What does a classic day at Disney look like? It probably starts bright and early in the morning so that your family can ride a crowded shuttle from your hotel to Magic Kingdom before the gates even open. One of your parents has a drawn out plan of everything to see at the parks. When those gates finally open, your family walks through to see the castle shining bright and bubbles flying everywhere. The smell of sugar overtakes you as you spot the classic caramel apple with marshmallows as Mickey Ears and M&M’s as his buttons… you take a mental note to make your mom buy you one on the way out of the park later. As the day goes on you meet all of your favorite characters, ride all of the rides, and eat all of the food you can before going home and having the best nights sleep ever.

            Unfortunately, not everyone gets to experience the magic of Disney in person, usually due to money. Although Disney has never been the cheapest place to visit, their prices will be increasing during the latter part of 2022 and early 2023. AllEars, a website dedicated to Disney news, has published an article revolving around the price hikes to be expected.

• A Regular ticket (one day or multi-day) will get you access to one of the parks for the whole day. This price ranges between $109 to $159, which is an overall $30 increase from 2018.
• A Base ticket is like a regular day ticket but guests can stack how many days they want to go in order to visit more parks. The prices for the adult 1-3 day Base tickets are not increasing, however the 4 day ticket will be increasing from $447 to $596.
• The Park Hopper ticket is popular because guests can visit multiple parks in a single day (as long as they stay at the first park up until 2pm). Only the 3 day ticket will be jumping from $416 to $556.
• The Park Hopper Plus ticket is exactly the same as the Park Hopper, but includes the Disney water parks. The adult 1-2 day ticket will not have a significant increase, however the 3 day ticket will go from $438 to $577.
• Genie+ passes are the way to skip past the normal lines and experience the attraction faster. These are purchased per day and prices fluctuate between $15 to $25 in both DisneyWorld and DisneyLand. In order to use these, guests must reserve the time they want to experience the attraction and show up at the “Lightning Lane” at the reserved time.
• A Lightning pass is another way to skip lines at the parks and it works the same as Genie+. However, Genie+ only allows line skips for all rides but the two most popular in each park, but Lightning passes work for every ride and range from $7 to $15 per person per ride.

DisneyWorld and DisneyLand have an average combined 76 million visitors per year, with the Florida park (DisneyWorld) the most visited theme park in the world and the California park (DisneyLand) the second most visited. These attractions have been a magnet to families since 1955 when DisneyLand first opened its magic gates with tickets only costing $3.50.

Part of the heavy traffic comes from the Disney Passholders who can get into the park whenever they want and attend any of the special events, like Halloween week or Epcot concerts.

“The prices have gone up substantially since I first got my pass,” Hayley Maither, Florida resident and Disney Passholder said, “when COVID happened, they stopped selling Disney passes so if you let your pass expire you couldn’t get a new one.” Maither decided to renew her pass during COVID despite the price increase because she is able to visit Disney with her family and friends as many times as they want, usually once a month. The Annual Passes will likely be seeing an increase next year, but not nearly as large of a jump compared to the 2020 increase. Disney Silver Annual Pass went from $519 to  $539, Disney Gold went from $699 to $719, Disney Platinum went from $1119 to $1195 and Disney Platinum Plus went from $1219 to $1295.

Although paying that amount yearly may be worth it if a guest is a Florida or California resident, Maither said, “I don’t think I would keep my pass if I moved to a different state. I don’t think it would be worth the hassle of trying to get there as opposed to just getting in the car and driving there whenever we want like we do right now.”

Guests can sometimes “cheat” the system to get cheaper tickets. First, guests should check what time of year to visit because different times of the year are going to have a significant ticket price change. September and February are two of the cheaper months to visit because it is when school is in session for a majority of the country. However, March through the summer months are more expensive due to kids being out of school. In December or October, prices are higher as large holiday events are held at the parks to attract more visitors. Another way to save money at Disney is to check Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, or other selling sites to see if there are families selling their tickets.

Now, what about flights and hotel stays? Flying to California and Florida are both expensive on their own, especially during the peak theme park season. Similar to park tickets, flight tickets fluctuate depending on the time of the year. During the spring break months, an average adult ticket can cost over $1,000 before baggage and other fees, but during low tourist season, tickets can sit around $200-$400 depending on where the guest is traveling. Another option is to drive depending on the starting location and the destination of choice, driving can be significantly cheaper than flying.

Hotel stays can be cheap or expensive depending on the preferences of the guest. If a guest flew in and does not want to pay to rent a car or take an Uber, the on-property or near-property hotels are going to be the smartest option because they are either a walk away from the park or a shuttle away. The bundles that the hotels give are pricier due to guests being given free transportation and other unnecessary perks, like the availability to rent a limo for a discounted price. The average price of these packages are around $3,736 as a base for an Orlando stay and California prices are based per night around $830.

Samantha Goodvin, mother of two from Waukee and Disney enthusiast said, “Fortunately we have a timeshare which helps with budgeting. We have already started saving because the prices are already so high up front that there are those extra things that you have to save for when you’re at the parks.” Goodvin has visited DisneyWorld enough times she lost track of the double digits, so learning about timeshares has helped save a lot of money. Timeshares are a vacation ownership that guarantees a spot for a guest when they want to visit somewhere and they usually have good deals for the owners. A couple hotel companies that have Timeshare options include Hilton, Hyatt and Sheraton. 

One way to save money on hotel stays is using Airbnb, which is on average $100 or lower per night, depending on how close the stay is to the parks, occupancy, and amenities. Travel agents tend to give advice on Airbnb’s saying to only use them if you plan on doing other things than Disney on your trip because of car rental cost and parking cost (ranging between $25-$50 per day). If a guest drives from home to the vacation spot, that will eliminate rental cost and make the Airbnb stay even cheaper.

Guests cannot forget about food. People have to eat, so budgeting around this is a little harder. According to the budget layout on ZiggyKnowsDisney.com, table-service restaurants can cost $30-$100 per traveler per meal, Quick-Service meals are $10-$30, and snacks are $4-$10. There are specialty food plans that families can purchase before the trip which costs between $55-119 for adults per day or $26-$47.50 for kids per day (depending on the plan). This plan is fantastic for guests who want to sit down for the included 3 full meals per day and get the most expensive thing off of every menu, otherwise paying for the plan is not worth it.

AllEars recommends just planning for one big meal each day and then getting snacks when hungry. These budgeted snacks do not include the Mickey-Ear caramel apples because of the price. For example, a regular pretzel is $3.50 but a Mickey pretzel is $7.25. Eating breakfast at the hotel or getting dinner on the way back will also help save money, but if guests are adamant on getting the full “Disney Experience”, the Disney mobile app shows each restaurant and the average price for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

The main question still stands, why are these prices continuously increasing? One reason for the price increases is because visiting Disney is in higher demand every year, especially as the parks add more and more attractions. Star Wars World and Marvel have recently joined the Disney parks and have been bringing more of the demographics that the fan bases hold. So, the more expensive the prices are, the less capacity Disney has to deal with on a day-to-day basis.

Keeping all attractions maintained is also a key to the higher cost. DisneyWorld and DisneyLand have around 100 attractions each that need to be maintained daily, fixed if broken down, and yearly repairs. Rides need to be repainted and repolished, restaurants go through a deep cleaning every night, and the streets themselves are continuously cleaned to keep the sparkly Pixie-dust-Disney alive. Disney has a high expectation for how everything has to look and keeping up with that maintenance costs more and more as attractions are added.

Employees also must be paid well. According to wdwtravels, DisneyWorld itself has 77,000 employees that need to get paid and have their work costumes provided. After the boycott from Disney employees, in 2018 and 2019 demanding higher-livable pay, more of the Disney parks profit is going towards employee income.

            Although a vacation at Disney can be the most memorable and magical time, it is hard for everyone to get that experience without severely breaking the bank. Walt Disney’s original mission statement for DisneyLand was “it will be a place where parents and children could have fun.” Year after year, it seems Disney has strayed from the possibility of every group of parents and children being able to have fun at the parks as Walt Disney intended. As more budget friendly options make their way to Orlando and Anaheim, hopefully all families with a variety of incomes can discover the magic of Disney.