On March 4th, Disneyland Paris Management held their Annual General Meeting within the convention centre of the Hotel New York. Although much of the meeting was boring and a little mundane, there were some interesting points brought up throughout. We want to highlight some of them below.
Although they did have a challenging first half to the year, it is good to see there was signs of recovery. Disneyland Paris is still under a huge amount of debt and in 2010 Philippe Gas did say that Disneyland Paris were on top of repaying this. A poor revenue performance would certainly have put this in jeopardy in 2011.
Overall, Disneyland Paris demonstrated a very profitable year. 15 million is certainly a healthy number and places it firmly as the number one destination in Europe. Within several theme park attendance rankings last year, Disneyland Park was in the mix with more recognisable US brands, showing that the demand for such a park was there. With a record attendance for the second half of the year, Disneyland Paris’ popularity certainly seems to be on the increase. It also shows that any promotions used in the second half of the year brought in a record crowd and also increased revenue.
With revenue up and total net loss down, are we seeing a change in the way people see the resort? Is Disneyland Paris finally becoming a profitable company to the point that we may see further expansion? We know that a deal to start ground breaking on a third park has been pushed back from 2013 to as far back as 2030 but it would be great to see the management commit to something big in the shorter term. The resort will continue to create new themes each year bringing exciting new entertainment offerings. 2011 will be no different with the introduction of the “Magical Moments Festival, the addition of Lightning McQueen to Walt Disney Studio’s stunt show and the re-opening of the Tarzan Encounter. You can take a look at video of their introduction here
The final slide to share with you is the attendance for the 2010 Fiscal Year. Already up on 2009, it is very interesting to see where many visitors came from.
It is obvious that the vast majority of visitors are indeed French. It is great to see the turnaround in the resorts 14 year history. When the parks first opened, the French nation were not taken by the idea of such an American park but now they have embraced the asset they have and have shown an increase in the number of people that have visited in 2010. The UK, not surprisingly come second with Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands following behind. One thing I have always found difficult to understand is how the UK has more visitors then countries who are connected by land. To get to Disneyland Paris from the UK is much more costly then Belgium, the Netherlands or Germany. As part of the 2011 strategy, Disneyland Paris will be focusing more more attention on these countries as well as strengthening links with Spain and Italy.
You can find the rest of the presentation and other documentation here. You can also check out the interactive annual review site here
What do you think? Is Disneyland Paris’ luck beginning to change?