Price discrimination comes to restaurants

"Real world" is a totally loaded and subjective term. My world is in fact very real, and the one I live in.

I don't make 100K a year like some of you guys, and I could probably afford DC sometimes. It depends on what one wants to pay for. $200 fixes my vehicle when it breaks down, or buys me a Nintendo Wii, or lets me stay in a hotel for a few days. It IS a lot of money to me, but it's not unobtainable. :)

It's not the price in absolute terms. It's the way they market themselves, as an exclusive experience. Read their marketing material---it's heavily tilted in that direction.

If you market yourself as an exclusive experience, you don't do so price-forward. The Ritz-Carlton Grande Lakes does not advertise prices on its front pages, even though it's not that much more than the cost of a Disney Moderate room.

Several baseball teams already charge more for weekend games or when a major rival's in town -- it's probably a closer match to park pricing seasonality than restaurants.

I can see regional amusement parks pulling this off, but I can't picture Disney or Universal going this route. The move would confuse weeklong guests (who may decide to venture off property during the weekends) and upset the Floridians who travel up for a weekend getaway on principle.

Then again, I guess one can argue that Disney parks should charge more when they're open longer.

...or perhaps charge a little less when they close before twilight...

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I paid $104 per ticket for Discovery Cove in February, and that included a free ticket to Busch Gardens along with it. They had prices published on their website, although they did fluctuate day to day.

LostKause said:
I don't make 100K a year like some of you guys, and I could probably afford DC sometimes. It depends on what one wants to pay for. $200 fixes my vehicle when it breaks down, or buys me a Nintendo Wii, or lets me stay in a hotel for a few days. It IS a lot of money to me, but it's not unobtainable. :)

Then again 100K isn't really much either. Not when it compares to Rob & Elissa Alvey and their "millions". Someone once told me that Rob Alvey is one of the most wealthiest "behind the scenes" guys in Hollywood today.

Considering the number of trips they take every year ( and their "rich" friends like Big Mike )..I can believe it.

Gonch is the wealthiest behind the scenes guy on CoasterBuzz. Believe it. Someone once told me.

Tis true.

I'm the Robb Alvey of Coasterbuzz.

Don't disrespect yourself that much ;-).

The trend continues...

Ticketmaster rolls out 'dynamic' ticket pricing

Event tickets seller Ticketmaster says it is going to let artists and sports teams raise and lower the price of tickets to reflect demand while they're being sold.

That's probably because Ticketmaster's competition was already doing it. I seem to recall that teams like the Cleveland Cavaliers were using someone else that enabled dynamic pricing, as well as enable a resale market that gave them the data to see that they were in fact pricing their tickets right.

What does Discovery Cove's $200 admission price have to do with Rob and Elissa? No need t interject their existence into the conversation. They don't deserve any attention at all.

From the Ticketmaster article:

while reducing prices on less-desirable ones that might have gone unsold otherwise

Ha! This feels a lot like when iTunes introduced it's new $1.29, $.99, $.69 pricing model: everything you ever want to hear will be $1.29 and you may stumble across a song from 1972 that's priced at $.69 once every blue moon.

SFoGswim said:
Ha! This feels a lot like when iTunes introduced it's new $1.29, $.99, $.69 pricing model: everything you ever want to hear will be $1.29 and you may stumble across a song from 1972 that's priced at $.69 once every blue moon.

What if what I want to hear is 70's music? Do I win?

The ski industry has been doing this since at least the 80s. Some, usually smaller places offer midweek discounted tickets. Almost all offer early season and late season discounts. On a recent ski trip in Quebec we adjusted plans to ski a day at Owl's Head because they were offering a $15 midweek ticket. The mountain was in full operation with just a couple of redundant lifts closed.

Many also offer midweek season passes at a great discount. We get one for Blue Mountain each year. The midweek pass that's good Monday to Friday is $189. The one that is good all week is $699. This is a huge benefit to me. For more or less the same reasons I won't go near a park on a Saturday, I loathe skiing on a Saturday as well. I'd love to see parks offer something like this.

If you want to hear 70's music, you most certainly do not win. No matter what the price point.

All of the music that I download is free, until I decide if it was worth paying for, and then I fess up and support the artist by purchasing a better quality download, or even the CD.

And all of the music I create is given away; no charge, because it isn't worth paying for. :D

Jeff said:
I seem to recall that teams like the Cleveland Cavaliers were using someone else that enabled dynamic pricing, as well as enable a resale market that gave them the data to see that they were in fact pricing their tickets right.

Flash Seats. It's an interesting system. My biggest gripe is that they completely fail at explaining how it works if you plan on actually using your tickets. The whole thing is geared towards enabling you to resell your tickets. The first time I bought anything through there I began to question whether I even had the option of actually using them myself. My other gripe would be the lack of getting a paper ticket to add to my collection (they let you in by swiping a credit card associated with your account) but I suppose that's probably not too important to most people.

I've noticed in the last few years that CP has sort of been experimenting with dynamic pricing in the form of deeper discounts being available/advertised on their slower days. Not exactly the same thing as outright changing the price day to day, but given what I know about the reading comprehension amusement park guests tend to have, I imagine it avoids confusing some people.

All of the music that I download is free

I think the word you are looking for here is "stolen".

As an aside, this is why I am a huge Rhapsody fan. I pay $15/month, and that gives me the ability to download any song in their catalog on three different portable devices---mine, my wife's and my daughter's. There are a few holdout artists who don't allow their music to be licensed this way, but not many. No worries about checking out some new obscure band, and it's all perfectly legal.