100 years of Disney: It all started with a mouse – SWZ

Burbank – There is hardly anyone who has never seen a Disney film. Scenes like the one in which Mufasa, the Lion King, is thrown off a cliff by his brother Scar and trampled to death by wildebeests in the gorge below have brought millions to tears – and made Disney billions. The group is now one of the largest in the world. Forbes ranks him 87th on its Global 2000 list with sales of $84 billion. It all started very small – with a modest budget and a tiny animal.

Pioneer of modern merchandising

“I hope we don’t forget that it all started with a mouse,” Walt Disney is said to have said. He was in his early 20s when he opened the Disney Brother Cartoon Studio with his brother Roy in 1923 – a hundred years ago. It was stored in her uncle’s garage in Los Angeles. The start-up capital of $500 came largely from Roy’s pocket, who from then on took care of finances and marketing, while Walt was responsible for the creative side.

The young company was able to make its first small profits with the short film series “Alice”. The final breakthrough came five years after the company was founded. “Steamboat Willie,” a Mickey Mouse cartoon, was the first animated film to feature music in 1928 and was an instant success. A little anecdote: The mouse was almost named Mortimer, but Walt’s wife Lillian ended up choosing Mickey. Other iconic characters such as Goofy and Donald Duck were born a little later.

At this time, Walt was already relying on fan merchandise as an additional source of income. He is therefore considered a pioneer of modern merchandising. In 1929, a businessman acquired the rights to print Mickey Mouse on student tablets, laying the foundation for numerous licensing agreements that Roy promoted.

Wartime as a time of crisis

In the 1930s, Walt finally took a risk. He wanted to bring the first full-length animated film to cinemas: “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”. It is said that Roy feared that years of work on the film would bankrupt the company. In fact, the film was a huge commercial success. Walt Disney saw his assumption confirmed that the era of full-fledged animated films had begun. But then the war intervened.

Europe ceased to be a lucrative market during the Second World War. The high production costs of today’s classics such as “Pinocchio” or “Bambi” could therefore not be recouped. The company slipped into debt and was unable to recover quickly in the post-war years; it wasn’t until 1950 that “Cinderella” brought about a turning point.

At around the same time, Walt started planning a project close to his heart. He wanted to build an amusement park in Anaheim, a suburb of Los Angeles, complete with theme parks, hotels and restaurants. To finance the construction of the first Disneyland, Walt sold his house in Palm Springs. It finally opened its doors in 1955 and became an extremely popular attraction. In 1960, three real princesses came to visit: those from Sweden, Denmark and Norway. Today there are six parks worldwide, in addition to the one in California, one in Florida (opened in 1971), in Tokyo (1983), Paris (1992), Hong Kong (2005) and Shanghai (2016).

The power of television as a medium

1955 was an important year for Disney in another way. The show “Mickey Mouse Club” premiered. It flickered across US screens until 1996. Superstars like Christina Aguilera, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears and Ryan Gosling started their careers there. Walt Disney once again demonstrated his foresight by recognizing the power of television as a medium early on.

In the ’50s and ’60s, Walt Disney himself appeared weekly on the nation’s screens. Outwardly he gave the appearance of being a cozy “Uncle,” but he was actually said to have been a jealous control freak.

After his death in 1966, the company fell into a crisis of meaning that lasted until the 80s, when a new golden age of animation began – including “The Little Mermaid” and “Beauty and the Beast”. Some spectacular deals and acquisitions followed. Disney bought the TV station ABC (1995), the Apple company Pixar (2006), the Marvel universe with its superheroes (2009), the Star Wars empire (2012) and large parts of 21st Century Fox including its majority on the streaming service Hulu (2019).

In the anniversary year, however, things are once again unsettled at Disney. Animated films are flopping, the traditional TV business is declining and the streaming service Disney+ is making losses. The popularity remains. (sd)

This article appeared in the printed SWZ with the following title: “It all started with a mouse”.