Question no. 1:
What are some of the characteristics of multinational enterprises that are displayed by the Walt Disney Company?
• They have to be responsive to different forces of home country and host country at the same time although Euro Disney do not have any big competitor as it was the largest amusement park opened in France but it failed to study accurately external environment, needs and wants of people, culture, price, policies, economic, social and legal issues. They should keep local employees rather brining from foreign countries.
• They draw common pool of resources like financial, information, human both are shared by Euro Disney land with other Disney land’s in the world.
• They link different business partners
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The company also shot a 360-degree movie about French culture.
• It opened in Europe because many Europeans visit other Disneyland, so Disney officials were optimistic that opening in Europe would be more beneficial for them.
• Later company studied their French culture and tries to modify themselves according to customer demand.
• Adopt French culture i-e replaced burgers and Mickey mouse which reflect American culture.
HR Strategies:
• “Disneyland Paris” changed their HR policies in order to cope up with crises.
• Employees objected to the pay rates and working condition.
• Employees raised concern about variety of company policies ranging from personal grooming and speaking English in meetings, even if most people in attendance spoke French.
• Their management was not good as of previous Disneyland’s working in other countries.
• They also changed dress code.
• They keep foreign employees for their working.
Financial Strategies:
• To overcome the bankruptcy situation (three years of heavy losses), in 1994 a major investor purchased 24.6 per cent (reducing Disney share to 39 per cent of the company injecting $500 million of much needed cash).
• Disney waived its royalty fees.
• Loan repayment plan is schedulized.
• Arrange investors from French government.
• Issued new shares.
• Disneyland reported a slight profit in 1996 i-e (about $50 million annually); visitors are increasing with the passage of time.
In the
To start off, one major similarity is both Disney World and Adventureland have specific characters that build the atmosphere of their theme parks. For example, Disney World has; Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Donald and Daisy Duck, Cinderella, Snow White, Belle and many more beloved Disney characters! As for Adventureland has a well-known character, the Saint Bernard dog. All the characters that "live in" their theme park attract children's attention very easily. Children are quick to recognize Disney Worlds characters from TV shows they have watched on Disney Channel. The Saint Bernard at Adventureland is a welcoming, fun character to Adventureland, which attracts thousands of tourists. Both theme park's characters endow the same qualities and draw vast amounts of tourist to both of their theme parks!
xix. Walt Disney has researched and developed ideal seasonal opportunities for maximum profitability. For example, holidays offer opportune times for families to travel to theme parks and on cruise lines; Christmas and Easter are profitable opportunities for product release; and because Disney has a strong focus on children, summer (or times when school is out of session) is a profitable season for movie releases.
The case “Euro Disney: First 100 days” talks about the issues faced by the Walt Disney Company when expanding to international borders. The case begins with the history of Disneyland and then describes the reasons behind its success and expansion to various states across the country. It then describes the success of Tokyo Disneyland, first Disney theme park outside America and the factors affecting it.
In 1955, the most charming place in the world was ‘Disneyland’ was open for the public. The idea was to create a magical place for the whole family. Ever since then, Disneyland theme parks have been growing and today Walt Disney Company owns 14 theme parks in the world.
Culturally, Disney cannot force itself on another people, which in this case was the whole of the European continent. Disney promoted its product, the theme park, similar to that of Tokyo Disneyland believing Europe wanted their piece of “Americana”.
One day Walt Disney had a vision. It was a vision of a place where children and parents could have fun together. The more Walt dreamed of a "magical park," the more imaginative and elaborate it became.
The Disney Corporation is a leading diversified international family entertainment and media enterprise with five business segments: media networks, parks and resorts, studio entertainment, consumer products and interactive media. (Disney Corporate, 2009). This company did not become one of the leading corporations in the world without hard work, an extreme dedication to the mission and core values of the organization, and the successful application of the four functions of management: planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. Many internal and external factors may have a direct impact on the four functions of management like: globalization, ethics, and innovation.
The Disney differences are “high-quality creative content, backed up by a clear strategy for maximizing that content`s value across platforms and markets”. Not only that, it also it is the undisputed long-lasting champion of all vacation destinations in general, and theme parks in particular. That reason is that they do it all right, and no one else comes close. For sure, Disney Difference will affect the company’s corporate, competitive and functional strategies in a positive way. The corporate strategy should include some questions like “would it work?” which means suitability, “can it be made to work?” which is
The main problem of the Euro Disney was that all calculations made by Walt Disney Company were based on parks in the USA and Japan considering Europe as a mass of people rather than many countries with different languages and cultures. Americans see theme parks as a destination where you can stay between 4 and 6 days. In Europe, Euro Disney was seen as a part of the experience when traveling to Paris. The cost was also a problem for the park. A night in a hotel inside the park costs as much as a high quality hotel in the French capital. So, given that the park was located 40 minutes by car from Paris, visitors preferred to spend a night in the romantic city of Paris.
Euro Disney marketers have recognized a trend. People are going to theme parks during the weekends for adults as well as children entertainment. Indeed, there is an existing need for entertainment of this kind. Therefore, an opportunity exists in the European market that Euro Disney could have taken advantage of.
IT suggests that there are two sources of isomorphic pressures (1) from the home country and (2) the host country (Davis, 2000). There are so many forces that a company must entertain and must decide between using coercive isomorphism or native isomorphism; corporate strategies from the parent company or imitate from a similar company in the new market (Escobar and Vredenburg, 2010). These pressures are a struggle for Disney who has a strong internal institutional environment and wants to keep their American values. That is WDC solely wants to practice an ethnocentric approach (Karadjova-Stoev and Mujtaba, 2011). In addition, Disney has found success with their first three parks because of its American experience: “TDL is an American in
As we know, Disneyland is very success in U.S. when the first Disneyland built in Anaheim, California on 17 July, 1995. After some debate about the site for a European theme park, Michael Eisner and Jacques Chirac signed a contract for the building of s Disney theme park at Marne-la-Vallee, a region of sunflower and sugar-beet farmland and small villages located twenty miles east of Paris (Janis, F., 1998, P.247). However, the European Disneyland was not as such success as they expected. This essay going to regards the main issues in opening the Euro Disneyland and compare the French cultural with American cultural by using Hofstede’s cultural Dimensions and Trompenaars ‘s cultural dimensions. This essay will then end by
Euro Disney could not modify the main theme of other Disney parks to create something unique for Europeans. Restaurants were not prepared according to the European eating habits and one of the biggest mistakes was not selling alcoholic beverages in the park which has very close connection with French culture. Customers had to leave the park to buy those from outside.
“Disney’s current theme park operations consist of the United States, Japan, France, and Hong Kong, while the geographical scope of its movie distribution and merchandise sales operations reaches almost two hundred countries” including Australia. Disney now plans to expand its global scope of operations of
However, the expectation of a successful first Disney theme park in Europe was just a dream. There were barely 50,000 visitors on the opening days while it was expected 500,000 visitors (Hill, 2000). Euro Disney