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Orlando Becoming East Coast Headquarters for Disney Parks, Experiences, and Products
- Thread starter The Visionary Soul
- Start date
We know that is all you heard, now you are just being rude about it. There was no throne intended. As I mentioned, don't take it personally. What you take out of it is your choice. If you like Be Our Guest Restaurant's design, so be it. You brought it into the conversation and people critiqued it compared to other work by the same company and standards and you did not like their responses. So much so that days later you want to quote my post to make sure to call me patronizing by posting a patronizing post? Cool.
Good luck to all who resigned and declined the relocation to FL. Hopefully they have some savings to live on while being unemployed.
All good. I said what I had to say. Moving on. No hard feelings.
Separation packages help for those who got them.
Like a typical company package of one week pay for every year worked for the company? It is better than nothing.
the.dreamfinder
Well-Known Member
Is it though? WDI is nothing more than a very expensive toy maker. They don’t make art anymore, though artistry is required to create a successful piece. They are no different than the people who make the action figures, plush, picture books or apparel.
Eisner and Strategic Planning threw WDI under the bus for their failures on EuroDisney.
Iger set it in motion with his Franchise/IP mandate and his, and others, low view of themed entertainment generally limited what was possible. Iger/Rasulo/Staggs largely oversaw the outsourcing of WDI under the guise of cost savings (remember MAPO?). Now Chapek came in as P&R head and decidedly moved the direction closer to what he knew, merchandising. This was an obvious endpoint, parks are no more than an ancillary revenue stream.
You have multiple generations of leadership who don’t understand or respect theme parks layering their worldviews, the resulting consequences, onto how this business is run.
Despite their considerable contribution to the company’s profits, Theme Parks are not on the same level as Film and TV. Many, many things need to be changed, but management needs to bring theme parks to the same level as the other two media units.
*I’d also argue Video Games needs to be moved out of DCP for the same reasons, Studios could be a good home, but that’s a topic for another day.
Universal/Comcast was/is faced with the exact same challenges that Disney has. But the difference in approach has been amazing. Whereas Disney got NFL USO got Harry Potter, no comparison. Whereas Disney got a scaled back EPCOT with delays to everything else, USO is full speed ahead on its new gate. This is by no means entirely indicative of the failure of WDI, but it just proves how entirely useless it is and why it’s being relegated to the swamp and outsourcing, because it has no worth to the organization other than its “legendary name”. And the self aggrandizing fools like Instagramineer The Zach just make it worse.
Sometimes, sometimes more. That is fairly generous in the business world as it is, because the option to stay and move with the company is a difficult decision, but not the most unheard of thing in many industries.
Notes from Neverland
Well-Known Member
It goes without saying that this is going to be interesting to follow for Disney's short-term and long-term future.
Not as important, but I'm curious ... what happens to the old tours Adventures by Disney held that included stops to Imagineering?
Not as important, but I'm curious ... what happens to the old tours Adventures by Disney held that included stops to Imagineering?
ULPO46
Well-Known Member
Always a pleasure no matter where on social media or Dis Boards! Yes as I've stated I'm young, married but have no desire for children anytime soon. My wife works for Palmas Restaurant Group aka Mexico Pav and Coronado Springs, so I will finally be able to make Orlando more permanent for myself and our future. Long distance has been rough but that's a part of the job when we have parks on 3 continents. If anyone watched the Imagination Story on Dis+ you pretty much heard Joe Rohde imply he was not happy about Pandora. But I mean everyone will find work elsewhere for Joe, he went over to Virgin Galactic.
Virgin Galactic Announces Legendary Former Disney Imagineer Joe Rohde as Experience Architect - Virgin Galactic
With preparations underway for the first Future Astronauts to arrive at Spaceport America, Virgin Galactic has brought in Joe Rohde as a strategic advisor.
Most high profile Imagineers will find work, whether here in SoCal or Florida or anywhere else in the world. Those who are more script/screenplay and sound engineering will have a much more difficult transition, why Florida is not the entertainment capital of the world. It all just depends on who is an expert in what field.
ULPO46
Well-Known Member
I can't quote on it for sure but the Grand Central Creative Campus will remain Disney property. But with a very reduced Imagineering Presence. Grand Central does way more than just parks, every Disney Consumer product gets tested there before it goes to Mattel, Hasboro and other manufacturers. It will remain, just not in the same function. It's just a very difficult time frame for a majority of imagineers to sell homes ect for an uncertain future. For all most know we can get laid off the moment we arrive in Florida people have to put that in balance. But you can't be held victim if you truly love your job even if moral is low, waking up every morning knowing you love your job is worth while.
Sir_Cliff
Well-Known Member
I don't know I agree with all that. Sure, Harry Potter shows what Universal can do, but I don't think that level of detail and attention to theming is representative of their approach to theme parks more generally. Epic Universe might be impressive, but I feel as disinterested in it as I would if Disney were to announce a park made up of a random assortment of IP lands... which is probably exactly what Disney would announce these days.
That's all to say that I don't think WDI's issue is they're not matching or should be trying to learn from Universal Creative. They need to go back and learn from their own history.
EPCOTCenterLover
Well-Known Member
After just being in Universal Orlando, I have a feeling that Epic Universe will be the best designed complete Uni park stateside to date.
The first Florida park, the Studios, is mediocre aside from Harry Potter. But Islands of Adventure is a good park with great Potter design and content and only getting better. Then came Diagon Alley back at the Studios. It is the best single IP land I've ever seen!
In order to truly compete with Disney, they need to steal one more day from them in a weeklong vacation. And I have a feeling they can do it. They'll design on par with Disney, and then they will continue to increase their market share of tourist's days. I'm saying this as an old school classic Imagineering fan who didn't want to believe Uni / Uni Creative could compete. But they can.
UNCgolf
Well-Known Member
Maybe.
Diagon Alley is absolutely phenomenal and definitely the best IP land I've seen as well -- Hogsmeade is pretty good, but nowhere near as impressive overall (and ended up wasting Hogwarts in a pretty short-sighted way). Those areas are straight out of a huge franchise with a limited number of settings that are ingrained in pop culture, though. I'm certainly not suggesting it was easy to do, but it was more of a direct recreation than most theme park areas.
It'll be interesting to see what they do for lands that aren't so ingrained in pop culture/don't already exist in a live action medium.
bcoachable
Well-Known Member
I see Uni understanding the Orlando theme park game better than ever, and because of that, making sure Epic Universe is a grand slam.
Uni has done great things in Orlando, and, it had major missteps.
Based on that track record, EU could be great, horrible, or somewhere in between.
WDF
Well-Known Member
RSoxNo1
Well-Known Member
Where was this posted?