Thursday, November 15, 2007

Shopping at the Disney Store

I made my first trip to the Disney Store as owned and operated by Children's Place today. That may sound strange, since as you know I am a collector of all things Disney but you have to understand that with me living close to Walt Disney World there just isn't much reason to make the trip to a Disney Store. Most of the "Disney Stores" that are closer are owned and operated by the theme parks and don't carry the Disney Store merchandise. The closest Disney Store owned and operated by Children's Place is in the FLorida Mall up on Orange Blossom Trail. I went expecting to see a multitude of snowglobes and prepared to buy many so I can document them for the book and then sell them on ebay (can't keep everything, not enough room or money). What I found was about 4 or 5 globes all of which I allready have documented because they are the same ones on DisneyShopping.com. In fact DisneyShopping.com had a bigger selection as I noticed at least one Disney Store globe that wasn't at the store but is still on the website.
There is one globe there that was new. I guess it is the Disney Store 2007 Christmas globe although it isn't dated. It cost $24.95 which I thought was a little high since it doesn't play music. It has Sorceror Mickey inside the globe with various Disney characters around the base.
They had some nice items but I was a bit disappointed that there wasn't more adult stuff & collectibles. They did have a lot of different snowdome cups. They sell 2 for $10. I think the cups would make an interesting collection for someone because of the variety available. They would also make excellent stocking stuffers because of their size. I probably won't be buying them but I did buy one to get my total up to $75 so I could take advantage of their free movie offer. I chose Jungle Book and spent this evening watching it and realized I don't think I've ever seen the whole movie before. I know I've watched it before but there was an awful lot I don't remember ever seeing especially towards the beginning. Perhaps I saw an edited version on tv or something. The digitally restored animation looks fantastic on my new high definition, wide screen tv and I especially enjoyed the bonus features explaining the evolution of the movie with Walt Disney's personal involvement through interviews with the people who had worked on the film. I rarely get through or even watch bonus material on dvd's but I found thiese to be very interesting.

4 comments:

SPBrazil said...

Thank for sharing with us what you saw at the Disney store and your opinion. As I live in Brazil and there are no Disney Stores here, I really don't know what they sell in the stores and how things have changed. I guess there used to be a Disney store at Winter Park Mall, but it was closed. My friend told me lots of Disney stores were closed all over the US and most of them nowadays carry basically merchandising for children. I suppose he is right. Please keep us informed about the snowglobes you see in parks and how different they are in the stores. As I realized, the snowglobe boxes are different: DisneyShopping.com has white boxes, Disney store has beautiful blue ones with the picture on them, and Disney parks has Mickey printed all over the box. Am I right? What kind of promotions do Disney stores have? You said about the DVD over 75.00 . That's interesting.

zapjones said...

Your right about the packaging. However, now that the Disney Store globes are available on DisneyShopping.com those snowglobes do come in the nice boxes with the picture on them. The free DVD offer is a great deal and I wouldn't have known about it if the cashier hadn't told me that I needed $4 to make me eligible. There was some signage behind the counter but you would think they would have a big sign as you walk in or something otherwise how does it do them any good? The Disney Store was mostly childrens clothes and toys much of it for very small children. The only reason I was able to spend as much as I did was because I was Christmas shopping for nephews and neices.

SPBrazil said...

How many different snowglobes was the Disney store selling? Did you find any that are available at DisneyShopping.com as a "Disney store item"? Are the prices similar???
Thanks.

zapjones said...

I think there were a total of 6 not counting the cups. I didn't look at the prices since I didn't need them but I'm sure they are the same as DisneyShopping.com. All the globes that were at the store are available at DisneySHopping.com except for the holiday one I mentioned.