DisLove Podcast with Vanessa and Kris

DisLove E20 Special Backstage Magic Tour Review

• Vanessa Ferguson and Kris Johns • Season 2 • Episode 20

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Hear a review of the Backstage Magic Tour at Walt Disney World with Vanessa and Kris. The seven-hour tour gives a glimpse into operations at the parks including behind-the-scenes look at The American Adventure Rotunda where they were married and the operations of Main Street U.S.A. including a visit to the utilidors.  Other highlights included stops at Creative Costuming, Central Shops and Textile Services.  There will be no guest in this special episode of the podcast that was recorded at Walt Disney World.

For all the latest news about our episodes follow us on Instagram @dislovewithvanessaandkris or on YouTube.

Speaker 1:

[inaudible].

Speaker 2:

Welcome to the does love podcasts with Vanessa and Kris. I'm Vanessa Ferguson and I'm Kris Johns. We would like to welcome you to episode number 20 and for listeners joining us for the first time, our show features, things that we love it Disney and each episode typically has a guest who talks about how they can create Disney magic for our listeners at home or on their Disney vacation from vacation planners to product producers. Our guests bring Disney magic into your life.

Speaker 1:

This episode is what is

Speaker 2:

going to be a little bit different. We want to share one of the things that we enjoy doing at the parks, which are some of the special backstage tours. And so today we actually just a couple of hours ago finish the backstage magic tour at Walt Disney world and so we decided we want to just share with you our experience right while it was fresh in our mind. And then on our next episode we'll get back to our normal routine with our regular guests. So as a reminder, we always appreciate our listeners leaving us a review on apple podcast. We like to give anyone who gives us a review on there, a shoutout, and of course we also appreciate those five star customer ratings. Those are awesome as well. So today and normally, like I said, we would be talking about our topic of the day and then bringing on our guests. But today we're going to go right into our backstage magic tour review. So we're going to talk about a little bit of the logistics of the tour, some of our favorites, and then we will also spend some time sharing a little bit, but we don't want to give away the whole thing. What do you think, Kris? How's it sound good? So a little bit of the logistics about backstage magic. It is a seven hour tour. So yes, it is quite long. It's an all day experience. It does cost$275 per adult. It's targeted for like teens and older. Well before you do for it, let's just talk more about the price. Like Yep. Outline like really what the value is. So let's break that down before you get too far. Now. First off we did get a discount with our Disney visa card. Okay, so that's something that is nice and I'm assuming because we got to Disney visa card discount, probably if you are, I know where the annual pass you would get a discount as well is probably DBC members. So always check if you are interested in one of these tours. Don't be scared off by the price because we did get a decent discount. Now the, the tour itself includes the seven hours, but within that you also get lunch at whispering Canyon cafe. That's pretty good. Yeah, that was included and there is no added costs like they cover the tip or the gratuity and everything. So really you do get your value in terms of you get food for the day, you are on the tour all day, you get to go to a lot of different areas, which we'll get to here in a few minutes. But with whispering Canyon cafe, that meal alone, when you look at, we got the all you can skillet, which is$24 at lunch. So that's a decent value. You figure in gratuity on top of that. So you have a full meal. So really that by the time we had our discount and you take off the cost of the meal, they throw in some bottled water. You're on$200 and that's of course I know Kris has mentioned before whether you're going to a concert or you're going to a big sporting event, that's about the same cost, but we got seven hours out of it. So we're going to talk a little bit in, these are things that with the backstage magic, you get to go, it's VIP, you have a private chartered bus. We were on one of the cruise line buses. They pick you up, you meet at Epcot and your behind the scenes the whole time. So we did things at Epcot. We did some of the just general backstage areas, which we'll talk about. And we also did some backstage at magic kingdom as well. So let's just start off how the day was the logistics of the day. So we had to meet at Epcot and we had to be there right before nine o'clock so it'd be there about eight 45 so for us, if you are staying at a Disney resort, the buses can sometimes be unreliable. So we opted to just take a lift over there, which is about$9 plus tip$3 tip. So you had$12. Right? So for us it was well worth, we got in last night, we were able to sleep a little extra and know that we going to be dropped off right where we needed to be. You do have to go through security, but you don't go into the park. Um, one other thing is that you do not need a park ticket for the day that you take the backstage magic's. Yeah, but I think the flip side though is you also do not get a ticket, right? You're paying, you're paying$200 you would call it to 50 after, you know, with the food. It is nice. But I know we had a number of people on one woman in particular who mentioned the ticket multiple times. And you know, it's one of those things where if you're looking at us to have some fun, it's a value, but if you're expecting to them, we'll leave you in the park when you're done. That will not happen. That's correct. So it is a seven hour experience, but then when the seminars is over, you're done for the day unless you have a ticket. So like for us, we opted not to have a park ticket for today. We are going to an after hours event later on tonight and we'll review that in a different podcast. But there are some things that you need to know because there are some tours that require you to have a ticket. This one is not one of those. But then on the flip side it's more expensive and you don't get a ticket as part of that. So that's kind of just the basics of the tour. Um, from what we understand, they pretty much run these every day of the week. They typically have 32 people on the tour. We today kind of lucked out. We only had 13 and our tour guide said that's very unusual. So I think we got a little bit more intimate experience because of that. But it is something that's offered year round every day. So you are able to um, take advantage of that for the tour. Now you booked this ahead of time and if you are interested, you call four oh seven WDW tour. So it's(407) 939-8687 and I will put this in the show notes but you do have to call ahead of time and reserve it. And the Nice thing leading up to today, I got email reminders about the tour. They sent an email a couple of weeks ago. I also got an email reminder like last week. So we got through, we got a lot of Nice things from it to keep you on task.

Speaker 3:

All right. But enough of that Vanessa, that people can find this on the Internet. They're smart. Tell us more about the day. I want to hear about what you thought about the tour. Let's get into that. The phone number, everything else. Tell me about what your experiences.

Speaker 2:

Well for us. I've been on some other backstage tours before. I've done keys to the kingdom. I've done the feeding the elephant animal kingdom. I've also done the Yuletide magic tour. Um, we've done some different ones. And for me I thought this was a great tour. You got to see a wide variety of things that most people are not used to having a chance to see. And I think we had people that were Disney veterans on the tour all the way down to people. It was their first time on Disney property. So I think there's some really great things without it. We're throughout it now. We'll just give you a basic breakdown. So you started in Epcot. We went backstage, we did go through the American adventure, which was nice cause it's where we got married. So for us that was a nice little added bonus. They take it in the back, they'll show you how things work and operate. We won't give away any of those trade secrets. But you did get a very interesting view of the world showcase if you never been there before opens because that doesn't open till 11 so we are back in the world showcase with nobody there except for cast members. So it's a great unique view there from world showcase. Then we went on from there, we headed out and we went over to costuming

Speaker 3:

and there was witnesses. So let's just talk more about that because I think you know we had an opportunity to go into areas that are not accessible to the average ticket holder. Not even, I mean you can even be DVC, you don't have access. So tell us, let's get more into what you thought about those individual places cause I want to hear what you think.

Speaker 2:

So one nice thing with costuming, if you have gone to Disney for a long time, you will remember, and they talked about this during the tour about how you, there used to be that window when you are going through on the back lot tour at Hollywood studios you can see into costuming. This is way more in depth. There was, we got to see all the different rooms from embroidering to where they do the actual cutting in the costumes and design where they use cad. All kinds of really interesting things. And for me it was really fascinating because they had a lot of displays on the wall where you've got to see older costumes. They explained how they use a lot of new technology with costumes. So a lot of cool things that I personally would never have realized that they're able to do. And there was even some costumes that they had saved from old attractions. So there's a couple of things from great movie ride if you've,

Speaker 3:

what's that lady's name from the pirates

Speaker 2:

of the Caribbean, the red head from the pirates of the Caribbean in there. And I think it was really neat though, is that just talked about what you got to see first and foremost, the people on their computers. And then as you walk through the hallways, it has, you know, fabric samples in, in buttons, in different things that they've made and just how much they do in house. Because again, you know, Disney is all about the quality and the quality control in there was, I, again, I don't know what it was, but there was two costumes that never even made it out into the park that they had in there and you could just see the intricate details of how they were designed. Yeah, so that was, they had a fire in a water costume that was for the rivers of light show at animal kingdom. They said they had worked on it for all this time and then it ended up getting cut from the show. But the work that had gone into it was amazing. They showed how they use three d printing technology, how they use laser printing on acrylic, where it looks like it's embroidery but it's not. So just really cool of how they are able to utilize technology in it. And the intricacy work that is done. One thing that I thought was really interesting in the areas where they put together the costumes, the like the final products, one seamstress works on the costume from start to finish mean she puts together all the pieces of it. So then that way that like if, oh, I go to the lion king show, I can say, Hey, I made that costume because they work on that one piece from start to finish once the design is already done. So I thought that was a really interesting fact. Um, from there they took us over, we got to see textile services. Okay.

Speaker 3:

Which is a fancy term for laundry, but again it is laundry, but when you just kind of see the process, I think it really adheres to the Disney spirit in regards to just how well things are thought out. And the from the woman, our tour guide who was wonderful, she had said that just there's actually like a waiting list to get into laundry to work versus, and she kind of made light of the name that you know, it Disney, it can't be Disney laundry that's too plain, too simple. But it's textile services. But just mentioning it that she said probably based off their occupancy, that Disney is probably the number one launderer in the country in terms of just what they have come through. And that there was four different laundry sites across Disney. Disney world. Yes. And we went to one and we went to one, but each one is kind of like be all star. She said it's really broken down by thread count. Yeah. So thread count. I don't even know what thread count is for sheet first. You, by the way, I don't, don't know what a number would be. Yeah. Cause I don't do a sheet 300 or 1,300 frequently. So 300 thread count sheets would go to one facility and a thousand would go to the next. Right. And just like the automation and when you like look at just how many like towels and things, uh, there's machines that do that for them. So it's just interesting just to see on the inciting cause you're really appreciation of that. But again, that was just, that was what the second leg of the tour?

Speaker 2:

Yes. And if my notes are correct, they launder up 1 million towels per day and that she said one day of laundry on a standard laundry machine. Like on your, in your Washer at home. Did you catch this? Yes. 75 years. 72 yup. So close, very close. Very close to 70 72 years on a standard washing machine to do all the loads. 24 hours a day that they do on one day. So that was really, really amazing. And just lots of different, I mean they do 300 pounds of towels and one dryer low, like just all kinds of really fascinating things. Now from there we went to a facility called central shops in this, I would say it's kind of like the hub of all of the attractions sorts of things. They were, they do maintenance and repair correctly. I mean it goes from like the fabrication to the repair and like the one thing that she had mentioned was, you know, if a ride has like six cars, let's say five cars in operation, there's usually a sixth car that's at back at the shop. And how much of preventative maintenance they do and how they just break everything down and then they will, they'll do it. Because again, you figured, you know, Disney is almost a 16 to$18 an eight hour a day shop. They'll go through and just look at the bolts and find the stresses because again, you know, safety's key and really you've never, I've, I pay attention to the news. I've never heard of any major equipment failure at Disney. And she said like for them, Disney wants to, instead of that one in a million chance, Disney wants to be down to zero. And they had like just their processes, safety's number one, followed by customer service. And I don't remember what the third one was, but her courtesy. And then the fourth one was efficiency. So they really know their stuff and it just, I mean, I've already felt safe at Disney, but just seeing their processes to make sure that those rides are maintained and kept safe really made me feel even better in this building. It was the size of roughly nine football fields, but it really hit everything in. And they would, we saw animatronic animals that had come out of the jungle book ride was one of them, cruise younger crews and just the process they take there. There was even a tea cup from the ride that was in there getting fixed. And so there's things that you could see space mountain, a handful of other ones. And she said it was really different every day that there's, you never know when they go in there, what they're going to see. So I think this would be fascinating doing it more than once. Like if you, if it had been 10 years since you've done this to her, it would be worthwhile going back now from there we are right, we were right near magic kingdom. So we went into magic kingdom and we went back stage and we ended up going down into the utility doors, which are, people think they're underground, but really that's the first level of magic kingdom. If you know the history of magic kingdom, it's built up. So the first level, our tunnels and offices and all kinds of things. I remember, I haven't been down there before. I did the keys of the kingdom tour with my family many years ago and we actually passed a group doing that to her. Um, so you get to see the intricacies of all the spaces where the cast members can, where they come into work, how they can travel around the park without interrupting the show up above. So if I'm in tomorrow land, I can come down and walk to where I leave with my car rather than walking through fantasy land and all of that. So it was really interesting to see the underground workings. They, you'd never been down there. What did you think about it?

Speaker 3:

It's interesting. I mean at the end of the day it is just the underground. I mean it's, yeah, it's a ton of four offices, four to one person. It's also the basement to another person. Um, it was just, it was interesting to see that and they kind of really concluded the day. But I think the one thing that I got out of it was just how much detail and I think for me the costuming to see that part, that was probably the most interesting of them all because just the amount of detail that goes into every costume. And what was interesting is that there are certain things that I'll like, there's certain jobs that we'll just see the lion king, what is it called? The lion king show. The show, like there's certain things where you need to be that size. So in terms of height, weight, because there's the athletic ability, but then other things largely are made to scale. And so like customer, you know, if you, you come, I'm staff and let's say you're a tall individual, that that customer will be made to your size. And then the same way if you're not as tall, you'll have that. And so that was just really interesting just to see that detail and really kind of how the Disney supply chain to see how close they are. Because you know, yes, there's certain things that are going to have fabricated out of Disney. But in regards to repair and quality control and design, how much of that happens right here at Disney world? So if you're in the park, you know those costumes that you see on a cast member on a performer really had been designed the less than in theory a half mile away from you by people that they understand

Speaker 2:

from halfway around the world and in one interesting thing too I thought was that there were several of the departments where the main headquarters are here in Florida, even though there are the parks all around the world, like for central shops, which was the area where they work on the ride vehicles and they create those. The main one is here in Florida and they'll do work for all of the parks. I'm the main costuming is here in Florida. There's smaller departments at the other parks around the globe, but it was just interesting to see that really so much of it is headquarters here and the fact that it is all in house because you just think of nowadays so many things are overseas or something. Disney does a lot of their stuff. Almost all of their stuff in house. So that was really amazing to see. And overall I think that time of the tour was, was a decent amount of time. You do get enough breaks with sitting if you're somebody who is in a wheelchair or an ECV, they have elevators at all the locations. They make sure there's frequent bathroom stops, they have bottled water for you. I'm at the end of the tour. You do get a little special surprise. We'll save that for if you take the tour. Um, it's a special pin. Yeah. And they do change frequently. She said that they do one batch and then they make a new bat. So just really, I thought it was well worth it. Again, it's for teens and older, so if you have any little ones, not something that you would be able to bring them on.

Speaker 3:

And I think even on it, no, this is not even for teenagers it would be the, because of the amount of money you're paying. Yeah. You really need to like Disney. I mean my, my attention span, which is already short, was beginning to wane a bit. I mean it is nice. And for the people like Vanessa who are hardcore Disney, if she were to go with another friend who is also hardcore Disney, wonderful value for the money. Me, I'm interested. I kind of fade in and out. You know, I hit my phone on me so I'm checking my things that I'm interested in. I may not be the core customer it this is really, this is not for kids at all. It's not even really for young people. I think this is really for hardcore people and I think that's where it was. There was a number of hardcore adults. Um, primarily, you know there are women and then there's people who,

Speaker 2:

or if you work in certain industries, like I think if you worked in logistics or engineering or different things, they talked about how people in certain careers really find certain part aspects really interesting. And I could see why that would be true. Like we have a friend who had taken it and her background is in some of those professions and she really thought like some of the processes and stuff were really fascinating to her. So those are just,

Speaker 3:

and that is true, but this is also a seven hour tour. Yes. I mean you're dedicating a lot of time. You're dedicating a whole day, a good amount of money. And so this to me is for the hardcore fan only. And if you're going to have a person, a company you, they need to like Disney and be a good spirit because it is a long tour. It is over seven hours, you know, the, the coach helps out. But there's just a lot of detail. And I think for the moderate intermediate person, no, for the hardcore person, definitely yes.

Speaker 2:

But what did you enjoy it? Was it worth it for you?

Speaker 3:

I did, but I'm also, I know how much you enjoy it. I myself would not buy a set. I wouldn't, yeah, me and myself would not dedicate money or the time to a seven hour tour. But I'm not, I mean I may be of a six out of 10 in terms of Disney. I come here because you want to come here. Well, and you like the service though. I do. But I would not buy this otherwise. I mean, I, I've come to learn to love Disney because of us, but you know, I'm here because of you.

Speaker 2:

So, but overall I think that we would both recommend it. Like do we have a lot of Disney friends? And I think if you are a Disney person, we would definitely, I would recommend it. Would you recommend it to our Disney? Yes, I would. Yes. So, and if you came to the park is quite a few times, I think it also would change it up a little bit. If you're somebody who comes quite frequently, it would give you a new perspective of things.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. You can easily skip out a day at the park and take you take that park money, that food money and put it into this. It would be a good value and then do what you had to do the rest of the day.

Speaker 2:

Right. So overall I think we would give it two thumbs up. I think we really learned a lot. It was definitely way more in depth than any of the other tours I've done. If you, and Kris hasn't been on this one, but if you're just looking for like a basic intro, I would suggest like the keys to the kingdom tour. And we did a future world tour before I've done the dolphin tour. But the keys, the kingdom is a good, it's a couple of hours, gives you some background about magic kingdom and you spend your time there if you're new to and you're not really hardcore, I would start with that one before you go to the back. Yes. Magic. So overall it was a great experience. We

Speaker 3:

wanted to share with you about it while it's still fresh in our minds. And so we're going to kind of wrap up the show with some of our last final segments of the day. So we always have our trivia, which, and then we follow that up with our Walt quote. So would you like me to go first or would you like to go Kris? I'll go with the trip yet. So I think the one thing that impressed me about today, about this tour is just the, how big Disney is in getting to go. So Vanessa. Okay. I'm not going to get exact, but Disney is large. There's a lot of property. Yes. That's the truth. Yeah. With the current Disney operations, what, what roughly what percentage of the current buildings in park territory takes up the overall Disney land property in central Florida? One third. Exactly right. Wow. Good for you. And go out on the tour. Well I tried to get Sam[inaudible] I was listening if you would ask me that, I would have got it wrong cause I really wouldn't been listening. But right now the current parks take up one third. One third is going to be held back for conservation that will never be touched, which I think there's probably some parts that are just unbuildable and then another third are eligible for new parks. I think what she had mentioned about with the things star wars coming on, guardians of the galaxy, all these other pieces that in theory Disney could double its size and its current property holdings. Isn't that something? Wow. And I know we saw on magical express and I don't know if you notice how many acres, how many thousand acres just in the own here. What was it like 30,025 25,000 is seeing that many acres. I know I, I'm not good at acres and miles, but it's 40 square miles. And so when you think of that with a third roughly, there's still a lot of lot of space to grow. What was the, you know, I noticed podcast is getting to keep going, but as we did this tour we went back what is the guardians of the Galaxy Tron? Yeah, we saw a lot of the back construction happening, which was Ratatouille. I mean things that are coming down the pike. I mean some of these things from me, a casual observer or about many, many, many years too late. But like Ratatouille, who cares? It's supposed to be a great ride though. Wait until you it. I understand. But when did write a tweet come out? I don't know. I think there's a to a, to a zero in another number. Like it was, it's been a long time, right? So it is coming over from Disney land, Paris. So again, you get to seal the full gamut of things. Now of course we always like to end with our wisdom from Walt and because we are talking about the parks, I wanted to end with um, one that everyone is probably heard. If you're a Disney fan too, all that come to this happy place. Welcome Disney land is your land here. Age relives fond memories of the past and here youth may save her the challenge and promise of the future. Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams, and the hard facts that have created America with hope. It will be a source

Speaker 2:

of joy and inspiration to all the world. And again, his brother Roy continued that vision down here in Florida and we just really were enjoyed having a glimpse into that planning and all of the intricacies that go along with operating Walt Disney world. And so we hope you enjoyed this special episode of the DisLove podcast with Vanessa and Kris kind of insight into a tour. We will be back with our regular format. We just wanted to throw in a few special episodes with some of the things that we're doing while we're down here. So again, I'm Vanessa and I'm Kris. Thanks for joining us.

Speaker 4:

[inaudible]

Speaker 2:

this podcast is not affiliated with the Walt Disney company or its holdings, and it is intended for entertainment purposes only.