Disney offers free admission to theme parks for visitors on their birthdays

Walt Disney Parks and Resorts will admit visitors free on their birthdays next year.

"Every guest gets in free to one of our parks on their birthday in 2009," Jay Rasulo, chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, said at a news conference in Manhattan today.

Visitors will have to show valid identification and proof of birth date to qualify for the free admission to Disneyland in California and Walt Disney World in Florida. Details are available at www.disneyparks.com, where birthday visits can be registered in advance.

Mike Lynn, a professor of consumer behavior at Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration, said admitting guests free to the parks on their birthdays could very well make money.

"The only thing they lose is the revenue from those people whose birthdays it is who might have come anyway," he said. "Having an extra customer in the park doesn't cost them anything. Those people are still a benefit because they have to buy food and drinks, and their friends and family are accompanying them."

The birthday offer is part of a larger Disney promotion announced Thursday called "What will you celebrate?"