It’s been a news filled week for the Disney company. Last Friday, Food & Wine Festival started at California Adventure and this week brought a Bob Iger interview that touched on several parks related topics. In this post, we’ll look at a few of the noteworthy topics from a Disneyland perspective, adding commentary to the news.

Disney California Adventure Food & Wine Festival Downsized

I’ve already covered many of the dishes at DCA’s Food & Wine but I wanted to take a brief, but broader, look at the festival. Food & Wine has been a favorite event of ours for the last few years. The festival brought in chefs to give demonstrations, bands to play and an ever expanding menu. Match that with the return of Soarin’ Over California and it was a wonderful and popular spring event.

Unfortunately and somewhat confoundedly, Food & Wine has been scaled back this year. Starting with the food, there are fewer Festival Marketplaces this year than last. Naturally, that results in fewer dishes being offered. We’re not talking about a huge drop off here, as the number has gone from 12 to 10 but it’s odd to see fewer offered. These festivals, whether it be DCA or Epcot, have always added more and more every year in terms of food and drinks.

Strangely, the park has a sign for the booths that are gone this year as a photo op. Posing with the words ‘Avocado Time’ is great but feels a little soon to call that retired booth retro.

Along with less food, the entertainment budget appears to be trimmed down a little bit. Festival favorites Phat Cat Swinger are only performing 4 times across the nearly 2 months. The bigger stage wasn’t even up on the first day of the festival, instead they have set up a makeshift stage a few steps in front of that. To be clear, I don’t know if that’s budgetary or if they’re doing work on the other stage.

I was disappointed that the entertainment has been scaled back. Disneyland Resort is still locally driven and many would go spend a day at the festival, eating and watching their favorite bands perform for the day. That can still be done but much less than previous years. Live music and entertainment bring an energy to the parks that can’t be attained otherwise. I will always be an advocate for more of that and at the highest level of quality.

More than anything, I’m puzzled why these changes have taken place. Food & Wine was thriving and seemed like it would grow every year. To be fair, maybe this is more infrastructure based as the walkways did get crowded and the stage did have to go down an hour or two before World of Color. I don’t know if I could get talked into that explanation but it’s plausible.

Whatever the case may be, it’s disappointing to see Food & Wine take a step backwards at DCA this year. The festival is still worth attending and is fun but could be better. I’m interested to see if this trend will continue for Festival of the Holidays this year.

Avatar Land at Disneyland Resort?

In a wide ranging interview earlier this week, Bob Iger hinted at an Avatar themed land coming to Disneyland Resort. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard this coming from Iger as he talked about Avatar on the west coast a little over a year ago. The difference this time was that he specifically used the word ‘land’ instead of ‘experience’ when talking about what’s coming.

That’s a fairly significant development if you believe that Iger is being selective in his word choice. There’s no reason not to believe that. No matter what you opinion of the man is at this point, he understands that his word choice will be dissected. He’s also savvy enough to add excitement for something that hasn’t been announced yet.

On one hand, hearing that there are still plans is encouraging. Disneyland Resort is short on current projects and could use some on the horizon. I think that’s part of the reason Iger brought it up. But on the other hand, just announce the thing! Regardless of what project it is, Disney has been slow playing parks projects for two plus years now. Really, it’s been five but I’m not going to hold the pandemic against them. I know that there are financial reasons for this but consistently hinting at what might be coming is frustrating.

In 2022, Josh D’Amaro stood on the D23 Expo stage and talked about what could be done at Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom. He did the same thing at a Destination D event in 2023. Iger has mentioned Avatar coming to Disneyland in consecutive years. It’s beyond time for some actual announcements, leave the conjecture to annoying websites like this one 😉

For those reasons, I’m going to slow play my thoughts on an Avatar themed land coming to Disneyland Resort. My guess is that this would come to California Adventure in place of Hollywood Land. I could also see this being a part of the push for Disneyland Forward, a proposed expansion by the resort.

If the project does come to fruition, there’s some obvious questions of fit. It would probably be time to drop the California from the California Adventure name. I do love Pandora in Animal Kingdom and think the world lends itself to a theme park but am not going to let my thoughts fly like a Banshee (get it?) until something concrete is announced. At this point, Disney is likely holding any major announcements for D23 in August. That’s what I’m hoping for anyway!

Magic Keys Back on Sale

The last bit of news I wanted to touch on was Magic Keys (Disneyland’s Annual Pass program) going back on sale. Earlier in 2024, the passes went on sale and then were all sold out within a day. Less than 2 months later, the Magic Keys went back on sale and 3 of the 4 options remain available more than 48 hours later. It’s a fairly big surprise to see, as I had friends waiting nearly 8 hours to buy them earlier this year and now the passes seem to be readily available.

I only have guesses as to why the drastic change. See, I told you I had you covered on conjecture! One theory is that Disney is in the midst of increasing park capacity. I’m not sure how viable this is as both Disneyland and DCA feel crowded even on days they aren’t. There’s not many shows going on and no additional ride openings on the horizon. Outside of just believing that they can hold more people in the parks, I don’t know why the resort would believe they should suddenly increase capacity.

With the reservation system, Disney could be looking forward at reservations knowing that there isn’t as much demand this year. Disney World has seen an increase in attendance recently but Disneyland’s has been down in the last couple of months. Adding more Magic Key holders will bolster attendance and, in turn, spending during quiet times of the year. After seeing WDW relax the reservation system to start the year, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the same thing happen at Disneyland soon.

More than likely, it’s a mix of reasons why the sudden change in Magic Key sales took place. If any Disney execs are reading this (ha!) and want to fill me in, I’d love to hear! Whatever the reason, I’m happy to see the resort lean into the local fans. Especially if this isn’t some conspiracy to overcrowd the parks!

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