{"id":751,"date":"2011-06-10T22:09:00","date_gmt":"2011-06-10T22:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog-1199783855.us-west-2.elb.amazonaws.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/10\/timeshare-spotlight-aulani-a-disney-resort-spa-part-1\/"},"modified":"2011-06-10T22:09:00","modified_gmt":"2011-06-10T22:09:00","slug":"timeshare-spotlight-aulani-disney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/10\/timeshare-spotlight-aulani-disney\/","title":{"rendered":"Timeshare Spotlight: Aulani, a Disney Resort & Spa \u2013 Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>Jim Lewis, President of Disney Vacation Development, Inc., (see photo at right) is on the timeshare industry’s A-List. In a 2-Part series we are going to offer some excerpts from an insightful interview of Jim Lewis, conducted by Prospective Magazine editor Matt McDaniel. Part 1 is a discussion about Aulani, a Disney Resort & Spa<\/a>.

PM: The big news lately is Aulani \u2013 how is that coming along?<\/span><\/p>\n

JL: The resort is progressing nicely and we\u2019re extremely happy. It\u2019s located on 21 acres of oceanfront property on the island of Oahu. The resort is going to have 359 hotel rooms and 481 two-bedroom equivalent timeshare villas – and we are on track for our scheduled opening of August 2011.<\/p>\n

<\/a>What have you learned from Vero Beach and Hilton Head that you\u2019ve taken to Aulani and may be expanded or improved on?<\/span><\/p>\n

The great guest service that we provide is legendary, and we can transport that anywhere around the globe. Hawaii is just one of the most beautiful places on the planet, and there\u2019s a lot to see and do. It is a place that\u2019s known for warm greetings, storytelling and attention to detail – and those are also terms that are synonymous with Disney. We think it\u2019s a perfect match, and we expect it to be hugely successful. <\/p>\n

We have a variety of different amenities that we\u2019re building into the resort there; we\u2019re going to have a spa that\u2019s going to be 18,000 square feet – it\u2019s going to be out of this world. The way we have incorporated the storytelling element – it\u2019s going to be a lot of fun, but also very educational. <\/p>\n

The folks in Hawaii have given us big-time kudos for the research that we\u2019ve done by really going out and talking to people, and for using a lot of the locals as consultants to guide us and make sure we get it right. <\/p>\n

I seem to remember something when it was first announced about this resort doing more to bring Disney character interaction and more of the \u201ctheme park\u201d feel \u2013 is that correct?<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/a>I wouldn\u2019t call it a \u201ctheme park\u201d feel, but we are going to have a character presence there. We do have characters that make appearances – we call them visitors to Hilton Head<\/a> and Vero Beach<\/a>; this will not be any different. So, you\u2019ll see Mickey and Minnie there on vacation, in their aloha attire, right along with all the other guests. But it\u2019s not a theme park at all; it\u2019s a very relaxing resort experience. There are going to be activities for kids and adults, and it\u2019s going to be a lot of fun, but it\u2019s clearly not a theme park experience.<\/p>\n

Timeshare Spotlight: Aulani, a Disney Resort & Spa \u2013 Part 2<\/a><\/p>\n

(Photo credits – perspectivemagazine.com and resorts.disney.go.com)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jim Lewis, President of Disney Vacation Development, Inc., (see photo at right) is on the timeshare industry’s A-List. In a 2-Part series we are going to offer some excerpts from an insightful interview of Jim Lewis, conducted by Prospective Magazine editor Matt McDaniel. Part 1 is a discussion about Aulani, a Disney Resort & Spa.PM:…","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=751"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog-origin.redweek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}