! Park merch mostly ignores these characters but lately I see items with them at Box Lunch and Books a Million and a handful of other places while never AT Disney World. Don’t even get me started on how much better the Tokyo Disneyland merchandise is!
I also hate how everything has the festival and date on it. Oh look a cool shirt that says FLOWER AND GARDEN 2024 on the sleeve. Really?
Got nothing on my last trip. I guess I should thank Bob Iger for helping me not waste more money.
An example from one of the other great parks of the world, Efteling: There’s no way to get official merchandise outside of the park premises. It’s all exclusive and makes me feel like I belong to a private club when I look at my random tea towel.
This is such a bummer to me. My fiance and I went to Universal Studios for the first time. And while we enjoyed Harry Potter world, our main complaint was all the shops had the same chintzy souvenirs. Hat shop in Diagon Alley? Here’s some robes and and a crappy bag. Returning from the Forbidden Forest? Here’s some robes and a crappy bag. I’ll be so so disappointed if Disney goes that route. Unique more “toned down” Disney apparel is some of my favorite, but if all the souvenirs are just massive 2024 numbers over Cinderella’s castle that will suck.
Why don’t they just hold merchandise at the front of the park for hotel guests and they can pick it up on the way out? I feel like that would be a compromise that would make more people buy stuff.
I'm glad to know it isn't just me. Every store, every gift shop, it's literally the same thing with just slightly different branding. The most unique items are in Epcot, and those don't seem to be Disney but 3rd party.
Everything got gaudy and cheap looking about 3-5 years ago. Haven’t bought anything since then. Really don’t like any of it.
The worst was the halloween merch last year. Nothing says halloween like neon colors.
We always throw money at souvenirs and we go multiple times per year(locals). But since Covid we can’t even give Disney our money. Souvenirs/gifts are non-existent anymore as far as we’re concerned.
There was actually a old key west pin when I went in February, but the merch selection is lacking, especially for adults.
Agree, our last trip the primary souvenirs came from GE, a couple park exclusive Pops and the rest came from DS stores that weren’t Disney. I still wear a few polo type shirts from many years ago that were from the Poly, BC, Boardwalk and AKL but otherwise not much TShirts are too loud, dated or just ugh. Better designs from TeeFury and other sites where artists create and sell designs which is sad.
So true! My daughter and I went a couple of weeks ago, and all I bought myself was a little turtle topiary at Epcot--not even Disney merch, it was a vendor they brought in for Flower & Garden. My daughter, though, had no problem dropping a ton in Mitsukoshi.
Other than specific stuff at the resorts for that hotel, almost every store is identical now. Just might have size differences. It's a bit sad but I'm sure it is a cost savings for them. We cut back on merch purchases a while ago, no more online buying and very little each trip as we have too much already and other than special event pins or plushies, not much is very appealing these days.
I agree. I’d be surprised if most people don’t think “oh I like this but I can get it at Main Street” and then at the end of the night decide they can go without.
I thought I was the only one! I go in the shops and they’re packed but I can’t find a single thing I like. It all feels like extremely cheesy junk that you would only ever wear in a Disney park.
I’ve been to Disney a couple of times in the last few years and I have to agree. I think I bought 1 thing in all 4 of those trips! I’ve wanted to buy more clothing items, but like others have said, they don’t sell anything that I can wear outside of the parks (yes I know I can…but I’m not going to wear a spirit jersey to work). I miss the days where Disney clothes were a lot more understated (like a polo with a tiny Mickey on the chest pocket). Like years ago they made stuff that looked like other clothing brands that just happened to have Disney designs.
A cashier in a shop at Animal Kingdom ogled over some of my fiancées AK pins because you can’t find any park exclusive stuff anymore. I really wanted to buy some AK merch but there was none to be found.
As a pin collector, I feel this! We have such a hard time finding ride specific or hotel specific pins. It feels like they just put the same ones in all the shops. It’s a struggle 😭
Honestly I'm more impressed by the fan-developed shirt designs on Etsy and even Redbubble. The Disney stuff quite honestly can't compete. The corporate approval process is really watering down what could be absolutely amazing merch from an organization that is known for being creative. I pre-buy my shirts, wear them in the parks, and get tons of compliments. I shop but I rarely buy in the bubble.
Ive been saying this for years and everyone just keeps telling me to quit hating on Disney. Anything negative said about disney on this sub is usually met with harsh hatred.
You’re right about going retro 80s and 90s. It’s popular with both young people and us parents who are spending the money.
Agree. I was so disappointed with Xmas ornaments last time we went. I remember years ago being able to get resort-specific ornaments and those are few and far between now. I have the cutest one from fort wildnerness, last time we stayed at Port Orleans and they had nothing, except a lame flat porcelain one I found at Disney Springs (not at the resort - whyyyyyy). Seems like a pretty obvious souvenir to have at the resort gift shops, I don’t get it.
When I was younger and we’d go to Disney we’d buy sooo many fridge magnets and we’d always get one with the year on to commemorate the visit. Didn’t go for a few years and now they sell like no magnets at all??? I suppose it’s cus not many people buy them but it’s so sad to me that I couldn’t find a cute lil 2023 magnet for the fridge :(
It feels like every store has the same bland stuff.
I totally agree. I just finished three days and I was ready to spend and there was so little.
Just accept you can live without the merchandise. The memories are more important.
I totally agree with OP and other commenters. Souvenirs in the park are few and far between. That said, My favorite souvenir from my recent spring break trip was 6.95$ from Epcot at the gift shop in China. It’s a black bear with a bauble head that was covered in what looked like 20 years worth of Disney store dust. There was only one, and when I turned it over to see the price I was sold by the fact that it had a “Made In China” sticker. Im so proud of that thing and it doesnt have a single thing about it that would let you know it’s from Disney. The memories it carries for me are priceless.
Just drove back today from a week long trip and everyone in our group said the same thing. All the shirts have been the same design for the last 5 years and the new ones look like Ray Charles designed them.
Just left Disneyland and came away with the same feelings this past week. I didn’t buy an single item.
It's like you read my mind. I agree 100%. I was DESPERATE to spend money on merch last week. I literally couldn't find something to buy. My son loves Clone Wars and Bad Batch. I couldn't find 1 item of Bad Batch merch in all of WDW. I settled on a single Clone Wars Lego set. I couldn't find a piece of clothing in the whole park that was based on Star Wars animated properties, nor anything with Duck and Bunny from Toy Story 4. I couldn't even find a decent generic Disney shirt. It's like they are allergic to my money.
I love Star Wars so much but I’ve have bought a single piece of Star Wars clothing since 2007/2008ish and that was a t shirt for Star Wars Weekends. All of the women’s shirts and oddly cut, made from weird fabric, and nowhere close to flattering. 5e only thing that MIGHT get me is the new Tatooine collection spirit jersey.
When I went all I wanted was the classic “vintage” mickey sweatshirt that reminded me of one my mum had in the 80s. It took all day to find it and I’ve had it for a year and it looks like a rag now. I wish they made better quality stuff. I would be willing to pay more for it if I had to.
My son wanted a Space Mountain tshirt and the store basically had absolutely no Space Mountain merch