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Official "Return the tables" Information

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Official "Return the tables" Information
Psycho Pixie

Psycho Pixie

Vacations are a grand thing
Rating - 100%
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Messages
7,998
Location
9 minutes from DLR!!!!
letters recieved: 1
Letters promised to come soon: only 5.

This is under-whelming. PLEASE commit to sending a letter.


I am going to ask EVERYONE who loves pin trading at the parks to PLEASE read this.
WDW folks, you may want to read this too, do you still have tables?
If you don't,or worry they are going away...
you may want to organize something for WDW as well.
​

Disneyland Resort California Appears to have NO plans for a future official pin trading area inside the parks. No more tables, no more official spot for us all to meet up and trade. I spoke with several CM's and a MANAGER at Guest Services on Main St at length regarding the loss of the tables at LGM.

The manager felt that the BEST way for us, as a community, to make our concerns known, felt and perhaps acted upon... would be to write letters, and make petitions. So that is what we are going to do!

Click here for information about the Petition you can sign!!!

If you LOVE being able to trade at the parks you need to help!
Writing a letter doesn't take much time. If enough letters get to the right people, we CAN make a difference!

some ideas for a letter:

  • Tell a story about why you love trading in the parks.
  • Explain how much pin collecting means to you.
  • Thank Disney for giving us this wonderful hobby, and express your concern that the tradition seems to be getting lost.
  • Offer solutions, such as places that would benefit Disney as well as the traders.
  • Express how deeply sad you would be if pin trading was gone from the parks forever.
Or all of the above. ;)
  • I do not suggest you write an angry letter.
  • It should be polite, and well thought out.
  • PLEASE use spell check?
  • be sure to sign your letter.
  • Provide a return address for just in case they want to reply.

I also do not suggest you inundate them with phone calls.... it wont reach the right ears.

Location suggestions:
  • DLR LGM returned.
  • Westward Ho returned.
  • DCA Fly N Buy.
  • DCA Carsland.

Once you have written the letter you can send it multiple ways, information for each provided at the end of this post.
  1. directly to Disney by mail.
  2. Send to Disney by email. (it is a form, so write it up on the form rather than emailing....)
  3. Send to me in the mail. I am going to hand deliver them all to GS on Main st.
  4. Send to me via email document, I can print it up to take to Main st. with the others i receive.

Guest Services RE: Pin Trading
1313 disneyland Dr
Anaheim CA. 92802

to send an online note go to this site:
https://disneyland.disney.go.com/help/email/

ME:
Kristine Schilling
4117 West Carol DR. #6
Fullerton CA. 92833

my email: kadair76@yahoo.com

If you are sending it to me in the mail, please either plan on me opening it and adding it to a stack, or send in a secondary envelope inside. I do not want to hand them a stack of envelopes with my address on every single one. lol

If you are sending me a letter vial email. send it as a WORD document please. I can open it and print it up to bring to them.

We need help with:
  1. co-ordinating a set day and time and place for a weekly in park pin trade meetup.
  2. Everyone needs to send me or the park a letter!
  3. sign that petition folks!!!!





 
Last edited:
BRAVO...Kristin, great suggestion. Well done! :like:

Note: I once wrote a letter to the President of Disneyland. It took me 2-3 solid hours to compose and edit the letter, so that it would be as Kristin noted above, professional, and courteous. It worked folks. Within 2 days of mailing the letter, I received a call from a CM in their corporate office. It was WELL worth my time. :)
 
sounds good. I hope it works.. the trouble seems to b that there are bad fish in the hobby. many times that bad will mess things up for us all. I wish there was some way of saying "I am not one of those traders" you know what I mean??
 
I agree with KT07. One bad apple spoils the bunch. But we have more than one who camp out all day, hardly trade, take advantage, trade away scrappers, *cough*steal*cough*, get in fights, ask for people to buy LE pins, etc. Just all around poor behavior.

I think we should also try to coordinate dates and times to show up en force and be good traders. Let's all pick a day, say Sunday afternoon after Thanksgiving and go to Fly 'n Buy and set up and trade. Let them know when and where and let them observe us as a community and how we interact with each other and with other guests. Everyone try to tally up how much you spent on food, starbucks, pins, etc. how many trades you made with kids and visitors, etc. Let Disney know we support their business but we are also part of someone else's magic. Helping non-frequent visitors find a long wanted pin, or explaining to them what it's about, or point out the closest restroom or store or just so they can see a pin they've always wanted makes them excited about pin trading and probably for them to buy pins.

I don't spend as much time pin trading now and that means I don't spend as much time in the parks. I run in and grab what I need and leave now. I'll go to Taco Bell on Harbor/Ball for lunch instead of the Corral or mexican place or Pizza Port. On one hand I am not using my pass as much, but still paying for it, but on the other I am not spending money on the other things in the parks. Which one do they want? But I doubt taking away pin tables even makes a blip on any of their financial indeces.
 
Pixie, you can go to Change.org and create an online petition. It seems pretty straightforward. It's easily advertised to people on FB, even folks you don't know. They will send the petition to anyone who has previously signed a similar petition. You could start there.
 
Cjvandever said:
Pixie, you can go to Change.org and create an online petition. It seems pretty straightforward. It's easily advertised to people on FB, even folks you don't know. They will send the petition to anyone who has previously signed a similar petition. You could start there.
Click to expand...

That was my plan... I was working on the wording for the petition and would post it here before I posted the petition...
 
I would personally suggest a more... 'out of the way' area. Perhaps not being right outside a pin shop would discourage people from doing the 'if you want this pin, you have to go in there and buy me blah blah blah' behavior, if just a bit. I've spoken to a few cast members and that seemed to be their main concern; the fact that some bad apples were disturbing 'regular guests' by being right there outside the pin shop. Just my two cents! Thanks for the great post and suggestions!
 
I am almost done the petition. Will post a link once I am done!

EDIT: I am almost done but who do I put as whom I'm petitioning? Would it be Disney or Disneyland?
 
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I don't know on whom still but this is what I'll put in the information on oetition section " Pin trading at the Disney parks as well as being a pin deal online. If you have been to a park you may not be able to tell its big especially if you go to Disneyland. The reason you may not know is because pin traders used to have their own trading spot in front of the Little Green Men (LGM) store. A little while back those tables were just taken away with no formal announcement or known reason. For all we knew we were pushed aside from Disney as pin traders. Then later we received tables in California Adventure at the Fly N' Buy store. Now even though those seems to be an improvement, they still weren't as good as LGM. There have been people who talked to cast members and a manager at Disneyland about the gone tables and they gave reasons including some people there were disrespectful with garbage etc. A few people including me are staring this petition to hopefully change this and get the tables back while also writing letters to Disneyland about this issue. If you would like to help with a letter as well, email me at Corvyn.Hartwick@gmail.com".

Should I add anything? Take out something? Thanks for the feedback and I'll post it in the morning!

Corvyn
 
I really hope they bring back the tables for you guys. That being said, I don't see why they would bring them back. A while back they made a special area for pin traders over there. If I remember correctly it was shaded and they even ran super cool games for you guys there. No one used it. If I were the powers that be, I would think that you CA people don't want a place to trade because you guys boycotted the area they made. Just saying....
I wish they would do something like that over here, but I doubt they will because no one in CA appreciated or used it.
 
Roxane said:
I really hope they bring back the tables for you guys. That being said, I don't see why they would bring them back. A while back they made a special area for pin traders over there. If I remember correctly it was shaded and they even ran super cool games for you guys there. No one used it. If I were the powers that be, I would think that you CA people don't want a place to trade because you guys boycotted the area they made. Just saying....
I wish they would do something like that over here, but I doubt they will because no one in CA appreciated or used it.
Click to expand...

They picked Big Thunder Ranch which is the farthest off-beaten path you can get at Disneyland. Almost no tourists would stumble on pin traders back there. It was way out of the way. And they always said it was temporary. And you have to listen to the same old crappy blue grass songs time after time. Cruel and unusual...
 
I'd be more than happy to help craft the petition, if you still need the help. I work in government public relations and used to handle actual petitions filed for the city I work for.


In addition to an online petition, I recommend a hardcopy petition; I could have this available for signing at the shop's next pin trading event for anyone who would like to sign. Also, I could have template letters available for signing. Hardcopy petitions always have a little more weight than online petitions, and online petitions have no merit when it comes to filing legal petitions for a ballot in all of the jurisdictions I am aware of. However, this simply is a statement we are making, so an online one will help those who can't sign a hardcopy petition.


On a side note--primarily because we see a growing trend in people negatively differentiating those who are sellers/resellers from those who are traders--Josh and I may sell pins as a component of our business, but we are still traders and collectors and appreciate the hobby of trading. We started at the tables and that's how we met so many of you over the years and grew our love for pin trading. The tables are important, and we are more than happy to help hit Disney from all angles to try to get those tables back.
 
I firmly believe that the only reason Disney would get rid of pin trading tables is because of the behavior issues. Pin traders have never policed themselves and because we cannot control the problems, Disney will. Until we, as honest traders, tell those taking advantage of unsuspecting people that they need to stop, Disney has no reason to give a place dedicated to bad behavior.
 
Regardless of rumors to the contrary, multiple management CM's have confirmed the reasons stated below for me.

The tables were not removed due to bad behavior.
  • LGM: They were removed because the LGM location was perfect for the new GS kiosk system they are trying out.
  • Westward Ho: removed because of new fire codes, that is the only road that is clear access to that side of the park. As well as being a massively busy thoroughfare for Fantasmic.
  • BTMR was only temporary. Disney knew it was not ideal for traders. Closing at dusk, in the back corner, no big pin store nearby... All bad for the traders.

There are only a few "bad apples" and many of those HAVE been shunned by the general pin community. Gone are the days when fist fights break out at the tables over shark offers and sharing table space. Those folks are pretty much GONE.

Another mentioned reason is due to traders leaving trash laying around. This is actually a RARE occurrence. Sometimes a cup or bottle is forgotten, but over all, we as a group tend to clean up our messes. We certainly do not leave a mess behind like most guests do all over the park. This is not the cause for tables being gone either.

This thread is specifically to get info out to everyone.

To Encourage the community to work together to gain an official trade area again.
So lets write those letters and sign those petitions and get them back!​
 
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