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Tourism

Disney and Universal Keep Building So Visitors Stay Longer and Spend More

Hannah Sampson

Photo Credit: Pandora — The World of Avatar, shown in a promotional photo, opens this week at Disney's Animal Kingdom. The land is part of Disney's strategy to attract more visitors, spread them across parks, and get them to stay on the resort property longer.  Disney Parks and Resorts / Matt Stroshane

Skift Take

Disney and Universal keep fighting for visitors — and more tourist dollars. Will new attractions be enough to attract newcomers and repeat business alike?

The center of the theme park universe this week is adding more waterslides, aqua rides, floating mountains, and flying banshees — and, most importantly for their operators, fresh reasons for visitors to drop some cash. As Walt Disney World Resort and Universal Orlando Resort ramped up to host simultaneous grand openings, top executives from their parent companies explained the bigger strategy to investors. The bottom line: If you build more at the parks, people will come, stay more days, and spend more money. "We look to make our park destinations must-see destinations," chief financial officer Christine McCarthy said during the MoffettNathanson Media & Communications Summit last week. "We also look for projects that we believe cannot only drive new attendance, but can drive increased attendance through repeat visitations....We also look at extending length of stay, and most importantly we look at improving the guest experience because that is r

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