Join us on a nostalgic stroll through the shifting landscape of Walt Disney World’s premier shopping and entertainment district. From the high-flying risks of tethered balloons and early virtual reality to the evolving culinary choices driven by the Disney Dining Plan, we explore the missed opportunities, corporate pivots, and ultimate transformations that shaped the marketplace we know today.
Disney Dish Episode 7 Transcript
Len Testa: Hi, this is Len Testa. We’re back for another edition of the unofficial guide to Walt Disney World Disney Dish with Jim Hill podcast. Today we’re at downtown Disney, the marketplace and Pleasure Island. Talking about all of the fun things going on there. Jim, welcome to the show.
Jim Hill: Thanks for having me. It’s a lovely afternoon here in in central Florida. The rains have passed. The heat is out. We’re slowly melting into the sidewalks. Let’s start. Let’s start walking. We’re starting off over at the left side of the complex over by Cirque du Soleil La Nouveau. Jim, is there anything new going on with Bendy French people?
Jim Hill: Well, they actually sent out a survey, I want to say eight months ago, asking people basically about what they’d be looking for with a replacement for La Nouveau. And on the survey, were… It was kind of interesting. They asked whether they’d like to see a Disney-themed show. you know, would they like to see a Disney, you know, literally a Disney Broadway type show. And again, I don’t know how they would ever make this work given, you know, the very, know, the various master licensing agreements for Isles adventure. But they actually asked about a Marvel themed show, which suggested that, you know, that Spider-Man show in New York. Spider-Man, here it’s a hit.
Len Testa: Yeah.
Jim Hill: So I don’t know that they, the belief is that while there is interest in continuing interest in Lanuba, is. I mean, what, we’re 10 years into the run.
Len Testa: Oh yeah, easily, yeah.
Jim Hill: Yeah. And it’s just, interest is waning. And I think everyone that’s wanted to have seen it would have seen it by now, especially the locals, right?
Len Testa: Yeah, I want to say, 97, so 15 years into its run, so come on, you know, it’s just…
Jim Hill: But at the same time, there is so much other stuff that they actually have to deal with over here, that it’s like, Lanuba is on the list, kind of like Disney Quest, you know, but… When you look at the fact that you have this giant empty virgin megastore that you had to scramble and put split splitsville into, right? You got other priorities. You know, you don’t, you know, you don’t take teeth out of the smile. You replace the ones that are missing.
Len Testa: So speaking of a Disney quest, we’re walking up on that. It’s a, immediately on our right hand side. On our left is the house of blues. House of blues is one of the last few places in Walt Disney World had not had a chance to eat. Now I have, actually it wasn’t bad. Not great, I don’t know if I’d go back. But not bad. But let’s talk about DisneyQuest here for a little bit. Five stories of virtual interactive fun, Jim.
Jim Hill: And again, on paper this should have worked. you know, back in the day the plan was for 30 of these nationwide. They built this one, they had the second one built in Chicago. They had actually started construction. building of the foundation work for one of philadelphia when it just became apparent that it was not going to work the way disney had hoped and you know continuing kind of a theme for this trip that one of the reasons disney keeps this open is for school groups and rainy days.
Len Testa: yeah, that’s true but we did it just rained a couple hours ago previously and we we definitely see a bunch of kids now coming out of out of disney quest. mentioned earlier though that there’s a couple interesting things in here one of them was that there’s a Pirates of the Caribbean virtual simulator right in here, right?
Jim Hill: Yeah and that’s the real irony of this situation where this was the last thing that went into the building but to give you some idea of how long ago that was this actually predates Pirates of the Caribbean Curse of the Black Pearl the first film in the series.
Len Testa: Wow.
Jim Hill: And they’ve never thought the circle back on it they’ve never thought, you know we have Johnny Depp we have Captain Jack Sparrow, we could put this character in there. The attitude at Disney is we have put every dollar that we want to put into Disney Quest. Right now, it’s all about upkeep. They’ll replace the carpets, they’ll occasionally go in and paint. Because again, when you’re throwing high school groups in there for, well, they don’t even do grad night here anymore.
Len Testa: my god.
Jim Hill: But yeah, but you throw a bunch of high school students in there for a couple hours every day, for days on end. Yeah, the stuff starts to wear down.
Len Testa: No, absolutely. I can definitely see that. you know, so it’s just right now until they deal with the other issues. That stays the way it is.
Len Testa: So we’re walking up now on, we’ve got the Wolfgang Puck restaurants on our left and we’ve got, will soon be Splitsville on our right. Have you dined at the Wolfgang Puck restaurants?
Jim Hill: It has been a while. They’re not bad actually. They do really good flatbreads. The sushi’s really good. I mean, sort of the things that you would expect from Wolfgang Puck.
Len Testa: It’s also reasonably difficult to get a reservation there. Which is surprising. Given that it’s not in a theme park.
Jim Hill: No, absolutely. In fact, that’s what’s kind of interesting about the West Side. The other thing is that they’re frankly trying to address here. That’s the whole Hyperion Warp project. There’s a problem with Downtown Disney and basically the problem is that people who are over on the original market site They don’t make it all the way over here Nobody gets over to where we’re at right now.
Len Testa: Yeah, I mean it just it’s and for a lot of years They believed it was because of the gated Pleasure Island, which is why they pulled the gates out in the middle.
Jim Hill: Yep.
Jim Hill: And then it’s literally the theory was now, well, there’s a hill And you know those Disney tourists they’re fat, you know, they’re slow-moving and they don’t want to go up that hill So they’re gonna stay on the market side. So that was actually part of the plan of Hyperion Wharf literally flattening Hill Street, you know And now, you know, course that project stalled up because of the financial crisis of 2008 and you know, we’re still waiting to see what iteration of that arrives I mean, in fact, I have to admit I’m fascinated by the fact that Splitsville goes in here and yet you and I both know that they’re building that multi-lane bowling complex at the ESPN, know, Wide World of Sports. We’re going from none to two bowling complexes in the space of 24 months. I mean, does that make any sense? I mean, I get it that that the one that’s ESPN is going to be for tournament and tournament.
Len Testa: Yeah, exactly.
Jim Hill: And, know, they’re also talking about they’re going to make it available to cast members and broadcast events. this is more literally what it is. This is for the tourists to come in and play.
Len Testa: Yeah, to play, to drink, you know, a lot of restaurants, lot of bars and stuff like that.
Jim Hill: Yeah. But again, the casual bowling is at work. But to go from zero to two, it’s sort of like, OK, I’m not sure you’re meeting demand. Show me that there’s demand. How far down was that the survey list of? Would you like more bowling? Would you like even more bowling?
Len Testa: Exactly. So we’re walking past now Bongos. Have you been to Bongos?
Jim Hill: Long ago. mean, literally just when this opened.
Len Testa: It’s two things about Bongos, because I’ve eaten there a couple of times recently. One, it’s incredibly difficult to get into Bongos at 5.30 on a weekday. It’s crowded. it is the second loudest restaurant I’ve ever been in my life behind T-Rex. It is… undeniably loud.
Jim Hill: Now, it’s interesting you bring up T-Rex because of course that’s the same corporate, isn’t it the same corporate group that did initially the jungle theme rest, right? The rainforest cafe?
Len Testa: Yeah, rainforest, yeah, same thing.
Jim Hill: dear lord.
Len Testa: I took my daughter there and we ended up, again, luck of the draw, she’s only two at this point. We end up under the thunderstorm.
Jim Hill: jeez. With a two-year-old?
Len Testa: Yes. Somebody, did you piss off the waitress, the cedar? I don’t know what happened, but literally, my daughter started off in a high chair. By the end of the meal, she was under the high the table, yeah. Occasionally, you’d see this hand snake up between lightning strikes and grab a chicken nugget. But it was, you know, we were working that out in therapy for quite some time.
Jim Hill: that’s a shame.
Len Testa: We passed by the AMC theater. We’ve passed by Candy Cauldron, a couple of other Sunglass Hut. Blink by wet seal Anything anything interesting at all about these these are really sort of mid mid-tier mall shops, right?
Jim Hill: Well, I think the story is if you think about how many times these have changed over that yeah You know, they really really really struggled to find a mix of stores that would appeal and Ironically again here. We’re walking by vinyl nation which is a D Street
Len Testa: Yeah, let’s stop in a D Street so DC seems to be the bus the busiest of all of the other stores Which is that’s because moderately it’s carefully nurtured and grown you know this collectible The vinyl nation collectible so we’re sitting in front of a giant shelf of one two three four five levels of vinyl nation parks urbans clears muppets star wars toy stories animations parents the karyvians tutors and more that’s a lot of animations
Jim Hill: but again it’s it’s still enough that you can wrap your arms around it if you get back to the what guides the vinyl nation people is the key principle is don’t do what we did with pins you know don’t get naked league really don’t make it impossible for a collector actually collect and you know so that’s you know that’s the interesting thing about vinylmation is they constantly have a hand on the break you know it’s just sort of like let’s do more but not too much.
Len Testa: Pins are interesting because I don’t know that anyone knows exactly how many pins Disney made like if you wanted to like for me I’m a completist right I would want every pin. There’s nowhere where you could go to say, okay, this is the definitive list of Disney pins, and every day they add, you know, dozens and dozens and dozens more. And that’s ultimately what happened. They did themselves in. Even the most die-hard collectors just stood at the edge of the phenomenon, it’s like, can’t do this. I can’t compete. can’t complete my collection. I can’t do 15,000 pins.
Jim Hill: No, that’s not exactly right. so, so many people fell away.
Len Testa: That’s a shame. Because the pin idea was great. Some of the pin ideas that they had, especially the ones with the moving parts, were pretty clever. Some of were very well done. But yeah, you get greedy, you want to sell each pin for… Remember that these pins started off at like $4?
Jim Hill: Yeah.
Len Testa: And then they started being like $6, $7, then $8, then $12. Then 13, that’s a lot.
Jim Hill: Again, Disney got nakedly greedy. we’re actually at the corner here at the top of West Street. Do you remember when they actually had the store here for David Copperfield Underground?
Len Testa: I don’t. What was it like?
Jim Hill: Well, that was what was kind of interesting about it, because again, this was the infamous project that never quite opened.
Len Testa: I thought the infamous project, the other couple of projects that never opened was his marriage to Claudia Schiffer. No? No?
Jim Hill: I get it. I’ll have to take a drink water to talk. Okay, how about those Disney lawyers? Anyway. As a tease for the restaurant which hadn’t been built yet They actually right here at the end of the corner here built a David Copperfield Outfit and it had blacked out windows and the the wonderful, you know magic underground logo and One day again, it was supposed to open in June and I was open July and I said it’s open August and it never opened one day I’m over here. I can’t help myself. I open the door And I look inside and it’s literally just duct work It’s just you know, they clearly had gotten to a certain point and and stopped, know, because again, that was the whole thing. They, I mean, they had the prototype building ready to go in New York. They literally, you know, were getting ready to ship the last stage pieces into the building when they got to get the money ran out. We don’t send anything. We’re done. And but anyway, I open the store, I look at the duct work and I close the door and I get in the rental car and I’m driving away from property and finally it’s like, oh, damn it. It was a magic shop. I should open the door twice and there would actually been the restaurant. get her like, look inside. Okay, it’s stuck where it opened. Hey, it’s a store full of merchandise! The hidden compartment behind the-
Len Testa: We’re also walking past characters in flight, which I guess came over to World from Paris.
Jim Hill: Yeah, it did. It did. It’s more popular in Paris, I think.
Len Testa: Yeah, but I think part of that is because there you literally lift up and look down into the parks. you’re like, wow, look over there. I enjoy the former Disney Institute. You know, I to see it from great heights. Look, Saratoga Springs. But that coupled with the fact that building something like this in the lightning strike capital of the world is probably not, you know.
Jim Hill: I was watching them try and land the balloon in a pretty windied night, one time I was having dinner over at Paradisio 37. And it was like trying to watch them duck the Hindenburg after the sparks it hits. Like, okay, we gotta get this thing down, we gotta get this thing down. The people who were on it were clearly hanging on for dear life. And the thing was, you know, it’s tethered, right? So as they’re pulling it down, the tether is holding it down, but it starts to oscillate even more, because there’s all that energy, right? And it’s funny, because people get off it, it’s like they’re seasick, they’re walking off it. All staggering and for a while after that no one would go on.
Len Testa: I can’t understand why. Yeah, right? We’re overlooking Planet Hollywood right now. We’re behind Planet Hollywood.
Jim Hill: I have to tell this story from when this restaurant opened, I believe June 97. They were behind schedule, but they had already committed to the classic Planet Hollywood event of Bruce Willis, Frank Stallone, Schwarzenegger, everyone was gonna come. come hell or high water and again you don’t remember that Robert Earl lived in Orlando so they were gonna get this done and literally a half hour before the celebrities arrived they’re laying tile I mean just literally bang bang bang bang putting down tile and they put this thing together so fast toward the end the restaurant is open for about a week when the waiter waves the manager over and says the customer’s complaining about being dripped on It’s like, it’s not raining outside. We don’t have any water pipes up there. They look up to the ceiling and it’s like they’re directly below Herbie. And it’s one of these things where it’s like. Before we put Herbie in a place, did anybody drain the crankcase? Literally, they actually had to move the tables around in Planet Hollywood because Herbie was dripping oil. They put him up there so fast, nobody thought to drain things out of him. He dripped, he was the perpetually dripping Herbie. Gotta be for three or four years. Anyway, again, another one of these things that they had hoped would energize the marketplace and never quite took off the way they hoped but of course you know by the time they were building this planet hollywood the chain was spinning in
Len Testa: have they opened up anymore We’re on the bridge now going over to to pleasure island right now
Jim Hill: they tried doing smaller low-key things and again with with newer sets of celebrities because obviously you know willis and trotson agar and salone wound up suing robert never quite took off. Now, to be honest, Robert basically concentrates on Earl of Sandwich.
Len Testa: Really?
Jim Hill: Yeah, in fact they’re about to open up one at Disneyland.
Len Testa: Yeah, that’s right. So we’re walking up onto the back set of Pleasure Island over here was the Comedy Warehouse, right?
Jim Hill: Yeah. And so you kind of see them experimenting with this form again in the improv that we talked about at the studios earlier.
Len Testa: Yeah, just again, spent so much time at the Adventurers Club. In fact, back in the day when I was making My Living as a scriptwriter, I actually wrote and sold a pilot for the adventures club tv search show we were at the the word things that work with two members the adventures club we got the disney channel interested that they love the idea they were going to shoot it here on location and i think they were going to do things like for example we put the bible together for the show where get they would do the jane goodall figure they go down to the jungle cruise and you know if you could have one of the adventures hiding in a blind at the elef the hippo pool You know, he was like, that one’s I just hit his wiggling its ears and but he would have done the Jane Goodall thing. It’s like, you know, he named all the hippos like, well, that’s snowball and that’s cupcake. And we literally got done in. know, they they love the idea. They were going to do it, shoot it here in Florida. In fact, they were talking about using a lot of talent from the actual club. And then to be honest, there was a step away from shooting in Florida and more to the point, there was this sort of thinking of Disney Channel. Why don’t we go after? the kids and that was sort of the rise of not necessarily Hannah Montana but the shows that predated it. I’m blanking the name of the young blonde lady who…
Len Testa: Lizzie McGuire!
Jim Hill: There we go!
Len Testa: I love that show. was cute.
Jim Hill: It was cute. An adventure show would have been cuter. that’s totally your work would have paled. Anyway, I think, again, what makes me a little crazy about Pleasure Island is obviously this did work, but in the end… It wasn’t making as much. Again, the problem with Disney is it’s not enough to make some money, you have to make a lot of money.
Len Testa: Right.
Jim Hill: And a lot of money on a consistent basis. And the Avengers Club was expensive. It had talent, had to have skilled talent to do it.
Len Testa: Yep.
Jim Hill: And it just eventually, much like the comedy warehouse, it’s just like, this costs a lot of money. And in the case of the actual physical Avengers Club, they were dealing with so many locals who would come in at night and sit down in a chair and sit there for four or five hours at a time. mean, people would literally walk in, paying guests would walk in, look over the edge, see that the hall was full. It’s like, well, I don’t want to go in there. And it’s like, these people are here every night and they don’t buy drinks. They’re just here to interact with the cast.
Len Testa: that’s a shame. In a lot of ways, it helped kill the club. that’s a shame. So we’ve got the Apricot Lane Boutique on our right. But then one of my all time favorite restaurants It’s in all of Disney World. Raglan Road on our left. Raglan Road, I’ve heard Jim is supposed to be the prototype for all future dining establishments in in walt disney world for an outside indented it’s in
Jim Hill: and you can understand looking at the physical layout of the place why that is between for example the quick service around the other side of the bar component the fact that people can sit down
Len Testa: you i’ve got a statement that’s not for no that’s not it’s not the quick service it’s got retail it’s got a bar it’s got sit down as a left music it’s really got everything you want in walt disney world that’s a good here
Jim Hill: But the downside of it is you now have to find ten of these. It’s fun for us to sit in Regal and Road and try and figure out what other similar concepts would work. Like country music. You could kind of sort of maybe see how country music would work the same way. And maybe possibly kind of sort of rock and roll. cover band type of club. But that gives you free, you need 12.
Len Testa: No, that’s it exactly. you know, Disney struggles to create these one of a kind dining experiences that people get excited about and want to come back to multiple times over their vacations. And the food’s good here too.
Jim Hill: It is, it is. They’ve got a name chef, he understands the cuisine, he understands what the tourists want, something that’s authentic but not too authentic. Right? Have you been to, by way, the Nine Fine Irishmen out in Vegas?
Len Testa: No, the New York.
Jim Hill: So it’s run by the same company. The interesting thing is they’ve got a bar there that I swear to God is the Haunted Mansion. You walk in, it’s got a bookcase with busts, know, like when you walk in. I walk in and I’m like, my God, I’m in the Haunted Mansion. And then after like, you know, three gin and tonics, you’re like, you seeing Grimgain Ghosts, right? It’s classic. All right, we’re right in front of Fulton’s Cl- Cribhouse right now. We’ve got to Portobello on our left. you been there since the menu change?
Len Testa: No, I have not.
Jim Hill: It’s not bad. I mean, it’s decent Italian. It’s easy enough to get into. The back is actually lovely because it overlooks the water. Have you been to Fulton’s recently?
Len Testa: No, and again, it’s interesting you mentioned ghosts because again, to me, the ghosts of the Empress Lily are kind of hard to shake.
Jim Hill: Oh, with the steamboat?
Jim Hill: Yeah, and again, this was when they when this place was struggling and it was struggling when they know we have i remember you know i mean you know they change the game’s multiple times uh… you know and they built this with the hope that this would give it a disney-esque icon and you know once they put character dining in here it became a comp your concept that swept the resort and you know the areas that they’ve completely stepped away from that here and now it’s his crab place that’s interesting the s or looking at the lunch menu which is certain to love four o’clock mostly entrees are somewhere between say eleven and eighteen dollars which is a case isn’t bad for a for a lunch menu especially for seafood and again you know just that that theme park math you’re here it’s like well that’s not so terrible
Len Testa: yeah eighteen dollars for lunch I guess so you know times four seventy two dollars
Jim Hill: it’s that it’s eighty five degrees out twelve hundred percent humidity I’m inside I’m sitting down I’m drinking a cool beverage this is worth it
Len Testa: yes it’s totally worth it right now we’re walking up now on on T-Rex So Jim, I was doing some research on the Disney dining plan and one of the things I’ve heard, be a rumor, don’t know if it’s true, right? Yeah, I’ve heard this, know, probably fourth hand. But one of the interesting things I’ve heard was T-Rex and to a lesser extent the Reinforced Cafes, they’re known for their extensive menus, know, 15, 20, 25 page menus with literally every sort of thing you could possibly want on it. But since T-Rex has started taking the dining plan, they’re being forced to simplify the menu and take out some of more expensive options because the restaurant can’t make money on the allowances that Disney gives them for the table service meals. So what you should see at some point in future is the menu going from 20 pages or so down to like six and you’ll see an elimination of things like surf and turf and the high end filet and instead get simpler, cheaper cuts of meat.
Jim Hill: But again, that’s What’s driving the bus? mean, yeah, again, the dining plan is so successful, so many people have committed to it. It’s like you either get on board or you miss out.
Len Testa: Yeah, or you see, you know, no one comes to your restaurant because you don’t accept the dining plan.
Jim Hill: but it’s funny because, you know, people, people make the dining plan very, very popular, but they don’t realize that by making it so popular, you’re essentially constraining everyone’s choices. because they can only make money on the economics of the plant if they offer, you know, four things, know, two steaks, two, you know, two steaks, a pork, a chicken, a pasta, you know, and a vegetarian option or something like that. But again, it is what it is. mean, part of the problem is that it’s you’re at Disney World. You know, I mean, it just, to throw 12 pages of choices at somebody who’s been in a theme park all day with their brain frying.
Len Testa: so that’s true too. Simplification is probably a thing there. We’re walking into a fresh appeal into into a baby cakes. Baby cakes. Jim is one of my all time favorite places in downtown Walt Disney World. downtown Disney because it’s got, it’s vegan, gluten, case and everything free, dining. They’ve got cupcakes. We’re going to grab some samples here in a second. they’ve got cupcakes. They’ve got donuts, they’ve got all kinds of fabulous stuff. Over there we’re going to take a break right here and we’ll be right back.
Len Testa: Alright, so we’re done with baby cakes, we’re eating our vegan carrot cake cupcake, which is fantastic by the way, if you guys get a chance, meet to eat at baby cakes, go ahead and do so. we’re walking out of baby cakes, we’re making a right, and we’re heading up to the LEGO Superstore. The new and improved, large, you know, oddly the building, not actually built out of LEGOs.
Jim Hill: Yeah, and you know I have to admit I’m a little intrigued as to putting this much effort into expanding this at a time when Legoland is literally opening what? 50, 60 miles from here?
Len Testa: about 45 minutes, maybe an hour drive?
Jim Hill: Yeah. Just, normally this isn’t how Disney plays. It’s like, Normally there’d be a mysterious fire at the Lego Exactly. It’s just sort of like, you know, but I would imagine you could walk through this entire building and there isn’t a brochure or any mention of the park over in Lakeland.
Len Testa: Probably, probably not. So we’re walking past the giant dragon Lego sculpture on our left in the water and it looks like the seven dwarves On our right, rendered entirely in Legos. That’s a Lego builder’s dream right there. And then of course they’ve got the outside space, which draws kids in. Actually it’s a pretty well designed store, and I love me a Lego.
Jim Hill: Well, you know, have you been following the new controversial female Lego sets?
Len Testa: No.
Jim Hill: my Lego friends where it’s literally Legos for little girls and if you thought they were upset about healthy habits, you know, you’re sort of like, how dare It’s stereo type girls!
Len Testa: Really? What’s the problem with Legos?
Jim Hill: Well, it’s know, it’s Lego sets for shopping or fashion. And you’re just sort of like, alright, you know.
Len Testa: No math or engineering or science right now.
Jim Hill: No, that’s it exactly. That’s their own.
Len Testa: So we’re walking past now World of Disney and Wetzel’s Pretzels in 41st Street. A clever name actually. Not badly, oh they’re redoing the volcano over at Rainforest Cafe.
Jim Hill: Well they have to. It’s falling in on itself.
Len Testa: there’s that. What about World of Disney? Anything going on here?
Jim Hill: To be honest, it’s more… These days they just love talking about the… This has more sales per square foot than any store on Disney property.
Len Testa: Really? Anything in the Magic Kingdom?
Jim Hill: Seriously, mean even the Emporium has fallen behind this.
Len Testa: Wow.
Jim Hill: So… But again, when you consider how much Disney merch there is inside there. And in fact, is evidently an aggressive plan in place to increase display space and, you know, and again, also sort of supposedly reaching out to social media to try to drive the bus here. So, you know, I don’t know how that’s quite going to work.
Len Testa: That’s incredible. So anyway, we’re now kind of entering the original shopping village and you can always tell this because of the kind of craftsman like Design. it’s sort of Archie and Crafts, sort of single story…
Jim Hill: Archie and Crafts is the architecture. This is the original work of place.
Len Testa: That’s it, exactly. And in fact, the irony here is that when you came here in 74, 75, you honestly couldn’t find any Disney merchandise. This was, you know, for example, the glass sculpting place over here, the…
Jim Hill: Arrubius Road?
Len Testa: Yes. They’re one of the only pieces that have actually survived. You know, they were, I mean, goldsmithies and potters and, you know, the idea was that they didn’t, figured if you wanted Disney, you were over the Magic Kingdom. But they wanted something that would compete with downtown Orlando. They wanted to draw the locals. They figured, okay, arts and crafts, let’s do that. And it died a dog’s death. It just, they couldn’t get anybody to come over here. So, but again, that was, the original name was, you know, the shopping village at Lake Pointe-O-Viste. And then suddenly it became the Walt Disney World shopping village. You know, to try to nail home that idea that you are, you know, here at Disney and, um, and they kept jiggering and jiggering the mix of stories and eventually realized that, look, people here at Disney, want Disney. And, you know, now, if you think of how many stories you have here that either embrace, you know, a certain set of characters, whether it’s the, once upon a Christmas, or the Winnie the Pooh stores or. Once upon a time, mean, it’s all Disney 24-7.
Len Testa: yeah, that’s sort of the thing that amazes me about the presence of Disney characters here. That, you know, you could get them in any of the parks, and the merchandise is essentially the same. People have this essentially bottomless appetite for Disney characters. And we’re sort of here on a Monday afternoon, end of February, it’s crowded. There’s people at every table. you know outside drinking stuff there’s all shops are busy we’re walking past a little mismatched which is the uh… the store that shows mismatched socks clever idea uh… but it’s it’s crowded it’s crowded and it’s warm too absolutely and again this is not at the time people are traditionally having dumped out of the parks and looking for things to do we were middle of the day people are still in line for twilight zone tower of terror even as we speak
Jim Hill: yeah you come back at uh… know seven o’clock it’s gonna be even more busy than this
Len Testa: We have Captain Jack’s over here, was among the first of the facilities built here, one of the first restaurants. And it’s interesting that it survived. But what’s fascinating now is that for something that debuted here, mean, they now have their electronic, the menus for here are sort of indicative of what’s going to spread out for the rest of the resort. So both old and new. But yeah, this was… in a weird sort of way this was planning a flag for a version of disney that never happened this the shopping village was supposed to be where the springs service brings you know that’s where the the tree has filled with work and that’s where the start of the community of like when it is that i mean this is a good with it When they originally built Walt Disney World, at least for like four or five years pretended that they were going to follow through on what Walt was going to do. That they were not necessarily going to start right out with the city, but they’d build, you know, vacation homes and, you know, condos and places you could rent. And, you know, it’s fascinating to read the annual reports from 74, 75, 73, you know, all that where they’re trying, they’re legitimately giving it a shot, but you know here comes the oil embargo of seventy three seventy four and you know coupled with you can a stagflation right and suddenly disney is just trying to figure out how to get people into the theme parks let alone get a part of the community of tomorrow so you know this get the shopping village again was supposed to service the people who were staying in those places and this is as far as they got and they then began to realize we can’t We a shopping mall for people who aren’t here. We have to build a shopping mall for the people who are here. And they want Disney. You know, they want Disney clothes, want Disney plush, they want Disney, you know, food. And so it just gave itself over. And now here we are. I mean, if you look across the way there, I mean, this again, this used to be just a little village of crafts along the waterfront. Now World of Vision has a two or three story building. Lego is at least one and a half. Yeah. I mean, and again, look at it. It’s I don’t know. Again. And I understand that, you know, you can only mourn for the past so much because, you know, the reality is that almost from the day that You know, there’s a famous story about it’s June of 67 and they’re having a meeting about the Walt Disney World project and here’s Richard Irvine who’s the guy in charge of building the resort and he’s okay and we’ve got our North and South roads started and this is where we’re going to build Epcot and the theme park’s going go here and Roy interrupts him and says, you know, Richard, Walt’s dead. And so even as early as 67, they were like, look, I know. What we’re telling people about what we’re doing in Florida, but I don’t think we’re building this city, you know and That’s always an interesting that watch it’s always interesting to watch Disney kind of to step around that because you know the you know because everyone’s seen the photo of Walt Standing in front of that model. Yeah, you know and that’s why they bottle this land in Florida to build the city and now It’s all about Again, we were just earlier today recording all of our fcat resort stuff and it’s just sort of like there are you know eleven thousand hotel rooms over there not a city but eleven thousand hotel rooms it’s small city it’s almost as big as the town i live in give or take a thousand people but you know that this And they worked really hard to try to get people coming over from a hotel drive here. Can you walk from a hotel drive from Buena Vista? Sorry, the hotel, what is it called? Hotel Plaza?
Len Testa: You can. In fact, the interesting thing is it was made a little more difficult by the construction of Once Upon a Toy. But you can get over here. But, you know, again, it just, what’s fascinating about this whole area is just all of the chances that we tried and didn’t quite work out. I if you think about Saratoga Springs being transformed from the Disney Institute, I did you ever get over there and take any classes?
Jim Hill: No, didn’t. my sister had. said it was interesting. It was sort of the experience vacation about 20 years before experience vacations became popular.
Len Testa: No, that’s it. Exactly. And in fact, you know, I remember talking with Jim Corcus. He was among the staff at the place and they had this big meeting about, know, Eisner’s talking to them about, we’re fully committed to this project and we’re going to be, you know, we’re going to give it five years to build this audience. And 18 months in there, I mean, literally shutting it down. it just, you know, people don’t come to Walt Disney World to learn how to cook. you rock one member of the city city you drive up and uses this climbing wall and it’s like well maybe if you put a big in cupcake on the top they might have a a a maybe they go for that but don’t know i think it’s just this is a part of the three the park of the part of the result that just again kind of makes me sad because again there are so many missed opportunities but it is what it is that they Look, people vote with their feet.
Len Testa: Yeah. All right. And if there was nothing about this mix that would bring out the Orlando locals, there was nothing about this original mix of crafts and that sort of thing would get people to come out from hotels and, you know, and now it’s all about trying to get the mix to work and whether it’s… I mean, it seems to be successful now. You get a lot of turnover in the shops, but the idea that there’s a marketplace here, I think is fairly well established.
Jim Hill: absolutely. But at the same time, mean, you think about how much turnover do you get in your standard mall? You know and that’s what this is. It’s a mall. So I don’t know So what’s gonna happen over the next couple years here just kind of wrap up this this podcast realistically again you You know we’re in this strange space where Disney is continuing to look for partners that will come in here That are willing to play by Disney’s rules whether it’s you know creating a simplified menu that works for the Disney dining system or it’s you know, doing the sort of hands-on type stuff that people respond to. Hands-on crafts.
Len Testa: Yeah.
Jim Hill: Well, you know, for example, one of the things that they keep eyeballing to bring in here, because it’s very successful at Disneyland Resort, is a Build-A-Bear.
Len Testa: really?
Jim Hill: You know, but again, it’s just sort of the notion of, you will allow us to put all sorts of Disney character-based Build-Bears in here.
Len Testa: A Duffy?
Jim Hill: Yeah, there you go.
Len Testa: All right, Well, we’ll see what happens over the over the next couple of years. Jim, thanks for being on the show and we’ll see you on the next episode.