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Changes at DTD
- Thread starter ImaYoyo
- Start date
Pumbas Nakasak
Heading for the great escape.
I take it you mean big as in salad dodgers rather than number of members, given you factually state the clubs closed through lack of use.
You mean that big group of guests that weren't attending the other 3 clubs?
googilycub
Active Member
Considering that the crackdowns starting in 2007, which I am sure you know was AFTER Disney removed paying access, you statement is makes no sense.
Mouse Detective
Well-Known Member
Actually, it was the Save PI blog that exposed the Schussler connection last September:
http://savepleasureisland.blogspot.com/2009/09/are-these-restaurants-coming-to-pi.html
You know, Pixarforthewin came on here and stated that Comedy Warehouse and Adventurers Club were the only two profitable clubs and everyone has bit that hook and believed it. I've heard that most of the clubs were profitable in the end with CW and BET being the only two unprofitable ones.
I think we all know that when the Island became ungated, the allure of paying $25 admission disappeared and that is when the mixing of drinking with families came into existence.
unkadug
Follower of "Saget"The Cult
Those of us that have been around since before the closure of PI have heard that all of the clubs we profitable, none of the clubs were profitable and everything in between. It does not really matter at this point which story is correct. One bad decision has left PI a ghost town and we can only hope that someone at Disney has a solution.
Mouse Detective
Well-Known Member
Yes, you're right. But if Raven is to be believed, and I have no reason to doubt her, the latest plan is the same as the original plan: shops & restaurants! But that means we're going to have to wait 2-3 more years until the economy improves and businesses want to invest again. Because with Paradiso already in bankruptcy, I just can't see any outside business willing to take a chance right now with an abandoned island and a horrible economy.
unkadug
Follower of "Saget"The Cult
Raven is a him, and I'm not so sure that the new vision is the same vision that they use to have.
I would agree. If Disney had tenants waiting to go into those buildings I would have been far less perplexed by the sudden and total closure. It is almost like they thought they could just vacate the buildings and tenants would come running with open check books.
PixarfortheWin
New Member
I guess you are forgetting about the nearly 100 Virgin Megastores currently operating outside of the US?
THere were ones in the US that were operating in the black and yet they closed them all down
Mouse Detective
Well-Known Member
LOL! The only "Ravens" I've ever run into worked in places with pole and lap dances! Sorry about that assumption, Raven!
Well, that is kind of what happened. The PI Blog reported about that long ago. I forget whether it was Motion or RRBC, but they put it up for lease and it was quickly snatched up by someone. With the quick response, they did figure they could unload the others equally quick. But by the time they could offer them for lease, the economy soured and there were no takers. And whoever bit on that initial lease, backed out.
PixarfortheWin
New Member
Oh i agree 100% with the last paragraph
PixarfortheWin
New Member
They at first had three buildings that were in the process of being bought but then the economy hit the trash....
Because they could make more renting the buildings than operating the stores. The same could have been true for PI but they closed it prior to securing tenants and then the economy collapsed. Now we are left with nothing but empty buildings and a bold new vision.
Question (and really, it's rhetorical) ... how does one "lose money" by keeping two clubs that are profitable?
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The various Virgin enterprises are not all owned and operated by the Virgin Group, and Virgin Megastore was no exception. Even the stores that were profitable, the last ones to close, were facing declining profits with the rise of competition from internet marketplaces and digital distribution. Operating fewer stores meant purchasing less inventory, providing the choice of earning less on each sale or charging more for products. Neither option is a good option and would have only hastened the decline.
Pleasure Island is in no way a similar situation. As I already stated, during the culture shift of the 1990s Walt Disney Parks and Resorts stopped looking at the whole and began looking to make individual components profitable. Even with Pleasure Island continuing to be viewed as a single attraction, despite the removal of any semblance of this idea, it did not preclude the possibility of addressing specific needs and/or areas of improvement. If this were not the case, then there would never have been any of the club and restaurant changes that did take place while the gates were still in place.
The "bare" profitability of the Adventurers Club and the Comedy Club Warehouse seems to stem from the peculiar accounting methods that were put in place after the removal of the gates and the introduction of the single club admission ticket. When EPCOT Center opened in 1982 it was decided that the attendance count would go to the park visited first. With Pleasure Island, it seems that the multiple club admission was counted equally amongst all clubs regardless of where it was actually used to gain admittance. That means that if a person payed to enter the Adventurers Club, the revenue from that ticket was split and counted amongst all clubs, not just the Adventurers Club. Had the two venues in question stayed open, they continued to share a single, high priced admission and attendance remained, then the two venues would have been even more profitable as ticket revenue would no longer be shared with the other clubs.
Pumbas Nakasak
Heading for the great escape.
Or have I missed this crackdown leading to the reintroduction of payment and the associated restriction of access?
Or do they not do sarcasm in the colonies?
Tip Top Club
Well-Known Member
Okay, everyone who is having a conversation in this thread, take a step back, take a deep breath, and realize that no one has any clue what the anyone else is talking about...
71jason
Well-Known Member
You've made that claim about CW and AC twice in this thread now, and it's utterly ludicrous. CW was one of two clubs that perpetually LOST money--it was expensive to run, with equity actors, and the relatively short shows meant limited drink sales.
AC was modestly profitable, if you include Jungle Juice--probably even moderately profitable if you pro rated out admission charges, but I've never spoken to any one who has seen that data.
8-Traxx and Mannequins were the economic engine that drove PI (with Motion apparently also making some money). It would have been insane to close 8-Traxx in any incarnation of PI--even if all that 70s/80s music attracts a heavy gang presence. (I'd always see them throwing gang signs at midnight in that place--not sure what "YMCA" stands for, but must be something nefarious). If you own a bar with a $25 cover that STILL sells $80k a weekend in booze and can't figure out how to make that profitable--well, then management is just not your field.