Euro Disney: The first 100 days

By:
Leandro de Mello
M. D. Hemandra
Devenathan
Athi Shankar
Rajamurthukarpagam
Sivakumar

12/08/09
 A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris
August 1988: Construction starts on the 2000 hectare site
located 32km to the east of Paris, in a still-rural location
near Marne- la-Vallee.
December 1990: Espace Euro Disney (an information
centre) opens to the public.
September 1st 1991: Casting Centre opens.
Late March 1992: Euro Disney opens for testing. During
those test-weeks, employees (and their families) of the
major sponsors such as Philips and Renault were invited to
visit.
April 11th 1992: Press preview day. Attendee Michael
Sandstrom
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 A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris
April 12th 1992: Euro Disney opens. Inaugural ceremonies
broadcast to entire continent by five national networks.
(500,000 visitors did not turn up for the first day of
business: in fact, barely 50,000.)
The first phase of development (the theme park, hotel
complex and golf course) cost 22 billion French Francs to
complete.
May 1992: Up to 3,000 employees have reportedly quit
over pay and working conditions.(Attendances are low;
20,000-25,000 visitors, much lower than the predicted
60,000. Only 3 out of 10 visitors are French. Company
stock falls to FF 123 ($22.70), down from $30.50 before
the opening.)
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 A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris
August 1992: The park is now expected to draw around 9.6
million visitors this year, as opposed to the 11 million that
had originally been projected.
Late 1992: European recession causes property slump and
Euro Disney falls into serious financial difficulty.
April 12th 1993: The park's first birthday.
Summer 1993: The new Indiana Jones roller-coaster ride
opens.
Early 1994: Euro Disney in crisis.

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 Visitors

9% Other
18%

18% 8%

40%

3.5% 3.5%

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 A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris
June 1994: A financial rescue package is announced which
involves a number of actions: the Disney Company agrees
to waive its royalty fees for 5 year; agreement by the banks
to support better loan repayment schedules; a new issue of
shares.
August 1994: All of the park's hotels are fully booked
during the peak holiday season.
October 1994: The park's name is officially changed to
"Disneyland Paris". The 'Euro' part of the logo had been
reducing in size for some time, and the name gradually
transformed from "EURO Disney" to "Euro Disneyland"
to "Euro Disneyland Paris" to "Disneyland Paris".
 A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris

November 1994: Slightly more encouraging year-end

figures are released. The previous year's UKP 650 million
loss has been slashed to around 200 million. This is despite
a 10% fall in attendance to some 8.8 million visitors.
Winter 1994: Unlike previous years, all of the site hotels
remain open for business.
Spring 1995: Disneyland Paris repeats its successful 'Kids
go Free' promotional offer.
April 1st 1995: New lower entrance prices come into force,
with an average of around 20% reduction on the previous
adult prices, slightly less for child passes.
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A Brief History of Euro Disney /
Disneyland Paris
August 1995: For the first time in its history, Disneyland
Paris and the Euro Disney resort complex announce a
profit.
15th November 1995: Euro Disney announces it first annual
operating profit.

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 Topical Information
 Park Opening Hours
 Dates Hours


January 10am-6pm
February 10am-6pm
March 10am-6pm (Sats 10am-8pm)
April 10am-6pm (Weekends 10am-8pm)
May 10am-6pm (Weekends 10am-8pm)
May 16-19 10am-8pm

10/28/02
 Topical Information
 Dates Hours
June 1-21 10am-6pm (Sats 9am-11pm, Suns
10am-8pm)
June 22-30 9am-11pm
July 9am-11pm
August 9am-11pm
September 1-7 9am-11pm
September 8-30 10am-6pm (Sats 10am-8pm)
October 10am-6pm (Sats 10am-8pm)


10/28/02
 Topical Information
During busy periods, a 'Magic Morning' scheme operates
which provides hotel residents with access to selected
areas of the park an hour before the general public.
Park Seasonal Structure and Current Entrance Prices
 Seasonal Structure
Low Season Jan 8-Mar 1, Sept 30-mid Dec
High Season Mar 2-Sept 29

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 Service Triangle

Building customer relationships.

Work for Developing, promoting & delivering of Standard

Services.
Service Triangle
 Management - Customers :
External Marketing


 “Setting the promise”

Effort that the firm engages in to set up its
customer expectation & make promise to
them what they deliver.
 External Marketing

Careful analysis of what customers expect

Mission: Making people happy
Approach for achieving mission
 Failure in External
Marketing

Changed their American inclined advertising to make it

more descriptive

Fake promise of promotional priced tickets

No visibility of the Disney characters shown on TV

Showcased a big theme park but distances are difficult to

cover
 Employee - Customer :
Interactive Marketing
 “Delivering the promise”
Where the promise is kept or broken is totally depend
on the employee hand.
People are critical at this occasion.
If promise is not delivered customer is dissatisfied.

 Interactive Marketing

Devoted
Creative

Hardworking
Persistent
Kind
Loyal
 Management - Employee :
Internal Marketing
 “Enabling the promise”.
These are the activities that management will engages
in to aid the providers in their ability to deliver on the
service promises: recruiting, training ,motivation
rewarding , providing equipment and technology.
 Failure in Internal
marketing

Employees were told to smile which didn’t work with the

French culture

Many employees quit due to imposition of American culture

Had standard French job classification

 Internal Marketing

Clear instructions will be given to the employees regarding:

The role to play, Where to report, What to wear, How to
handle typical encounters.
Proper training is provided before the employees face the
customers.
New developments will be intimated to the employees.
 Failure in Interactive
Marketing

Promise of a multi linguistic staff proved wrong when the

ticket counter staff could not speak German

French drivers were not so happy with the limited parking

space
Service recovery strategies
 Fail-safe the service


 Welcome and encourage

complaints


 Act Quickly


 Treat customers fairly



 Learn from recovery

experiences


 Learn from lost customers

Thank you

NE
Questions?