Originally Posted By SuperDry From Reuters/Yahoo: <a href="http://tinyurl.com/dm39o" target="_blank">http://tinyurl.com/dm39o</a> <<< Japan's Oriental Land Co., operator of the Tokyo Disney resorts, reported a 9 percent decline in nine-month net profit on Thursday, reflecting a fall in visitor numbers, but it kept its full-year outlook. The company said its net profit totalled 16.54 billion yen ($139.6 million) in the April-December period, against 18.19 billion yen a year earlier. The company also said it was hurt by increased costs from offering special events for longer periods. >>> That doesn't bode well for special events going forward, does it? <<< The full-year outlook [of 14.4 billion yen] is lower than nine-month earnings because the Tokyo Disney resorts -- Disneyland and the adjacent DisneySea -- usually draw fewer visitors in the colder months of the fourth quarter. >>> That's fascinating. Just to clarify, the Japanese fiscal year is April 1 - March 31, so when they refer to the "fourth quarter" above, they are referring to January 1 - March 31. What's fascinating about this is that they actually operate the park at a net loss during January - March and know this up front. The other interesting thing from this article is that if you assume 25 million guests for the year and divide it out, they make less than US$5 per guest on average. This is the number I remember reading several years ago regarding other Disney parks. Sometimes we think that they're making a fortune off of us, when we add in admission, food/beverage, and merchandise. But their overall take is rather slim as compared to what we might think average guest spend is. Also, it's fair to note that OLC pays licensing fees to WDC based on the gross revenue. That is, WDC gets its cut off the top from varying percentages of ticket sales, food sales, and merchandise sales. So the above figures quoted by OLC almost certainly are after they've made their profit contribution to WDC's bottom line.
Originally Posted By Mr X >>>The company said its net profit totalled 16.54 billion yen ($139.6 million) in the April-December period, against 18.19 billion yen a year earlier. The company also said it was hurt by increased costs from offering special events for longer periods.<<< Well, now we see why they're getting rid of lots of entertainment. ALTHOUGH, I have to wonder about the "chicken or the egg" argument. How many people might NOT have shown up, if the special events had not been offered? Seems to me that there is a MARKED increase in customers whenever a special event is running, but of course that's just my opinion and not based on anything scientific of course. However, I CAN say that, when special events are dark, the parks are quite dead (of course, during those times, the parks would have been "dead" anyway being between holidays or offseason times). Makes ya go "hmm...".
Originally Posted By SuperDry <<< How many people might NOT have shown up, if the special events had not been offered? Seems to me that there is a MARKED increase in customers whenever a special event is running, but of course that's just my opinion and not based on anything scientific of course. >>> That is quite the dilemma, isn't it? Especially at TDR, which has a tradition of lavish special events. And I don't mean that they should do things just because of tradition, but because the fan base is driven to the parks by the special events. Figuring out the optimal balance between all of this is why the head honchos get the big bucks, right? Or so the theory goes.
Originally Posted By TDLFAN They did it to themselves. Keep repeating the same stuff year after year, and tick off the regulars.. No reason to go back if they don't care to try and offer new and varied events...
Originally Posted By TDLFAN BTW... still waiting for Leemac to claim SuperDry robbed his topic and link.
Originally Posted By Mr X That IS an interesting point TDLFAN, OLC blaming the LENGHT of special events (doesn't seem all that different from years past) rather than perhaps the quality or repetitiveness of them. Then again, of COURSE they'll try to make themselves look as good as possible in the report, and having the report mention that they "generously" ran nice, long special events and it hurts them makes the company seem like the victim.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney Wow too bad. I've never been a show guy, so the special events ironically kept me AWAY from the parks because I knew they would be packed to the gills. But its obvious they are needed and as far as I knew, its WHAT kept the people coming back again and again. Then, they decided to take a chance and just recycle a lot of the same stuff and people caught on. Again, you condition people to a certain quality and standards, you can't expect them to automatically accept lower standards because you don't want to put in the energy anymore. Better for me though ;D.
