News TWDC Organizational Shakeup - Parks combined with Consumer Products

[EricsBiscuit]

I will say this might not have that big an impact because Chapek is still in charge. It looks like they might be trying to combine their slower segments with good ones to make their numbers look better.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I need to put you in the same room of the folks who are saying ESPN will bring the whole company down and let you all fight it out over whether one division affects another.

Espn is gutting the profits and stagnating the stock...

I mean...500 or so people that write about Wall Street got together in a room 8 or so years ago and continue to keep making up the same story, right?

I think you might be clutching your blankie company too tight here...some things are purely opinion...some are absolutely not.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

People died under Pressler’s leadership.

...I did emotionally

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

The wall street folks seem to think this is an upgrade not a downgrade. Apparently Parks, Experiences and Consumer Products is the largest division by revenue and profit.

Some folks here seem to think this is a downgrade because of a couple hundred Disney Stores? That is very short sighted.

If Chapek squanders this opportunity and let’s the parks rot like Rassulo did, he gets booted from the race for the big chair.

Love him or hate him, Chapek is the first Parks leader in a long time to define a new path for P&R and actually get things moving (albeit a IP centric path).

Wall Street shares none of the same opinions/goals of the disney fan/consumer...

That's rule #1 and it's not gonna change

 

[2351metalcloud]

What do some of you all think about whether Disney considering future possibilities of virtual reality and augmented reality experiences could have been influential on the decision for parks and consumer products to be listed in the same grouping?

 

[MisterPenguin]

Because it puts the parks at the same level as The Disney Store: just another place to dump cheap shirts and toys made in China.

So, let's get this straight what you're saying. If a company has diverse projects and some of them may not be as much of an import as the others, then it must spin off the lesser project into its own sequestered division because putting it under the same division as a more important project is necessarily diminishing its importance?

 

[the.dreamfinder]

What do some of you all think about whether Disney considering future possibilities of virtual reality and augmented reality experiences could have been influential on the decision for parks and consumer products to be listed in the same grouping?

Disney’s moved towards letting each division explore new technologies by themselves for their own needs and reporting their findings to one another. So Lucasfilm has ILM XLab, which focuses on VR experiences and production visualization tools, the animation studios have played with it on “Zootopia” and “Coco”, and WDI has been a pioneer on the research side and built DisneyQuest. VR/AR, like most new technologies, should be intergrated naturally into the existing divisions to meet existing needs and future opportunities, not in some catch all division stifled by know nothings.

 

[Slowjack]

@wdwmagic, your front-page article includes the words "Signirncatly" and "pervious." Remember, coffee first .

 

[larryz]

So, let's get this straight what you're saying. If a company has diverse projects and some of them may not be as much of an import as the others, then it must spin off the lesser project into its own sequestered division because putting it under the same division as a more important project is necessarily diminishing its importance?

No, what I'm saying is, when you're a merchandise guy, everything's a channel.

 

[larryz]

@wdwmagic, your front-page article includes the words "Signirncatly" and "pervious." Remember, coffee first .

That's highly signirncat.

 

[montyz81]

Wall Street shares none of the same opinions/goals of the disney fan/consumer...

That's rule #1 and it's not gonna change

And rule #2 is that most company leadership spend more time listening to Wall St then they do the Consumers... TWDC is no different, sadly.

 

[andysol]

Shocking... Said no one, ever:

"Bob Chapek, Chairman, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, will assume additional responsibility for all of Disney’s consumer products operations globally, including licensing and Disney stores, as Chairman of the new Parks, Experiences and Consumer Products business segment. “Bob comes to this new role with an impressive record of success at both Parks and Resorts and Consumer Products, and he is the perfect leader to run these combined teams,” Mr. Iger said. Mr. Chapek will continue to report directly to Mr. Iger."

Edit: There's more in that article about Chapek and some quotes from him... But they made me throw up in my mouth just reading them, so I can't repost them.

As a theme park and WDW Fan - I, like most here, can’t stand Chapek.

But this reorganization has definitely put someone with a tremendous track record in charge of the two things he has been incredibly successful at. He took Consumer products to new heights; which led to his promotion to parks. And then he has done nothing but take Parks to unprecedented levels (in terms of profit). The guy is killing it in the board’s eyes.

Obviously, streaming is the goal with this reorganization, but with consumer products underperforming- they saw a way to put the “best” guy in charge of two things he has done nothing but print money for.

 

[HauntedPirate]

As a theme park and WDW Fan - I, like most here, can’t stand Chapek.

But this reorganization has definitely put someone with a tremendous track record in charge of the two things he has been incredibly successful at. He took Consumer products to new heights; which led to his promotion to parks. And then he has done nothing but take Parks to unprecedented levels (in terms of profit). The guy is killing it in the board’s eyes.

Obviously, streaming is the goal with this reorganization, but with consumer products underperforming- they saw a way to put the “best” guy in charge of two things he has done nothing but print money for.

If "tremendous track record" is equivalent with "raising prices, bigger profits, and higher profit margins", then I agree. But that's all the board cares about, so this is what we now have.

Thought I read somewhere that this reorg also makes it somewhat easier to "jettison" things like ESPN down the road, if they can't turn around it's sagging financials.

Edit: You know what really bites? There are a lot of people, myself included, that want Chapek to fail and fail hard, because he's a "merchandise guy" and has zero background in theme parks. But what would something like that do to P&R in the future? Kind of like the Eisner/Iger change - Yeah, he's "new", but what if he's worse than what he's replacing?

 

[mikejs78]

Then why not raise Consumer Products by lumping it in with all of those blockbuster movies whose merchandise they sell?

Because Bob Chapek has experience in both.

 

[SourcererMark79]

If "tremendous track record" is equivalent with "raising prices, bigger profits, and higher profit margins", then I agree. But that's all the board cares about, so this is what we now have.

If I ran a business and raised the price of everything 25% over 5 years, in sure my shareholders would be so happy they would be swimming in dollars. It doesn't take a brilliant person to succeed by doing this.

 

[lazyboy97o]

Because Bob Chapek has experience in both.

He does not have real Parks experience, but even then he could have been given both jobs instead of a massive corporate restructuring.

 

[Rodan75]

If "tremendous track record" is equivalent with "raising prices, bigger profits, and higher profit margins", then I agree. But that's all the board cares about, so this is what we now have.

Thought I read somewhere that this reorg also makes it somewhat easier to "jettison" things like ESPN down the road, if they can't turn around it's sagging financials.

Edit: You know what really bites? There are a lot of people, myself included, that want Chapek to fail and fail hard, because he's a "merchandise guy" and has zero background in theme parks. But what would something like that do to P&R in the future? Kind of like the Eisner/Iger change - Yeah, he's "new", but what if he's worse than what he's replacing?

I get the dislike of Chapek, Studio IPs for the sake of Franchise extensions and upcharges galore (the upcharges would have happened under any of the recent Parks leaders). But again, he is the first person to own Parks to get projects actually approved and get construction moving in a long time. And a lot of it...staged in very short succession He has gotten Iger to open the wallet for items outside of Iger-driven projects (Shanghai, DCA-Redo, Pandora).

 

[ford91exploder]

Wall Street shares none of the same opinions/goals of the disney fan/consumer...

That's rule #1 and it's not gonna change

If Wall Street felt that they could make more money by auctioning off TWDC assets, they would force Iger to do so in a New York minute. The key to Wall St, They want things that are good for Wall St, Not necessarily things that are good for the companies themselves.

Example Bain Capital (Mitt Romney's company) is forcing Toys'R US out of business. Because they feel auctioning off the companies assets would be better for investors than fixing the company.

 

[EricsBiscuit]

If Wall Street felt that they could make more money by auctioning off TWDC assets, they would force Iger to do so in a New York minute. The key to Wall St, They want things that are good for Wall St, Not necessarily things that are good for the companies themselves.

Example Bain Capital (Mitt Romney's company) is forcing Toys'R US out of business. Because they feel auctioning off the companies assets would be better for investors than fixing the company.

Well TRU was losing money hand over fist. WDW is making money hand over fist. So is the rest of TWDC.

 

[smile]

what has he done except maintain, really?

the ol chap has yet to effectively manage or properly reign in wdi's costs and time to market, for one thing
- there's some interesting goings-on out west....

good thing the industry's booming