Disney Closing Star Wars Hotel

[Henadic Theologian]

Disney Is Closing Its Immersive Star Wars Hotel, A Year After Opening

The $1,200-per-person-per-night Star Wars experience is being shuttered for good at the end of September, roughly 18 months after opening.

www.forbes.com

If they ever did a Hotel for Star Trek, I'd base it on the Starfleet Musuem from season 3 of Picard.

I hear the Star Wars one was generic or something, instead of say the Deathstar. Not an expert in Star Wars, but I love that Star Trek no longer play second fiddle to Star Wars.

 

[MGibster]

I hear the Star Wars one was generic or something, instead of say the Deathstar. Not an expert in Star Wars, but I love that Star Trek no longer play second fiddle to Star Wars.

When it comes to merchandising and films, I think Star Trek is still playing second fiddle to Star Wars.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I hear the Star Wars one was generic or something, instead of say the Deathstar. Not an expert in Star Wars, but I love that Star Trek no longer play second fiddle to Star Wars.

No. There were a LOT of problems with it.

Let's start with the basics- from all accounts, it was a pretty awesome idea, and it was well-executed. The people that did it really liked it!

But here's the problem- it was incredibly expensive to run. Because it was an immersive experience with all the actors in the hotel. In addition, the accommodations themselves (the starship "cabins") weren't luxurious; while it was great theming as a spaceship and immersive, another way of looking at it is that you were spending $5000 for a tiny hotel room without any windows.

And because of the limited number of rooms, they couldn't cut the price - because then it would lose more money. Conceptually, it just wasn't something that was going to last. Shame.

 

[deganawida]

When it comes to merchandising and films, I think Star Trek is still playing second fiddle to Star Wars.

Heh, I think everyone plays second fiddle to SW when it comes to merchandising. That was Lucas’ masterstroke.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

No. There were a LOT of problems with it.

Let's start with the basics- from all accounts, it was a pretty awesome idea, and it was well-executed. The people that did it really liked it!

But here's the problem- it was incredibly expensive to run. Because it was an immersive experience with all the actors in the hotel. In addition, the accommodations themselves (the starship "cabins") weren't luxurious; while it was great theming as a spaceship and immersive, another way of looking at it is that you were spending $5000 for a tiny hotel room without any windows.

And because of the limited number of rooms, they couldn't cut the price - because then it would lose more money. Conceptually, it just wasn't something that was going to last. Shame.

The concept works great at Rise of the Rebellion, which mixes actors with a very fancy dark ride and the immersive Galaxy's Edge environment. Some things don't need to be multiple days long and include sleeping inside the attraction.

I love Pirates of the Caribbean, for instance, but I wouldn't pay $5,000 to sleep aboard a ship in the harbor of the ride.

 

[deganawida]

I love Pirates of the Caribbean, for instance, but I wouldn't pay $5,000 to sleep aboard a ship in the harbor of the ride.

Nah, that’d be perfect! So what you do is mutiny, commandeer the ship, then leave harbor. Mix with rum and Hans Zimmer, and, boom, best PotC experience!

 

[MGibster]

I love Pirates of the Caribbean, for instance, but I wouldn't pay $5,000 to sleep aboard a ship in the harbor of the ride.

I think mere mortals such as you and I were not the target audience for this hotel. This was a product designed for people in a much higher income bracket. I could go on a cruise for less money. It'd be cheaper to go to Gen Con even accounting for food, lodging, and travel expenses.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I think mere mortals such as you and I were not the target audience for this hotel. This was a product designed for people in a much higher income bracket. I could go on a cruise for less money. It'd be cheaper to go to Gen Con even accounting for food, lodging, and travel expenses.

Heck, I just got an email from GenCon hyping up a live dungeon pirate treasure hunt for ... $58.

So yeah, for $5k, my wife and I could get to GenCon, stay in a hotel and do all three live dungeon events and play RPGs all weekend and still come home with thousands of dollars in change.

(I will not be going to GenCon this year, but I'm not gonna lie: That pirate live dungeon certainly increases the likelihood that I will one day.)

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Heck, I just got an email from GenCon hyping up a live dungeon pirate treasure hunt for ... $58.

So yeah, for $5k, my wife and I could get to GenCon, stay in a hotel and do all three live dungeon events and play RPGs all weekend and still come home with thousands of dollars in change.

(I will not be going to GenCon this year, but I'm not gonna lie: That pirate live dungeon certainly increases the likelihood that I will one day.)

It's been a while since I was there, but it was fun, especially for meeting all the EN World and CM people I knew. I did one of those True Dungeon thingies, which was fun, but not quite my thing because I am not really good at puzzle-solving. But traveling overseas to the US for it... I don't really have it in me anymore.

But of course, this thing Disney is closing is a luxury hotel set I couldn't reasoably afford in something in Star Wars I don't particularly care about it, so it's not that relevant to me. Except it might be interesting to know what factores lead to its failures - Covid, price point, setting appeal, running cost, audience size?

 

[Benjamin Olson]

In addition, the accommodations themselves (the starship "cabins") weren't luxurious; while it was great theming as a spaceship and immersive, another way of looking at it is that you were spending $5000 for a tiny hotel room without any windows.

That really gets at the heart of the problem. Normal rich people don't want to pay for the dingy, lived-in aesthetic of Star Wars. That is the exact opposite of a premium resort experience to them. So this was exclusively a place for proper fans who had an extra $5k to spend on a Star Wars resort experience. When you then also subtract away the many die-hard fans who are too at odds with "Disney Star Wars" for whichever reason to hand over amounts of money so large to it and the many people too introverted to want to pay for an immersive experience with actors and such... well they must have had dozens of guests.

If they had built a Naboo palace luxury resort, that had some Star Wars theming for fans but was mostly just another fancy resort for the people that like those and pay for them, I would find it way less interesting, but it would probably have been a more viable business endeavor.