After Universal proved with Harry Potter-themed areas in 2010 and 2014 that it could create crowd-pleasing attractions at its parks as well or better than crosstown rival Disney, executives strategized their next theme park step: How to get consumers who treated Universal as an adjunct to an Orlando vacation to spend more time and dollars with them.
“Right now, we get a good three days,” Mark Woodbury, Universal Destinations and Experiences CEO, said at a 2023 investment conference. “What we really are looking for (is) the full week, and Epic is really the driver of that full-week transformation.”
Epic Universe, the company’s new $6-billion theme park, opens May 22. Cue the superlatives. “Incredibly exciting,” says Visit Orlando CEO Casandra Matej. Says Martin Palicki, editor of Milwaukee-based InPark Magazine, “The addition of Epic is going to change the tourism market in Orlando in a big way.”
Even in the world’s largest theme park market, Epic is big and a big deal. It’s Orlando’s first new theme park since Universal’s Islands of Adventure in 1999. “The most technologically advanced theme park ever,” Comcast NBC/Universal president Mike Cavanagh said in a January earnings call. Universal says Epic will “forever” change theme parks.
According to Universal’s online ticket site, for the Epic opening days, a three-day adult ticket — one park per day — costs $351.99. At Disney in the same period, three days with one park per day runs $571.99.
Epic narrows Disney’s theme park edge in Orlando to 4-3 (not counting water parks). At 750 acres, Epic and its environs more than double Universal’s Orlando footprint. “It’s ratcheting up the game, no question,” says Dennis Speigel, CEO of Ohio-based International Theme Park Services, a consulting company. “It really has become a boxing match now between Disney and Universal.”
Chasing the Mouse
Over its 35 years in Orlando, Universal was a minion’s second banana to the Mouse, an extra day or so for destination- Disney devotees. Universal went for more. It built hotels to emulate Disney’s success at keeping customers and their money on property. Once it opened its Wizarding World of Harry Potter area at Islands of Adventure, the race to innovate and immerse was on. Universal followed up with another Potter area at Universal Studios next door while Disney rolled out Avatar and Star Wars areas.
Then in 2019, Universal announced that three miles down Kirkman Road from its parks and its CityWalk retail center, it would build Epic Universe. Tom Williams, Universal Parks & Resorts CEO at the time, leveled a shot at the crosstown rival: “Last I heard, a universe is bigger than a world.” (Not by acreage. In Central Florida, Disney has 25,000 acres to Universal’s 1,900. In appraised value, Disney’s $20.4 billion in property dwarfs Universal’s $3.3 billion.)
In popular shorthand, the two companies historically drew different demographics. Universal aimed for ages 8 and up; Disney reigned for families with younger kids. Contrast, for example, Universal’s jump-scare Halloween Horror Nights and Disney’s Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party. But there was always overlap. Until 2021, after all, Universal had Barney the purple dinosaur for the pre-K set.
Now with 70-acre Epic, Universal continues to play to older youth and adults but challenges Disney with broader family and multigenerational appeal. Epic’s Celestial Park central hub will “bring the park back into theme parks,” Woodbury told investors. “The physical makeup of the park is unique and different to anything we’ve done and anybody else has done.” Connecting to that hub are: Super Nintendo World, a new Harry Potter area, a Dark Universe monsters area and an area devoted to the “How to Train Your Dragon” franchise.
Ginning Up Jobs, Development
Epic takes Universal’s Orlando employment to 35,000 from 25,000.
Universal touts Epic as its single biggest investment in parks and in Florida — 50-plus attractions, shows, eateries and shopping and three new hotels co-owned by Loews totaling 2,000 rooms — a $6-plus billion boon to contractors and thousands of construction workers. “People in contracting are over the moon,” says Robert Niles, editor of ThemeParkInsider.com.
The lodging market salivates too. “No way is Universal going to build enough rooms to cover the demand they’re going to induce,” says Michael Weinberg, managing director with Berkadia in Central Florida, who has expertise in hotel investment sales and financing. Universal, with the Epic hotels, totals 11,000 rooms across 11 hotels. Epic already is reshaping development patterns around it. Investors dropped $1 billion last year to buy the 1,641-room Hyatt Regency Orlando at the Orange County Convention Center near Epic. Along with the hotel, buyers RIDA Development Corp. and Ares Management Real Estate got 45 acres where they plan a 2,500-room hotel.
Across from Epic, another developer, Maryland-based Buccini Pollin Group, plans a 22-story, 400-room W Hotel Orlando. Universal put $160 million into building a Kirkman Road extension that also will benefit the convention center and corporations and small businesses in the area — and hospitality and multifamily developments. Since 2019’s Epic announcement, conditions in the capital markets slowed hotel development to a trickle while demand is about to boom, Weinberg says. “I think the hotel demand later this year and really into ’26 could be an all-time record,” Weinberg says. “I just believe it’s going to be a tremendous, tremendous growth story.”
Disney’s Counterpunch
While both companies struggled through the pandemic, Disney had unique troubles. Under former CEO Bob Chapek, Disney decided to oppose a Florida law that prohibited teaching about gender identity and sexual orientation through grade three. In the spat that followed, Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state Legislature stripped Disney of control of its just-for-Disney governmental district — its own company-run municipality — that dated to the days of Walt himself. Disney also made missteps internally. It spent $350 million on an expensive Star Wars-themed hotel it shuttered after two years.
“If we gave them more, they would give us more time.” — Mark Woodbury, chairman and CEO of Comcast NBCUniversal’s Universal Destinations & Experiences
Disney’s counterpunch to Epic will take years to land. All told in coming decades, Disney says it will spend $60 billion company-wide on cruise ships and parks — including $17 billion on capital projects within Walt Disney World over the next 10 to 20 years. First up will be a redevelopment of Dinoland at Animal Kingdom to create rides based on Indiana Jones and Encanto. It doesn’t open until 2027. Disney hasn’t announced an opening year for its “largest expansion ever” of the Magic Kingdom with Cars and Villains areas. Consultant Speigel foresees a Disney “fifth gate” in Orlando, but Disney hasn’t forecast a new theme park.
Disney especially depends on gold mined from its parks. Comcast, which owns Universal, draws on theme parks for just 7% of revenue and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. At Disney, the “Experiences” segment — which includes cruise ships and theme parks — accounts for 59% of operating income, up from 37% in 2017. A Disney investor presentation in 2023 cited “tremendous” per capita growth in customer spending, up 42% in 2022 from 2019. That growth in part owes to wringing more money from customers through higher prices and charging for formerly free services. According to research from Touring Plans, the company behind the The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World, a family of four spending four days at a value-priced Disney hotel in 2024 spent $4,266 — up 32% (from $3,230) five years earlier, adjusted for inflation and before food and transportation. Some 80% of new costs came from services and add-ons that once were free. Touring Plans’ Len Testa says Disney prices its theme parks for the top 20% of U.S. households by income. InPark Magazine editor Palicki, says, “The cost of taking the family to the parks, depending on who you talk to, is already prohibitively expensive for some people.”
Ultimate Impact
The accepted wisdom in the theme park industry is that Epic will succeed at getting customers to spend more days and money with Universal. The impact might be most keenly felt beyond Disney. “When the big dogs want to eat, sometimes there’s less food for everyone else,” Niles says. But Visit Orlando’s Matej predicts the Epic tide lifts all: “It gives consumers fresh reasons to visit, and while they are here, they stay in hotels and resorts, dine at our restaurants, shop and enjoy other experiences and attractions in the area. The benefits will be felt throughout our destination.”
The public and industry will watch how deft Universal proves at operations. In 2010, the crowds were so huge for the Wizarding World opening that “Harry Potter and the Endless Line” became the meme. “It’s like it was insanity,” a Bank of America Securities analyst, Jessica Reif Ehrlich, said in a Q&A with Woodbury at that 2023 conference.
To maximize revenue and avoid a replay, Universal requires Epic customers to buy a multiday ticket that grants entry to Epic on only one of the days. Jennifer McCormack, a vacation planner with MickeyTravels in Minnesota, says that die-hards aside, casual Universal customers tell her they will wait until next year when that one-day restriction presumably lifts.
Investment research firm MoffettNathanson last year forecast Epic could cost Disney as many as 1 million visitors over 2025 and 2026 while increasing Universal’s three-park total by more than 8 million.
Attempts to obtain an interview with Disney executives for this article were unsuccessful, but Disney has expressed no Epic concern. CFO Hugh Johnston in a January earnings call said early bookings for the summer were positive. Disney expects “experiences” operating income to be up 6% to 8% this year, even modeling for Epic’s impact. “We also looked at the history of other attractions opening up and other parks opening up in Florida, and it’s generally been beneficial to us,” Johnston said.
Industry observers agree. “From the Disney competitive standpoint, I don’t see them getting any big, big chinks, as I’ve said, in their armor but it’s going to have an impact,” consultant Speigel says.
Says ThemeParkInsider editor Niles, “I can’t imagine Epic Universe in the long term is anything but good for Disney. It’s going to expand the market.”