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[phantom247]

I hope Shareholders understand what a negative impact James A Rasulo has had on Eurodisney SCA and vote not to re-elect him to the Supervisory Board this year.

[Alpop]

Explain a little further. What has he done that was so negative? Generally you only ever hear the positives about the board.

[ford prefect]

One man is not to blame for the company's turmoil.  The indebtedness is a far reaching and complex issue that is not going to be solved by the election of board members.

Equally, a witch hunt against the poor chap is counter productive.

[phantom247]

I would not call it a witch hunt do you know who was one of the main decision makers as CEO of Eurodisney with the construction of WDS and told investors that what we where going to provide Guests on opening the park to the General public was what they had asked for in terms of Shows and attractions when the park opened this was found to be totally unfounded.  There are plenty of other bad decisions he made while being in control of the resort.
Since his departure to be in charge of all resorts and destinations worldwide he has diluted lots of local decision making powers for not just our resort but WDW and Disneyland which has caused lots of problems re marketing, Sales bookings, Merchandising with dictating that we should have more generic merchandise on resort that's why Legends of hollywood in WDS park has a very small range of merchandise specially developed for the park, operating procedures etc.

[ford prefect]

The link below is the company biography for Rasulo.

http://corporate.disney.go.com/corporat ... asulo.html

He has 22 years of experience within the Disney Company.  A lot of his decisions made (and make) good business sense.

The rationalisation and standardisation of merchandise allows for better purchasing and profit margins.

It is important that operating procedures are standardised across TWDC.  Although Eurodisney SCA is a corporate entity in its own right it is indirectly owned and managed by TWDC.

http://corporate.disneylandparis.com/co ... l#contentj

The above link shows the ownership.

The modus operandi has to be consistant otherwise control will be lost and it becomes difficult to combine accounts.

Generally I think Rasulo did a reasonable job and have voted accordingly.  The last thing Eurodisney SCA needs is a destabilised board.

[phantom247]

Ford Perfect I respect your opinion but when you look at things like Merchandising the more shops that have identical products do not increase sales as Guests will only buy a product once if your talking about the Disney Stores this policy would work but not in Parks where people look for something different which reflects the overall theme of the Park.
Don't always take things from the company line talk to industry insiders and reporters such as Jim Hill and Mouseplanet who covered the departure of the last CEO of Disneyland CA and the real reasons why he departed from the Company and took a possition with a large hotel chain ask them both if they can give you a link to these old articles you will find it very intresting.

[Disneyland Paris Treasures]

It seems to me that there are two types of people to look at here. There are those who are interested in investing heavily in marketing and promotions and short term schemes to drive attendance for attendance's sake. It is an interest in "filling quotas" that motivates this type of person. This type of person usually spends their time worrying that unless they are pushing to get higher "numbers" they aren't going to get promoted or keep their job. It's all about "numbers." This usually translates into how can I look like I'm investing, but really save as much money as possible? That's why any investment goes into marketing and promotions as they tend to be cheaper in the long run.

The other type of person, while they are interested in keeping their job, is not focused on that. They are doing their job because it is something they love. It is not just a job for them. This type of person is interested in investing heavily in the park, the infrastructure and the people. These types of investments can be incredibly costly and they are long-term. They don't show immediate results and the risk can often times be substantially larger than with short-term investments. However, the benefits from this type of investment are HUGE. It is this type of investment that people are referring to when they talk about "quality of show" and "details". This is the type of investment that Walt Disney was interested in. This is why Disneyland started out with a million dollar budget and quickly ballooned up to 17+ million.

Jay Rasulo fits into the first category of people. Greg Emmer and John Lasseter, Tony Baxter, they all fit into the 2nd group.

+1

[ford prefect]

I appreciate your comments, the merchandise is a thorny issue, however purely on a commercial basis the fewer ranges you have the better your purchasing.

There is an argument that DLP has too many boutiques.

I would love there to be a wide choice of themed merchandise as there used to be when the resort opened.

It is a very expensive (and not particularly profitable) sales policy.

An interesting fact is that people will browse more and buy more because although there isn't a huge choice there is a mindset amongst holiday makers that "they must buy something"  So, they will!

Mobi: Perhaps Rasulo is from the SPQR brigade, I don't think there is anything wrong with that, every company needs a balance and Disney has to tread a line between artistic integrity and profit making whilst entertaining a family audience.  I don't believe that he is "worried about his job" or pushing for figures for their own sake.  I merely get the impression he focuses on the bottom line.

I must admit to paying very little attention to MousePlanet and Jim Hill, since I have found their sources to be unreliable.  Company sources (whilst obviously biased) are duty-bound to be factual.

Some companies are an exception to this rule but generally I believe Disney to be honest.

I will try to find the info you suggested (although, being lazy I would be grateful if you could point me in the right direction!!!).

For me, the very nature of being a shareholder means that I trust the company, since I am not (nor ever will be) in a position of being able to see the big picture, I have to rely oh the honesty of the company officers.  Naive?  Maybe, but my share dealings and business dealings have always been successful.

[Willow]

I'm not going to vote (due to me only recently getting shares).

I haven't got any issues with merchandise or how Mr Rasulo operates the Disney Parks
The real decisions which affects the park occur at much lower managment levels and visitor numbers suggest that there are no issues with how Joe Bloggs perceives Disney Parks Worldwide.