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Disney’s Military Salute

Military Disney Tips Round-Up 12 June 2011

Jun 12th, 2011
by Steve.
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Military Disney Tips Round-Up, Woody (C) Disney

It's a Round-Up Partner

Welcome to the latest Round-Up! 

It’s been a week of highs and lows… Great news for Military Discounts, and a depressingly early Disney general ticket price increase.

Great news as far as Disney’s Armed Forces Salute is concerned.

Booking codes were released this week which allow booking the great Disney resort discounts through the end of the year.

And Military Discounted Disney theme park tickets became basically unlimited.

On the flip side, on Friday the 10th Disney in typical short notice fashion announced a general ticket increase for today Sunday. Prices on all theme park admission has now been raised. This affects the price you’ll pay for the normal military discounted Magic Your Way Tickets and Annual Passes at both Shades of Green and your local Base’s Ticket Office. It doses not effect the rates for the Armed Forces Salute tickets!

August has been the month in recent years when Disney traditionally raises the theme park ticket prices. Usually very early in the month. It looks to me like Disney is trying to capture extra profit using some of the summer traffic levels this year. This ties in with this Orlando Sentinel article in which Disney Chief Executive Officer Bob Iger talks to Disney’s attempt to wean the general public off the discounted room rates they’ve offered recently to keep attendance levels up.

“Iger said the company was going to keep prices where they are now to send a signal that the discounts Disney employed to draw crowds during the economic slump are a thing of the past.”

Summer room reservations are down 2.5% but at a higher price. This ticket increase most likely makes up the difference.

Dave at Your First Visit has an analysis of the ticket price increases.

On a lighter note…

You may have seen elsewhere in my site that I recommend the daily Retreat Ceremony at the Magic Kingdom’s Main Street Town Square. WDW Parkhoppers has this great post with fabulous pictures of the ceremony.

The Disney Food Blog has this post with their Favorite Ice Cold Snacks at Disney Parks. Our family favorite is the Strawberry Juice Bar (Which didn’t make the DFB list), and I’ve also become partial to Dole Whip.

What’s your favorite Park treat? Leave a comment!

If you are new to Military Disney Tips Start Here

Disney’s Armed Forces Salute FAQ

Information on Shades of Green – the Military Hotel on Disney World property

For up to the minute news follow us on facebook and twitter.

Free Disney Planning & Reservation Checklist

Ears of Experience Featured In Military Spouse Magazine

Jun 1st, 2011
by Steve.
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Ears of Experience - Full Service At No Extra CostAs I’ve mentioned before Military Disney Tips was recently featured in the Reserve and National Guard Magazine. Well, I’m excited to be able to announce that my recommended Disney Travel Agent, Amy Sinclair of Ears of Experience has also been featured in Military Spouse Magazine. Check her out in the June edition.

The article’s focus is on creating a portable career that a military spouse can operate from home, no matter where that is. “Some military spouses create a portable career – one that’s satisfying and pays reasonably well – by opening their own small business at home.” Amy has succeeded in creating a perfect at home business that is thriving even in a down economy.

I wanted to interview Amy to both inspire other spouses to do the same and to showcase her great business, which ties in so nicely with my content.

Here is my exclusive interview…

Amy, congratulations on being featured in Military Spouse Magazine this month! The article talks to the portability of home-based jobs, which can remove one of the stresses of a PCS move. What advise do you have for other spouses who are interested in beginning to work from home?

Thank you. I suggest really reflecting on what you want to do, what you have passion for and finding out how you can make money doing it. Once you have an idea and a business model, commit to it. Whether you commit 10 hours a week to it or 80, committing to it is what makes the difference. You commit, you have the drive, the drive pushes you through the hurdles that will come. But it is so rewarding to have a thriving business in an economy that is still limping and all from home where I can monitor the kids and be here for them.

In the article you mention how your home-based business has taken off. Do you employ others who work from home?

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More Details – 2012 Disney Armed Forces Salute Military Tickets

May 26th, 2011
by Steve.
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2012 Disney Armed Forces Salute - Military Disney DiscountI Salute Disney! I’ve been in contact with a couple people within the company and now have all the details on the 1 October 2011 through 30 September 2012 Disney Armed Forces Salute Ticket Offer.

UPDATE – The offer keeps getting changing. See here for the most up to date details

For those waiting on details about the extended Armed Forces Salute Disney Resort Room Military Discounts you’ll need to wait just a little longer. While Disney has announced that the discounts will be the same (30% on Value Resorts, 35% on Moderate Resorts and Fort Wilderness Cabins, and 40% on Deluxe Resorts Including Disneyland) the blockout dates have not yet been set. Expect these mid June as well as the release of the “fare codes” which will allow your travel agent or Disney reservations to book your room at these rates past 1 October 2011.

So here are the details on the “Extended Offer.”

It’s much like the current offer.

Up to six park tickets may be purchased including a ticket for the military member (only five if the spouse is purchasing with out the member).

There is a maximum purchase of six theme park tickets per family for each offer period. However, Disney states – Exceptions should be made for immediate families larger than five people. For example, if a family has six children, they will allow all members of the family to purchase 4-Day Disney Military Promotion Tickets.

The tickets available are:

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Details Announced – 2012 Disney Armed Forces Salute

May 23rd, 2011
by Steve.
2 comments

2012 Disney Armed Forces Salute - Military Disney DiscountDisney officials confirmed for me today the details on this outstanding Disney Military Discount. Last month Whoopie Goldberg announced the extension of the current military discounts on resort hotels and theme park tickets through September 2012, live on The View.

I’ve seen lots of posts lately on the various message boards asking if there were more details available. People want to find out if they’ll be able to use these discounts during their vacation dates. And if using the offer this year would exclude them from using next year’s offer.

So today I got in touch with the Sales Director at Disney’s Military Sales Department to check on if he had any updates to pass out. And he did have some great information to share. Here is what I found out:

UPDATE – The offer keeps getting changing. See here for the most up to date details

“Military members who purchase their tickets during this “Salute” period (originally ending 1 Oct 2011), will be eligible to take advantage of next year’s promo as well…they are NOT mutually exclusive”.

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Military Disney Tips Turns Three

May 8th, 2011
by Steve.
2 comments

Military-Disney-Tips-Birthday (C) DisneyAt the beginning of this month Military Disney Tips turned three. I wanted to take a moment to say thanks to you my readers. I’m so appreciative of your interest. It’s been my pleasure to try to help you in whatever way that I can to plan for your Disney vacation.

It’s been a big year for MDT, we broke the story on both the extensions of the Disney Armed Forces Salute, both in October 2010 when the offer was renewed for this fiscal year, and again just last month with the extension until September 2012. It’s been a busy year too trying to keep up on the numerous packages and specials offered by Shades of Green throughout the year. Also I was interviewed by AmeriForce Publishing for inclusion in an article about Disney Military discounts. The article is due out later this month in their Reserve & National Guard Magazine.

Over the past year the site has seen fantastic growth. Military Disney Tips now receives nearly 10,000 visitors and 40,000 pageviews per month. Our Newsletter launched last October and has grown to over 390 subscribers. We also started our facebook fan page this past year and now have 220 facebook friends who like it. Just a couple of months ago the Military Disney twitter account was launched too.

The majority of our readers this year have been Stateside, but we also have readers from numerous locations where our military members are stationed: Italy, Germany, Iraq, the UK, Puerto Rico, Japan, South Korea, Kuwait, Qatar, Afghanistan, the UAE, and Bahrain to name some.

Because of the specialized content on this site, many great Disney sites on the net sent visitors our way. I’d like to thank those sites for their support this year. They are:

Yourfirstvisit.net where I’ve been lucky to do quite a few guests posts
disneyfoodblog.com Where AJ has also allowed me to guest post
universal-parks-military-discounts.com our sister site
disboards.com
wdwradio.com
passporterboards.com
mouseowners.com
dismarks.com
usmclife.com
couponingtodisney.com
westoverafrc.org
coastiechicks.net

You also found the site via search engines. Some of the things you were looking for were: Information on Disney’s Military Salute, Universal Studios Military Salute, Sea World Military Discounts, Shades of Green, and the Armed Forces Vacation Club.

Some of your favorite pages were:

Military Discounts
The Disney Military Salute announcement for 2011
Disney’s Armed Forces Salute
Shades of Green
Universal Military Salute
Shades of Green Military Discounted Ticket Overview
and the Military Disney Tips Blog

This year is our third year partnering with Ears of Experience, an authorized Disney vacation planner and Veteran Owned Business. Over 150 of you asked Amy for help making your Disney reservations this past year.

Again I want to say thanks for the Happy Birthday! It’s been my pleasure to provide content that I think you might find helpful and I’m so glad that the site’s growth shows you are enjoying it. I’m looking forward to an even better year coming up. I’ve got several great new projects like my new series of Patriotic Disney posts and several new partners who I’ll be joining with to produce more great content.

Yours, Steve

 

If you are new to Military Disney Tips Start Here

Disney’s Armed Forces Salute FAQ

Information on Shades of Green – the Military Hotel on Disney World property

For up to the minute news follow us on facebook and twitter.

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