Disney Hideaway : Wait Is Long, but Exclusive Club 33 Is Open--for a Price

There is an attraction inside Disneyland that most visitors never get to see. The wait for membership is nearly two years long.

Set in the heart of New Orleans Square, its elegant confines have comforted kings, princesses and presidents not to mention Michael Jackson and Cher. It has been a showplace for rare Disney mementos, and it is the only place in the park where the strict ban on alcoholic beverages does not apply.

Designed by park patriarch Walt Disney, Club 33 is the city’s most exclusive private club, where corporations pay up to $20,000 in membership fees to have access to the club’s gourmet meals and fine wines, all within view of Tom Sawyer’s Island and down the street from the Haunted Mansion.

It is a place, park officials say, where the limited membership has earned the French Quarter-styled hideaway a mystique all its own.

“It is a different experience because it is so quiet,” Disneyland Executive Vice President Ron Dominguez said. “There is fine linen, china and glassware. It’s different to have that right in the middle of the theme park.”

Opened five months after Disney’s death in 1967, the club serves as an exclusive entertainment spot for the 400 or so members, who, Dominguez says, represent a wide array of business executives and others, largely from Orange County and Los Angeles.

Even during the current recession, park officials said there has been little turnover in membership, causing new applicants a wait of up to two years for a membership card.

So popular is the Sunday brunch, Dominguez said, the club’s own members need to make reservations up to three weeks in advance.

“It’s such a unique place to entertain,” Disneyland President Jack Lindquist said. “This is for members to bring relatives from out of town to Disneyland and gives them a new experience in the park.”

In keeping with the club’s exclusive tradition, park guests would be hard-pressed to find the front door.

No different than any other facade in the New Orleans Square area, the club’s entry is distinguished only by its address, 33 Royal Street, from which the club takes its name.

In a fashion reminiscent of a Prohibition-era speak-easy, members and their guests gain entry only after punching a hidden doorbell and announcing their presence to a host or hostess through an intercom.

Inside, a French lift ushers guests to the second floor and the club’s two dining rooms.

Glossy parquet floors lead to the main dining room decorated in early 19th Century French style where the original conceptual sketches of the New Orleans Square attraction and the works of other Disney artists hang from the walls.

Although Lindquist ranks it on a par with other exclusive clubs in the area, the range of clientele is not reserved solely for power brokers. Last week, lunchtime guests ranged from small children and their parents, clad casually in shorts and T-shirts, to business men and women.

Lindquist said plans for the club began after the New York World’s Fair in 1964, when Disney was attempting to lure the General Electric Co. to Anaheim as a sponsor for a Disneyland attraction.

Since the New York fair was equipped with executive lounges stocked with alcoholic beverages for dignitaries and corporate sponsors, including General Electric, Lindquist said the company wanted the same amenities in Disneyland.

Lindquist said the concept clashed with Disney’s ban on alcoholic beverages inside the park and was nearly a “deal breaker” in attracting the sponsorship, untilDisney agreed to design a privateclub with the intent to open it to all corporate sponsors.

“It was an important point for GE,” Lindquist recalled recently. “That’s not to say that everybody at GE needs a belt.”

His aversion to establishing a simple lounge where alcoholic beverages would be sold still strong, Disney reportedly made sure the club would only serve alcohol with meals, Lindquist said.

For all the club’s elegance, Dominguez and Lindquist said it was rarely used in the early years. In later years, park officials elected to open membership to the public.

By 1984, membership grew to 580 and was open to all who could afford the fees and dues, which ranged between $300 and $1,000. Still, few of the members actually used the facility so officials decided to raise the membership costs.

These days, the corporate membership requires a $20,000 fee, entitling the organization to designate nine associate members who are charged $1,800 each per year in dues. Limited corporate memberships are offered for a $10,000 joining fee and provides for one executive membership at the same dues rate. The fee for individual members is $5,000, plus the annual dues charge.

The fees do not include the cost of meals, but, according to club rules, does grant members and up to nine of their guests free parking and admission to the park provided the member dines at the club during the visit.

After the fee increases of 1984, the number of memberships declined, but Lindquist said use of the club’s dining facilities dramatically increased and word has spread to other prospective members who now must wait for an opening.

“I think people felt that if they were going to pay that kind of fee, they were going to use it,” Lindquist said.

Although Dominguez and Lindquist said they have never analyzed the club’s membership roster for such things as minority representation, Lindquist said the application process has always been open to anyone provided they could meet the financial requirements.

“I don’t think we’ve ever turned anybody away,” Lindquist said.