I feel like Amy's tired of us doing silly cold opens, so she
wanted to do something heartfelt and so I'm going to let her tell
a little bit of a story while I hold all of my Wally stuff here
for a second. All right, so we, we
experienced, I think this is our first real Pixie dust moment,
honestly, if we're talking about it.
So we were at Disneyland, Disney California Adventure Park, and
you guys, Paulie, know there's not a whole lot of wall-e in the
parks, but in DCA on Pixar Pier, they have a wall-e game and Paul
always has to go over to that wall-e game, although I feel
like it's never open. But this time we were just over
there late earlier this month and it was open.
And so Paul, Paul had his eye on the boot because the other two
are actually big prizes, and it's $5 to play and you could
lose. So the boot is a small prize.
So that was our best hope. He wanted the boot.
And we were staring at it, trying to decide if it was worth
to try $5. And good old Jeff Haslam comes
over and he's like, well, let's all play.
I'll pay for it. It's not my Google, yeah.
It's like a $25 game if we all play.
But anyway, so I think it was just the four of us, right?
I don't know where Jeff and Dan had gone, but.
They were waiting in line for Rex.
That's right for Rex. So Jeff and Amy and myself and
Paul, we all sat down. Luckily we didn't have any
competition, although I feel like Amy would have beat them
anyway, But so they, so we were going to pay or Jeff was going
to pay for all of us, but they were like, oh, just sit down,
sit down. We'll get started.
So the cast members told us to sit down and they asked Paul and
I, it was actually our, our 12 year wedding anniversary on that
day. And they asked us about our
celebrating button and we said, you know, 12 year wedding
anniversary love Wally. Wally was the first movie we
ever went and saw together. And Paul still has the movie
ticket from Wally. And so they said, you know, sit
down, sit down, we'll get started.
And we played. And of course Amy Templeton won
because she creamed everyone on Midway Mania as well.
And they said you know, OK, well what do you want?
And but they said but you get 2 prizes or something.
I don't know why they just made it up.
And so Amy got the little Mickey, Paul got his little
boot. So we got 2 prizes for one.
And then when we went to leave, they didn't charge us for the
game at all. They came around, another cast
member came around and they had taken the Wally and the Eve
stuffies and they had put the anniversary buttons on them to
say 12 years and they gave them to us.
So they didn't charge us for the game and we got a whole bunch of
the stuffies for free. But I thought that was sweet.
That was very cool. I was.
I was really happy to be a part of it, because it was.
I've never seen Pixie dust like that either.
And everybody walked away with a prize.
Well, except me. So I had to go buy my my.
Jeff had to go get his own Carmajin.
Hey everybody, and welcome to this week's episode of The DVC
Show. I'm your host Paul Krieger,
joined by Wally, joined by Eve the Boot, my lovely wife Amy
Krieger. We've got John, scary Big fat
Panda with us. Welcome home everyone.
Senior sales associated for the DVC resale market.
Derek, Deborah. Hey now, happy Monday everybody.
And the one the only, the honorable Jeff Haslam and his
crew mother. I'm just going to hold these for
the entire show. It's going to be great.
It's very comforting. It like brings out the inner
child, Paul. Yeah, now you know why I like
Toothless. But he just sits on a shelf now.
Well, he's kind of big. Yeah, we're also, the dogs are
already staring at me with like, saliva dripping out of their
mouth. The fact that I'm holding these
and they're close to the ground. Most of these, they actually go
on that shelf. That's like right behind my head
right now is where they came from.
But well, welcome to this week's episode of the DVC show.
Fair warning to anyone that's watching, this is the third show
of the night. So we are going to be a little
bit hungry. We are going to be a little bit
hangry and we might be a little bit off the rails, but we're
going to get through it because I think this week's topic is a
good one that has come up several times in conversation.
But it is comparing some of the newer DVC properties that are
out there to what we traditionally call the older
properties, the old Key West, the Boardwalk Resort, some of
those original properties. I'm just talking through some of
the things that make each of those a little bit different and
maybe influence your decision in making if you're looking to buy
into Disney Vacation Club, if you're looking to maybe stay
rent points and stay at one of these properties.
So hope to kind of impart some wisdom when you're making that
decision. This and all of our DVC content
as always brought to you by the world of DVCDVC resale market
where you can buy or sell a Disney Vacation Club contract.
Monera Financial who will assist in financing that DVC resale
contract purchase. Amy's texting someone right now
looking to finance a contract? The DVC Rental Store where you
can try before you buy, rent some points or rent out your own
points for cash, and Unlocked Magic where you can get
discounted Walt Disney World and Universal tickets at
unlockedmagic.com/DVCfan. I just want to give myself a
round of applause for the fact that that was the smoothest.
I have read that in probably two months of this show, so I fully
credit it to the fact that I'm holding a Wally at the moment.
But was this your original idea? I forget where we got this idea
for this show in terms of kind of comparing newer.
No, it was a it was a fan of the show that yes, that asked.
Shout out to that fan. I apologize that I don't know
your name at this at this moment, but we do get a lot of
show ideas that come in. And this was one that we kind of
identified as something that I think is very relevant.
Because I think that when it comes to some of these older DVC
properties, there are some that we are just never going to kind
of see a property like that again.
And I think that's what makes them so special is kind of just
their uniqueness and kind of where Disney Vacation Club came
from as a whole. When I sent this over to this
whole team, I said we're going to kind of focus our
conversation on comparing two different types of properties.
I mentioned old properties. We're going to be looking at
kind of old Key West and we're going to be looking at Boardwalk
for some of those older style resorts for newer properties.
We're going to be looking at specifically Riviera and also
the most recent that has come online, the Polynesian Island
tower and just focusing on it because of some of the design
decisions and some and kind of what they're doing in some of
the rooms. You could probably add
Disneyland Hotel to that list as well, but we'll kind of keep our
conversation focused on some of those discussions.
But I think the best way to start this off is to focus on
kind of those general resort theming and design decisions.
Jeff, I want to take it to you for Old Key West real quick and
just, you know what makes that resort so special in terms of
its overall theming and that design and layout that they have
there? Yeah, for me, I think the
biggest take away for Old Key West is the size of the rooms.
You know, we've talked about this many, many times on the
show. They don't make them like this
anymore. Those rooms are are 50% larger
than any of the other rooms at any of the other resorts.
And so I think that's a big win, especially if you're traveling
with a big party or you want some room to spread out.
You don't want to have to move your suitcase from the bed to
the couch and then back and forth.
There's just a lot of open space in those rooms.
The color palette, you know, it's very Caribbean, it's very
Florida, it's very Jimmy Buffett.
It's very, you know, Key West, obviously.
And so I think those two things are what it really has going for
it. I know people complain about the
sprawling nature of the resort and then the amount of bus stops
that it takes. For me, I actually put that in
the pro column rather than the con, because it feels like a
neighborhood. It doesn't feel like a hotel
that you're going to stay, that you have to go to the lobby and
then go up to an elevator and down the hallway to your room.
You park in front of your your house for the week or however
long you're staying and I I think that's something that
sometimes is under undervalued with that resort.
Yeah, keeping with the old resorts, Derek, it is where you
own it is your home resort, your your home property where all of
your points are. Boardwalk Resort is probably
again what we would consider an older DVC property.
What makes it so special when we compare it to maybe some of the
other properties that are being built today?
Yeah, I think, God, it's so hard because there's so many great
things about the Boardwalk. But I mean, to me, like we first
fell in love with it when when we first visited it for the
first time, like after it opened.
So this is back in like the late 90s.
And there's something about coming off that road and making
that left turn coming up and seeing the sign that, you know,
says Boardwalk and you see the resort and then you walk into
that lobby. And I think still to this day,
and it's so funny because I just had someone that joined with me
not that long ago that used their points for the first time
and they were able to get into the Boardwalk, right?
They had never even been to Crescent Lake.
They've never even been there. They've never seen it.
They've heard about it, but had no idea actually what it was.
And now he wound up buying some points for the boardwalk because
he's like, Derek, this area is just so unbelievable and so many
people still to this, they don't know about it because it really
is this whole other kind of world.
And I think for me, that's when we fell in love with the
boardwalk. Is that, yes, you don't have
your, you know, view of the quote UN quote, Magic Kingdom or
you don't have like old Key West.
You know, you can't park right out in front of your car, but
you have the boardwalk. I mean, you walk out there,
you're in that boardwalk lobby and you step out and you look
across the water and see the beach club and you see the Yacht
Club and then you see the water and then you go down to the
boardwalk. And then of course, you hear
that familiar, you know, boardwalk, that old time music
playing over the speakers and you know, it's wow, where do I
go? Do I go left?
You know what, I could walk over here and go to the Hollywood
Studios or the boats are right in front of me, or I can walk
and stroll over to Epcot or there's the sky liner that's
over there. To me, it's just such a
beautiful area that it feels like a vacation, you know, in
Walt Disney World. So I mean, as much as I love the
Poly and I love being in that area because that to me is just
the quintessential Disney for me.
We fell in love with the boardwalk when we realized that
my God, we could walk to Epcot in like 4 minutes.
That was as good as it got for us.
Not to mention, the boardwalk at night takes on such a different
vibe and a feel and there's so many options.
Not as many right now, but hopefully there will be, you
know, wink, wink. But between the Yacht Club and
the Beach Club and the Swan and the Dolphin and the boardwalk
itself, there's just so much stuff to do.
And it's just got such an energy.
And again, Epcot is right in your back door.
And if you don't even feel like walking into Epcot to watch the
fireworks, you can just walk up right to the bridge right there
or even stay right on the boardwalk and watch them.
Or heck, if you get one of those really good rooms that are all
the way down by Jelly rolls, you can watch the fireworks right
from your room. So yeah, we we fell in love with
it because to me, it's just a destination within a
destination. I guess you could say that.
It's so interesting to see where the product itself has gone over
the years. And I think it's, it's crazy to
to see a resort like old QS being the first Disney Vacation
Club resort that they built, being that sprawling design, as
Jeff kind of talked about, you know, the ability to just pull
right up to your room, but then have something almost completely
different that they then constructed with Boardwalk being
a different kind of feel. And it's, it's the appealing
nature that Disney Vacation Club has always brought to the table.
And we even see that carried through to, you know, the newer
resorts today that we'll get to in a second.
But I want to focus on the older resorts at first as we kind of
compare new versus old and just talk about some of the pros and
cons of these two resorts. First, you know, we've talked a
little bit, Jeff, you know, you know, you talked a little bit
about the rooms and how special they are.
And I think that is where we talk about Old Key West because
I think we could all agree we will never see rooms like Old
Key West ever again in terms of that size and that design.
Yeah. Yeah, it's like an apartment.
They are. So one bedrooms.
Yeah, 1 bedrooms, 2 bedrooms. They are.
They're some of my favorite rooms, you know, the old Key
West ones. But also just in general, you
know, the rooms are good size and, and I know you guys have
been touching on this, but the resorts themselves are just more
sprawling and they don't feel as on top of each other.
And you have a lot more places if you like to walk or you like
to run like we do. There's just a lot more area to
get around. Some people view that as a
negative, but I like the space, you know, I mean, and you look
at these older resorts and you've got like a Max of like 3
to 5 floors of people on top of you.
Whereas, you know, if you go over like Riviera, you've got
what, 8 floors, you know, these towers are getting getting
larger and larger. You know, the island tower is
big. Whereas when you look at the
original older, you know, you don't have as many people in
such a condensed space. And I think it makes the resort
quieter. I think I I think too, Amy and
it's so important and I think Jeff just kind of hit it too
when he said you pull up and it feels like you're home.
There's never been and never will be another resort that I
think members stay at longer for extended periods of time than
they do at Old Key West. I can.
We got a ton of fantastic viewers of this show, Jared and
so many people and Webmaster Doc used to.
These are folks that would go to Old Key West, and they still do,
but they would go not just for three nights or not for a week.
They're going for two weeks. Three weeks.
Even up to a month and they're doing it that I don't think
you'll ever have people do that for two reasons.
A because who wants to like stay at the, I mean no offense to the
Poly tower, it's super pretty, but I don't want to stay there
for like a month. Like Jeff said, I don't want to
have to go wait in the line for the elevator every single day
and do the same kind of thing. It feels like your home.
And not to mention most people are not going to be staying
there for 3-4 weeks because the points are insane.
Whereas you could go to old Key West.
And the point I remember being Disney vacation Gov guide
training like 20 years ago and one of the first things that
they trained you on was truly when people talk about old Key
West, it's two things. The rooms are 20% bigger than
any other Disney Vacation Club resort and that still holds true
and the point usage is 20% less. So that's why I've seen over 20
years of talking to folks and all my Old Key West members will
always say, so how are you using your points these days?
You be like, yeah, we tried the New Riviera, but we're going to
go back to Old Key Western. Yeah, we tried the Poly Tower,
but we're going to go back to Old Key West, so.
Just to back that up, I own at Riviera.
I am happy I own at Riviera. But I will say that 20% of my
time is Riviera. The 80.
I spend 80% at Old Key West. I love the feeling of it.
It's a better use of points. When I go with my nieces and my
nephew. It's it's more, there's much
more space. Like Jeff said, it's just yeah.
But you know, I love it. If I need the gondola for some
reason, I'll make sure I stay at my home resort.
Otherwise, I'm spending my points at Old Key West.
I always feel like, you know, kind of like what Derek said
when we stayed at Saratoga Springs, the first time we ever
stayed there and we sat on the balcony and, you know, drink
coffee and whatever. Homestead Best.
Yeah, I, I remember thinking like this feels like home.
Like I could live here. Like this could be my condo and
I could live here. And, and some people don't want
that. Some people, you know, when they
go to Disney, they want to feel like, bam, I'm in the middle of
everything. I'm in the middle of the magic,
and I get that completely. But if you want that escape, if
you want to be somewhere where you feel like this feels like a
community and I could live here forever, then yeah, Saratoga and
Olkey West are definitely give you that feeling where you get
away from, you know, the the madness and the busyness of the
crowds. And yeah, that's just.
I always like that, I feel. Like I I feel like it'll never
happen again. Like any other DVC resort that
they build will never be one of those sprawling community type
resorts. I think those days are done.
The only reason that Saratoga is how it is is because they took
over for Disney Institute. That's it.
They're never going to have a meeting and sit down and say,
all right, here's our 20th DVC resort.
It's going to be a sprawling golf community with a
Mediterranean feel. It ain't ever going to be that
again. Never.
I think everything from this point on, you're at least
talking. You know what?
How big is Lakeside Lakeshore Lodge. 5 stories. 10 stories, 5.
Seven. I don't.
Know it looks big. 900 rooms. It's huge.
It's 900 rooms, right? But it's that feeling of you're
never going to have the kind where you can pull up and park
your car, like Jeff said, right outside your room.
I think those days of that, they're not going to use the
land for that. Absolutely not.
The only recent, you know, example of that again is the
cabins at Fort Wilderness. And Derek, to your point, they
took over an existing property. So that's the only reason it is
what it is. But to look at the land they
have available, sure they could do it, they've got the land
available, but why build something like that when you
could just build up and that that's the general kind of theme
that we've seen with a lot of these resorts.
So unless they convert maybe a moderate property in some
capacity and take some of those buildings and make them into
DVC, but those weren't even designed for it.
So I think that could be a stretch.
And I don't think we're going to see it at Port.
I, I think if we ever see it at a moderate like Port Orleans or
Coronado spray, we're going to see a tower added to the resort
to, to bring that capacity in because the original rooms just
weren't designed for it. We've praised these older
resorts and I, I think anyone that listens to this show, you
know, we always sort of say, you know, it's, it's like the
general, they don't make them like they used to.
Like it's that general, it's that general kind of thought
process. And that's super true when it
comes to Disney Vacation Club, But is there any, when we focus
on these two specific properties kind of being our older
properties, are there any big negatives that you could kind of
draw out or pinpoint with these resorts that Disney Vacation
Club has actually improved upon over the years?
Yeah, 100%. Yeah, Panda, what would be one
of them that that would come to your mind?
I'm, I'm nitpicking, but the furniture is kind of, you know,
it's been through the, the mill. It's not the, you know, there's
just fibers popping out. There's cushions that are not as
new as they should be, unlike the Revere.
There's tiles that are cracked in the bathroom at the, at old
Key West. It's just not new, but it's OK.
I mean, old is in the name. So I kind of expected, you know,
the Riviera feels like, you know, the the octagonal tile and
it's much richer with the bathtub and actually the bathtub
at old Key West wasn't bad, though.
So I think furnishings is my is my big take away.
It feels, you know, rundown A. Little.
I think Old Key West is the only place on property where you
still have furniture that is bolted to the wall.
With the. Chain And I will say, Derek, you
mentioned the rooms at Old Key West being some of the best and
I agree with that one, bedrooms and up.
But I will say that that deluxe studio wise, Disney improved
upon the deluxe studio after they moved away from Old Key
West. That is the only one that I'm
just kind of like the layout was a little bit weird.
It kind of just feels like you're walking into, you hit,
you hit the. Bed.
Yeah, Yeah. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's just
there's two beds right there. There's ATV on the other side of
the wall. Everything else is tucked in the
corner. There's no character to the
studios. I would agree with that and and
actually Old Key West probably more than any of the other
deluxe studios, feels like a hotel room more than the rest of
them do because it lacks the Murphy beds it lacks.
It's kind of that it has that weird layout like you guys were.
TV's tiny, yeah? T VS very small There's 2 queen
beds instead of you know a bed and a you know so but.
That's a win for that's a win for some people.
It is. People only stay at Old Key West
because of two real beds and there's already discussions.
Old Key West is up for its soft goods refurbishment very soon.
It feels like we would just finish talking about it's full,
full refurbishment. But now they're they're coming
around to a soft goods again and there's already discussions.
And I believe Disney Vacation Club has said, Jeff, at the
meetings that, you know, they're they're looking at adding the
Murphy beds there. But at the same time, I think
that if they really listen to the owners of that resort, I'm
not quite sure that they want them.
Well, and there's some layout issues too, like you guys were
talking about in our last show. It's not going to fit
everywhere, but I would say they've also improved greatly,
especially from the old Key West food and beverage.
Oh yeah. You know, I mean, I think
Olivia's is great and I think it's cool because it does give
you that mom and pop feel with the pictures of people that have
stayed there in the past and the license plate and all that
stuff. But the gurgling suitcase is the
smallest. It's smaller than my bar at my
house, you know what I mean? Like.
That I don't know what that says.
Well, yeah, the goods to go quick service is it feels like
you're standing out in the hot sun and waiting for hot soup.
It's just there's no shade and there's no place to eat it.
Yeah. And do you remember I wrote you
guys when I got the soup there, though?
It was really good. You know it was 90.
Eight they they had a coconut Curry chain of soup.
Name like Turf Club, artist palette, the bar there.
The newer resorts definitely have a lot more to offer from
that point. Of view and that that is the,
the plus of kind of the tower concepts as well is that you do
have more opportunity to then bring all those amenities into
one place. Because if you are on the other
side of old Key West or you know the other side, you could say it
about boardwalk as well. Like especially right now,
boardwalk is really struggling with an identity crisis.
But you know, a historical complaint about Boardwalk is
that there is no quick service or easily accessible food, more
so even refillable drink stations in the main complex.
You have to either go outside and go to the Boardwalk deli or
you have to go to the pool area for the refillable mug stations.
That's and, and how easy would it be, even in the lobby area?
For the seating is for the coffee bar, just to add.
Just. Freestyle like just easy, easy
fix that would solve a lot of guest complaints.
Or on the other side, you've got Bellevue Lounge where you could
bring in a little bit more food, have some more grab and go
options, you know, or expand that area and potentially make
it some sort of, whether it's a quick service or something, I
don't know. It's it's called and we've
talked about this, it's called Atlantic Dance.
Needs to become a quick service. That's it.
That's problem solved. They have a kitchen in there.
They do events in there already. If you have it open for
breakfast, lunch or dinner, you have inside seating, outside
seating. It's an absolute no brainer.
I don't know why they don't do that.
Yeah. And this is an unpopular
opinion, but I was talking to some friends over the weekend
about these refillable mugs and Disney either needs to go all in
or get out of the business all together.
Because as it currently stands, unless you're staying at Pop
Century or Art of Animation or the All Stars, it doesn't
matter. The rest of the resorts, it's a
trek to refill your mug. They just need to get away from
it. Or go all in and put them like
they do ice machines. Put them on every floor or every
other floor. Like you look at what the way
Universal does refillable mugs. You buy one mug and you can use
it in the parks, you can use it at resort you can use.
Oh sorry, I should have put him on my shoulder.
I hate refillable. Mug I think they are the biggest
money grab and the Disney propaganda I will never.
I think, I think the difference with the 2 is that Universal
truly looks at them as like a revenue opportunity and Disney
looks at it as a throwaway because I'm guessing neither
property truly pays for any of the soda that is being paid,
that it is being utilized here. I, I imagine that the contract
basically says that, you know, Coke will provide a, provide you
with, you know, all of the syrup and, and mixing and all of that.
And they, I think I agree, you know, Disney could do a lot more
with trying to sell those where Universal is kind of going.
Yeah. Oh yeah.
We can actually, we can make a lot of money here if we position
these smartly and put them in the right places and everything.
And I, I, I'll just take this step further.
If if you're comparing new versus old, I will say Coke
Freestyle is a neat concept, but the machines probably cost so
much more money and take up more room.
But I honestly wish we would just go back to the original,
you know, dispensers because I feel like you could process
people through those a lot faster.
Yeah, less choice. Maybe have one freestyle machine
off in the corner. But like I would much rather
just go up and get my Coke 0 from a regular dispenser a lot
quicker than waiting for people to stand in front of those
machines for 20 minutes and make a decision.
Well. No one.
Never quite tastes right,
because if you're going for a Diet Coke but the person before
you got grape Fanta, you're getting a little bit of the
Grape Coat. In your diet?
Oh, I never thought of that. It never quite tastes like your
regular Diet Coke. Yeah.
You're getting residual. Yeah, yeah.
You need like like 5 flavors. No one needs like a kumquat
Sprite. Save that for club cool Oh.
Geez. For me, for me, one of the
biggest, one of the biggest downfalls of the older resource
is transportation. So Jeff talked about, you know,
it's, it is cool if you're driving a car that you can just
pull up right to your, your, you know, quote UN quote house at
old Key West or, you know, Saratoga you're building.
But if you aren't driving, you know, if you're from out of town
and you took the, I guess the Uber 'cause there's no magic
express to your resort, then you know, it is those, those older,
bigger resorts, they have multiple bus stops as opposed to
the new resorts that just have one.
So you not only do you have to, you know, be at your bus stop,
but you have to wait for the bus to go all the way around.
You know, I mean, depending on what stop you're at, it could be
full by the time it gets to you. So there are some challenges
with that. Now, that being said, the last
time we say to Oaky WI felt like you never had to wait very long.
Like those buses are going around everywhere.
But then that is another downfall of it.
Like you're constantly got buses on those roads around the
resort. And if you look at any of the
biggest line items when it comes to like annual dues for Old Key
West, it pays for that too. You know, that resort is seeing,
you know, 2-3 times as many buses as any other resort.
Same can be said about, you know, Fort Wilderness and the
cabins at Fort Wilderness. That's one of the main reasons
why the annual dues there, among other reasons are extremely high
is because of the sheer scale and the size of that property
and the fact that the buses have to navigate around that.
Now you're, you're absorbing some of that cost.
Also, Boardwalk gets it right a little bit from the perspective
of, you know, at least you can walk to two parks and at least
you do have. You have a boat, You have sky
liner. You have multiple options
available to, but the some of these original resorts, I won't
say Saratoga was a maybe an original resort, but again, it
was kind of makeshifted like Derek said earlier from
essentially what was there before.
And it again also suffers from just being a resort that is only
from can only be served via some transportation.
Moving on to there are a couple other categories I think we want
to compare these two on. But I do want to go to the new
resorts a little bit and kind of what we're comparing these two
and put that in your mind when we take a look at new versus
old. And again, the two that we are
looking at is Riviera and the Polynesian Island Tower Panda.
Go ahead and give us your love, love, love letter to Riviera
real quick. You know what makes that resort
special? And you mentioned a little bit
about the newer feel and and the newer amenities there, but what
makes it, what makes it special? Just to give a comparison, like
if you walk into grandest, you know, it's a huge lobby.
I kind of like that Riviera is a a smaller, more intimate lobby
with a coffee shop that doesn't say Starbucks.
It's their own Riviera Starbucks.
I like the fountains in the front and I liked it.
They really don't let anybody in like the Poly.
You could sometimes talk your way through.
I really got to get there, you know, I got to meet a friend.
Sometimes they let you to. Riviera is locked down.
If you're not staying there or have a restaurant reservation,
you're not getting unless you come over from another resort.
So it still feels, homie, not as much as old Key West.
There's no doubt. It doesn't feel like you know
your neighborhood, but there's something still intimate about
the Riviera that I love. The whole first floor there, the
wrought iron, love it. The whole feeling of the resort,
the quick service downstairs that would, I forgot if it's
Piazzo something Piazo, Piazzo, Piazzo.
Yeah. Thank you, Primo Primo Piazzo.
Even the Was it Del Rivo bar El Rivo?
Bar Riva. Bar Riva.
Bar Rivo, all those places I love it, including Topolino's.
If you go for breakfast or dinner so and the rooms are
spectacular and they don't feel like they they had any wear and
tear. I don't even like if you told me
they needed a refurbishment. I can't see it when I go.
They all feel really pretty new. So it does have that going for
it. And of course, the gondola
access, the you could walk right over to Caribbean beach and eat
over at Sebastian's if you wanted to.
So I, I still love it, but I can't say, you know, it's not up
to the old Key West neighborhood feeling, but there's some
similarities as far as even though it's new, it's not, you
know, mainstream Poly, you know, it's, it's more subdued.
Well, and the advantage of you know, we talked about the
advantage of the sprawling and being able to feel like it's a
neighborhood. The advantage of the tower is
you have much more option for better views from your balcony.
You know, you better access. I also think the public spaces
in these newer buildings, and I'm not talking about just the
lobby itself, but like the lounge behind the coffee shop in
Riviera, the pools, the. Community Hall.
Community hall is another great, great option.
You know, it's just the splash pads like that splash pad at
Riviera is gorgeous and the one at the Moana themed one there at
the quiet pool is very cute for the for the kiddos, you know
what I mean? So you have those public spaces
that are centralized that's easy still to get your food and your
drinks, but still kind of gives it that intimate feel.
I think that's something they really have have going for them.
It's amazing the hate that Riviera got when it came to the
resale restrictions and all of that.
And yet when you really go back to that resort, I think you
cannot see anyone have ever knocked it on.
The construction quality, the the design, all of that.
It just hit every single mark. And I think you really you you
do get what you paid for at that property.
I do think that they they, they went all out in some of those
things. On the flip side of that, the
resort that I think has gotten more hate than any, you know,
than any recent memory in its construction, in its design and
it's taking over of Seven Seas Lagoon was the Island Tower
edition at Disney's Polynesian Resort.
Yeah, and honestly, I don't. So we're starting to see posts
from people from the island tower of, you know, just like
construction issues, things that are breaking cracked floor
pieces. And it does.
It almost feels like, 'cause you're right, I don't ever
really remember seeing a whole lot of that from Riviera.
And to this day, I don't feel like we get a whole lot of that
from Riviera, but we see it from Disneyland Hotel, We see it from
the Island Tower. Almost feels like post pandemic
to construction. You mean quality has declined?
Because I do think Riviera was one of the best constructed,
best theme, like just the fixtures and everything was, you
know, so just felt really, really upscale.
And what's funny about Riviera is I'll never forget this one
time when we stayed there, I watched this housekeeper because
you can kind of see, you know, some of the balconies.
And I watched her sweeping with, with a vacuum outside on the
balcony. And I thought, wow, like, they
really keep this place as nice as possible.
And could you imagine if they they had always been sweeping
the balconies, you know, every with every turnover of guests
over at like Olkey W, They wouldn't be grimy like they are
now, but and. They're, I mean, they're going
through with a duster on the wrought iron, you know, that's,
that's part of the balcony there as well.
I mean. Yeah, meanwhile there's like
spiders crawling up and down the Olkey W Falcon.
Not that I don't love them, but but then you get to the island
Tower and as much as I think it's it's I love I love the
theming and how pretty it is. There are some questionable
construction, you know, choices and was with the Disneyland
Hotel as well. I would even add to your
conversation the the flip that they did at Big Pine Key.
Oh yeah. With Grand Floridian, again, you
have these concepts for these beautiful rooms, but you know,
we've been a part of this community so long that we've
seen the openings of all of these resorts.
You know, Panda was there with us when they opened Big Pine Key
there. The, the place smelt like paint
when we walked in the door, the, you know, they were throwing
shrubs into the landscaping that morning.
And I, it just surprises me that they're always up against this
wall of that opening date. And I think I don't know if it's
part of it obviously is construction quality.
Trust me when I tell you, you know, we live in a new build
community. We see how fast they're building
houses right now down here in Florida.
So it, it would imagine that they're using similar labor and
that labor knows how to build things real fast.
But there are things that are wrong.
You know, we've had warranty items in our first year in our
new house that we've had to call on and things, things happen,
You know, things break. But again, when you looked at
Riviera, you, you never saw those kind of complaints,
whereas with especially Disneyland hotel, you know,
Jeff, you, you recently stayed there and kind of saw some of
that stuff first hand, didn't you?
Yeah, and in fact, it was. It was bad enough that I felt
necessary not to complain, but to let the general manager know
this is a brand new property and there's already water damage in
the bathroom that isn't being addressed as still like look
like melted paint from the water behind the walls.
It's a brand new property that people are paying dues for.
So again, it wasn't a complaint. I wasn't looking for anything.
I was just like the new, new hotel, you know, probably sand
this down and repaint it. You know that you shouldn't see
that, especially at a Disney hotel, especially at a $600 a
night plus hotel. Yeah.
Those things should be taken care of instantly.
And I, I think it does go to the quality of construction.
And you know, and while we're on this topic, I, I kind of don't
want to go too far off, but I'm not a fan of the like the Big
Pine key idea, taking an existing hotel room and
converting it. I know we've talked about it
that we would love to see something at Coronado or Porter
Orleans or stuff, but it never really fits right.
I look at Beach Club and the balcony situation there, they
just shoehorned in some DVC rooms and you never know if
you're going to have a balcony you can eat on or a triangle you
got a Flamingo on with one hand, you know, 1 foot.
They don't fit. Build something new, we'll buy
it. Obviously we'll buy it.
Give us, you know, a deluxe resort for the money that we're
spending for it, not something that we polished up and put some
new paint on. Do you think we're going to get
that with Lakeshore Lodge? All science point to yes.
I mean, I don't I can't speak to the construction quality because
they're sure throwing that sucker up fast.
But at the same time, it is encouraging that Disney is
building something fast instead of, you know, five years for a,
for a Plaza with lights and A, and a statue, you know, So I
just hoped that they were bringing in more work workers to
do it. It, it's just sad that it gets
the, the problem that they've run into yet again is that they
are up against a little bit of a wall because here we have
Riviera, which as, as, as honestly, a lot of us never
thought the day would come, or at least we knew it was far off
into the future. Within the next 12 months,
Riviera will sell out. Riviera will, will, will hit a
sold out status sooner rather than later.
I don't, I don't, I probably don't even give it 12 months to
maybe for us to see maybe our final sales of Riviera or them
do a promotion and and push the final sales of Riviera.
It is getting very, very close to that point.
That said, what do they have that's left?
They have the Polynesian Island tower, which OK, yeah, you'll
get by by a little bit of time, but this is where I think they
are already at the pressure to get constructed.
So, you know, they're, they're already at the pressure to get
this thing up because they're going to need it to continue to
push sales. And so you do that.
You didn't green light it soon enough, which means now you got
to rush construction, which means now you're going to cut
some corners throughout that construction process.
And I hate to say this, but I just don't know.
We said this a long time ago. He's like, what do you consider
Disney Vacation Club? Do you consider it deluxe?
Is it deluxe adjacent? I don't even know that it falls
into any of those categories now, and I hate saying this out
loud, but I think all you can really refer to the rooms as is
like a timeshare or a motel kind of room.
I don't know that we can fully push it into that deluxe
category anymore if this is the level.
Of think motel words a little rough, although when I think of
motel. Motel is equivalent to stop and
rob. Yeah, Motel 8 or.
Yeah, I'm just thinking of like Red Roof, when you prepare the
amenities then like the ability to did.
People under the bed a. Super nice motel.
I don't. Know No, it's still a hotel.
I see what you're saying though. I see what you're saying.
And, and I've always struggled because people have said, well,
I don't, you know, they called Riviera moderate adjacent for a
long time because you can see the Caribbean beach and it
doesn't feel like it's its own thing.
And whatever my thing with the DVC room and I take the studios
out of this for the purpose because people that are wanting
those, the, the bigger villas are bigger families that want
the kitchen. You're not going to get that at
any other hotel. I don't care if it's on
International Drive at Universal Kissimmee, you know, Erlo
Bronson, people that are looking for that room, if they're not
getting it at Disney, they're doing an Airbnb, you know what I
mean? Cuz.
They or renting another timeshare.
Or renting another timeshare, They're going to Margaritaville.
They're doing some of those things because they need the
space, they want the kitchen. And when it comes to the
studios, you can stay at a studio at Old Key West or a
studio at Pop Century, and there's not a lot of daylight
between the two. So I think you have to get to
the one bedroom level to really dial in what DVC is.
Well, and as much as you say that, though, at the same time,
it runs into the problem of, you know, people shoving 5 people.
One of the reasons maybe that, that, you know, we're having
construction issues is because people are shoving 5 people into
these studios. And you know, I, I, I, I hate to
use the cruise ship, you know, example, but on the last day of
being on a cruise ship, when you're, when you're it's depart
demarcation as people leave their rooms, they prop them open
with your stoppers and you walk by some of these rooms and you
are just, I don't know if you just have need to give the
disclaimer here, but like these, you own these properties.
So if you want them to remain nice, you need to treat them
nice while you're living there. No matter how many people you
put in there, you. Can't look like a crime scene
when you're leaving, no? And boy, I've see I've walked by
some sketchy cruise cruise rooms.
Oh my God, yeah. I'm like my my mouth dropped on
the cruise ship when I looked into someone said, Oh my God,
somebody has to clean that up. Oh my God.
Yeah. And then they're mad when their
room's not ready at 4:00. Yeah, 3 hours later, they're
wondering why the room's not ready.
You were going to say. Something you lost me.
That was the cruise ship. Oh no.
So you guys were talking about, you know, Disney being deluxe or
not. I don't Disney gets away with
the word deluxe when it comes to more location, I think than
anything and theming to a degree.
But you know, if you go and stay at a real luxury resort like
like a Ritz Carlton or I don't know, I don't know what you
consider luxury, But there there's definitely a difference
in the quality of the actual room itself that unfortunately
Disney doesn't have. Like the rooms are pretty the
theme really well, but it's never going to be on the same
level as like a real luxury resort.
And that's because Disney can get away with that deluxe
because you're on Disney property.
So you're paying for that or you know, you're staying at the
Grand Floridian and you have walkway to Magic Kingdom.
So you're paying for that proximity for that location.
And I think that they get, that's where they get, you know.
Yeah, well, and it's. At this point, you look at
Universal's deluxe hotels. I can't speak to Helios, I
haven't stayed there, but we've stayed at Royal Pacific a lot,
which is a deluxe hotel, but there's nothing to that room.
It's a hotel than. What Porter rooms have.
Or. Same with same with Helios.
We were, we just, yeah, we just stayed at Helios last month.
Earlier this month it was this. Oh, no, it was last month, June.
I, I, I just noticed I've said earlier this month when I talked
about a lot of things, it was a long, it's because in my head I
was still in June, but it's July.
Well. And Derek, maybe you can speak
to this because you've been in this longer than the rest of us,
but wasn't there a time, I seem to remember there was actually 4
room categories, There was value, moderate, deluxe, and
then they called the DVC rooms the home away from home.
Deluxe villas they could book. Separately through the website.
Oh yeah. Yeah, they're still listed like
that it. Was it was its own category?
Because it has, yeah. They're still listed like that.
It's still listed value, moderate, deluxe and then deluxe
villas. And they do place deluxe villas
ahead of deluxe, and I think that's because of pricing.
You know what? I mean, and I, I will to, you
know, Jeff, like you said, I will put them there for the 1
bedrooms and the two bedrooms and the three bedrooms.
But more often than not, it's these deluxe studio properties
where you start to, you know, run into issues again because
you're, you're cramming 5 people in there or you just make silly
design decisions. You know, we've been in, we've
been in some of these properties where you open one drawer, you
can't open the other. Yeah, you're snacking into.
Disneyland Hotel, we set it We set it opening night and our you
can go back and watch the live stream from opening night at
Disneyland hotel and we said these mirrors you have to have
them all the way slid over to then be able to open them for
the wardrobe that's behind them. And if it's not all the way slid
over, it's catching this thing and people are going to RIP
these things off. And the first thing I did when
we recently were at Disneyland is I messaged Jeff and I said,
Hey, take a picture of take a picture of your, your closet for
me. Mirrors are gone.
They're gone like, and it's just how, you know, I think that's
the, that's the big miss. And I don't want this to turn
into like a negative of like the newer properties.
I want to, I want to get us back on kind of this new versus old.
But I think it's worth considering like, you know,
you're buying this, you're spending a large investment on,
on what you're buying. And so you want to make sure
you're getting the value for your money.
And so these are the, these are the considerations, the other
things you need to think about. And if anything, I would just
hope that when it comes to the deluxe studio property in some
of these newer rooms, DVC just pays a bit more attention to the
fact that, like, I agree, you're building these rooms for, you
know, 2 to 3 guests. But I can promise you 9 times
out of 10, there's five people in the room like they are.
They are filling every crevice of this.
And I think durability needs to be key, and that's with any
hotel, any timeshare property. You know, we've got CVC rooms
where the, you have to move the coffee table out of the way,
obviously, to bring the Murphy bed down.
But the coffee table's really not easy to move out of the way.
You know, it's not on wheels. Yeah, where?
I don't remember where. We just did a video not too long
ago. And you can see the scratch
marks all along the floor of where the, you know, families
and guests have to push the coffee table out of the way.
And that's not their fault. You know, I mean, that's a
that's a poor design, poor durability if.
You don't have convenient USB chargers at this point.
You are not deluxe. Stop it.
Well and USBC chargers at this point like.
Please. I mean when the contemporary
doesn't have a USB, forget USBC doesn't even have USB.
How contemporary are we? Yeah.
And pay, pay the extra money to to actually make this part of
like the outlet, like the the the built in charging that's
part of furniture that we've been doing for so long.
It breaks a lot. It breaks.
I've been, you know, we've been in some of these brand new
properties. It was or were we was it we we
were on I well, again, cruise ship a great example.
But we were on icon of the Seas for the second time this summer
and they have these built in chargers on the wall and one of
the US BS was just jammed back, you know, all the way back into
the wall and like you weren't using it like it just wasn't
wasn't happening. So I mean you could it's easily
it's easy to swap out an outlet these days and put USB or USBC
into it. So it just it it just makes
sense to I think do it. It it's just the easiest there.
The one, the one resort, I will say that didn't have a charging
problem when we were at the Grand Floridian Villas.
We were in a one bedroom. OK, well, to be clear, they
didn't have anything updated though there was no updated
charging but there but there were 12 outlets in a row just.
Behind the desk in the in the well, the main bedroom.
Oh wow. All right next to him, you won't
have a problem in that room. It's not the longest we've gone
with Derek not speaking. I think he's.
Shutting down. I think his batteries, his
lights are going to go out pretty.
Soon. It's so weird.
I'm letting everybody. I'm letting everybody talk and
waiting for my turn because I do want to address one thing, but
whenever we're ready, just let me.
Know we're ready. We're ready.
We're ready because I'm going to move on to point charts and
annual dues pretty soon and wrap us up so.
Well then let me touch on this quickly.
And again, I love everybody's points and hearing about it.
It makes 100% sense. Of course, one thing I do want
to touch on when I think comparing, for example, if I'm
just going to pick out two of them, if I'm going to say Old
Key West and then I'm going to say Polly Island Tower, I think
a big difference. And again, I want to stress this
has nothing to do with the actual cast members themselves.
I think it literally is just with the tools that they're
given is I think service and the check in experience.
I think if you try to compare checking in to Old Key West with
team members that have been there for a really long time and
you get big giant welcome homes and people are ready to help you
with your luggage verse Pauley Island Tower when you check in a
if you're driving, you know, good luck trying to get through
the, you know, robot guard stand that won't let anybody in and
make sure everything works because there's not an actual
human being there to let you check in through the gate to
check in. Then you get in there and it's
great cast members. Again, it's got nothing to do
with these cast members, but I cannot figure out and I know we
could probably do a whole other show and our awesome audience
would love to jump in as well. How they decided that building
this whole tower made no sense to have an actual front desk
that they have no front desk. They've got super helpful cast
members with iPads, but when it comes to, I need help with my
luggage, when I need help with this, they're on the phone
trying to call or they're texting back to the great
ceremonial house. So I think the communication
that they can open something to me, it's just, it's just
stunning. And again, it's not the cast
members themselves. They're they're doing their jobs
as great as they possibly can, but it's effective.
How do you open up a tower and right next to the Polynesian and
you're charged these huge point prices because of the location
that it's in or let alone if it's a cash rate, you're
talking, you know, 78900 dollars a night for a studio and you've
got no front desk so you have no one to help you.
I've heard so many stories of people, even our dear Mary had a
horrible experience when it came to just trying to get bell
services coming from great ceremonial house to overhear
first. I think that's something that I
don't know if they just took into account and said, well,
yeah, we'll just use the main original Poly check in and the
main original Poly bell services tower.
But no, there's no front desk. I mean, come on, you can't put
all these people in a tower without a front desk.
That you can just walk by and talk to an actual person is
stunning to me. So hopefully they fixed that.
I don't know how, but that is one thing I hear about a lot.
Is what? I heard that was a that was an
intentional decision by DV CS part to cut back on basically
the labor and operational costs of of Eilent hour.
So basically. Let me guess.
Oh yeah, yeah. We listened to our guests and
what they told us is we don't want a front desk, so we're not
going to give them one. Well, and unfortunately, and I
hate to be, you know, the curmudgeon, but they're not the
only ones. There's a lot of hotels now that
are going away. App usage, check in on the app.
You know, I know that you hate it and that's 'cause you're old
and you don't like technology, but we, I can't remember the
name of the hotel that we stayed at in Times Square, but it was
that way. They did have, I don't want to
call it a front desk cause using the word desk is very lenient.
But they had a, a kiosk that if you had an issue, you could go
to, it was basically a guy with an iPad.
It was the same situation. But you know, AI and technology
and all these things are, are pushing these cast members and
these front desk people out of a job and into, you know, other
things because that's what people want.
They don't want to talk to people.
My, my kids tell me all the time, why are you calling me?
Could you have not texted this? You know, they don't want that
human interaction. The younger generation, the
millennials and below. They.
Want technology to do everything?
And I agree with it. I I agree with moving that
direction for a younger generation.
But when you when the majority of your DVC population's still
not that generation, then you have to offer both.
You don't have a choice and and to to tell give.
Me a break. And I mean to tell the the, the
older population that they have to walk to the grand ceremonial
house, that's not the answer. That's not the, that's not the
service that they're expecting. And and so yeah, it's it's
interesting to see what direction that goes in and you.
You can have no one saying like they're anti technology or
whatnot, but 14 year old Tommy isn't buying a 25,000 dollar
$30,000 Disney Vacation Club membership.
Guess what? Mom and dad are or grandma and
grandpa are and they're the ones and they're the ones that have
luggage. So if you're telling me that now
I'm going to have to what? Use my phone to text bell
services to have it come up? For God's sakes, just have a
actual person. There.
Disney prides itself on Disney prides itself on cast members
and customer service. The best stories that we still
will ever hear again. It goes back to say oaky W the
relationship that those members have with those cast members
that have been there for 10/20/25 years.
They are like family members. No one's saying God.
Do you remember that time I texted that some random AI think
that was such a great service. I really just up.
And to be clear, I wasn't, I wasn't agreeing with the
direction that it's going. I'm just saying, whether we like
it or not, I'm afraid that it it's happening.
I would. I see so many complaints.
I can't imagine that Dizzy's not rethinking it.
I mean, everybody's complaining that there's no front desk.
And the iPad people, he would think that they would realize.
Price and again, it's not the cast members like I'm not, I
want to stress that the cast members are phenomenal people,
but they have to work with the tools that they've been given.
And somebody laid out that toolbox and said, hey, you know
what, let's not to put in there. Let's not put in actual people
in an actual front desk or an actual bell services for what is
probably one of the most anticipated DVC resort openings
in a long, long time. It's just weird to me.
Weird. Yeah.
All right, I'm done. Thanks.
At this point, I'm not quite sure what to call this show.
It was we we kind of went comparing new versus old.
And I think basically your take away should be they don't build
them like they used to and they don't put the amenities like
they used to. But I don't want to fully disk
the newer properties because it is the the product that we have
today. And you know, to Pandas point,
Riviera is absolutely beautiful. I think that the big things that
we've hinted at is that you need to buy where you want to stay.
We've said that for years. We always have, we always will
and we always say try before you buy as well, because you need to
do the research and get an idea of what you're looking into.
And you need to understand also depending on what you're buying,
what those restrictions are. Because granted, if you're
buying a, if you're buying a direct membership and you're
buying, you get the, the, the full package, then you're going
to be able to use your points at any of these resorts, which is a
great benefit to have. You also need to keep in mind
that some of these older resorts are going to go offline at some
point and you are going to be stuck with some of the newer
properties. Same needs to be said if you're
looking at, you know, buying some of these properties, these
newer properties via resale, you need to consider the fact that
this is where you're going to stay.
I think that's, you know, one of our biggest complaints about
resale restrictions is the fact that, you know, you'll look at
how well does a Disneyland hotel age over time.
And if you're buying resale at Disneyland Hotel, you can only
stay at Disneyland Hotel. That is the only property truly
that I think that really effects in my opinion these days more
than anything. I don't, I wouldn't argue that
for Riviera because as we said on the show, Riviera was a
different kind of construction. It's a beautiful resort and I
think it will hold up well over the test of time.
So I think that I hope that the construction quality of like a
Lakeshore lodge improves. I hope that we see it, you know,
built in a way that not only is beautiful, but also holds up to
the wear and tear that people are putting on these rooms and
resorts. But love to get your thoughts.
As always, we love to hear comments and feedback.
Let us know, I guess, what to call this show.
But I'm not sure what I named it at this point if I called it new
versus old. We gave the new resorts their
credit with dining and with public spaces and with pools.
And it wasn't all hate. No.
And and and whatever you name this show, Paul, just name it
Part 1, because then we'll have a Part 2.
Got too many of those to film? Well, that's going to do it for
this week's episode of the DVC Show.
Folks, Like, subscribe, do all the things.
If you love our ramblings, head to patreon.com/DVC fan for some
behind the scene content and some fun stuff.
And as always, we will see you next Monday.