The Problems of Adaption to the Local Market in Cross-Culture Management and Operation ——Case Analysis of the Euro Disneyland

Historically, the film, music and theme park powerhouse encompassed by the Disney Corporation has enjoyed massive success in exporting its brand, identity and products internationally. And on a domestic scale, Disney's theme parks and resorts have achieved a level of success fully unparalleled in the tourism amusement industry. However, success on a similar scale remains quite elusive where the international theme park industry is concerned. Just as Disney has struggled to gain a foothold with its Paris-based theme park, so too has its Hong Kong destination manifested more challenges than victories.

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.

Disney believed in magic. Disney is a common household name. In fact, some toddlers can recite the name of their favorite characters from their favorite Disney movie. It is not uncommon to see adults watching a Disney movie, and I would venture out and say most Americans have been to Disney Land or Disney World once in their life. Needless to say, Disney is part of the American culture. However, translating the success that Disney has had in the United States to another country can present a lot of challenges. As we will see, in this case, Disney did not do their homework when it came to planning this project in Europe. Some of the challenges that the company had were their makings such as hubris management and a lack in understanding their customer’s cultural differences

“Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.” – Walt Disney (Goodreads). The success of Walt Disney films, theme parks and company has built a legacy and attracted the attention of millions of people. Through the animated stories they enable to fill children’s imaginations with entertainment. Disney has embodied American culture with its catchy tunes and mass marketing. It has portrayed different repertories through movies and TV shows that shine light into different cultures, which is centered to be a controversial aspect. Not only has Disney become controversial, it has also become popular with its accomplishment in being able to create a wide spectrum of animated characters.

In my opinion, these are three main reasons attributing to Euro Disney fail. Firstly, the lack of prior market research and study for European lifestyle and cultural before European Disney built. Euro-Disney chose to spend excessive expenditures on the establishment，but Euro-Disney did not recognize the geographic and cultural differences between Europeans and Americans. For example，most of Europeans will not notice leather wallpaper when they had their lunch in Disney，and most Europeans are not used to stay overnight in the theme park, so the heavy investment in hotels will bring more risk for Euro-Disney. Secondly, higher price did

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

Attendance and operating income in France were less than anticipated and a major restructuring of the Euro Disney operating company was affected in 1994. Cultural challenges, as well as a European recession in the early 1990s, resulted in less than expected success of the park and its related hotels and facilities. Renamed Disneyland Paris early in 1994, and with enhanced performance, the Disney European experience finally began to pay off for this facility, which, by the late 1990s, was the largest theme park in Western Europe!

When the International Offer of Shares for the Euro Disneyland S.C.A. (in the following called Euro Disney) was published in October 1989 the plans for this new enterprise of the Walt Disney group were ambiguous. The financial plans for the first year of operation projected total revenues of FF 5,482 million and a net profit after taxation of FF 204 million. For the following years the development should be even more impressive. At that time the plans were seen as a consequent application of the concepts of the existing Disney-designed theme parks.[1]

Globalization is the worldwide movement toward economic, financial, trade, and communications integration. Globalization has impacted many different companies like Nike,Reebok,McDonalds, and Walmart. In order to have a successful globalization and spreading that brand across the world is something that Disneyland has mastered over the years. Opening in 1955 Disneyland was founded in California the company and brand took off over the years and has been globalizing across the world in many of different Countries. While many argue Globalizing a company brands is a bad route to take because it is taking away from the American made style and the company using other people to work for cheap at these other countries across seas. I believe that Disneyland is a good thing for the economy and boosting other countries economy, opening job opportunities’ for people in those countries, and bringing many cultures and people together.

As Disney decided to go global, their first expansion was launched in Japan in 1983 and eventually turned out to be a success but it’ proved to be a false sense of security for its overseas expansion’. When Disney launched its name on the European market in 1992, there were a lot of cultural issues that arose during its planning stages. They were particularly accused of ignoring the French culture and exporting American Imperialism in its European Venture. The main issues were alcohol consumption, language, pricing of tickets and merchandise tarnished the name of the Disney brand. Farmers also protested for the fact that Disney would be using their precious land in constructing their theme parks. These issues made Disney aware that venturing into non-American markets would be very complex due to cultural differences. (Cohen, N/A)

Mickey, a major promotion tool of Disney management did not create reason or attraction enough for the European community, unlike at the sister theme park Tokyo Disneyland. European families found EuroDisney to be an “over-rated” promotion of American culture and lifestyle, contrary to what

At the press conference announcing Euro Disneyland SCA’s financial results for the year ended September 30, 1994, CEO Philippe Bourguignon summed up the year in succinct terms: “The best thing about 1994 is that it’s over.” In fact, the results for the year were better than many of Euro Disneyland’s long-suffering shareholders had predicted. Although revenues were down 15 percent – the result of falling visitor numbers caused by widespread expectations that the park would be closed down – costs had been cut by 12 percent, resulting in a similar operating profit to that of the previous year. The bottom line still showed a substantial loss (net after-tax loss

As a conclusion, all of these factors are foreseeable by Disney. Lack of knowledge of the local culture and the American ethnocentric tendency make the foreseeable things covered with the mist. Global recession, wrong pre-assumption, and Unknowledgeable of local culture are controllable things that can be managed well. For example, during the global recession, Disney can introduce affordable packages which may attract people on visiting Euro Disney. The wrong pre-assumption that affect the construction design can be overcome by building a fast and temporary facilities while waiting for the permanent building is being built. Hiring local French advisor is one of the solutions to the lack of local culture knowledge. Yet, The intense competition that came from the Olympics, world fair, and landmark’s event are foreseeable but it’s hard to be controlled as such Olympics is just happening once in 4years and other events might happens once a year. People are more interested to visit those events rather than Euro Disney that can be visited anytime.

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.

differences of cultures between Euro Disney and the United States. Euro Disney does not stand