Strategic marketing analysis of Walt Disney's Parks and Resorts

Seminar paper from the year 2013 in the subject Business economics - Marketing, Corporate Communication, CRM, Market Research, Social Media, grade: 1,0, San Diego State University (College of Business Administration), language: English, abstract: The Walt Disney Company is one of the biggest media and entertainment corporations worldwide. It was founded by Walt Disney in October 1923 starting with the production of a series of Alice Comedies. The first Mickey Mouse cartoon was then released in 1928 (The Walt Disney Company, 2013a).
Today the company operates in five business segments: media networks, studio entertainment, consumer products, interactive media and parks and resorts (The Walt Disney Company, 2013b): the Media Networks comprise broadcast, cable, radio, publishing and digital businesses across two divisions - the Disney/ABC Television Group and ESPN Inc. Disney Studios include Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios, Disneynature, Marvel Studios, Lucasfilm and Touchstone Pictures. They also own two music labels and theatrical groups producing Broadway shows like 'The Lion King' or 'Disney on Ice'. Disney Consumer Products is the world largest licensor and delivers toys, apparel and books. They operate 350 Disney retail stores worldwide. The business segment Interactive Media creates entertainment for digital media platforms like games. Finally, the segment parks and resorts comprises five vacation destinations with 11 theme parks and 44 resorts in North America, Europe and Asia, with a sixth destination currently under construction in Shanghai. They also have four Disney Cruise Line ships; 12 Disney Vacation Clubs approaching a total of 200,000 member families; and Adventures by Disney, which provides guided family vacation experiences to global destinations.
In 2013, Disney earned revenues of $45,041 million which represents an increase of 7% compared to 2012. The net income gained 8% to $6,136 million and the earnings per share for the year 2013 increased 8% to $3.38 (The Walt Disney Company, 2013c, p.1). Its profits amount to $5.6 billion and the market cap is $103.96 billion which makes the company very valuable. At the moment Disney has approximately 166,000 employees around the world (Forbes, 2013). The parks and resorts segment was one of the main growth drivers in 2013: they contributed more than 31% ($14.1 billion) to the overall company revenues and 21% to the segment operating income. (...) Therefore, the parks and resorts play a very important role in the company's brand portfolio. The paper will therefore focus on this business segment.