The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as Disney, is a major public corporation headquartered in Burbank, California, and is one of the largest entertainment and media companies globally. Founded in 1923 by Walt and Roy O. Disney, the company has expanded its operations to encompass film and television production, theme parks, merchandising, and digital streaming, with notable subsidiaries including Pixar, Lucasfilm, and Marvel Entertainment. Disney's influence extends well beyond its theme parks, which are iconic attractions worldwide, as it significantly shapes global entertainment branding and culture.
The company has a rich history marked by pioneering animated feature films, including the groundbreaking *Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs*, and the establishment of renowned theme parks, such as Disneyland and Walt Disney World. More recently, Disney has made strides in digital content, launching its streaming service, Disney+, and acquiring major media outlets to enhance its content offerings. The company has faced challenges, such as political disputes, financial pressures, and the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, which temporarily affected its theme parks and streaming operations. Despite these hurdles, Disney continues to be a dominant force in the entertainment industry, shaping cultural narratives and leisure experiences for audiences around the world.
The Walt Disney Company
Company Information
- Date founded: 1923
- Industry: Producers and providers of entertainment and information.
- Corporate headquarters: Burbank, California
- Type: Public
The Walt Disney Company, also known as Disney, is a public company owned by its shareholders and one of the largest entertainment and media corporations worldwide. Founded in 1923, Disney issued its first stocks in 1940 and joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 1991. Forbes ranked the Disney Company among the world's ten most valuable brands in 2020 and at number two in its 2023 list of the world's biggest media companies.
Disney's areas of operation include film and television production, free and pay television channels, DVDs, videogames, record labels, radio, book and magazine publishing, theme parks and hotels, licensing, and product merchandising. Among its most renowned companies are Pixar and Lucasfilm and a vast number of cable and television channels, such as The Disney Channel and other Disney channel subsidiaries, as well as Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN), the leading sports channel worldwide, and American Broadcasting Company, one of the top television channels in the United States. For many years, Disney's most profitable channels were ESPN and the Disney Channel.
Although the Disney brand is still linked in the public's mind to its theme parks, a major portion of the company's revenue comes from its broadcasting and cable channel branches. By 2013, Disney's second-largest revenue source came from its parks and resorts located around the world.
History
In 1923, Walt Disney opened a company with his brother Roy, known as The Disney Brothers Studio when it signed a contract with Margaret J. Winkler to produce a series of comedies in which a little girl named Alice and her cat share many adventures. By 1928, the studio had released Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and the first Mickey Mouse cartoons. In the early years, while Walt focused on the creative side, Roy handled the finances and deals for the studio. It was Roy who financed the deal for Disneyland, which opened in 1955, the first of the company's two theme parks in California.
Disney's first feature-length animated film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, premiered in 1937. Walt Disney Music Company opened in 1949. In 1954, The American Broadcasting Company began to air a weekly television show featuring Walt Disney as host, which would win an Emmy Award. Mickey Mouse Club, a long-running children's show, debuted in 1955.
Walt Disney died on December 15, 1966, at the age of sixty-five. In 1971, the Walt Disney World Resort opened its Magic Kingdom park near Orlando, Florida. Roy Disney, Disney's cofounder, died that same year. Disney opened EPCOT Center in Florida, which cost around $1 billion—a stunning amount for the times—in 1982.
In fact, the 1990s were an important decade for the Disney Company. Among its many landmark events, such as opening more parks, resorts, and its first cruise, Disney inaugurated its first Disney Store in Glendale, California; Disney MGM-Studios (later renamed Disney's Hollywood Studios); Hyperion Books, Disney's publishing company; and Disney Interactive and Disney Online, aimed at developing and marketing CD-ROM software and games and at expanding its internet presence. It also increased its media presence by inaugurating Disney Radio and acquiring Capital Cities/ABC for $19 billion in 1995.
Disney continued to expand its media conglomerate in the 2000s, with the acquisition of media outlets such as the Fox Family Channel in 2001, which was later renamed ABC Family and then Freeform in 2016 (in an effort to draw in slightly older audiences as well as the traditional younger market). In 2005, it pioneered the licensing of television episodes from its ABC and Disney Channels via digital download through Apple's iTunes Music Store. Disney acquired Pixar Animation Studios and Lucasfilm Ltd., the entertainment company founded by George Lucas and which included the popular Star Wars franchise. It also acquired Marvel Entertainment in 2009. Therefore, Disney was involved in distributing new installments of the Star Wars films, including The Force Awakens (2015),The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019), as well as Marvel superhero films such as 2018's Black Panther and 2019's Avengers: Endgame, all of which sold extremely well.
In the summer of 2017, Disney announced that it would be taking greater advantage of the increasingly popular digital streaming market by removing its films from Netflix and beginning its own digital streaming platform to house its content. Called Disney Plus, or Disney+, the company's streaming platform launched in late 2019 and included exclusive films and television series produced by Disney. By May 2022, Disney+ had over 137 million subscribers, helped in part by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to increased television watching from home, and popular films that could be found only on the service, such as Hamilton (2020) and Luca (2021). Expanding its streaming offerings, Disney also took over two-thirds of the streaming platform Hulu in 2019.
In early 2022, Disney became involved in a political dispute that resulted in a Florida legislative change that took away Walt Disney World's Reedy Creek Improvement District, described as a special, autonomous area in which the company had been able to control its taxes and parks as well as municipal services. This action was reported as retaliation on behalf of the state government following the company's public criticism of the so-called "don't say gay" bill passed by Florida governor Ron Desantis to severely restrict instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity in school classrooms. DeSantis officially signed the bill to remove Disney's self-governing district into law in February 2023. The following month, Disney World hosted a large LGBTQ conference, which was seen as a rebuke to the new legislation.
In November 2022, Disney announced that its CEO, Bob Chapek, would be fired amid several controversial decisions he had made during his tenure, and that he would be replaced by former Disney CEO Bob Iger. The news came weeks after the company reported disappointing fourth quarter earnings. Iger, who had previously filled the role of CEO from 2005 to 2020, agreed to return to the position for two years to help the company get back on track financially. Iger's return initially caused the company's stocks to rise significantly. In early 2023, Iger announced the company planned to lay off some seven thousand employees that year in an attempt to make up for losses the company had been experiencing, mainly due to lost revenue on streaming content. The streaming business ultimately reached profitability for the first time in mid-2024.
Impact
A company's brand name is one of its most important marketing assets. Global brands, then, have an even wider impact. In the twenty-first century, The Disney Company has positioned itself at the head of global entertainment branding. During the previous century, Disney became an important player in foreign markets by way of its movies, cartoons, and related products. In the 1980s, it ventured to open its first signature theme park abroad. Despite uneven results, many agree that Disney has helped boost the tourism industry and created hundreds of jobs wherever it opened one of its theme parks and resorts.
In 1983, Disney inaugurated Tokyo Disneyland in Japan. From its inception, the park attracted a large number of visitors, even though it posted no profits until 1986. In 2013, Tokyo Disneyland became the second-most visited theme park in the world, with a reported attendance of 17.2 million annual visitors. By the 2020s, it remained one of the most popular theme parks in the world.
Disney opened its second park abroad, Disneyland Paris, in 1992. Until late 2016, Disneyland Paris remained the most visited park in all of Europe. In 2016, however, it posted a rapid 10 percent decrease in visitor numbers and record financial losses in the wake of jihadist attacks on Paris, which led to fears of future attacks targeting the Disney park. After France's tourism rates increased once more in 2017, the company announced plans in early 2018 and subsequent years to invest heavily in an expansion and creative reimagining of the Paris park, including attractions catering to some of their newer brands such as Marvel superheroes, Star Wars, and Frozen. New construction was slowed, however, due to the COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020.
Hong Kong Disney opened in 2005 and was modeled after the original park in Anaheim, California. However, by 2011, Hong Kong Disney was suffering from decreasing visitor numbers and financial losses. Hong Kong Disney may have also been hurt by the global economic downturn as well as the opening of another Disney park in Shanghai, Hong Kong. In 2016, it unveiled plans to open new attractions, from 2018 to 2023, meant to revive attendance. However, expansion plans were reduced following the Hong Kong government's refusal to sell land bordering the resort in September 2020. Expansion efforts instead focused on the existing resort. Late 2023 saw the opening of the park's land titled World of Frozen.
Shanghai Disney took more than twenty-five years to bring to fruition. The park is Disney's largest foreign investment, costing $5.5 billion. It had 11 million visitors in its first year, following the park's grand opening in 2016. Shanghai Disney has contributed positively to Shanghai's economy since opening, increasing the city's GDP and contributing to Shanghai's yearly tourism income.
The COVID-19 pandemic impacted all of Disney's theme parks negatively. Depending on the country, theme parks were forced to close their doors for periods of time in 2020 and 2021. Limits were placed on the number of visitors allowed, and attendants were required to wear masks. Overall, the pandemic caused an estimated loss of $3.6 billion for Disney's theme parks by mid-2021. However, visitors began returning to the parks in large numbers after the arrival of vaccines in 2021, and profitability returned. In 2022, despite rising inflation, theme park attendance soared as COVID-19 restrictions were lifted and families were eager to travel again. The company reported domestic park attendance exceeded 2019 levels on many days in 2022. Though park profits then fluctuated overall, in 2023 the company announced that it would be doubling investments in its domestic and international theme parks as well as its cruise lines.
The international impact of Disney is not limited to its theme parks. Disney aesthetics have been credited with influencing the creation of a wide variety of children's products and design around the world. On the other hand, Disney has been criticized for imposing its uniquely American values on local cultures, not only through its parks and merchandise but also through its ownership of a vast array of news and other media outlets.
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