PDA

View Full Version : Our "Mansion Mail" has arrived!!



KarenW2
09-17-2001, 10:02 AM
Just wanted to let those interested in knowing, Fed Ex was just here and had me sign for each envelope of our "Mansion Mail"!! They came "2 Day" from Anaheim, postmarked 9-14-01.

In the envelopes were: a Tentative Event Itinerary, Merchandise Random Selection Process letter & brochure, additional info sheet (with registration, dress code, merchandise and parking info), and a business reply envelope for mailing the order form back to Orlando.

The cover letter has a special note that the postmark date for returning the RSP form has been changed, from 9-18-01 to 9-25-01, "in light of this past week's national tragedy".

Looking at the brochure, I was surprised to see that not all of the items for purchase are pictured! Hard to decide when they're all "random selection process" items, if they don't have a picture! But I am happy to have the info, since we've been waiting for it.

AVP
09-17-2001, 10:36 AM
Woo Hoo! I'm glad it's finally here. (My FedEx driver doesn't get here until around 3 - I am SO envious)

I'll be writing about this for tomorrow, so everyone can get all the details.

Adrienne VP

SpazRobot
09-17-2001, 05:37 PM
I don't know what everyone with 'insider info' was oohing and aahing about. The merchandise doesn't really look like the amazing artwork that it was made out to be.

Who's really going to pay $250 for plate with Lock, Shock and Barrel painted on it?

A lot (not all) of the merchandise really looks like Nightmare Before Christmas merchandise and makes no reference to Disney or to this special event whatsoever! Maybe stuff will have event logos stamped on the back, but still. It seems like you could pick up a lot of this stuff (or stuff that looks like it) at any Hollywood memorobilia shop.

There is no CD for sale :(

Unless you want a pin, sweatshirt, or flat hanging Christmas ornament, expect to pay upwards of $125 per item. Yikes.

I was hoping for a unique Jack Skellington sculpture kind of like what's on sale at Disneyana right now, only with an event logo on there and maybe a small haunted house off in the distance. That would have been special.

Now I don't feel so bad about getting locked out of the $200 dinner.

cstephens
09-18-2001, 09:36 AM
Originally posted by SpazRobot
There is no CD for sale :(

There is no CD for sale that's exclusive to event goers, but according to Adrienne's article today, a Nightmare Mansion CD will be available for general sale.


Unless you want a pin, sweatshirt, or flat hanging Christmas ornament, expect to pay upwards of $125 per item. Yikes.

The watch is only $65. And again, the brochure only lists items that will be sold to event participants. There will be other Nightmare Mansion items sold generally.


I was hoping for a unique Jack Skellington sculpture kind of like what's on sale at Disneyana right now, only with an event logo on there and maybe a small haunted house off in the distance. That would have been special.

I think the doombuggy sculpture is pretty awesome.


The only thing I didn't understand was the "first choice", "second choice" thing. I was at the Pirates and Divas events, but I don't remember having to list choices in order of preference, just if you were interested in purchasing it. I'm not sure what the choices mean. Do you get more consideration if you put something as a second choice versus a fourth choice? But it's supposed to be a random process anyway. Confusing. Oh well. Doesn't matter. If we come away with some of the stuff we requested, that'll be cool. The event itself should be awesome in any case.

SpazRobot
09-18-2001, 11:01 AM
The RSP as I understand it seems like a pretty fair way of doing things.

Everything's basically given away in a lottery system. If you put the marionette as your #1 choice, you'll get maybe 100 entries in the lottery for that item. If you put one of the plates as your #2, you'll get 90 entries for that one, and so on.

This was how they did the DCA sneak preview event merchandise and it worked out really well. It was a sharp contrast to the Pirates event. There were NO lines for merchandise at the DCA event, mostly because everything had already been selected and paid for weeks before the event. All that was left to do was pick it up. I thought that was really well handled. October 3rd should be similar!

I was glad to see Adrienne's article today about the CDs. It's kind of weird that they're not including them as pre-sales at the event, but whatever. I guess it means they're not limited editions (like the Pirates and Mansion event CDs) which in theory should make them easier to get. That's good!

I guess I'm disappointed that the inexpensive merchandise is just so boring. The doom buggy sculpture looks great, and I'll probably be signing up for one of those. But NMBC watches, Christmas ornaments, pins...eh... I feel like I could just go out and get that stuff at a Hallmark store.

I'm being too negative. I'll shut up now!

Nigel2
09-18-2001, 12:29 PM
I just find it totally hillarious that people pay money to go to an event with the sole purpose of buying stuff. I know a bunch of you probably want to see these people, and could care less about the merchandise, but it makes me laugh that some people go there spend $65 to however many tickets they let you purchase, and then buy stuff to sell.

Gandalf
09-18-2001, 01:45 PM
It would be great if Disneyland offers a dvd or something along that line of the actual ride and NBC makeover with little added extras of the actual redo process. Didn't they offer something like that for the POTC and the Haunted Mansion events? That would be something that could be done fairly quickly and easily. Disney is usually pretty good at documenting just for cast viewing of events. Tim Burton and Danny Elfman are the draw for us. We have enjoyed their works for quite a while. Even saw Elfman/Oingo Boingo at his very last Oingo Boingo tribute at Universal.
Does anyone know if Tim Burton was hands on with the imagineers of the HM Holiday attraction? I hope they have Elfman sing Dead Man's Party.
FOURTEEN DAYS AND COUNTING......

cstephens
09-18-2001, 04:29 PM
Originally posted by Gandalf
I hope they have Elfman sing Dead Man's Party.

I would be very surprised (though pleasantly) if Danny Elfman sang at all. Even if he did, I expect it would be something from Nightmare.

Mister E
09-18-2001, 04:32 PM
Tim Burton was not on hand to direct anything. He did, however, sign off on a lot of the initial artwork, and quite liked what was being done by the fine people at Entertainment Art! This whole shee-bang was put out by Steve Davison and the Entertainment Art crew, with minimal support from WDI. They did very little.

AVP
09-18-2001, 08:03 PM
Originally posted by cstephens
The only thing I didn't understand was the "first choice", "second choice" thing. I was at the Pirates and Divas events, but I don't remember having to list choices in order of preference, just if you were interested in purchasing it. I'm not sure what the choices mean. Do you get more consideration if you put something as a second choice versus a fourth choice?

When I was at the big pin event in Epcot last month, I happened to be standing in line with someone from the Information Services department, and I asked him exactly that.

He said that there are really two reasons why they ask you to rank your items in order of preference:

1) It gives them a system for entering the items into the computer. Yes, there are other ways this can be done, but the system now asks for 1st, 2nd, etc.
2) It gives them an idea of how popular certain items really are. Of course they will know how many people asked for each item. This now lets the buyers know how highly ranked each item is. If 500 people all ask for the same item as their number 1 choice, it can tell the buyers, "hey, people REALLY liked that, let's offer more next time"

As it was explained to me, the ordinal ranking does not make any difference at all in what items you are chosen to receive. That's why, at the Epcot event, we saw people who listed a certain pin as their 1st choice NOT get it, when people who listed it as their 10th choice DID. If 500 people ask for a certain item, and there are only 100 of them, the computer will randomly select 100 people, regardless of "how much" any given person wanted that item.

Now, this is the system as it was explained to me by someone who claims to have helped program and administer it. I wouldn't take this as gospel, and I have not included this in any columns because I can't get it confirmed.

Personally, I wish the ordinals DID make some difference. It would not be hard for the computer to decide, "ok, there are 100 of these, and 500 people asked for it. 70 people listed it as their first choice, 50 as their second. So we'll give the first 70 to everyone who chose it first. Then we'll randomly pick 30 of the 50 people who asked for it second." Doing that would help increase the odds that people would at least get their first or second choices.

Adrienne VP