If Disney tried to force me into park tickets or shorter stays I just wouldn't come at that point. I'm not going to spend 4 days traveling (2 days to get there, 2 days home) for only 4-5 days at the Fort. If I'm going to tow my camper across the country, I'm going to stay at the destination for 2 weeks minimum.
I get that. I really do. I'm just not sure Disney should think this is the optimal use of their campground. Someone staying for 14 days and not buying park tickets, eating mostly in their RV, and not buying upcharge events, isn't what Disney should want. They should want those same 14 days to be used by someone who is going to spend more money. Here's the example.
Two families staying for only 10 of those 14 days and buying a total of 8 days of Park passes would more than double the revenue. to price it out, $100 a day x 14 days, you spent $1400 for Ft Wilderness (yes, I'm using easy numbers here). Add some ancillaries like the occasional meal or bike rental, and you have spent around $2000 over 2 weeks. That's a lot of money, but with 2 people in your camper it's only about $40 per person per day.
Compare that with two families of 4 staying 10 days. That makes for only $1000 for the campsite, which is a drop in revenue. But, assuming park tickets average out to $80 per person per day, on the cheap end since that's roughly the 4 park special right now, that's $320 per day x 10 days, or $3200. Now assume one meal a day in the parks, 7 of 10 QS to keep costs down is about $80 per day per family, or $560 over the period, and $160 per day for TS, that's $480 over the period. So we are at $5280 roughly for those 2 families, staying less time, and that's being pretty frugal. Cheapest tickets, no add-ons like Park Hoppers, no Dining Plan, no snacks, no souvenirs, no character meals which cost more, etc. It could easily work out to being 3x more revenue than you are providing or more. Either way, that $5280 is $132 per day per person over 10 days, or $95 per person per day over the full 2 weeks, which is kind of a silly measure since for 4 of those days you wouldn't have additional expenses while the site was empty, but it's still revenue positive over what Disney had before.
With the difficulty booking Fort sites, I'm guessing they wouldn't miss it if they started finding ways to make sure Fort Wilderness was used by people who were going to do more of option 2 than what you want to do. I'm also guessing this is at least part of the reason why the campground hasn't really been expanded and no other campground has been built despite the demand. It's just not a particularly good use of Disney's construction dollars the way a significant portion of the campground is currently used. Especially during Peak Times in Snowbird Season.
My thought of tying a park ticket every 3 day stay obviously wouldn't provide as much revenue as the example, but you can see what Disney should be aiming for from a revenue standpoint.
