A woman who wanted to take her family to Disney World had to put off her trip due to the pandemic, so the grandparents purchased $10K of Disney Plus gift cards, thinking they were for the theme park. This is the update to the story.
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| Disney World Florida |
A family from Normal, Illinois made a blunder when the grandparents thought they were "being smart" by buying $10,000 worth of Disney plus gift cards ahead of time thinking they were good to fund a trip to Disney World.
It wasn't until the grandparents were trying to pay for the trip to the theme park online that they realized their big mistake.
41-year-old Andie Coston shared about the mishap on TikTok recently and her original video was viewed over 4 million times, giving her temporary viral video fame.
In the text overlay in the original video, it read:
"To save some money, my parents bought 10k of Disney gift cards to purchase our tickets and restaurant reservations." -Andie Coston, Disney park enthusiast
After it happened, she said:
"We were all befuddled and baffled at what had happened...The absurdity was funny but then the realization that we may not actually make it to Disney was sad ... This has always been the one big trip that I can take my kids on." -Andie Coston, Disney park enthusiast
Coston Family Realizes They Have $10K in Disney Plus Gift Cards
USA Today reported that Andie Coston's parents thought they had bought $10K in gift cards to the magical theme park in Florida from Sam's Club. When the family discovered they had accidentally purchased gift cards for the Disney Plus streaming service, they first reached out to Sam's Club and also to Disney.
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| Disney plus gift cards |
Here's the update to her story.
Update: Disney Works to Make it Right
Andy Coston posted an update on her situation to TikTok on Thursday.
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| Andie Coston |
In the video, she said:
"Good morning everybody. I just wanted to provide um some updates, some clarifications, uh number one...yes, Disney has contacted us. They contacted my parents Monday evening and they have been working on rectifying the situation ever since. It is a slow-going process.
My parents are having to take photos of every single one of the gift cards and email it to this poor guy named Joey in California. Joey, you have my deepest condolences and sympathies, and then Joey has to do his thing and then transfer them onto like regular like Disney Parks gift cards, so they've been working on that slowly cause you can only send so many pictures per email, right?" -Andie Coston, Disney park enthusiast
Sam's Club did reach out to them, but could not refund the cards.
Andie explains in her update video that her parents had scratched off all of the codes on the back of the gift cards, trying to enter them into the Disney Park website, but they didn't accept them at the Disney Park website, and the cards could not be returned to Sam's after the codes had been used.
Andie's video update can be seen on TikTok.
Update: The Coston Family Went to Disney World
The Coston family was still able to take their dream vacation to Disney World and has posted about it on TikTok.
The photo below was posted on Tuesday, 27 December of her family at Disney World.
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| Coston family |
Andie wrote the following message in the description on TikTok, sharing that some of the internet fame was not all positive.
It read:
"When I was a teen, I wanted to be famous so badly. I graduated high school and joked that one day I'd be a cast member on SNL. It was really a pipe dream I never pursued because my skin isn't thick enough to handle the feedback.
This past week has felt like a month. When I woke up and saw my TikTok had hit 500k and then over the next 7 days watched it hit 4 million, I was aghast. I'm not made for fame, but better in my Therapist chair.
I've had to engage my support system and work hard to try to embrace this BANANAS experience while facing online trolling, criticism, hate, and sheer disregard for the value of human worth. So I stayed MOSTLY out of the comments." -Andie Coston, Disney park enthusiast
Thankfully, her family was still able to travel to Disney World and enjoy the theme park.
Thoughts
Now it's time for the reader to share your thoughts on this story.
- Have you ever made a mishap and purchased the wrong kind of gift or gift card for someone?
- How would you feel if you accidentally purchased Disney+ gift cards instead of Disney theme park gift cards?
- Are you surprised that Disney was willing to switch out her Disney Plus gift cards for Disney Parks gift cards?
Sources
Andie Coston on TikTok: @aofthecoast
Goh, Amanda. "Grandparents messed up and bought the family 70 years' worth of Disney+ instead of a trip to the theme park." Business Insider. 25 December 2023.
Robledo, Anthony. "70 years of Disney Plus: Family accidently spends thousands on streaming instead of trip." USA Today. 20 December 2023.
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