Volume 2, No. 4. February 22, 2002
Shared reaction
Amid the forecasts, promises
and sometimes contentious grumblings typical of The Walt Disney Company's annual
shareholders meeting, this week's session in Hartford, Connecticut, saw stockholders
put forth two proposals that could have far-reaching impact for the whole amusement
industry.
This was the first shareholder meeting of any sort to witness a fallout of the Enron Corp. bankruptcy scandal. A shareholder proposal to ban Disney's independent auditing firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers, from also serving as a consultant to the company won 40 percent of the votes cast. Though the proposal failed to pass, analysts say the number of yea votes was extraordinarily high for a first-time proposal.
The vote, however, was effectively moot. Though Disney's board had opposed the proposed audit policy last September, the company adopted the measure anyway in January in light of public, political and commercial consternation over the growing Enron scandal. "We've been very prudent in this area over the years, with close and active oversight by the audit committee," news reports quoted Disney Chairman and CEO Michael Eisner. "But, in the current world, it's become more important than ever to make sure our shareholders, and the market as a whole, have full confidence in our financial reports, including the integrity of the auditing process." Wall Street watchers expect shareholders across the United States' commercial landscape to take up the issue throughout the year.
The other proposal set its sights squarely on the amusement industry itself: that Disney report to its shareholders the company's amusement park safety measures and medical response policies, identify all injuries on all Disney amusement park rides since 2000 and disclose the costs associated with those injuries, "including legal and out-of-court settlement costs incurred by the company." Prompted by a spate of highly publicized accidents at Disneyland in 2001, the proposal also referred to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission July 2000 report on ride-related injuries.
The Disney board also opposed this proposal, citing the company's and the industry's overall safety record the past 50 years, Imagineers' adherence to ASTM standards, rigorous inspection practices and oversight by both insurance companies and state regulators. "We therefore believe that The Walt Disney Company is already an industry leader in promoting theme park safety and that a special report on the subject would not meaningfully benefit the Company or its shareholders," the company's proxy statement said.
The proposal won only a 4 percent approval, but needed only 3 percent to return to the table at next year's meeting. Consequently, the assault on the industry's safety standards has engaged another front.
A song in his heart
To Darrell Metzger, his newest Pacific
Rim challenge is "kind of a dream job." One week into his role as CEO of Sentosa
Development Corporation overseeing the operations and improvements of Singapore's
island resort, Metzger was sifting through all the ways he could spend a total
of SGD$3 billion (US$1.6 billion) projected financing of a 10-year expansion
plan for the resort.
"This is a great one," he said of his new work. "We've got all the resources to do a good job here. Even though the economy is bad now, I look at that as a positive. You don't want to come in at the top of things, you want to come in at the bottom because even your mistakes look good."
Calling his Sentosa helm "a great one" says a lot for the man who was part of the management team that brought Tokyo's Disneyland on line in 1983, who helped organize the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles and the 1986 World Fair in Vancouver, and who served as CEO of Ocean Park in Hong Kong from 1991 to 1996. There he implemented a five-year plan there that boosted annual attendance from 2.4 million to 4 million.
Sentosa, who hired
Metzger after an international search, wants him to replicate his Ocean Park
success—only moreso. The 10-year master plan, which is expected to gain
government approval in the next few weeks, aims to boost annual visitation from
3.8 million last year to 8 million. "Quite simply we're playing with a lot more
money here," he said. There's
a lot more risk, the goals are more challenging, but we have the resources to
do it."
The strategy, however, is virtually the same. With attendance stalled the past
few years—"A polite word for it is that attendance on the island has stabilized,"
Metzger said—Sentosa will look to increase local traffic to the island
while building its resort offerings for international visitors. For the long
term Sentosa will develop its two beach areas as restaurant, retail and entertainment
centers. "There isn't much waterfront activity in Singapore, and this is a great
opportunity to create a local destination," Metzger said. The island also will
get a theme park, "something in the range of SGD$200 million (US$110 million),"
he said. "If we can't find anybody to do it for us, we'll do it ourselves."
Small attractions on the island that are not doing well now will be "fixed or shut down." Already Sentosa has closed its waterpark. "The problem we had with that and other smaller attractions was that operators were new to the business and didn't understand that you had to continuously invest and add new activities." To engender such devotion to reinvestment, Sentosa will require long-term leases of up to 30 years rather than the 10-year leases of the past. Those attractions that have performed well will get significant investment. The dolphin show in the lagoon, for example, may become a Discovery Cove-type immersive program. Sentosa will also get its own rapid transit system linked to Singapore's subway.
To build buzz for the short term Metzger is looking to special events: a fireworks festival, a music festival and upgrades to its Sandsation sand-sculpting festival with live shows based on the upcoming Scorpion King movie. A musical fountain show also will get an overhaul. "We want to start building momentum so that, first of all, residents start expecting to see new things every few months and the tourism bureau starts talking about us," he said. Then, in the coming years when the hotels, golf courses and other resort attractions come on line, Sentosa will be poised to attract tourists from North America and, particularly, Europe. "Instead of being a three-day stop-over in Singapore, our lure will be to stretch that out for a week." And keep them coming back for more.
Pinning hopes on the
future
Once positioning itself as the fun
and games venue of the future, GameWorks is about to take a page out of America's
past to further its coolness factor. Bowling—the real 60-foot-long lane,
10-crashing-pins kind—will be joining the video games and virtual sports
typical of the hybrid arcade/nightclub when Minneapolis, Minnesota, opens its
GameWorks in the fall.
"Bowling is the ultimate party game," said Ron Lam, CEO of GameWorks. Almost
a third of Minneapolis GameWorks's 35,000 square feet (10,600 square meters)
will be devoted to a 10-lane bowling alley called Hollywood Bowl with disco
lighting and a dance-happy soundtrack. Lam envisions that GameWorks, located
in downtown Minneapolis, will entice groups of workers from surrounding office
buildings to drop in for lunch and a roll or perhaps engage in happy hour bowling.
Lam was in Newport, Kentucky, yesterday to host a pre-opening party at GameWorks' 13th venue, and he said the company improves with each outing, further distancing itself from its 1997 founding as a cutting-edge, adults-oriented arcade in Seattle. Until Minneapolis' edition is completed, Newport's will serve as the model GameWorks. This 25,000-square-foot (7,500-square-meter) center is set to open March 15 in the Newport on the Levee retail and entertainment complex across the river from Cincinnati, Ohio. It contains the Jax Grill restaurant serving a full menu of starters, entrees and deserts, the Hopscotch Lounge serving signature cocktails in an intimate setting, and in between the Arena Bar where bartenders and wait staff occasionally break into a percussion and dance routine. The center will also contain more than 200 games and virtual experiences, including the Big Win Zone filled with redemption games.
These disparate sections are arranged in full view of each other to maximize sight lines to the various entertainment elements, whether that entertainment is chefs flipping pasta with their skillets, bartenders drumming on ice buckets or other patrons playing games. "Everything is open; everywhere you see entertainment," Lam said. Despite its name, GameWorks is trying to position itself more as a fun place to hang out than as a place to play games, he said. "It's all about socializing."
Cliff's hanger resolved
After eight years of wrangling among
themselves, and then months of bureaucratic foot dragging, Cliff's Amusement
Park in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is finally getting its very own wood roller
coaster, the state's first and a first of its kind for the American West. It
was a new mayor, just two weeks into his administration, who finally put the
project on the fast track, and Wednesday Mayor Martin Chavez joined park owners
Linda and Gary Hays in formally announcing the $2 million project.
The wood track on steel frame coaster by Custom Coasters International is scheduled to open June 21, 2002, just shy of the mid-point of Cliff's season. "Because of all the delays, we thought, 'Well, do we wait another year?'" said Gary Hays. But with Cliff's operating on a weekends-only schedule through the first week of June, the Hayses decided the new coaster would only miss three full weeks of the high season.
Part of the coaster's
delays came at the hands of the city's Planning Department. "The zoning was
fine, but the Planning Department felt like we needed to go through a series
of public hearings," Hays said. Then Mayor Chavez took office December 3, and
Hays managed to get a meeting with him and Planning Department officials December
14. "He looked at the project and looked at them and said, 'What's the problem?'"
Hays recalled. "They said, 'We need to go through public hearings.' He said,
'Is the zoning OK?' They said, 'Yeah.' He said, 'This is an amusement park,
this is an amusement ride. Get it done.'"
Though the ride is
not the state's first coaster—Cliff's already has a steel Galaxy coaster
installed in 1977—it is the first custom-built, large-scale ride on record
in New Mexico. This also will be CCI's first installation west of the Mississippi
River of the wood track on steel frame type coaster. Yet to be named, the coaster
will wind through the park's Kiddie Land and pass over a couple of buildings
and walkways. A unique pretzel design near the end of the ride will have the
train passing into a 100-foot-long (30 meters) underground tunnel. "One of the
neat things about CCI is they have the ability to build over and around and
above things with wood coasters," Hays said.
The new coaster signals
the Hays' decision to stay put on their current 15-acre site. Over the past
few years they had been in discussions with the city fairgrounds and nearby
Native American reservations about relocating the park. "We kept putting off
and putting off making a decision on the coaster thinking something was going
to happen," Gary Hays said. "We decided we couldn't wait anymore." On the other
hand, Hays expects the coaster to spark renewed interest in landowners who may
re-initiate relocation talks.
"From that standpoint, this type of coaster is moveable," Hays said. "That would be one heck of a job, but when you consider it in the cost of building a new park, it's doable."
World's Cup
Even as the Winter Olympics are fading
into fond memories, the next big athletic gathering will be getting under way
Down Under. Resuming after a one-year hiatus, the Challenge Cup competition
among West Australia corporations will heat up at Adventure World Fun Park in
Bibra Lake near Perth.
Admittedly, this will not be Olympic-calibre competition. Events include the
"Slip and Slide Obstacle Course," "Balls Up" (maneuvering a ball with mechanical
hands) and the "Ski and Track Relay." For that contest, five members of each
team must, in tandem, race on one giant ski to the end of the course, then five
teammates race back in a rolled-up carpet.
"Bigger corporate groups
look to put teams in the Challenge Cup not only as a great team-building event,
but a big event for spectators who cheer their companies on," said Kirrily Spencer,
sales and promotions manager for Adventure World. The park is hoping to sign
up 48 teams comprising five females and five males each, plus two alternates.
Teams will be divided into three heats, competing March 9 and 10 and March 16,
and the top finishers from each heat play in the final on March 17. First place
earns AUD$1,500 (US$770) and an exclusive breakfast function at Adventure World.
Second place wins $750 (US$385), and the third-place team gets $250 (US$128).
Prizes also will be awarded to the best cheer squad and for the best team uniforms.
Corporations pay $1,089
(US$559) to enter a team, or for $1,750 (US$899) the company will also get 100
Adventure World admission tickets, a $29.50 (US$15) value each, that it can
sell or give away. Spectator tickets cost $8.50 (US$4) for blocks of 20. The
competition takes place in the evening after the park has closed to the general
public, but Adventure World's new ride, Rampage, will continue operating
for the Challenge Cup participants and spectators.
For the park, the Challenge
Cup attracts media attention just as Adventure World is entering its post-summer
shoulder season. The program also boosts the park's group events marketing efforts.
Having run the competition for 10 years, Adventure World decided to drop the
Challenge Cup last year while it pursued other special shoulder-season events,
like the adults only swim parties. The off-year also allowed organizers to "revamp
and put a new face on Challenge Cup," Spencer said, and this year's event focuses
more on the competition's team-building aspects, making it even more attractive
to corporations.
"Our corporate market is a big one," Spencer said. "We need to look after them; they are a big part of our group bookings throughout the season. Apart from the monetary benefit, Challenge Cup is an added value for groups taking part. It is exposure for us, something different for them, a very unique event, and a bit of fun."
Z + 6 = $300
Zealand Shannon learned the value
of community giving at an early age. It was part of his family culture. So it
seemed a natural thing for him, following the example of a Hollywood couple,
to celebrate a milestone birthday by asking his friends to give him donations
to a charity in lieu of presents. His charity of choice was his favorite place
in the whole world: the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa, Florida.
That total donation
of $300 Zealand gathered at his sixth birthday party made him the youngest donor
in MOSI history. "Zealand is an example of a true philanthropist, which to me
is someone who gives from the heart because they want to," said Kathryn McManus,
MOSI's vice president of development. "Also, for a kindergartner, this is what
I would call a major gift, a sacrificial, unselfish act of giving. It is more
meaningful in some ways than a $10,000 gift from a businessman, in relation
to his net worth."
Jeff and Gina Shannon,
Zealand's parents, had discussed the concept of charity with Zealand since he
was 4. "We had no idea whether he would latch onto it," said Jeff. But the story
of actors Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones requesting charity donations
instead of gifts for their wedding two years ago prompted the Shannons to adopt
that same tradition in their family celebrations. Zealand, Jeff said, "liked
the concept."
But he wanted to pick
his own charity: MOSI. He especially liked its new "O is for Oranges," hands-on
exhibit aimed at smaller children. Drawing from what he knew of the Make-a Wish
program, Zealand wanted the money he collected for his birthday to go toward
giving other less fortunate children the chance to visit MOSI, too. Zealand's
wishes dovetailed perfectly with the museum's own K+I+D=S program, a fund-raising
campaign aimed at making MOSI affordable for underprivileged children.
Gina Shannon called
the museum asking where she could send the money, but MOSI's management, upon
learning Zealand's stature, "wanted him to come over so we could fuss over him
and make a presentation," McManus said. In the glare of television cameras last
week, MOSI's President Wit Ostrenko stood with Zealand in front of "O is for
Oranges." "Zealand dug down in his pocket and pulled out a wad of cash," McManus
said. "Wit gave him a MOSI pen and a lapel pin, then Zealand and Wit went off
and played in the exhibit together for a half hour. The president wanted to
take him on a backstage tour, and Zealand said, 'No, I'm having fun here.'"
MOSI contacted Michael
Douglas to relay the inspirational tale, and the actor wrote a later to Zealand
congratulating him for his act. "We commend your parents for teaching you about
the pleasure of giving at such an early age, something we will try and instill
in our young son Dylan as soon as he is old enough to understand," Douglas wrote,
and he promised to match Zealand's gift to MOSI.
But there was one thing Zealand himself wasn't old enough to understand. Said Jeff: "When we got the letter and read it to Zealand he said, 'Who is Michael Douglas?'"
Special Haunt Show Issue
Scared kidless
As a primer for the
upcoming Transworld National Halloween Costume and Party Show at the Rosemont
Convention Center in suburban Chicago, Illinois, March 8-12, we want to relate
this story from Drew Hunter. He is currently Design Director at Sally Corp and
one of the leading veteran haunt designers in the country who originated the
Dr. Blood character and show back in the 1970s.
Around 1986 Hunter was producing a special Halloween show for the Wax Museum
of the Southwest in Grand Prairie, Texas (now The Palace of Wax). One night
a pregnant woman got so scared she went into labor. "We rushed her to a back-stage
storage area where we were certain she was about to deliver right then and there,"
Hunter said. An ambulance arrived in time to take her to a hospital before she
gave birth.
Standing by was
her husband. Hunter asked him why he brought his pregnant wife to a haunted
house. "He calmly told us that she was a bit overdue, and he thought maybe a
good scare might help," Hunter said. "It was nice to know that we came through
for him."
Hunter said neither he nor the museum heard from the couple again. "But if you
ever are in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and meet a 15-or-so-year-old girl named
'Waxina' or some such, she just may be the result of having the kid scared right
out of somebody at our show!"
Frightening prospects
It is a place where
people proudly proclaim themselves "evil," "crazy," "mad" and "bloody" as they
engage in business. The annual Transworld National Halloween Costume and Party
Show at the Rosemont Convention Center in suburban Chicago, Illinois, March
8-12 will once again play host to the haunt industry with seminars, exhibits
and macabre parties.
Activities for the International Association of Haunted Attractions begin on
March 6, two days before the trade show, with the Wednesday evening Crazy Bob's
Annual Talk Back Session and Social at the Chicago O'Hare Hyatt Regency. Robert
"Crazy Bob" Turner, owner of the Haunted Hydro Dark Attraction Park in Fremont,
Ohio, began hosting these free-wheeling, idea-sharing sessions in 1998, spending
$2,000 of his own money to rent a room and host 20 of his colleagues at the
first meeting. Now TransWorld foots the bill and last year 300 people attended.
For honest discussion on current issues and problems facing hauntrepreneurs,
this session is invaluable, and it serves as a great place for newcomers in
the industry to meet and mingle with this collegial group. The eating and drinking
begins at 7 p.m. (19,00) and is free for anybody who has signed up for Transworld's
Haunted Attractions Owner/Operator Seminars. All IAHA members not attending
the seminars will be admitted after 9 p.m. (21,00) in time to join Crazy Bob's
open forum.
The bulk of the seminars sponsored by the IAHA take place at the convention
center on Thursday, March 7. Topics cover most aspects of the haunt business,
including insurance, marketing, sponsorships, theming, throughput and working
with actors. With titles ranging from "Rigging and Flying" and "Junk Wars" to
"How To Make A Zombie" and "Guts and Gore: How to make those scenes real and
real gross," the presenters include make-up artists, illusionists and a stuntwoman,
as well as veterann haunt producers. The whole program costs $295. To register,
call 800-323-5462 or visit the web site, www.imevents.com/transworld.html.
IAHA uses Transworld to hold its Annual Membership Meeting and fund-raiser,
Saturday, March 9, 7 p.m. (19,00), at the convention center. In addition to
the election of board members and officers, the event will include the annual
"casket basket raffle" with baskets containing everything from gruesome props
to prize-winning wine donated by haunt attractions. The money raised finances
IAHA operations.
Part of those operations include two publications which will be available to
members this year: an update of the association's Safety Manual, and a new publication
called Haunter's Handbook, containing tips on prop building, make-up, managing
actors and staff, operations and marketing. "We're pretty excited about that
because it is a tangible deliverable for folks," said IAHA President D'Ann Dagen.
As the association gathers more material, individual topics will spin off into
their own manuals, she said. Another new IAHA initiative to be launched at Transworld
will be a legislative survey. "We want to find out the hot topics and goals
for our membership on a federal level and state-by-state," Dagen said. Already
pro-active in sharing safety and business tips, IAHA is seeking more ways to
make sure the only scary things haunters need to deal with are those they spring
on their customers.
Sea dead
people
The woman who created all those bodies floating in the North Atlantic near the
end of James Cameron's movie Titanic will be taking her talents aboard
a real cruise next January, part of a vacation package specifically aimed at
haunt attraction operators. Make-up artist Bobbie Weiner, AKA: Bloody Mary,
and Robert "Crazy Bob" Turner are hosting the Moonlight Fantasy cruise on Carnival
Cruise Line's ship Fascination on a trip from Miami to Nassau, Bahamas, January
17-20, 2003.
Though Weiner was responsible for one of the most gruesome sunken-ship scenes
in cinema history, Carnival approached her last year to be a featured star on
one of its cruises. Originally the program was slated for last November, but
the terrorist attacks of September 11 canceled the trip. When Weiner rescheduled
for next January, she brought on board Crazy Bob. "I needed a Regis Philbin,"
Weiner said. "He's such a crackup. He's such a hoot. He's such fun." As
such he's the ideal moderator for seminars on building haunts and creating scares
and, based on his experience running the IAHA annual fund-raising raffle and
auction at the Transworld show, Turner will be the perfect emcee for a "Who
Wants to be a Monsteraire" horror trivia game, said Weiner. She will do makeup
workshops during the cruise. The program also will include an evening cocktail
hour and masquerade ball. Carnival is giving Weiner conference rooms and space
for the parties.
The programs will be open to other passengers, but Carnival is offering a 10
percent discount to IAHA members. Because of the educational nature of the workshops,
haunt operators can count the cruise as a business expense, IAHA President D'Ann
Dagen said. Weiner also sees the cruise as an opportunity for anybody in the
Halloween business to actually celebrate the holiday, albeit three months late.
"We're trying to get all the people who do Halloween, whether it's the party
store, haunted attractions or makeup artists," she said. "They don't get to
enjoy Halloween, so this will be their Halloween."
Prices start at $379 for inside berths and include all meals, taxes, gratuities,
a bottle of champagne, box of chocolates and souvenir T-shirt. People attending
the Transworld show can sign up either at Bloody Mary's booth No. 3424 or the
IAHA booth No. 3436. The IAHA will also be raffling off two tickets for the
cruise.
New Arrivals
It's
a resort!
Gaylord Entertainment announces the arrival of the Gaylord Palms Resort and
Convention Center in Kissimmee, Florida, February 2, 2002. Measurements: 64
acres, 1,406 rooms, 115 suites, 400,000 square feet ( 121,212 square meters)
of meeting space, 178,000-square-foot (53,939-square-meter) exhibition hall,
three themed entertainment areas, one business center, two swimming pools, one
spa and fitness center, three restaurants, three bars, 14 shops, and a 4,000-square-foot
(1,212-square-meter) child care center. Delivered by Cosentini Associates (lighting),
EDSA (landscape), Hnedak Bobo Group (architecture), ITEC Entertainment Corporation
(entertainment), Lorenc Yoo Design (signage), P.B.S.& J. (civil engineering),
Pelton Marsh Kinsella (acoustics and audio visual theatrics), Thornton-Tomasettie
Engineers and Uzun & Case (structural engineering).
When Gaylord Entertainment officials broke ground on their ambitious, $450 million resort and convention center —the most expensive hotel built outside of Las Vegas—in June 1999, they promised the hotel would open on February 2, 2002. They liked the symmetry of the date: 02/02/02. Even the resort's public relations manager admits that announcing so specific an opening date that early is "crazy."
But at 2:02 p.m. that afternoon, a ceremony in the Palms' grand atrium featuring Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Gaylord Entertainment CEO Colin Reed concluded with a pyrotechnic display and 100-foot (30-meter) banners unfurling from the ceiling. That's 14,02 on the international clock, of course. "We thought about doing it at 2:02 a.m.," Salwoski said, "but it's hard to get the governor to come to your event at 2 in the morning, and the pyro going off would disturb the guests."
Guests began staying at the Palms on January 10 as the resort first hosted small groups, gradually ramping up to larger groups. Even as the official opening event was progressing in the atrium, guests attending the Palms' first convention, the American Bus Association, were checking in.
The resort is expressly
designed with the meeting clientele in mind. "We built it around an experience,"
Salwoski said. "The top two reasons people attend conventions is for the education
and to network. What happens in most places is that once the meetings are over,
there's nothing to do. We built this so there's something else to do here. We
give groups a reason to stay together." Most of that strategy plays out in the
three themed entertainment areas. The Everglades features a storyteller's shack,
with live actors. Key West hosts a sunset celebration every evening with street
performers. St. Augustine is centered on the Fountain of Youth, a fountain show
with narration of Ponce de Leon.
"In Orlando, the second largest hotel market behind Vegas, nobody has really built a resort or hotel focused on meetings and conventions," Salwoski said. Is Orlando the right kind of market for such an enterprise? Gaylord Entertainment already has its answer. The resort booked more than one million room nights, all pre-sold to groups through 2011, before the hotel even opened. And it opened right on time.
Eric’s Turn
Street
cred
According to a recent special aired by the Travel Channel featuring Cedar Point
in Sandusky, Ohio, "Eric Minton has probably ridden more (roller coasters) than
anyone else alive."
This was news to me. And though my interview with them, pictured above, is featured
heavily in the show, I'm sure their source for this assertion was not me. I
know many people who have ridden more roller coasters than I have, and my friend
Lisa Scheinin, the associate editor of ACE's Roller Coaster! magazine, has been
on two or three times more coasters than I.
The Travel Channel show's gaffe on this and other facts and images in its portrayal
of Cedar Point illustrates the duality of credibility gaps. My credibility has
been impinged by a show that, despite its documentary style, frequently strayed
from credibility. The end result, in this case, is a wronged public in addition
to a wronged subject.
Among true journalists, including most of my colleagues covering the amusement
industry, credibility is held dear. We at THE LOOP are so intent on keeping
our credibility standards high that we run corrections and clarifications even
though we correct our mistakes or misreadings on the original source, a luxury
our publishing via a live web site gives us that our print brethren do not have.
We also once deleted a report on a successful New Arrival when we learned that
the park's public relations representative gave us incorrect information.
Most of you have suffered fallout from misinformation broadcast, published or
gossiped about you or your park or company. And what park hasn't suffered at
the hands of a careless journalist, ranging from filming the wrong ride or animal
for their report to making spurious comparisons or juxtapositions? But beware,
too, of your own culpability.
Especially now. The lead story in this week's LOOP touches on the many facets
of credibility involving our industry and the general public in the current
U.S. climate, a climate where the general public is clamoring for higher standards
of credibility.
On the one hand our industry's overall
stellar safety record continues to be assaulted by misinformation and misrepresentative
data. Meanwhile, we as an industry continue to shunt the issue aside, hoping
it will go away, consequently compromising our own credibility. Is the shareholders'
demand on the Walt Disney Co. just a handful of unhappy stockholders finding
an issue to make waves with or is it a legitimate quest for accountability?
It's easier to believe the former, but would that risk doing too little to address
the latter.
Additionally, do not underestimate the public's growing interest in the fallout
of the Enron scandal. No company can afford to mislead the public on anything
from stock reports to marketing images. Just the appearance of giving false
or withholding information can raise a ruckus.
Amusements and entertainment is an unusual industry in that illusion is a key product. The demand and need for that will not change. Just keep those illusions in the safe haven of your park or show.
If you have a
comment or question
contact Eric Minton ric@gettheloop.com
888-902-5667 (outside North America call
1-937-296-9796).
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