“Unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable.”
That’s what I honestly thought as I was reading the following letter. That someone could really work this hard at a job that sounded extremely stressful and incredibly hard to do … yet only get paid $6.70 an hour!
Don’t believe me? Read on:
Dear Jim:
I am a Disney World employee who works at the Kilimanjaro Safari attraction at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. For reasons that will soon become extremely clear, I would appreciate it if you’d keep my identity under wraps.
Why am I writing to JimHillMedia today? Because — in the mail today — all Kilimanjaro employees got a letter from the “Local 362 Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union.” Which is the new union for cast members taking effect 2/1/04. In the letter, Local 362 states that they want to resolve an issue that Kilimanjaro employees have faced for a long time.
The problem is that Kilimanjaro Safari has no classification. It has not been classified as anything on the union contract since DAK has opened in April of 1998. The classification I am talking about is levels on the pay scale. Transportation, Entertainment, and Security are all higher classified jobs than Attractions. Now Kilimanjaro Safari is not listed as an attraction on the current union contract (which is up for negotiation in 2004). But it is paid as one.
The starting hourly pay rate for Kilimanjaro Safari’s for full time cast members is $6.70. To put this in perspective, Characters start at $7.15 an hour. Security and Transportation are at over $8.00 an hour. More importantly, the top pay out for WDW employees working in attractions is not (nearly) as large as these other three examples that I cited earlier.
The point of today’s letter is — in spite of everything that we do for DAK — we are not respected. In a recent guest service survey that was administered to guests as they exited DAK’s Kilimanjaro attraction, guests were asked “What makes this attraction a great experience?” Some of the selections offered on the survey were “The animals,” “The story,” “The location” and “The ride vehicle.” So which answer did the majority of WDW guests select? The most popular answer was that “The Safari Guide makes the ride.”
The difference between a guest having a truly great time on Kilmanjaro Safari or not all depends on how good their Safari Guide is. Take — for example — what can happen on one of DAK’s Magical Gathering Dinner Experiences. Now, the Magical Gatherings Dinner Experience takes place at 5 pm after the Kilimanjaro Safari attraction has closed for the day to most WDW guests. And — at the end of the day — you typically do not see a whole lot of animals. And why not? Because — when 5 o’clock comes — a lot of the creatures head straight for the back gate of their enclosures, so they can quickly get back to their holding pens where their food is waiting.
So that means — typically as DAK’s Magical Gathering Dinner Experience is just getting underway — the elephants are out of sight. As are the giraffes and the mandrills. So wouldn’t you think that this sounds like a pretty lousy safari?
Well, according to the guest surveys that WDW management has received, the guests have just been loving DAK’s Magical Gatherings Dinner Experience. How come? Not because of the lack of animals or the so-so food. But because of their safari guide. These guests spend two hours rolling through a simulated savannah with their safari guide … and they end up being totally charmed by the guy or gal.
WDW guest surveya show that Kilimanjaro Safari is now one of the top five attractions on Walt Disney World property. More importantly, this attraction gets 90% of the gate at Animal Kingdom. (That means 90% of the people that visit DAK on their WDW take a trip on Kilimanjaro Safari. Which is the highest percentage capture of the gate of any attraction at Walt Disney World!)
How does Kilimanjaro Safari get that many people through this DAK attraction each day? To be honest, it’s because the safari guides get pushed so hard by their managers. Every day, we have this early morning meeting that WDW employees like to call a “track talk.” And every day, the managers give us the same message. Which is that — every 19 minutes — we should be dropping off our latest load of guests at the attraction’s departure point.
Twenda is the African word for “Let’s Go.” It’s something that we hear every day as we drive through the jog (that area between Kilimajaro Safari’s load and departure area). We are pushed and pushed by management to “Twenda!! Let’s GO!!!!”
In the summer, we are driving trucks with little or no air condition in 100+ degree heat making up to 8 round trip journeys around the same ride path. That’s over 3 hours of “Twenda”-ing around DAK’s pseudo-savannah, always trying to deliver the best possible show we can. The heat in the driver’s section of those trucks is just unbearable. (How come the driver’s compartment of the Kilimanjaro Safari vehicles is so poorly air conditioned? Well, the real problem is that the A/C in that area always has to be kept on medium. Otherwise, the vehicle’s on-board audio system will actually freeze up. That’s how poorly designed these ride vehicles are!)
You can just not imagine what a tough job it is to be a safari guide on DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari, Jim. Some people lose their voice from all the spieling they have to do. Others get bad backs from all the sitting they have to do in the truck’s hard driver’s seat. Still others hurt their arms and joints from all the turning of that big steering wheel that they have to do as they steer this multi-ton vehicle through all of Kilimanjaro Safari’s sharp turns.
But — as I stated a few paragraphs ago — it is the safari driver who really makes the show with DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari attraction. Though we are not classified as Entertainment employees, we are still expected to entertain dozens of guests — working off of an extremely long script which we have to memorize — all the while safely maneuvering a multi-ton vehicle through an environment full of animals.
Imagine the stress we’re under, Jim. On every trip through DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari, the safari guide is responsible for the safety of the 40 guests riding in their vehicle as well as the hundreds of animals along the attraction’s ride path. While you’re driving and spieling, you always have to keep an eye on the rear view mirror to make sure that none of your guests do something stupid. Like suddenly stand and/or fall out of the truck.
You also have hundreds of very expensive animals that — without any rhyme or reason — can suddenly dart out into the road and possibly get hit by your vehicle. If you hit an animal, even if it wasn’t your fault, you’ll almost certainly get reprimanded or possibly terminated.
But it’s not just the animals you have to worry about. If your truck goes off the ride path and accidentally hits a rock or tree, that could result in your being terminated as well. Or if you hit another car or truck as you’re rolling your Kilimanjaro Safari vehicle down the perimeter road at the beginning or the end of the day at DAK, that could get you “termed” as well.
All of this added responsibility and pressure is placed on the shoulders of the cast members who work at DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari attraction. And yet we are still classified and paid at the same level as the guy who turns on the Dumbo ride over at the Magic Kingdom. Does that seem right to you, Jim?
Because of all of the reasons that I’ve listed above, the cast members who work at DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari feel extremely mistreated. We believe we deserve better pay for all that we do.
The only problem is that “The Suits” at Disney World want us (for cost-effective reasons, of course) to remain classified as Attraction employees making $6.70. Every time Local 362 tries to bring our concerns to the attention of Disney World management, “The Suits” warn that — if we try get ourselves classified as “Transportation” — that we’ll all have to got out and get trucker’s licenses. Or — if we try to get ourselves classified as “Entertainment” employees — they may have no choice but to fire some of our less entertaining drivers and then hold auditions to fill these open slots with newer, funnier cast members.
What basically going on here is that Disney World management is doing everything it can to avoid meeting with Local 362 and discussing whether or not to give cast members who work at DAK’s Kilimanjaro Safari attraction the pay that they deserve.
So please, Jim, can you put out the word out? Make people aware that the DAK cast members who are busting their asses daily to deliver a top notch trip through Kilimanjaro Safari are putting up with all this aggravation … for only $6.70 an hour.
Consider it done, pal. Consider it done.