Disney Theme Parks -- Outrageously Expensive -- May 23, 2022

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All my posts are done quickly: there will be content and typographical errors. If anything on any of my posts is important to you, go to the source. If/when I find typographical / content errors, I will correct them.

DIS: someday, sooner than later, I'm going to start accumulating DIS. I'll be watching at least three things: earnings, of course for the next six quarters, share price, and then if/when DIS starts paying a dividend. With regard to earnings, I will be looking for rate of growth, not just earnings per se. With regard to share price, when that price starts to move up. Would $140 be a good entry point? I don't know, maybe. Dividend is less important than rate of growth of earnings.

• DIS:
• one year ago: $200
• today: $100

But that's not why I'm posting this. I'm posting this because there's another "meme" article on how expensive Disney's theme park in Florida has become.

Link here: https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/cost-disney-world-unaffordable-average-american-family. The browser may not support the link; if so, you can copy and paste.

We've talked about this before (at least I think we have -- oh, yes, here it is -- the key words: Disney outrageously expensive).  

Whether [Disney theme parks are] expensive or not is in the eye of the beholder. 

I know I could not afford to go this year if I had a family of four or six (spouse plus three or four children). [Not true: I could afford to go; I just would hate to spend that much money at this point in time.]

However, having said that, when Disney can price the experience at the rate they do, and yet the parks are still filled shoulder-to-shoulder, it tells me one thing: there's a lot of money out there. A lot of money.

On another note, along that line, I can't imagine having not visited Disneyland at least once in my life. 

"Everyone" needs to have the experience at least once, and that experience must come before age 25.

Old folks like me who have seen the theme park -- in my case,  more than a dozen times -- and others over the age of 45 who may or may not have seen the park -- can say they are no longer interested in such things. That's incredibly understandable. I have no interest in ever seeing Disneyland again (or Disney World for that matter, for the first time). But I can't "transfer" that emotional response to others, especially to anyone under the age of 25.

Nine-year-olds still see the magic.

High school seniors taking their dates to Disney theme parks still see the magic.

There's a great book out there, Enemies of Promise. I think folks who try to take that magic away from others are enemies of promise. 

It's possible -- and likely -- a larger and larger percentage of the American population cannot afford a Disney theme park experience. I don't know. I know the vast majority of Americans cannot afford to do this, but the vast majority of Americans cannot afford to do a lot of things.

But if it's an experience of a lifetime, and one wants to do it, one needs to plan for it as such. 

Note: I did not say "the" experience of lifetime, but "an" experience -- one of many experiences of a lifetime, one needs to plan for it. 

At the link the writer chose the most expensive options to max out the cost of his/her Disney experience, I assume, to make the story that much more sensational. A Disney theme park will be expensive but there are ways to bring that cost down.

But let's say one plans to do what the writer did and spend upwards of $8,000 -- in today's dollars -- for the experience.

Our daughter really, really wants to make sure her two-year twins get the chance to see Disneyland, California. They may decide they don't want to go, but she doesn't want to take that magic away simply because she did not plan.

So, let's do the math.

Start with the goal, or cost in today's dollars: $8,000.

From their age today, two years old, to ten years old, eight years to plan.

8 x 52 weeks = 416 weeks.

$8,000 / 416 = $20.

$20 / week.

So, I opened another Schwab account which I've nicknamed the "Disney Account."

I will deposit $20 / week in to that account.

What can one buy for $20 / week?

• a week's worth of Starbucks?
• a bottle of cheap gin?
• a bottle of mid-priced wine?
• a softcover book?
  
• a cheap haircut?
• a cheap dinner out for one?
• half a tank of gasoline?

I'm going to cheat:

• I'll make the deposit at the end of every month: $100 / month.
• every six months -- January 31st and June 30th -- I will add an additional amount to bring the total to the highest the account has ever been up to that point .. if that makes sense.