Can You Really Whinge About and Praise a Company at The Same Time?

Here's a point to ponder:

With shipping costs rising exponentially, shouldn't we be getting better/faster service?

Recently (loosely translated: within this decade) I ordered a package from Disney (no, not THAT one). It was a lunch box for the boy with the big, brown, pleading eyes.

You know the boy, the little guy who already had a lunch box, but not a Wall-E one.

We're suckers for the weekly Mousey ad that appears in my email box, even though we have to really plan ahead since it takes FOREVER to get our stuff.
A Disney representative once confided in me that shipping to an APO could take 16 weeks.



Now what I want to know is, why?





They are only responsible for getting my goodies to New Jersey.
Amazon gets packages to me in less than 6 days; my mom's packages take 10 (she's in Podunkville, Far Western US); Ebay sellers, sometimes in as little as 4 days or as much as 12.

Here's the route my little lunch box has gone so far:

Sept. 11th it was in SC. It took three days (I think I could've walked there in that time) to reach Kentucky (Hi cousins!). KY took two days to get it to NJ and one day after that it was "tendered to USPS".

Now I pay just as much as you there in the US of A, however, my packaged is labeled "budget parcel"-- loosely translated in military-ese? "Throw this in the corner and when I have time to look at it again, I may load it onto a plane". It's the same place my magazines go and never come back from.

So Disney... What the heck? Does it cost you more to stamp "priority" or "first class" when that IS what I am paying?

Now, don't get me wrong and think I'm going all postal over my favorite place to send all of my Hubby's hard-earned dollars, because I'm not.
In fact, I am singing their "customer is always right" praises all over the place today.

While vacationing in the Magical World of Attention to Minute Detail, the hubby and I kept saying, "Wow, they think of everything!"
The kids couldn't wait to return to the room every night just to see what the housekeeping had been up to and we always came 'home' wrists adorned with rubber banded Photo Pass cards containing happy smiles from every location.

I dreamed of scrapbooks bulging with happy reminders.

Tips for future Disney trippers:

1.) The Photo Pass is brilliant for getting those shots of the entire family in Kodak spots, but VERY expensive. IF you pre-order your Disney Photo Pass before you go, you can get $50.00 off. Email me, I'll hook you up (or Google it, might be faster). Don't you dare scoff at $50.00, you know you easily handed Wally World twice that much in the last year for printing.
2.) Under NO circumstance should you try to view it while on vacation. You see, those cards begin ticking the minute you type the details in online. Tick Tick Tick, just like Captain Hook-- or was it the crocodile? Anyhoo, Photo Passes self-destruct in 30 days.


THIRTY days in a household as chaotic as ours whirs by at super sonic speed. I know this because in rare moments of alone-ness, I would bring up the photos and wonder which ones to toss and which ones to keep. Not all of their pictures were terrific. Some had me wondering just what credentials you had to have to splash a camera around in a wave pool. I began a "favorites"list to narrow it down.
And then one day "POOF" they were gone.



I was gutted. I stomped out of the computer room. What made me the most angry is that I KNEW we were running out of time, I just dropped the ball.

I tried to apply the "spilt milk" ointment, telling myself that I remembered the photos and had the memories and being upset wouldn't return them to my computer screen, but I kept coming back to the fact that there were pictures of all SEVEN of us in one spot, smiling.
I have no idea when another opportunity like that will come again.
Posed pictures of the oldest actually smiling? Priceless. and gone.

Seriously, I ached at that loss.

Prince Charming (aka Sexy Guy aka Hubby) wrote an email -- to the company that clearly states: "30 days, that's it, your loss, no recovery, boo hoo to you!" (okay, not exactly the wording).

While flailing around looking for our deleted albums, we discovered that one can extend one's viewing time for a fee. Crumbs, I might have even paid it had I seen that before we lost them all.

So, he wrote an email to the company that clearly states their deletion policy WHILE offering ample opportunities to keep one's photo memories.

Can you guess what the giant corporation replied to the silly, hysterical couple?

"Here's your pictures, And free extended time to view and order them".

Bless their little mousey hearts.
I love this company (and they love me. They received payment for those seven smiling, giddily happy tourists caught up in the magic within hours of hooking us up with our lost photos).



Well done, Disney, we'll certainly be back.




P/S If you could just speed up delivery times, I think you just might be dancing on perfection.