Disney Plans To Spend $60 Billion On Theme Parks And Cruises, With New Experiences Based On Animated Features

Addressing investors on Tuesday, the Walt Disney Company announced it will make a massive investment of $60 billion into its Parks, Experiences, and Products unit over the next decade. That figure is double what it spent over the last decade.

The company will ‘leverage’ the work created by its animation artists to create many of these new attractions and experiences. The company specifically mentioned Disney Animation’s Frozen and Zootopia along with Pixar’s Coco, as part of its “wealth of untapped stories” that it plans to “bring to life across our business.”

Why is Disney doing this? Disney’s Parks, Experiences, and Products unit has been one of its most consistent in recent years, pandemic slowdowns notwithstanding. The broadcast tv landscape is a minefield, and rumors abound that Disney is considering unloading its traditional networks including ABC, FX, and National Geographic. Streaming has proved volatile and unpredictable, and just this month, Bloomberg reported that Disney has lowered its Disney+ subscriber target for 2024. The company has also had a very hit-or-miss couple of years at the box office, with films like Lightyear and Strange World ranking as two of 2022’s biggest flops.

What’s included in Disney’s Parks and Experiences? Disney operates 12 parks across six sites worldwide and a cruise line with stops in 94 ports in 40 countries. Tuesday’s release also indicated that Disney owns over 1,000 acres of land ready to be developed to expand park space across its sites.

How will the investment be spent? Disney says it possesses a “deep well” of stories that haven’t fully been explored at its theme parks. According to Tuesday’s announcement, that’s one of the fundamental changes coming with the increased investment. The release indicates that characters and franchises, “including some that haven’t been leveraged extensively to date,” will be featured at its parks around the world in the near future.

What upcoming additions have been confirmed? Frozen-themed attractions are being worked on at Hong Kong Disneyland, Walt Disney Studios Park in Paris, and Tokyo Disney Resort, and a Zootopia-themed attraction is coming to Shanghai Disney Resort. Disney Parks, Experiences and Products chairman Josh D’Amaro hinted at a few other possibilities in Tuesday’s release, saying: “We have a wealth of untapped stories to bring to life across our business… Wakanda has yet to be brought to life. The world of Coco is just waiting to be explored. There’s a lot of storytelling opportunity.” The number of animated properties mentioned on Tuesday were animated properties speaks to the importance of original animation as the fuel that powers growth in the company’s other divisions.

What are some goals Disney hopes to achieve with this investment? Disney leadership believes that if the company expands its parks and experiences offerings, more fans will visit the parks. According to internal Disney research, more than 700 million Disney fans worldwide have yet to visit a Disney park. “In fact, for every one guest who visits a Disney Park, there are more than 10 people with Disney affinity who do not visit the parks,” read Tuesday’s release. The company also believes that the proposed changes can build its audience and create new fans for many of its brands. “Throughout our history, we’ve created enormous growth by investing the right amount of capital into the right projects at the right moment,” said CEO Bob Iger. “We are planning to turbocharge our growth yet again with a robust amount of strategic investment in this business.”