Plans have been filed for DVC expansion at Caribbean Beach Resort

[lockedoutlogic]

It's funny Disney under Iger has had an ego problem.

Bruce Vaughn long gone WDI head was quoted saying Disney is untouchable...

This as Universal inches ever closer.

They do have an identity problem...they've spent the last 16 months scrambling to try and figure out how to get the stock price back up to $125 a share...that's it. They are in a bubble economy and yet act like it's 2002 and It's nothing but damage control.

 

[Sweettears]

Well I'm in the middle of Disney war.

Eisner came into the company and found out right away that theme parks were a pure money maker for Disney and a constant stream of revenue. His first act was raising ticket prices. Back in the 80s the raise wasn't much of anything and nobody except Dick Nunis was opposed.

Fast forward to EuroDisneyland. Eisner was in love with the the idea of a Paris park. He pushed for it to be an amazing park while Wells helped keep him in line. Eisner had some crazy ideas, including a Disney branded restaurant that would have locations across the country. Wells was always the one there to keep him in check.

The swan and dolphin project was a big part of "Disney's expansion" in Florida. Eisner had a competition with architects to come up with the best design. Michael Graves won out and Tishman wasn't exactly pleased but they went forward. Graves also worked on the Parks project. Eisner loved the architect who did yacht and beach too. Eisner always would stay at yacht when at WDW and that architect worked on the parks project.

Sorry a lot of rambling but I suggest a read of the book if you haven't read it. Eisner always saw Theme parks as that safe spot unlike TV and film which weren't as safe and his beef mid career with Katzenburg.

Disney needs to go back to the two person model. Walt and Roy or Eisner and Wells is what worked best. It all went downhill when Wells died. Eisner even had heart surgery right after that.

I don't disagree that having a complimentary team wouldn't be helpful but the biggest missing piece after the Wells Eisner tandem was Roy leaving the board and having no influence.

 

[lockedoutlogic]

Granted he fixed the Pixar issue but the other acquisitions, park expansions haven't proven to be a success at this point in time. Eisner started the expansion outside the US. Iger's efforts are a continuation of that strategy. The long term success of these properties has yet to be determined. Don't underestimate the power of ego that says if we can expand to Europe we can conquer Asia.

As far as the WDW expansions are concerned I think we should wait and see. Toy Story Land for one seems to be greatly diminished from its original concept. Everything being developed now seems to have an element of let's get it done sooner rather than later all of a sudden. This is what makes me tie it into Iger's term as CEO that was supposed to be ending.

A trained dog could have fixed Pixar. That was 100% about Eisner in a peeing contest with Steve jobs.

Eisners biggest park achievement was the consolidation of Florida...that place is the heavy hitter and always will be.

He made some overreAches and got silly late...but left much more than he found.

Iger...on the other hand...will get nothing out of wasting 10 years in China. Wall Street doesn't care...they know there's no money there because they know where they run their sweatshops.

What's next? Disneyland Mumbai?

And Alexander had no problems in Europe...Asia proved more difficult. Rome had that problem too.

They can't get anybody to watch Star Wars there...that's like fishing with dynamite.

 

[lockedoutlogic]

I don't disagree that having a complimentary team wouldn't be helpful but the biggest missing piece after the Wells Eisner tandem was Roy leaving the board and having no influence.

Roy Disney was the most important figure in Disney history...1.0 and 2.0

 

[Sweettears]

Exaclty...


And yes...the growth of Disney after the bottom out in 1984 rapidly gave eisner enormous street cred...not only over his board but also over his shareholders...it allowed him the ability to over expand WDW (his favorite) in about 10 years. It allowed him to plow through the problematic Paris project...and ak - which the board didn't particularly like (zoos are trouble and always will be)...and nearly got him his dream park in Virginia. He also got to overpay for abc - which brought us iger and was viewed as a horrid overpayment at the time.

That doesn't happen if he hadn't turned the movies around, if animation hadnt come back, and Disney didn't boom as a marketing force...that doesn't happen.

Yep. And the ABC deal was because it was his baby.

 

[lockedoutlogic]

Yep. And the ABC deal was because it was his baby.

110%

 

[rteetz]

Wells spent his last 5 years dealing with Paris. The reality is I think shouldn't have been in France. Great park though.

I agree and that was all Eisner who pushed for the location it is in.

 

[lockedoutlogic]

I agree and that was all Eisner who pushed for the location it is in.

That is true. He insisted Paris. They could have picked a more temperate area in southern France or mainly Spain and fared better.

He had a romanticism about Paris. It is the greatest city on earth though...so I can't judge too much.

 

[rteetz]

That is true. He insisted Paris. They couldn't have picked a more temperate area in southern France or mainly Spain and fared better.

He had a romanticism about Paris. It is the greatest city on earth though...so I can't judge too much.

They had a deal in the works with Spain and the government was more friendly but that Paris location wouldn't go away. I do hope to get there someday.

 

[Sweettears]

A trained dog could have fixed Pixar. That was 100% about Eisner in a peeing contest with Steve jobs.

Eisners biggest park achievement was the consolidation of Florida...that place is the heavy hitter and always will be.

He made some overreAches and got silly late...but left much more than he found.

Iger...on the other hand...will get nothing out of wasting 10 years in China. Wall Street doesn't care...they know there's no money there because they know where they run their sweatshops.

What's next? Disneyland Mumbai?

And Alexander had no problems in Europe...Asia proved more difficult. Rome had that problem too.

They can't get anybody to watch Star Wars there...that's like fishing with dynamite.

This is exactly what I was saying or at least meant to say in my earlier comments. CEO mind thought. If it worked before It must be better if I double down.

The Jobs Eisner deal was 200% macho combat. Interesting how Jobs heirs have gone out of their way to divest their Disney holdings.

 

[PuppyJonathan]

Paris was really Eisners first big failure with Disney. When Wells died Eisner even went as far as wanting to put his wife on the Disney board. People thought he was nuts and put a stop to that.

That's honestly when I break Eisner into two categories, before wells and after wells. He burned so many bridges after his death it's actually insane to think about how much the company declined after that. If you ask me the best thing he did the second half of his CEO term was Animal Kingdom, even though that was announced a year before wells died. Then he screwed up feature animation, sold the Disney stores, messed up the parks with DCA and other rushed projects and made really bad financial decisions. His first ten years were amazing though, highly recommend waking sleeping beauty for a watch

Now back on topic, I'm staying here in may, will I get a mug without a food court?

 

[rteetz]

That's honestly when I break Eisner into two categories, before wells and after wells. He burned so many bridges after his death it's actually insane to think about how much the company declined after that. If you ask me the best thing he did the second half of his CEO term was Animal Kingdom, even though that was announced a year before wells died. Then he screwed up feature animation, sold the Disney stores, messed up the parks with DCA and other rushed projects and made really bad financial decisions. His first ten years were amazing though, highly recommend waking sleeping beauty for a watch

Now back on topic, I'm staying here in may, will I get a mug without a food court?

My guess is yes you'll get a mug, they'll have a fountain at the grab and go location. They aren't going to deprive the DDP people of their mugs

 

[Sweettears]

That's honestly when I break Eisner into two categories, before wells and after wells. He burned so many bridges after his death it's actually insane to think about how much the company declined after that. If you ask me the best thing he did the second half of his CEO term was Animal Kingdom, even though that was announced a year before wells died. Then he screwed up feature animation, sold the Disney stores, messed up the parks with DCA and other rushed projects and made really bad financial decisions. His first ten years were amazing though, highly recommend waking sleeping beauty for a watch

Now back on topic, I'm staying here in may, will I get a mug without a food court?

Wells was a check on his ego to some extent. At least he had the support of the board which in corporate speak is paramount.

For what ever reason it seems that Rhode had a lot of influence or support with the higher ups to get A K done. Despite his shortcomings I give him a lot of credit for making AK one of my favorite WDW parks.As far as the mug is concerned, I'll be grabbing a few in a couple of weeks. Although mine won't have the requisite chip to get fountain drinks.

 

[rteetz]

Wells was a check on his ego to some extent. At least he had the support of the board which in corporate speak is paramount.

For what ever reason it seems that Rhode had a lot of influence or support with the higher ups to get A K done. Despite his shortcomings I give him a lot of credit for making AK one of my favorite WDW parks.As far as the mug is concerned, I'll be grabbing a few in a couple of weeks. Although mine won't have the requisite chip to get fountain drinks.

Rohde tried several times to get AK passed. Eisner himself said Disney doesn't do zoos. Rohde brought a live tiger into the board room one day and that got the idea flowing.

 

[Sweettears]

Rohde tried several times to get AK passed. Eisner himself said Disney doesn't do zoos. Rohde brought a live tiger into the board room one day and that got the idea flowing.

The ghost of Walt when he brought in a deer for the animators to learn how to draw Bambi. I'm not familiar with all of the imagineers but I'm greatful for Rohde.

 

[Sweettears]

That's honestly when I break Eisner into two categories, before wells and after wells. He burned so many bridges after his death it's actually insane to think about how much the company declined after that. If you ask me the best thing he did the second half of his CEO term was Animal Kingdom, even though that was announced a year before wells died. Then he screwed up feature animation, sold the Disney stores, messed up the parks with DCA and other rushed projects and made really bad financial decisions. His first ten years were amazing though, highly recommend waking sleeping beauty for a watch

Now back on topic, I'm staying here in may, will I get a mug without a food court?

Also recommend Waking Sleeping Beauty. And as long as we are way off topic the film with the Sherman Brothers is outstanding as well.

 

[PuppyJonathan]

Also recommend Waking Sleeping Beauty. And as long as we are way off topic the film with the Sherman Brothers is outstanding as well.

It is outstanding but I found it sad because of Robert

 

[LSLS]

So I really hope people cancel reservations (I CERTAINLY would) unless they get A.)An upgrade/another moderate at no additional cost or B.) About $75 off per night. Sure, POFQ went without a Food court. At a much smaller resort, and you could walk 10 minutes to a different food court (POR). Move offsite if they won't do one of those two options. You will have a great room, great amenities, and after the resort fees/parking or uber to and from the airport, you will end up with about the same cost as a moderate hotel. People need to start standing up to Disney sticking it to the customers.

 

[sachilles]

No real good spot for this post, so I'll add it to this thread.
Do we all remember the cost cutting and up charges(of course we do). All seemed to make sense when they announced star wars land, toy story land and the struggles of the asian park. We figured it was belt tightening to afford these new lands. ESPN isn't helping either.
These resort, and transportation projects are the hidden things we didn't think about in that belt tightening phase.
This is an epic spending phase for the company.
Anyone remember the fallout from 9/11, and how a certain value resort construction was halted?
It's a pretty volatile time in the US politically. That can have a severe financial impact, for better or worse. There has to be some execs sweating this growth spurt. I'm sure they have Iger setup to take the fall if anything derails this growth. Either pull it off, or take your golden parachute and jump.
It's going to be a very interesting time.
I think it's a huge risk to have all of this happening at once. I think for the first time in a while, I think you will see disney rushing project timelines to get things done, that they'd normally let the timeline double. They simply can not allow all this stuff to linger. It needs to be completed so that the money making machine can churn at full strength.

So while the permits may be in place, and construction is imminent, we must temper our enthusiasm, as we are only one world event away from having a bunch of stalled half built structures on property. They will pull the plug if they have to.

 

[Phicinfan]

It's gotta be 100% about cost efficiency...that's all I can figure.

The cable car idea fits neither the caribbean theme nor the general site lines of the area.

But...what it does is eliminate the need for beams...which killed the monorail.

not to jump in on you debate, but I am pretty sure its been expected that the new expansion at CBR is NOT CBR themed. CBR is being reduced, and that whole area will be new development and themed to a different area.

Add to that, you are missing the focus. The Gondola is NOT to address the theme of the new DVC resort. The new DVC resort is the HUB for the Gondola, the Gondola is just the new cheap link for Epcot, DHS and AoA and new resort.

Net, don't focus on cable car for theme, its based on cost and less bussing needed.