Originally Posted By Donny If you were at the park as I was on WDW's 40th any feeling you had about the celebration had to be connected with Meg Crofton.
Originally Posted By Dreamerica I cant understand why the 40th birthday wasn't turned into a huge year long celebration with a special parade and other things to commemorate such a milestone. If they were able to have all that "100 years of magic" stuff a few years back, they certainly could have come up with something for the 40th. It's hard to figure out WDW management .
Originally Posted By Donny I was very underwhelmed with the celebration but to almost any observer you could see lines out the door for 40th anniversary merchandise.Before today I did not have an opinion of Meg and I must admit beyond what I am about to say ,I still don't, but the speech she gave was very bland and almost seemed forced.the guy after her was great and the story he told when he was first a cast member showed his love for the guests.If I would have seen the Orange bird maybe I would have walked away with a more positive experience.
Originally Posted By HokieSkipper <<the guy after her was great and the story he told when he was first a cast member showed his love for the guests.>> Yea...that's the same guy who when presented with two different Pirates overhauls picked the cheaper, less time-consuming one claiming, "The guests won't know the difference." Phil Holmes holds no true love for the guests.
Originally Posted By leobloom >> you could see lines out the door for 40th anniversary merchandise << Well, sounds like the 40th was everything the execs hoped it would be. Cheap and profitable.
Originally Posted By standor Shame on Disney for being so cheap and not caring for their customers (so called guests). Boycott is the only language they will understand. Stay away and do not give them any of your hard earned money until they lower the prices and give more value.
Originally Posted By Witches of Morva ORWEN: We tried that tactic with the Horned King in the Land of Prydain, once. All it got us was thrown into his castle dungeons and tortured nearly to death!!
Originally Posted By TP2000 I watched the YouTube video of the ceremony. It was mostly painful, although the little procession before it honoring the previous anniversaries when they actually did something was fun. It obviously didn't cost 'em much; just make the big banner at SignMart, and add sparkly ribbons to the symbols on the end of the nervous Flag Boys' batons. Throw in a deli platter from Publix for the executives and some overtime work for the character rehearsal this week, and they probably got away with the whole thing for under ten thousand bucks. The Ambassador who introduced the 40th show was frightful. "It is my pleasure to welcome you to Magic Kingdom Park at Walt Disney World!" Yikes. What slimy and humorless lawyer wrote that script for her, and why did she agree to that gig? The poor dear. Meg Crofton was trying, bless her corporate heart, but she just doesn't come off as believable. You can tell she is an HR executive; they are cut from the same cloth in every big company, and HR drones really shouldn't be allowed to get up on stage like that. Phil Holmes was only slightly better, but still there's that corporate slime oozing out from between his smiling teeth and he just doesn't connect on a human level or sound trustworthy. They had practiced their scripts though, so at least they tried, but we aren't stupid. Interesting that no one from Burbank made it out there. Just some Floridians wandering around in the swamp pretending that everything is magical. I can think of some recent public cremonies where Disney theme park executives get up and give a speech that connects with the audience, and where they show genuine emotion for the park they are speaking of. This 40th show was not one of those times. But then, I don't know that those types of executives exist out there in Florida.
Originally Posted By Friar Tuck and Roll Many of the folks around me seemed disappointed with the presentation. Some wanted to know why no true celebrity was present for this, like say Julie Andrews. She was the host for the Grand Opening special, so it would have made a lot of sense. I was lucky in where I was standing and was able to converse with Charles Ridgeway about the original opening day. That was much better than anything said on stage and I think it would have been great if Disney would have put some of the opening day designers or cast members on stage for this ceremony.
Originally Posted By TP2000 Brilliant idea about Julie Andrews! She would have been like having Art Linkletter come back for Disneyland's 50th ceremony, which he did. Julie was also the official Ambassador and hostess for Disneyland's 50th, and really seemed to shine in that role. I'm sure she would have been happy to have been flown out and put up in a nice suite for a few days at WDW, if she'd been asked. But they probably already maxed out the 40th budget when they got that deli tray from Publix.
Originally Posted By leobloom At least they had "special" cupcakes available for purchase and plenty of limited-edition merchandise. Would it have killed them to give the cupcakes away for free?
Originally Posted By -em >>At least they had "special" cupcakes available for purchase<< Umm they ran out of cupcakes in the first oh 2 hrs and couldnt keep up with demand the rest of the day (heard they made only a couple thousand) When I stopped by to photograph them it was a 20 min wait for one and they were completely done by 3-4 o'clock.. They were super basic- basic single colored swirl with a edible image of first the 40th logo then after those ran out an 'e ticket' so no reason there wasn't enough... ------ Due to the Wine n Dine that night I didn't get to the MK until 8:30 so was stopped before the turnstyles due to the opening "show" which besides mentioning the birthday was the same. Booked it down Main Street to pass a gift card off to my friend who was in the pin line (who had been there since 5am) then waited for the ceremony. Expected a bit more from the "parade" and ceremony- Went and met up with my friend who had conquered the merchandise line then hit Harbor House. Afterwards I booked it to Wide World of Sports for the Expo- Heard lines were long but not overwhelming all night and the fireworks weren't worth a mention as there was no special tag just added perimeter to standard Wishes.. -em
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 Jim Hill wrote about why the 40th wasn't a big(ger) affair <a href="http://jimhillmedia.com/editor_in_chief1/b/jim_hill/archive/2011/09/29/why-for-wdw-s-40th-anniversary-celebration-is-kind-of-on-the-modest-side.aspx" target="_blank">http://jimhillmedia.com/editor...ide.aspx</a>
Originally Posted By WDWVacationer What they did was mostly a disappointment. The fact that they featured all the past celebrations did nothing but make me more angry and remember how Eisner sure knew how to throw a birthday party. New attractions, entertainment and televised specials featuring the stars of the day. For an entire year you knew WDW was celebrating "x" years. Those were the days. Where was Burbank by the way? Eisner always showed up for these things. The ceremony was so bland. Nothing like slimy corporate executives standing in front of banner reading "Magic Kingdom PARK". Meg did manage to squeeze in a Walt quote, as always. Pisses me off since she has killed everything he stood for. And Phil makes my skin crawl. I really expected a Wishes tag featuring music from the park and lots of extra pyro and not like, 8 shells. They could've done SOMETHING during the daytime parade or ran Spectro. All I have to say is I want an 18 month long blowout for the 50th and the resort better have no problems.
Originally Posted By TP2000 Two thoughts here; 1. Jim Hill is still around? And he actually thinks we can't see right through his laughably vague prediction that there will some new "shows and parades" by 2021, and his even more laughable grab into thin air that there will be a 5th theme park in 2021? 2. The executives in charge of WDW, especially Crofton and Phil, are borderline pathetic. No wonder no one from Burbank bothered to fly out for the 40th; if I was Iger or Staggs I wouldn't want to go out to the swamp to hang out with those two squares that run Gatorland either. They desperately, DESPERATELY, need to shake up the entire executive team out there in Orlando. You can only blame so much on the heat and horrible climate, then you just have to realize it's not working.
