On layoffs, very bad attendance, and Iger's legacy being one of disgrace

EricsBiscuit

EricsBiscuit

Well-Known Member
Phil12 said:
The CEO of TWDC has a difficult job just trying to live up to the reputation of some of the past CEO's. In particular, Walt Disney himself.

Walt was always the front man for his movies, TV shows, Disneyland and Walt Disney World. We knew about these things because good ole Uncle Walt told us all about his plans on his TV shows. And the public loved him!

Of course, that was all pure public relations. Walt was not one bit as he appeared on TV. In reality he was a chain smoker, he drank to excess and he swore like a sailor. He was also a very brutal businessman. But after all, he was in show business. So he hired the best in the business to make him look good. And it worked perfectly because he came off looking great and was able to sell the public most anything. He was a great pitchman!

After Walt died, Roy Disney and the others after didn't have the on camera charisma to effectively sell the Disney product. That is until Eisner came along. Eisner was a rather ruthless guy (just like Walt) but he realized the valve (just like Walt) of being able to pitch the product to the fans. And Eisner did well on camera and used the TV shows to sell product in an effective manner.

Unfortunately, Iger left most of his personality with whomever replaced him as a weatherman. I'll give Bob credit in that he tried to sell the Disney product on camera. But the camera just doesn't like Bob. He comes off as a stiff dupe and a smarmy CEO. He comes off almost as creepy as the Dreamfinder. Iger is just not a guy the fans felt comfortable with nor someone they could trust.

And now we have Bob Chapek. Poor Bob comes across on camera like a wet dishrag. He just can't sell the product. Now let's hope that a brave someone in TWDC confronts Bob and tells him that his on camera personality sucks. Given the proper acting lessons and guidance, they can make him look good or even great!

They did it for Walt and I'm sure they can do it for Bob. I think the difference is that Walt was willing to put on his fake persona for the sake of building his personal fortune (i.e. greed). I'm not sure that Bob is motivated by greed as was Walt.

Here's an example of poor Bob trying to sell the Disney product:

Click to expand...

Walt was never CEO. Roy was.
 
Sirwalterraleigh

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
EricsBiscuit said:
I remember the days when MK closed at 6 on weekdays and later on weekends during the early-mid 2000’s.

edited to add: it made driving to Disney after school less attractive!
Click to expand...
Yep...I remember when the tickets were $52, the passes were $300, the rooms at port were $90 and the restaurants had an a la carte menu where you could get a $12 burger or a $14 pasta dish too! 🤔
 
scpergj

scpergj

Well-Known Member
Sirwalterraleigh said:
Yep...I remember when the tickets were $52, the passes were $300, the rooms at port were $90 and the restaurants had an a la carte menu where you could get a $12 burger or a $14 pasta dish too! 🤔
Click to expand...
I still remember ticket books and purchasing additional books after we got in the park.

My first single day ticker I purchased for myself was Epcot in 1986; I believe I paid $14.95. later, in the mid ‘90’s, my wife and I paid around $27 for single day single park tickets. First trip with our kids in around 2003 we purchased 4 day park hopper passes for $99. First full on Florida residents AP’s we purchased were $279....
ah, the good old days...
 
P

pheneix

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Real talk:

People on this board don’t need business classes. They need to see the real life experience of running theme parks with their own eyes. Things are pretty screwed up at a theme park in the best of times, much less poor times.

Probably doesn’t help that most recent college grads that were coming to the industry only knew the last 10 years or so of the business. The “good times”.

You got one camp of industry vets saying, “there’s an asteroid coming, you need to run.”

The other camp is all like “let’s measure the asteroid. Will the impact really be as bad as the doomsayers claim? Perhaps this asteroid is made up of an element that would not explode as hard when hits the ground. Perhaps —“

Ooof
 
Last edited:
P

pheneix

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Btw I got a little gossip on the French restaurant at Epcot, tho it’s not earth shattering (also rumor warning. Grab your blankets because a *rumor* is being discussed).

Apparently WDW doesn’t care if the operating participant in France bails. From Disney’s POV, they can simply take Chefs back and turn it into a Ratatouille restaurant. I did ask if the 3rd party wanted it on running such a proposed restaurant. The answer, for now, is no. There is not enough demand for any Disney IP or the Chefs brand to run the restaurant. The Epcot hour cuts sealed that.

As far as the restaurant upstairs goes....

That one may be closed up for a while.
 
Sirwalterraleigh

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
pheneix said:
Btw I got a little gossip on the French restaurant at Epcotho it’s not earth shattering (also rumor warning. Grab your blankets because a *rumor* is being discussed).

Apparently WDW doesn’t care if the operating participant in France bails. From Disney’s POV, they can simply take Chefs back and turn it into a Ratatouille restaurant. I did ask if the 3rd party wanted it on running such a proposed restaurant. The answer, for now, is no. There is not enough demand for any Disney IP or the Chefs brand to run the restaurant. The Epcot hour cuts sealed that.

As far as the restaurant upstairs goes....

That one may be closed up for a while.
Click to expand...
I could totally see that.

I think they switched partners with the last renovations and this outfit is bad??
 
WDWVolFan

WDWVolFan

Well-Known Member
So are we saying that WDW May close altogether? I’d think that they would close all parks around the world to save WDW and DL.
 
Phil12

Phil12

Well-Known Member
EricsBiscuit said:
Walt was never CEO. Roy was.
Click to expand...
That's somewhat correct. Roy was the CEO in 1929 but he was never given that title until the year of Walt's death in 1966. Walt bought out most of Roy's share of the production company back in 1929. Both Walt and Roy shared the Chairman of the Board title starting in 1945. Roy ran the finances while Walt sneaked around behind his older brother's back to raid the studio coffers after the production company went public.

As a practical matter the employees and the public knew Walt as the head of the studio. And when Walt created WED, he lured the best and the brightest employees from the public production company to come to work for his private company. And WED used the studio facilities and office space at the studio rent free. In essence, Walt was a double CEO!

Roy had no part in WED until he finally engaged the studio attorney's to complete an exhaustive accounting to determine how much property and cash Walt had diverted to WED from Walt Disney Productions and Disneyland. That occurred in the two years just prior to Walt's untimely death.
 
MaximumEd

MaximumEd

Well-Known Member
If Roy was the business brains and Walt was the creative, then how did Walt figure out how to raid the coffers of WDP without Roy catching on? Also, where does Retlaw fit into all this?
 
ParentsOf4

ParentsOf4

Well-Known Member
Sirwalterraleigh said:
Yep...I remember when the tickets were $52, the passes were $300, the rooms at port were $90 and the restaurants had an a la carte menu where you could get a $12 burger or a $14 pasta dish too! 🤔
Click to expand...
This is what I paid for the first ticket I bought!

1983 tickets.jpg
 
hopemax

hopemax

Well-Known Member
I have been wondering, through all of this, the 50th anniversary if we might see the return of the classic 5-day, non-expiring park hopper (at no extra cost). Or at least not expiring for the length of the 50th anniversary. Non-expiring would provide some confidence for people worried about picking specific dates and having to change them if there are still some virus fires, or employment related. If things are really bad, they can do the "buy 3 days get 5" promo that was so popular at Disneyland for so long (not sure if WDW committed to that as much as DL did).

But then I started thinking that I'm not sure how many current guests remember the classic 5-day, non-expiring park hopper.
 

Register on WDWMAGIC. This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.

Back
Top Bottom