Prototype82
Well-Known Member
This is huge.
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News Disney names D’Amaro as Chairman Disney Parks Experiences and Products
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lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
This is a great example of how so much of what he says about the parks is what he thinks people want to hear (and he has been incredibly successful at crafting his image). He's trying to paint himself as someone who is not overly focused on how much money is being made but in the process completely ignoring the guest experience, what is actually being sold. He absolutely should be thinking about the price of churros and how that impacts peoples' experience and perception of the parks. Instead he is sort of patting himself on the back for being able to charge an absurd price on something so simple and cheap.
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EricsBiscuit
Well-Known Member
If Iger thinks as you described, why would he invest $5.5 billion in a new resort in Shanghai? Why would he green light billions in investment at WDW alone? Why would he green light MM and Grizzly Gulch? The parks have always been part of the synergistic engine that is TWDC, since 1955. You’re coming at this as if you have some personal vendetta against Iger. I’m not a huge fan of his but any objective look will show that your post is wrong.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
Shanghai Disneyland had been a major goal of The Walt Disney Company going back to the mid-to-late 1990s. It was to be Disney’s way into the large Chinese market and something Michael Eisner could/would not complete as it was originally packaged with other guaranteed means of distributing content like a Disney Channel. Completing the park meant doing the big visible thing Michael could not do.
Walt Disney World is now receiving billions because it was neglected for years and continues to follow a strategy of aggressively suppressing attractions per guest per hour. There was even a multi billion dollar effort in MyMagic+ to avoid having to build new attractions for years. They’re buying a new car because they refused to change the oil.
Mystic Point, Grizzly Gulch and Toy Story Playland were demanded by the Government of Hong Kong to help make amends for the bait and switch of the initial build out of Hong Kong Disneyland where Disney announced a larger park but built a significantly smaller park. That massive reduction in scope occurred while Iger was President and COO.
The shear cost of Iger’s park projects, especially in recent years, is not a point of pride. Costs have spiraled completely and totally out of control. Even adjusting for inflation, what once bought the nondescript coaster themed like India or whatever at the beginning of his tenure now does not even buy paint and babies on a stick (Pixar Pier). The return on investment has become worse, with Disney having to spend significantly more to attract new guests and dollars at the parks.
TiggerDad
Well-Known Member
I emailed Jeff Vahle after our last cruise to compliment some CMs and make a few suggestions. I immediately got a call from one of his people, who was engaged and interested in the feedback. I'm guessing this is standard practice, but I think it reflects the level of quality at DCL that hopefully could be brought to bear on the parks. I've heard plenty of people say they prefer the DCL experience to what WDW has become, so I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for now.
I don't have any Josh D'Amaro stories, but if he's replacing @realBobChapek as head of the Parks and Resorts, shouldn't he be creating @RealJoshDAmaro here on the boards?
Edited name, and I see that he has now joined an hour after my suggestion.
I don't have any Josh D'Amaro stories, but if he's replacing @realBobChapek as head of the Parks and Resorts, shouldn't he be creating @RealJoshDAmaro here on the boards?
Edited name, and I see that he has now joined an hour after my suggestion.
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jt04
Well-Known Member
Funny you mention this. I was thinking when they were having so much trouble with RotR that they needed more Georgia Tech engineers. Or at minimum Purdue.
No Name
Well-Known Member
mikejs78
Premium Member
It's a video platform. People said similar about YouTube and especially Snapchat.
Like I said, I personally don't get it. But I have stopped underestimating services for "young people" that end up becoming mainstream.
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
How is that a fact?
peter11435
Well-Known Member
Have you been there?
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
Have you stayed at every Disney hotel globally?
Is there only one metric to measure them?
Do we not evaluate hotels based on a number of factors, including price?
Are we only judging hotels operated by Disney itself and not including other Disney branded properties?
It's entirely subjective, and subject to change as other properties get renovated/remodeled. That is my point.
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I'm not sure if Aulani is any better than the deluxe resorts at WDW but one thing Aulani has hands down better than any WDW resort- the beautiful Hawaii weather and the constant cool tradewinds. My last trip and I didn't even need AC everyday.
peter11435
Well-Known Member
I’ve stayed at every Disney operated hotel outside of Shanghai/Hong Kong and half or Paris.
There numerous metrics to judge them.
Price is certainly a factor in the overall rating of a property. When I visit WDW I don’t always stay at a deluxe resort because I know I can often receive a great experience of higher value at one of the more affordable options. That doesn’t mean I don’t see that the quality of the overall experience at WL is superior to that of pop century. Service, amenities, theming, groundskeeping, facility maintenance, food and beverage offerings, all combine to make WL a superior product even if I may find better value at a cheaper property.
Yes, I’m only discussing hotels Disney operates. Why wouldn’t I be? I never said it was the best hotel in the world, I said it was the best they offer in the world. Obviously there are hotels in the world that are far better than anything Disney operates, and hotels that are far below. That’s not relevant to discussing how different Disney properties are operated compared to one another.
This isn’t entirely about the physical facility itself. It’s a combination of the facility, the amenities, the service, the entertainment, the maintenance and upkeep, the groundskeeping, the recreation, and the food and beverage offerings. Obviously it’s subject to change. There’s no question there. It could go down or other properties could go up. I never said this was locked in for eternity. In fact we should be hoping it changes, we should be hoping other resorts rise up to meet or beat that level.
One might say that after a decade of no investment in the parks that $28B since 2011 was necessary. But still, since 2011, $28B ain't nothing to sneeze at. Cars Land, Pandora, 2 Star Wars, Toy Story Land, Tron, GotG, Rat, huge infrastructure projects, and all the major overseas park developments...
There is absolute zero evidence of unwillingness to invest in parks on the part of Iger.
You need to revise your hateratti talking points.
the.dreamfinder
Well-Known Member
This is happening after WDI has undergone major layoffs and reorganized itself to outsource more and more work.
DDLand
Well-Known Member
As @ParentsOf4 is fond of pointing out, the total theme park CAPEX is incomplete. That poster makes a point of differentiating between “maintenance CAPEX” and “growth CAPEX.” An excellent summary of the two concepts can be found in this post:
Walt Disney World’s Biggest Investment since 1998
With the fiscal year complete, it’s time to comment on the financial performance of Disney’s Parks & Resorts (P&R). (Disney’s fiscal year runs from October to September.) Disney’s P&R segment is divided into two unequal parts. Domestic P&R includes Walt Disney World (WDW), Disneyland Resort...
Much of the number you quoted was spent on maintenance CAPEX. Let’s break it down…
My back of the envelope sums found total Disney Theme Park CAPEX at $30.986 Billion from 2010 to 2019. That’s an impressive figure. But what about the number that theme park fans care about? What about growth CAPEX? Well first we need to calculate yearly deprecation, which stands in for maintenance CAPEX. That comes in a massive $16.080 Billion.
Growth CAPEX then comes to $14.906 Billion from 2010 to 2019. So roughly $15 Billion was spent on new rides and lands around the world. Still impressive, but much more modest than the number you originally quoted.
While most theme park fans will acknowledge the last five years have had solid investments, we can hardly forget about the first decade of Iger’s tenure. After Eisner added several new E-Tickets before retiring, the spigot was turned off in America. Expedition Everest would mark the last E-Ticket at WDW until Flight of Passage more than a decade later. Even Disneyland’s ballyhooed Disney California Adventure relaunch (they dropped the ’s so it became way cooler) only brought with it one E-Ticket, a dark ride, a trolley, and a handful of flat rides. Instead of investing in the properties responsible for increasing operating income by nearly 4x from 2010 to 2019, Iger was spending much more on Shanghai, cruise ships, and DVC.
All of that changed when Iger had an epiphany in summer of 2015. Much to his surprise, he realized that Parks and Resorts was a business worth investing in. So we got many of the expansions we know today.
We can acknowledge this more recent influx of cash while also pointing out just how slow he was to marshal resources to a business that had so much potential. Why did the world’s #1 theme park destination go more than a decade without a new E-Ticket? Why weren’t more rides added? Why were parks allowed to limp along as denigrated “half-day parks?” Where was Iger in 2012 as Walt Disney World started to roar to life? Oh yeah, he was busy selling Wall Street on a dumb iPhone app…
My favorite thought experiment goes like this. Suppose Iger actually cared about theme parks and actually understood them. The easiest way to make a typical guest’s day better is to add attractions. But aren’t attractions expensive? Let’s see…
Little Mermaid was famous for costing $100 Million+. For our purposes we’ll say that each ride we’ll add comes in at $100 Million even. Then say there are a mix of ride system types that have an average ride capacity of 1400 per hour each. We could add 14,000 in ride capacity for the equivalent of $1 Billion. Depreciated over 40 years that would only have a yearly cost of $25 million. To give perspective, Galaxy’s Ledge added 3000+ capacity for the same price. $25 million a year and we could see an increase in ride capacity 4 times more than what we saw at Galaxy’s Ledge.
But who wants that?
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lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
A multi billion app with a stated purpose of reducing the need to build those expensive attractions. Even Iger was once quietly honest about not wanting to deal with the parks and that’s why he shopped around the idea of selling or spinning them off.
Yes, I'm aware of that distinction...
While 'maintenance capex' isn't adding a new thing, like a ride, it is essential to make the park look good, to make things run well. Else, you'll be shutting down more rides than just Stitch because you don't want to spend the money to fix/upgrade attractions.
E.g., think of all the new entranceway work being done (and was sorely needed). I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing that was classified in whole or in part as 'maintenance capex.'
The point is, about $28B was spent this decade for new stuff and to maintain the old stuff.
The old stuff could have just been left to degrade. No new stuff could have been added. The bare minimum everywhere could have continued since 2009, and it wasn't.
So, the point originally made that Iger doesn't invest in the parks has been false for a while. Doesn't matter whether he's being forced into it by Wall Street, or has motivations for profit, or he has bouts of projectile vomiting because he so hates the parks that every dollar spent on them makes him puke... the money's being spent.
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Donaldfan1934
Well-Known Member
This essentially sums up why I’ll always argue in favor of Michael Eisner in the discussion of who was ultimately the better CEO. You can debate all day over who’s good decisions were better and bad decisions were worse, but at least Eisner was and still is a fan of what TWDC has created over the decades. Bob Iger, on the other hand, hasn‘t seemed to developed a similar passion for any of it, let alone the parks. The only occasions where Iger appears to express even a little bit of personal enthusiasm are for projects that directly impact his legacy/ego.
To be fair, I do believe Iger is at least somewhat honest about being able to find appreciation in other’s joy for Disney, but he is clearly too detached to fully understand what makes his product appealing to so many. This is why Josh D’Amaro’s promotion is exciting to a lot of fans. It puts someone who has a solid understanding of the parks into a position where they have greater say in their overall direction. D’Amaro won’t be able to change everything given the mindset of those above him, but his influence is enough to give hope of better days ahead.
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