Only one year after the grand opening of EuroDisneyland, Robert Fitzpatrick left his position as
EuroDisney’s chairperson, citing a desire to start his own consulting firm. In April 1993, Philippe
Bourguignon took over the helm of EuroDisney, thought by some to be a sinking ship. EuroDisney publicly reported a net loss of FFr188 million for the fiscal year ending September 1992, though cumulative losses through April 1993 approached half a billion dollars.1 The European park also fell one million visitors short of its goal for the first year of operations, with the French comprising only 29% of the park’s total visitors between April and September 1992—a far cry from the predicted 50%.2
In addition to the financial woes weighing on Bourguignon, he was also expected to stem the flow of bad publicity which EuroDisney had experienced from its inception. Phase Two development at
EuroDisneyland was slated to start in September 1993, but in light of their drained cash reserves (FFr1.1bn in May 1993)3 and monstrous debts (estimated at FF421bn),4 it was unclear as to how the estimated
FFr8-10bn Phase Two project would be financed.
Despite this bleak picture, Michael Eisner, CEO of Walt Disney Co., remained optimistic about the venture: “Instant hits are things that go away quickly, and things that grow slowly and are part of the culture are what we look for. What we created in France is the biggest private investment in a foreign country by an American company ever. And it’s gonna pay off.”5
The Dawning Of Disney
After first attempting to start a commercial arts firm in 1917, Walt Disney, along with his partner Ub
Iwerks, joined the Kansas City Film Ad Company, and began to learn the craft which would carry him to fame—cartooning. By 1919, Walt was making independent short cartoon ads for theatres. In 1920,
Walt’s brother Roy became a partner, and soon thereafter the group moved to Hollywood. There, they developed a standardized cast of cartoon characters, which were mass-produced using a large staff and artists working on a single easy-to-draw cartoon. The year 1928 saw the creation of “Mortimer Mouse,” later renamed Mickey.
1 David Jefferson. “American Quits Chairman Post at Euro Disney,” The Wall Street Journal (January 18,
1993), p. B1.
2 Ibid.
3 “Euro Disney: Waiting for Dumbo,” The Economist (May 1, 1993), p. 74.
4 Peter Gumbel and Richard Turner. “Blundering...
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...,” commented one.27 Different cultures have varying definitions of personal space. EuroDisney guests’ problems ranged from people who either got too close or who left too much space between themselves and the person in front of them. It was thought that the competition from French theme parks, which had significantly lower admission costs, might be a concern. However, Fitzpatrick did not appear to be daunted. “We are spending 22 billion French francs before we open the door, while the other places spent 700 million,” he said. “This means we can pay infinitely more attention to details—to costumes, hotels, shops, trash baskets—to create a fantastic place. There’s just too great a response to Disney for us to fail.”28
Bourguignon’s Predicament
With these bold predictions of his predecessor echoing in his ears, Bourguignon stared at his desk.
Surrounding him were piles of financial statements drowning in red ink (to the tune of $500 million), stock market reports chronicling EuroDisney’s falling price from FFr166 to approximately FFr65, and newspapers full of stories of EuroDisneyland’s cultural blunders. Bourguignon wondered where he would find the magic to turn this kingdom around.
And last but not least is the villain in these movies. Most of the killers in these films are portrayed as mentally deranged and/or has some type of facial or bodily deformation and who have been traumatized at an early age. Even though these characters terrorized and murder people they have taken on the persona of anti-heroes in pop culture. Characters like Halloween’s Michael Myers, A Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger and Friday the 13th’s Jason Voorhees have become the reason to go see these movies. However, over time,”their familiarity and the audience’s ability to identify and sympathize with them over the protagonist made these villains less threatening (Slasher Film (5))”.
Walt Disney was on a train ride to Hollywood after the loss of his character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit when he decided to start from scratch. He bounced ideas off of his wife as to what would make a cute character. Walt started doodling and eventually settled on a mouse. He wanted to name the mouse Mortimer but his wife laughed and said Mickey was a nicer name, and thus a star was born. (Miller)
In the first film, Bughuul was sly and sinister enough to remain a shadowy mystery – only to have this latest installment treat him like an angry puppet master that isn’t capable of carrying out his own dastardly plans.
in the twenties when a man by the name of Walt "Elias" Disney (1901-66) a
He took a live human and inserted them into a cartoon. He was the first to do this. After he produced so many of these shorts, it was when he found his place in Hollywood. The more shorts he did, the more famous and well known he became. Walt had accomplished so much in his life, but the only thing left was a family.
Walt Disney is known around the entire world for the amusement parks and films which bear his name. He won a record 29 Academy Awards, many Oscars, and even received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor for a citizen of the United States. While his life may seem glamorous, Disney encountered many hardships in his life and reached his dreams only by remaining determined.
Walt Disney, the founder of Disney, was born on December 5, 1901. He founded Disney in January 1920. As a young child he had moved around a lot with his family due to work. Disney’s most famous cartoon was mickey mouse and the mickey mouse collection was created in the late 1920`s and Walt did the voice of mickey mouse until 1947. Some would say that this is the most successful portion of the Disney franchise. (Wikipedia 2)
Throughout World War II, Walt Disney Productions created a total of approximately 1,200 military emblems. In the previous world war, a sixteen-year-old Walt Disney served as a Red Cross ambulance driver. It’s rather possible that he was exposed to early nose art, cartoons and drawings that military crews painted on their aircrafts’ noses (“Disney Goes to War”). He knew that the use of cartoon humor could be valuable to boosting morale. Whilst serving in France, he used his drawings to decorate the ambulances in his unit, much to everyone’s delight (“Disney Pins on Wings”).
On December 5, 1901 in Chicago, Elias and Flora Disney gave birth to a 4th son Walter Elias. In 1906 the Disney family relocated to Marceline, Missouri, where Walt found interest in drawing and painting pictures as well as starting his entrepreneurship journeys by marketing his works to friends, family and neighbors. In 1911 financial pressures and health stresses for Elias required him to sell their farm and transfer to Kansas City. Here Walt and his brother Roy helped their family financially by delivering newspapers. In addition to Walt assisting on the newspaper routes he attended Benton Grammar school and on the weekend attend the Kansas Art Institute to cultivate his creative skills. Shortly after Walt graduated from Benton Grammar School, the family moved back to Chicago, where Walt attended high school and joined the school newspaper staff contributing by drawing cartoons for it. Walt attended McKinley High School for a brief time before deciding to join the Red Cross Ambulance Corps. In 1919 Walt moved back to Kansas City after a brief stay in Chicago after serving for the Red Cross Ambulance Corp. In Kansas City Walt began working for the Kansas City Slide Company developing advertisements, gaining animation experience, then eventually left to start his own company Laugh O-Graham Films. Walt created his first series of short films called “Alice’s Wonderland” while owner operating his first business. Unfortunately at this time Walt lacked some business talents, therefore Laugh O Grahams life span was only approximately a year and a half. After claiming bankruptcy in 1923, he decided to travel to Hollywood with hopes of bringing his dreams to life as a producer. Walt experienced several rejections while trying to find a jo...
...cartoons. Roy, Walt’s older brother and Walt moved to Los Angeles to set up the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio. Here they made the "Alice Comedies" and "Oswald the Lucky Rabbit." In 1926 Walt changed his cartoon studio name from Disney Bros. to what we now know it as today, Walt Disney Studios. ( www. JustDisney.com NP) Things took off in November of 1928 when Mickey and Minnie Mouse made their debut in "Steamboat Willie." This movie is what made Mickey, Minnie and Walt Disney famous. Early on, Walt Disney was working so hard he was having some trouble sleeping, so he took some sleeping pills to help him sleep. His wife, Lilly was unable to wake him up one morning and she called the doctor who prescribed a long trip for rest and relaxation. (Ford NP) After Walt came back home well rested, he went right back to work. He began to work on the first Disney movie! Walt wanted each of the dwarfs in “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” to be a distinct individual. The solution was to create names for them that would reflect their personalities. (Miller NP) "Snow White," which took three years to make, was released in 1937. This was the beginning to what we all know today as Disney movies.
In addition, one weakness that can be concluded from the case study is Euro Disney’s ineffective marketing team when entering the European market. In fact, it is a failure of its marketing team to quickly react to the threatening environmental signals and especially predicting them before entering and positioning itself in the European market.
The Walt Disney Company started as a small entertainment company in 1923 (Disney.com, 2011). Since that time the company has used various strategies enabling them to grow into a global entertainment company.
“The Golden Age of Comics” PBS. PBS, 2011 Web. Retrieved on February 11 2014 from http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/the-golden-age-of-comics/
In 2002, WorldCom’s bankruptcy was the largest in US history; WorldCom admitted that it had falsely booked $3.85 billion in expenses to make the company appear more profitable. Ebber who was CEO of WorldCom created fictitious some more than questionable accounting practices. Thus began the practice of taking an operating expense and reclassifyin...
The Comic Book Makers. Crestwood/II. p. 51. -. ISBN 1-887591-35-4.