New Minnie & Mickey Mouse Stroller Rentals at Disney World
Walt Disney World has rolled out a brand new lineup of Minnie & Mickey Mouse stroller rentals at Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Hollywood Studios, Animal Kingdom, and Disney Springs. This post covers the change, pricing, and my clueless commentary–and solicits your feedback on the refreshed wheels!
In addition to featuring character models of Minnie Mouse and Mickey Mouse in the same new cartoon style as Runaway Railway, these strollers have a sharp red, black, and yellow color scheme that replaces the previous plain beige & blue strollers. In technical terms, those were very blah.
Otherwise, these are the same molded plastic bases with soft sides, including mesh paneling that allows air flow and a fabric roof. Walt Disney World’s rental strollers are essentially designed for durability and daily use by different guests, meaning that there are minimal moving parts that can break (e.g. no reclining) or elements that can get dirty or worn (e.g. no padding for the seat). Here are other details about these new Mickey & Minnie Mouse rental strollers at Walt Disney World…
Let’s start with pricing and parameters:
Single Stroller – Recommended for children 50 lbs. or less and under 38 inches tall.
- Daily: $15
- Multi-Day (Length of Stay): $13
- $100 USD credit card deposit is required for strollers rented at Disney Springs.
Double Stroller – Recommended for children 100 lbs. (total weight) or less and under 38 inches tall.
- Daily: $31
- Multi-Day (Length of Stay): $27
Length of Stay Rental – Pre-pay the number of days that you will require a stroller and save. Purchase a Length of Stay rental ticket for less per day when rented for multiple days. Then, upon visiting a theme park, simply show your receipt at the rental location to receive your stroller for the day.
Stroller Return – Strollers should be returned to a rental location before leaving the theme park.
Stroller Replacement – Strollers cannot be removed from the parks. When visiting more than one park in a single day, simply present your rental receipt at another park to obtain a replacement. Likewise, if you misplace your stroller, replacements are available with a receipt at various locations throughout Walt Disney World, based on availability.
Okay, now time for commentary. This is a seemingly insignificant change, arguably not worthy of a standalone blog post–but then again, yesterday we covered the announcement of a Toy Story Land “playset” (gift shop). This is easily more interesting and consequential than that.
In actuality, I think this is moderately interesting news. For one, these are a nice visual upgrade over the old blah strollers that also offers more exposure for Minnie and Mickey Mouse. That second point may seem unimportant, as the characters once had greater recognizability than even Santa Claus. However, they’ve started to slip in recent years, and if there are two characters who deserve widespread exposure and visibility, it’s Mickey & Minnie.
For another thing, whenever there has been any change with strollers at Walt Disney World in the last few years, it has been a hot topic among readers of this blog. Two years ago, Walt Disney World banned oversized strollers, requiring them to be no larger than 31″ (79cm) wide and 52″ (132cm) long. Additionally, wagons were no longer permitted.
This led to outrage, confusion, and concerns about third party stroller rentals no longer meeting the size parameters. Disney’s stated reason for that particular size update was to help guest flow and ease congestion. Setting aside the legitimate concerns many readers had at the time, that goal made sense. There had been a proliferation of Humvee-sized stroller-like monstrosities in the parks, including ones shaped like pumpkin coaches and spaceships from Star Wars. The huge strollers were causing crowd flow issues.
Only a few months after that, Disney inked an exclusivity deal with ScooterBug, the company that provides all such devices at Walt Disney World’s theme parks and Disney Springs. This resulted in Walt Disney World no longer allowing third-party vendors for strollers and mobility aids to be dropped off at Bell Services prior to guests arrival at the hotel, nor can they be left with Bell Services by guests for vendor pick-up at the end of a trip.
This change is much less “exciting” in retrospect, as a lot of the comments at the time were fueled by uncertainty and vagueness in the announcement. With that said, there were a couple of obvious reasons for the change, with the first being the burden all of these deliveries pose for Bell Services. The proliferation of third party vendors for strollers, ECVs, groceries, etc. meant that Bell Services was often constantly dealing with trucks doing drop-offs at Walt Disney World. The other obvious motivation was that the third parties are competition for Disney and ScooterBug, and the companies had no incentive to help out their competitors.
Nothing about this cosmetic change to Mickey & Minnie strollers strikes me as even remotely controversial, but I also didn’t anticipate the backlash to either of those past changes. This may come as a shock to all of you, but I’m not exactly an expert on strollers. However, as someone who operates a Walt Disney World blog, it’s probably knowledge I should have, which is another purpose of this post–to solicit that from you.
I’ve unintentionally locked eyes with parents trying to navigate an oversized stroller amidst the gridlock of post-fireworks crowds in Magic Kingdom, and seeing the desperation and dejection in their face is something I can never unsee or forget. This actually occurs with surprising regularity–not the locking eyes part, just seeing strollers stuck in the sea of crowds and parents looking like they’d rather be anywhere else in the world right then.
From those observations, my assumption has long been huge and clunky strollers are a mistake. That smaller strollers are better, with the most compact and lightweight options being best. In my mind, a stroller is a sort of like a tripod–the goal should be striking the right balance of compact size, weight, durability, strength, and price. (I assume carbon fiber strollers are a thing?)
If I were shopping for a stroller, I’d probably want one made of the lightest, space age materials that can hold a lot of weight but don’t weigh much themselves and condense down to the smallest size possible, while also not breaking the bank. When Walt Disney World crowds get rough, I’d want the ability to call an audible, collapsing the stroller and carrying the kid through the congestion.
However, and I cannot stress this enough, I have no clue what I’m talking about. When watching Dwight stress test a stroller with a watermelon, my reaction was “that seems like a smart idea.” I’m pretty sure that wasn’t the intended takeaway. (Sarah is going to be mortified that I wrote all of this, as my uninformed opinion of strollers is one of many topics I should “keep to myself.”) Anyway, I’m curious–are Walt Disney World’s rental strollers a solid option? Is renting from a third party the better bet? If so, which one(s) do you recommend? What makes for a “good” stroller while navigating crowds and the parks in general?
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Care to share your thoughts, experience, and recommendations on strollers at Walt Disney World? Thoughts on the new Mickey & Minnie Mouse designs? Do you agree or disagree with my assessment of what makes a good stroller in the parks? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
The fact the park strollers don’t lie flat is annoying. I actually think getting rid of the wagon strollers was stupid, we could put 3 kids in it. Instead we bought a double wide and a single which was way more space taken up.
We just returned from our first Disney trip. I got here looking to see if anyone had encountered the issue we had, I have yet to see anyone mention it. We have an 8 year old with Downs syndrome. We do not have or need a stroller for her in our daily lives. We went to Magic Kingdom on Saturday 1/15 and she got really tired of walking by days end. The next day we went to Animal Kingdom and rented a stroller for her. She was a bit too big for it with her head pushing against the mesh top. We asked the agent if the top retracted and they said it did not. On Wednesday we went to Epcot and we rented a wheelchair instead. When we were returning the wheelchair, we noted the attendant with a stroller with the top retracted. We asked how he did that, he told and showed us the lever to pull on the bottom left underside to unlock the top to retract it. We told him the people at AK didn’t even know it did that and he said he was not surprised. We went back to Magic Kingdom on Thursday 1/20 (day one with the new Mickey strollers) and we rented her a new stroller. When getting it we told those attendants of our last two experiences with the strollers, and they told us the guy at Epcot should not gave told us that. They said that although the top retracted, WE WERE NOT TO RETRACT THEM. WHAAAAT?? They could not provide a reasoned explanation of why we shouldn’t, just that we were not to. We rented it and did with the retracting top as we wished. The stroller was nice, stylish and handy for carrying her and our stuff, with the top up or down.
1) Don’t pay for a stroller rental at Disney. Practically all major airlines let you “gate check” a stroller for free. And, of course it is even easier to bring one with you if you’re within driving distance to the parks.
2) REALLY pretty tired of the “hide the stroller” game Cast Members seem to enjoy playing. Disney of course needs *some* employee help to make sure stroller parking does not impede good traffic flow. But when you consistently park your stroller in the legit, designated stroller areas – and then have to hunt for it later because the CM apparently decided to move it anway… that gets old quickly. Sometimes I swear I had to waste more time finding the stroller than I did waiting for the ride/attraction.
I agree with the comment about getting a rain cover – we’ve used a poncho in a pinch, but a dedicated cover would have been a better idea.
These look nice, and you could easily bring a seat cushion if you wanted extra comfort for the child. But i would echo the comments that it is in general much easier to bring your own, and probably cost-effective to boot. Folding it up on the bus is a bit of a hassle, but that’s outweighed by having it in the airport (gate check is easy) and having it outside he park. If you are taking a bus back to Pop Century at the end of the night from Epcot, you easily have a half mile of walking from the front of the park to the bus, then bus to your room. It’s nice to have the stroller for that at the end of a long day.
Gerhard – LOL
How funny if there was such a thing as a Double Wide Scooter
Great comments all around! Just wanted to add something that was not brought up by others. You have to be careful with some of those super lightweight strollers when you are lugging around stuff. Not at Disney, but we were using a lightweight umbrella stroller and hung a bag with a bottle of wine on the handles. Not thinking, we got the kid out and bam went the bottle onto the sidewalk as the stroller tipped backwards. Most definitely user error, but when we last visited Disney I made sure not to bring that stroller for exactly that reason.
We take our own stroller. I prefer the tandem double stroller vs side by side because I feel it’s easier to maneuver and you get get through doorways easier. I recently flew to Disney and since you can check the stroller for free at the gate, I don’t get why people would even rent a stroller if they already have one unless it wouldn’t fit in the car or they accidentally forgot it because it would have definitely made our trip more expensive and harder.
This may sound crazy, but we (six older adults) would rent a stroller without having children on our trips. We used the stroller to carry backpacks, jackets, packages, umbrellas and other items. Worth every penny.
On trips with small children or grandchildren, I found a good, lightweight and easy to close umbrella stroller worked well. We’d put everything we needed for the day in a large tote bag and store it under the stroller. Made it easy when taking Disney transportation. I also found bringing a stroller made moving around the rest of Disney property easier. No one wants cranky overtired children (or adults) on vacation. Plus, our stroller was more comfortable for the kids, especially at nap time.
One of the reasons we rent as well! We do not own a stroller any longer (our youngest is 5 1/2) but knowing she’d be miserable walking all day, multiple days in a row is why we rent a stroller….but admittedly, it’s for all of our stuff as well, lol!
These are cute but I’m concerned about my little one actually being comfortable in it; he’ll be only 14months when we go and still naps whenever the need strikes him on busy days. I also worry about the height of the handle which can strain on backs and necks. I’m 5ft and my husband is 6ft so it was important for us to get a stroller that the Handel was adjustable. These rentals look pretty low even for me. It would certainly be nicer not to fly with the stroller even though we did exactly what you imagined you would do and got the lightest most compact one we could find. Worth every freaking expensive cent.
When our children were younger we always did the Disney rental strollers. We all absolutely loved them. The children were comfy and had shade, and they liked that they could move around with a little freedom and stretch out their legs. We liked that they were easy to push and maneuver, and always easy to pick up and drop off. By renting each day, we never had to deal with strollers on trams or busses or monorails, which made things so much easier. I would watch people struggling to fold up and lug their strollers plus their kiddos onto transportation and I would always be grateful we didn’t have to do that. Never regretted using those Disney strollers, and I love these new designs!! I do think they are pretty expensive, but I know from personal experience over many trips that they work very well.
Fascinated by all the comments from folks who say they don’t want to fly with a big stroller. Why not? It’s the BEST thing to have at an airport. A solid yet collapsible stroller (whether single or double) serves as a drink/snack carrier, a purse carrier, a portable nap zone, and one or two extra seats (which can be really hard to come by at most gates these days unless you stake out a spot early). It keeps your little ones from running off, or running into (or being run into by) hurried passengers. And it lets you move about three times faster than a toddler can walk. There’s never too much hassle at security (similar to taking through a passenger in a wheelchair) and you can literally wheel it all the way down the jet bridge and quickly collapse it to be gate checked, and then it’s waiting there for you and your kids the moment you get off the plane. Then your kids don’t have to walk the long death march to baggage claim and they have somewhere secure to sit while you’re waiting at the luggage carousel (don’t tell me with your little kids and a week at WDW you were able to pack light enough to go all carry on, and then wheeled your carry-ons a mile through the airport along with a backpack/purse while carrying the children in your arms? If so, more power to you.)
The only truly annoying thing about flying with a stroller is getting on and off rental car shuttle buses, but Orlando’s rental car facilities are mostly on airport.
I can’t say enough no matter what stroller invest in a clear plastic rain cover! Pop up storms happen soooo often in Florida and a well fitted rain cover will not only provide a nice dry ride for the littles but it will also protect your stuff, keeping it dry in the below seat storage compartments. It will also help to keep the seats dry if you cover your stroller when you go on rides or sit down for a meal when rain is forecasted. No more soggy strollers! These are also great on chilly or windy days as a wind barrier to help keep the kids warm. Ones with Velcro fasteners are great for keeping it in place and can be found online for about $20.
I am happy Disney offers double stroller rentals! My 6 year old will only need one IN the parks. I don’t want to fly with a big stinking double stroller. Strollers in general are serious business these days. The cost of some remind me of a car payment. With that being said, we own a few different strollers as they vary depending on your activity & needs.
As always, Thanks for the update! Plan to rent one of these cute new double strollers
I do not understand how people get little kids through the airport without a stroller!?! We went to WDW with my kiddos (age 1 & 2) and could not have gotten on the plane without the double stroller. We had gone the cheap route on our main strollers at home, because we just didn’t use them much. So when we were planning the trip, I just hit up Craigslist and bought a used double stroller that was awesome. Obviously that was a long time ago, but you could do FB Marketplace and find one. It lasted us 3 trips and then we gave it away and they were happy to have it. I can’t imagine taking a stroller I actually cared about to WDW. Ours was forever stained with sunscreen and banged up from the buses.
What I need from a WDW stroller:
Must have a waterproof cover.
Must have good storage. If my kids were small enough to need strollers they needed a change of clothes, maybe diapers, snacks, autograph books, accessories for pictures, things like bubbles to keep them happy. Plus, it gave a spot for anything else we might want to stash.
Able to recline for naps. Even with older kids!
I think it is more important to have a stroller collapse strategy than to have it be really easy to collapse. I never learned how to do it. I would grab the bags and kids, then my husband would collapse the stroller in less than 2 seconds and we were on the bus faster than some people without kids. We never collapsed to run through crowds, but we would have one person take the stroller and the other take the kids. When have two little kids, people are happy to have the other parent join you so that your kids aren’t so annoying. Or they feel bad for you, either way they as long as you are nice and look exhausted (which you will) they don’t mind.