Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. I’m so excited to finally bring you the history of the Shanghai Disneyland Resort. I’ve been thinking about doing an episode on Shanghai Disneyland for so so long, even before I visited the resort in April of last year. Shanghai Disneyland is incredibly special to me as I was at The Walt Disney Company as an intern in 2014, when the park’s design was being finalized and constructed. I was friends with several Imagineering interns who worked on various aspects of the park, including writing copy for opening day maps and the designs for Wishing Star Park (a unique distinctly-chinese recreational area, which sits adjacent to Disney Town and the Park’s entrance). 

So - without further ado - let us dive into the recent history of this modern-day theme park that has captured the attention of the world since opening on June 16, 2016. 

Part #2: The OTHER Disneyland in China 

The courtship that lead to Shanghai Disneyland began long ago in July, 1990, when Zhu Rongji, then the mayor of Shanghai, made a trip to the original Disneyland in Los Angeles with four other Chinese mayors and came home determined to have a Disneyland in his city. Mr. Zhu rose through the ranks to become premier of China from 1998 to 2003.

He was the one that held the first ever discussions for a Disneyland in China, 17 years before the opening of Shanghai Disneyland back in 1998, with Michael Eisner and Bob Iger. At his request, Shanghai Disneyland was originally planned as the Walt Disney Company’s first foray into China. Hence, when we talk about the early history and development of Shanghai Disneyland - we cannot do so without talking about The Hong Kong Disneyland resort as the two parks’ tremulous histories and recent successes are relatively intertwined. 

Hong Kong Disneyland has long borrowed the slogan from Walt’s original magic kingdom, billing itself since it’s 2005 opening as the “happiest place on earth”. However, its history has been far from fun-filled, with the park operators dogged for years by struggles with tourist numbers and revenue, as well as labour issues. While Shanghai Disneyland has been a runaway success since opening, Hong Kong Disneyland has joined Euro Disney as one of The Walt Disney Company's most disappointing developments. 

Yet, when Bob Iger and Michael Eisner first entered discussions with the chinese government in the late 90’s, they had no conviceable visions of failure. Afterall, international tourists from Asia were frequenting their US properties in Florida and California, Tokyo Disneyland had been a success since opening in 1983, and the Chinese Government had promised to offset the park’s construction cost - the very thing that had killed them with Euro Disney in 1992. The Walt Disney Company was so confident of their success they went so far to promise the Chinese National Government in 1999 that a Disney theme park in China would generate a minimum of $148 billion over 40 years.

Although the Walt Disney Company was originally interested in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and briefly Beijing, as locations for their second Asian theme park, Hong Kong was the first to give Disney the greenlight. In 1999, the Hong Kong’s legislature gave funding approval for the construction at Penny’s Bay, Lantau Island. It was decided that Hong Kong Disneyland would be built at an estimated cost of 14 billion, with $5.6 billion coming from a Chinese government loan, by a new joint-venture company - Hong Kong International Theme Parks Ltd - to be formed by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government (aka the Chinese Government) and The Walt Disney Company (Disney). 

However, despite Disney’s assurances of the park’s success, it was a risky investment for Hong Kong, which was in the midst of shaking off its worst recession in decades. Also, the former British colony had only just returned to Chinese rule in 1997. Despite promoted the deal as a tonic for Hong Kong's sagging economy, meanwhile, while they took on the majority of the risk, Disney's invested less than $300 million in their new theme park. 

However, they did risk their public image. Commentaries appeared in newspapers in 2000 accused Disney of “taking the Mickey”, and tourism workers associations, lawmakers, and shareholders urged the company not to push through at risk of draining tourists from Asia, which has traditionally represented a sizable percentage of the visitors to Disney World, Disneyland, and Tokyo Disneyland. There was also the tense relations between the US and China to consider. In fact, with the exception of Mulan, most Disney movies had been barred from being released in China for over a decade. 

To quell these very vocal criticisms, Disney vowed not to open a mainland China theme park for at least eight years. Meanwhile, the construction of Hong Kong Disneyland began in 2003 and the first park in China opened its doors to the public on September 12, 2005. It was the smallest Disneyland park in the world, yet the imagineers took pains to incorporate Hong Kong touches in the park, with feng shui masters offering advice on the placement of the gates and some park features, and Disneyland restaurants offering Cantonese favourites. 

However, the idea for a mainland China park that would cater to those billions of Chinese visitors unable to leave the country due to lack of finances or the country’s strict visa system, didn’t leave the minds of Disney’s top executives. Months before the opening of Hong Kong Disneyland, on a cold day in January 2005, the two titans were joined by their wives as they stood on a bridge in a village on the outskirts of Shanghai, a city that was little known outside of China and the financial services industry. Like Walt Disney did as he stood in the middle of a rural Anaheim orange grove in 1953, the two stewards of the Walt Disney company surveyed the land imagining a new theme park with worldwide appeal. It must have been difficult to imagine as there were not even any adequate roads to get there in a taxi, much less the 50 passenger busses favored by tour groups at Walt Disney World. 

However, these plans had a wrench thrown in them with Hong Kong Disneyland’s first year numbers came in 2006. Disney initially refused to release the attendance figures after media reports surfaced saying the park's attendance numbers might be lower than expected. However, public pressure mounted and they finally released the numbers. The park had performed well below Disney’s promises, by welcoming a mere 5.2 million guests its first year. The second year was even worse, when park attendance saw a 13.5% drop. In fact, it wasn't until 2012 before the park saw its first profits, a meager $14 million.

Although Disney, with only a 43% stake in the park and 300 million invested, was optimistic these numbers would not impact their bid for a mainland China theme park - the Chinese Government was rightly concerned about entering into another capital heavy investment. The cache of the Disney brand was also rather low in Mainland China, Disney’s films and characters more a foreign curiosity with limited nostalgic value than the cultural staple they are in the US. The mainland Chinese government of Shanghai, unlike that in Hong Kong which by all accounts gave Disney a sweetheart deal, would not be so easy

It would take 5 years for the central Chinese Government to approve plans for a Disney theme park in the Pudong district of Shanghai. They did so in November of 2009, after a protracted, 25-year piece of political negotiation and economic calculation. It was unclear what convinced China to finally approve the deal after years of off-again, on-again talks. The prospect of creating tens of thousands of jobs, both permanent and during construction, at a tough economic moment might have played a role, as China’s economy had begun to slow in 2009. 

Others analysts have speculated that it was a virtue of timing as President Obama held his inaugural visit to China just weeks before in November of 2009. Regardless, it was a move that signaled a closed and government-regulated society was now tolerating a certain kind of western involvement, afterall in 2009 only 20 US films were shown in the country. 

Disney’s new CEO, Bob Iger, appointed to the chief job in 2005, called the Shanghai Disney park the company’s “greatest opportunity since buying land in Florida.” Afterall, by 2009, millions of newly affluent Chinese were making their presence felt in overseas destinations such as Hong Kong, London, Paris and Thailand. With tens of millions more are fueling China’s internal travel and tourism boom. Disney picked Shanghai largely because of its transportation network; moving guests in and out of a huge resort and feeding them while they are there pose enormous logistical challenges. About 300 million potential customers live within two hours of the site, located between the city’s airport and downtown. This is a huge boon, as Hong Kong only has 7.3 million people on the island, and therefore needs to rely heavily on international visitors to create a profit. Feeling confident in their choice, the new Disney park was built with expansion in mind.

The initial proposed resort, with a mix of shopping Downtown-Disney style areas, two hotels and a Magic Kingdom-style theme park, was built to sprawl across 1,000 acres of the city’s Pudong district — with the theme park occupying about 100 of those acres. The park is little bigger than Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif., and on par with the parks in Paris and Tokyo. Disney’s plans for expansion were ambitious: with further development encompassing more than 1,700 acres with a capacity rivaling Disney World in Florida, which attracts about 45 million annual visitors. 

This time though, they didn’t make any outrageous financial promises to the chinese government. According to Tom Staggs, Disney's former COO who worked on the project, the resort was thought to be “a very long-term proposition.” Analysts did not believe it would necessarily turn a profit any time soon, how could it with a 5.5 billion dollar price tag? However, the Central Chinese Government was willing to spend the money on the development of a real tourist district in Shanghai. At the very least, Shanghai’s (and to an extent mainland China’s) decade-long transformation into a global tourist destination would be solidified by Disney’s new theme park. 

Part #3: The Road to Opening 

Luckily, the Chinese Central Government’s concerns for their investment were pacified at the beginning of construction when Hong Kong Disneyland finally recorded profits for the first time in 2012 to the tune of $14.1 million. Suddenly, the Chinese government’s 57% percent stake in this new resort, represented by a holding company formed by a consortium of Chinese companies selected by the government called the Shanghai Shendi Group, seemed like it might amount to some tactile economic growth. The Walt Disney Company was also hopeful. Although they only have a 40% stake in the project, they told shareholders on a call that they expected over half of their revenue to come from overseas market in the coming years. As of 2013, the number hovered around 25%. 

In March of 2013, the company revealed what the resort complex will look like when completed in late 2015. Bob Iger’s mandate to the imagineers was to build a park that was “authentically Disney, distinctly Chinese” - not just to build a Disneyland in China like they had been accused of doing in Euro Disneyland in the 1990s (when French farmers picketed outside the gates) and to an extent even in Tokyo and Hong Kong Disneyland. One way the imagineers accomplished this was to infuse the park with elements of Chinese culture. The idea behind it was that not only could [Chinese visitors] relate to it, but they could be proud of it and could have a sense of ownership. Shanghai Disneyland is an arranged cultural and corporate marriage, an American company planting itself in very foreign soil, a gamble on shaping a culture as much as being accepted by it. Shanghai Disneyland, like the Disneyland of 1955, is a huge gamble. The park that opened as Shanghai Disneyland on June 16, 2016 represents this duality of is limitless opportunity and calculated constraint.

In designing the park, Bob Weiss, President of Walt Disney Imagineering had this to say: It’s fun to do a new park from the ground up […] and say so if you were going to do a new one from the start without any of the confines we’re familiar with, which changes would you make?

Afterall, it can be difficult to remember the 1955 original Disneyland, a place so successful and so pervasive today was originally a gamble against all odds, another Walt Disney “folly” predicted to fail. Many necessary concessions in size and scope were made for Disneyland to become a reality. Expansions and improvements were constant under Walt Disney’s watch, from Tomorrowland’s essential rechristening in 1959 to the first land expansion with New Orleans Square in 1966, but the park was always and forever working within the constraints of its 1955 conception. The park was limited as businesses built on the adjacent land Disney could not originally afford to buy were already boxing in the physical space. As a resort Disney didn’t even own the single hotel, contracting the Disneyland hotel out due to monetary constraints.

What would a Disneyland look like if it were conceived from the beginning with the confidence of 60 years of success, designed with over 60 years of theme park experience and the latest breakthroughs in technology and engineering, and constructed with a nearly infinite budget only a multinational company worth more than 150 billion dollars could provide? Shanghai Disneyland is the closest we’ve got to answering to that question. Shanghai Disneyland is the first truly modern Disneyland.

Afterall, the differences between the Disneyland that opened on the outskirts of Los Angeles in 1955 and the one opened on the outskirts of Hong Kong in 2005 are surprisingly minimal. ficionados may delight in the small differences between them, but taken as a whole they’re largely the same experiences with the exact same beats. Disneyland as a concept has been nothing if not resilient, remaining steadfast despite time, place, and culture.

However, a park with different themes and different perspectives was needed in Shanghai, necessitating a different execution than the Americana cloning of previous attempts. To lay roots in Mainland China Disney was forced to use a blank slate, to reconceptualize Disneyland in 2016. To make Shanghai Disneyland work Disney had to export Disneyland without Walt’s America, the very soul of Disneyland as we have always known it. According to Matt Almos, Director of Live Entertainment, Shanghai Disneyland, “a dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes means nothing to China.” 

A focus of Shanghai Disneyland as a place to relax, reflect, and escape. Open space was a key driver in the physical design, also a key tenant of the park’s emotional core as well. Shanghai Disneyland is a statement about leisure and enjoyment and possibility, a set of canvases encouraging you to explore yourself more freely. Shanghai’s greatest strength is in cutting anything that could bring complicated cultural baggage and conflict with this playful freedom - a departure from Walt Disney’s Americana. 

Perhaps where this marked change is most visible is that the Shanghai Disneyland Resort is the first Disney Castle park not to have a Main Street USA-themed area at the entrance to the park. Larry Davis, Executive Producer/Creative Director, Walt Disney Imagineering Shanghai stated that building Main Street in our other parks was relevant at the time because Walt [Disney] grew up in a small town and wanted to replicate a small town feel. However, because this was Shanghai, a new market, we wanted this to be completely unique and different from all our parks and we said, ‘Why not make it about our characters?’–because the characters are really the foundation of our company.” The street can can best be thought of as a bit of Toontown (Anaheim and Tokyo Disneyland) combined with Buena Vista St (Disney California Adventure) and Hollywood Blvd (Disney’s Hollywood Studios). Note: That even though Tokyo Disneyland’s entrance is called World Bazaar, it is still an area filled with shops that reflects early 20th-century America, matching the "Main Street, U.S.A." areas of other Magic Kingdom-style parks.

Instead, the entrance of the park is called Mickey Avenue, and is done so it purposely avoids saying it is in the US. According to Bob Iger, this land inspired by the personalities of Disney cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, and Chip 'n' Dale, should feel like it could be in China. 

There was also the creation of a distinctive, and for now, free public park just outside the gates of DisneyTown. In Chinese Culture, families often spend time in local parks to exercise, play games, and relax in nature. This beautiful park, named Wishing Star Park. was built around the lake with that in mind and is definitely unique to the Shanghai Disneyland Resort.  


However, the park did not open on December 2015 as planned. Insted, Disney and its Chinese partner, the Shanghai Shendi Group, announced an additional $800 million investment in 2014 to add more attractions - including a Soaring attraction called Soaring Over the Horizon borrowed from Epcot and Disney’s California Adventure - which since opening has proved to be the most popular ride in the park among chinese audience. This investment is attributed to timing, after posting profits again at Hong Kong Disneyland in 2014, Disney was confident the Chinese economy was booming and the market for leisure activities among the Chinese middle class was huge.

In fact, by opening in June of 2016, the Shanghai Disneyland Resort was already deep into the construction of their very own Toy Story Land… which had not even been announced. Walt Disney once said Disneyland would never be completed as long as there is still imagination left in the world. His words really ring true for Shanghai Disneyland, which has not halted construction since opening in 2016 with with the park’s first expansion, Toy Story Land, opening in late April 2018 and Zootopia land on the way. Toy Story Land includes an additional three rides, two restaurants, a show, and a giftshop. According to Bob Iger, there is ample room to expand this park, to build [a second park], to build more hotels, and to expand the two hotels we have, which include one budget or moderate level resort themed to Toy Story and another deluxe resort that is unique to Shanghai. 

Part #3: Opening Day

Despite the rain, the resort opened with fanfair on June 15, 2016, after over a month of soft-openings for family, friends, and the park’s construction workers. The park had taken 5 years to construct. Opening day tickets sold out in a few hours after they had gone on sale at midnight, March 28. The monumental task of opening the park, which included planting 2.4 million shrubs, stocking 7,000 pieces of merchandise, including mickey ears, and training 10,000 employees, has had its challenges. Right before opening, engineers were racing to finish an elaborate white-water raft ride. And Soaring Over the Horizon, the park's newest ride having started construction just months before opening, was having some technical difficulties, resulting in four-hour lines on opening day. 

Shanghai Disneyland opened at 320 acres, roughly three times the size of the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World. The entire resort encompasses 963 square acres (including Shanghai Disneyland, two hotels, Disneytown, and Wishing Star Lake) at nearly twice the size of Anaheim’s Disneyland resort,with six themed lands: Adventure Isle, Gardens of Imagination, Mickey Avenue, Tomorrowland, Treasure Cove and Fantasyland. According to Bob Iger in the parks dedication, the lands allow guests to ‘discover imaginative worlds of fantasy, romance and adventure that ignite the magical dreams within us all.’ 

Shanghai Disneyland’s centerpiece is the Enchanted Storybook Castle, a 197 foot castle unique as it is both the largest and tallest castle in any Disney theme park and it does not have a single patron princess like Sleeping Beauty in Disneyland, Hong Kong Disneyland, and Disneyland Paris and Cinderella in Tokyo Disneyland and Florida’s Magic Kingdom. Instead, the Enchanted Storybook Castle is home to all Disney princesses. Enchanted Storybook Castle is thankfully not a clone like Tokyo or Hong Kong’s opening-day castle, instead taking a unique approach that is a bit more ornate and more chateau, arguably a bit more realistic.The castle, in a Disney first, features not just a walkthrough or a restaurant but both, with the Royal Banquet Hall taking on a similar role to Cinderella’s Royal Table at the Magic Kingdom. Kingdom. Walt Disney Imagineering President Bob Weis nixed the idea of placing a dragon in the castle dungeon like that present in Disneyland Paris due to China’s reverence for the creature.

Many usual Disney park features have been redesigned or are absent from Shanghai Disneyland Park to cater for Chinese visitors. For instance, the park does not feature a railroad surrounding the park, despite the entrance plaza structure evokes the train stations that occupy this space in other Disneylands. As a replacement for a central-spoked/hub, the center of the park features a collection of Chinese zodiac gardens called the Gardens of Imagination, in the center a grove of cherry trees with 12 mosaics depicting Disney characters in Chinese zodiac style. This land is actually home to Dumbo the Flying Elephant and the Fantasia Carousel, as opposed to in Fantasyland, where they are traditionally found in disney parks. Strange enough, this land is also home to a small pavilion reminiscent of the short-lived Marvel Expo pavilion at Disneyland’s Tomorrowland called Marvel Universe, a meet-and-greet pavilion featuring Marvel characters including Spiderman. 

Meanwhile,  Shanghai’s Fantasyland evokes a village in a forest, somewhat akin to the approach of New Fantasyland in the Magic Kingdom that debuted in 2011. The land is the park’s largest land, the only Fantasyland in the world where you can’t see the back from the front. It includes variations of rides located in other disney parks. Attractions include Seven Dwarfs Mine Train from Walt Disney World (which was actually originally designed for Shanghai prior to opening in Magic Kingdom in 2014) , Peter Pan's Flight -  a disney staple-, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh from Disneyland, and For the First Time in Forever: A Frozen Sing-Along Celebration from Hollywood Studios.

Fantasyland’s premiere attraction is Voyage to the Crystal Grotto, a 10 minute boat ride around and under the castle that takes guests past animatronic scenes that utilize fountains and water effects. The films including Tangled, Aladdin, Mulan, Fantasia, The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. 

The land also has a unique walk-through hedge maze called Alice's Curious Labyrinth, inspired by the 1951 and 2010 film adaptations of Alice in Wonderland. The rumor is that this attraction builds on the plans for the unicorn hedge maze originally designed for the Beastly Kingdom expansion of Animal Kingdom that was never built in the early 2000s. To learn more about Beastly Kingdom, be sure to listen to episode 10 of Fastpass to the Past.

Instead of teacups, Fantasyland in Shanghai Disneyland has a Hunny Pot Spin, based to 2011 animated film Winnie the Pooh, where Pooh sings Everything is Honey. 

The park does have a Tomorrowland, but it virtually unrecognizable with sleek minimalism and a modern silver, blue, and white color scheme. According to Imagineering, they sought to create a city of the future filled with optimism. As such, they enscrewed the Future = Space conceptual laziness and created no Space Mountain for the theme park. Instead, it is home to TRON Lightcycle Power Run, an indoor Tron-themed roller coaster that will be making its way to the Magic Kingdom within the next few years. Similarly, instead of an Astro Orbiter attraction, Shanghai's park includes a spinning Jet Packs ride. Other attractions include Star Wars Launch Bay from Disneyland, and Buzz Lightyear Planet Rescue, a variant of previous Buzz Lightyear dark rides located in Disneyland, Disney World, and Disneyland Paris. Tomorrowland also has an orginal attraction called Stitch Encounter, which utilizes the same technology and idea as Crush Talk at DCA, Epcot, and Tokyo Disney Sea. 

Other conventional-themed lands such as Frontierland and Liberty/New Orleans Square, are omitted entirely or changed beyond recognition. Adventureland is reimagined into Adventure Isle. However, Adventure Isle takes its operational cues not from other Adventurelands in the various Disneyland locations but from California Adventure: the area is practically a re-theme of Grizzly Peak at Disney California Adventure. Both feature a river raft ride through an iconic mountain, a version of Soarin’, an interactive play/trail area, and a Quick Service restaurant.

According to Stan Dodd, Producer/Creative Director, Walt Disney Imagineering Shanghai, his motto for Adventure Isle is Seek Adventure, Discover Yourself.’ The land is meant to challenge guests, and it does with Soaring Over the Horizon and Roaring Mountain, home to Roaring Rapids, a river rapids ride and Camp Discovery, which is made up of 3 elevated ropes courses that overlook the park with caves, waterfalls, a hidden temple, and cliffs. Camp Discovery is a highlight as there’s really no equivalent at any other Disney park, a rope trail loosely inspired by the world’s most dangerous hike. However, this may be one experiment we don’t see imported elsewhere as the attractions is made feasible primarily by the labor rate in China that allows the attractions 39 operators to be cost effective. Adventure Isle also features Tarzan: Call of the Jungle, a live acrobatic stage show developed and directed by a Chinese woman who envisions and tells the Tarzan story with Chinese acrobats.

Instead of appearing in Adventureland or New Orleans Square, pirates get their own land to call home at Shanghai Disneyland. Treasure Cove is themed to an 18th-century Spanish harbor town located on a Caribbean island that has been captured by Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean. Most Disneyland’s that aren’t in China celebrate the American Old West and westward migration as a simultaneous celebration of American history and a romanticized role play of the era. In this sense, Treasure Cove is very much Shanghai’s Frontierland analog, romanticizing the exploration and mystery of a pirate’s life. The land's marquee attraction is Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for the Sunken Treasure, a dark ride based on the films. 

Led by imagineer Luc Mayrand, the ride feels like Disney flexing every technical and imagineering muscle it currently has into one impressive dead lift. It utilizes the zeitgeist of current theme park design, projection screens, but they’re not the sole focus except in key scenes and work more in synergy with the physical sets than seen in anything Universal or especially Disney has done prior.Like it’s predecessors Blue Bayou or Paris’s Captain Jack’s, Pirates shares a space with a wonderful indoor eatery, Barbossa’s Bounty, which is a quick service restaurant with amazing atmosphere and great food that allows you to watch the boats from the attracton go by.The land also is home to Eye of the Storm: Captain Jack’s Stunt Spectacular, a stunt show inspired by the films, and an interactive play area set aboard a wrecked French ship in the port. In a throwback to Disneyland, Davy Crockett’s Explorer Canoes are also located in this area, their path explores both Adventure Isle and Treasure Cove. However, this attraction has been lost in translation for some. On opening day, people didn’t realize they had to paddle. So two cast members were paddling for like 30 people. 

Several staple attractions, such as the aforementioned Space Mountain, Jungle Cruise, and It's a Small World, all of which are found at sister park, Tokyo Disneyland, are excluded to ensure the park is distinctly chinese.

In terms of food, per Disney only 10% of the food in the park is Western, with 20% Asian and 70% Chinese. Bob Iger even tasted the food in advance, including Mickey Mouse-shaped Peking duck pizza and turkey legs with hoisin sauce. Restaurants seating was even rethought, after studies found that Chinese guests take longer over meals, and extensive picnic areas were built to ensure the park catered to extended families with grandparents. In part because of China’s longtime one-child policy, Shanghai Disneyland must have strong intergenerational appeal. Even the restrooms are distinctly chinese, with stalls that hide squat toilets, as is customary in China. However, there is always at least one American-style toilet as well.  

Also, there is plenty more live entertainment in the park than can be found stateside, as many Chinese patrons prefer that to thrill rides. A theme that is repeated in other asian parks, Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea where the live entertainment has to utilize a daily lottery system due to crowds. Nevertheless, the park opened with many more rides than Hong Kong and Paris Disneyland had when they opened. You have almost 10 major attractions to visit and queue for when you enter the park upon opening. That's very unusual for a new park.

But, did that risk pay off for the Walt Disney Company? 

Part #4: Legacy 
 
Short answer: Yes. 

In less than three years, Shanghai Disneyland is proving to be one of Walt Disney Company’s most successful theme parks with more than 11 million visitors in its first year of operations, putting it in the top seven of theme parks worldwide. The total exceeded the company's most optimistic expectations. In the same way Shanghai Disneyland’s history is tied to Hong Kong Disneyland, its successes are tied to Bob Iger's legacy at the company. He spent 17 years to build the $5.5 billion theme park in China — and even signed the golden peony that sits atop the Disney castle, the world's largest.

At 11 million visitors, Shanghai would rank in the middle of Disney's parks, slightly outperforming Disney's park in Paris. The US Parks see more visitors, with Hong Kong significantly less.

The project is meant to boost Disney's brand in a country where average people haven't grown up with characters such as Mickey Mouse in the same way their American counterparts have. It was seen as an important step for Disney, not just for the theme park business but for the company as a whole. The idea was to use the park as a platform to market Disney's characters and movies to the Chinese consumer, and to get children and families here excited about them.Although Disney holds only a minority position in the park, the profit potential for the company has been nothing short of spectacular. It receives a 43 percent share of revenue from the park, which includes merchandise, food sales and hotel income. Disney also receives a fee for its role in managing the resort and royalties for the use of its characters. Moreover, Shanghai Disneyland has increased interest across China for its movies, toys, clothes, video games and books.

Although it is still early days to fully understand the impact the park is having on its China business, Disney movies since have been successful in the country, including the movie ZooTopia. Released in March of 2016, three months before the resorts opening, it earned $236 million and is the #1 animated film of all-time at China’s box office. 

Inspired by this reaction, ZooTopia has recently been announced as the park’s eighth themed land. Construction will begin soon and it will be the first “Zootopia” land at any Disney park worldwide. The press release mentions world’s first four times when describing the Zootopia land at Shanghai Disneyland. So it is It’s entirely possible that this is being co-developed for multiple gates worldwide, with Paris or Disney World’s Hollywood Studio or Animal Kingdom seeming the most likely. 

Regardless, the Shanghai Disneyland park was once predicted to be a money loser for years given its small size and high ticket prices.Even Chinese property tycoon Wang Jianlin said the park would not be profitable for 20 years. Surprisingly, the resort, started to make money three years ahead of market expectations. With a profit on the books in the 3rd quarter that ended in April 30, 2017 and a break even for the full year. The runaway success of Shanghai Disneyland gives an idea about the spending power of the Chinese middle class.

Meanwhile, Disney’s first forrey in China and smallest Disneyland, Hong Kong Disneyland continues to fall further in the red, as losses double in 2017 for the third consecutive year. Hong Kong Disneyland saw 6.2 million visitors in 2017, making it the second-lowest performing park after Disney’s Studios in Paris, which saw 5 million. Locals were the biggest group of visitors to Hong Kong Disneyland last year, making up 41 per cent. They were followed by mainland Chinese tourists, at 34 per cent, and overseas visitors who accounted for up to 25 per cent. However, with plans for new attractions, including attractions based on popular IP’s not present at Shanghai Disneyland or Tokyo Disneyland, namely Frozen and Iron Man, Hong Kong Disneyland hopes to recap a greater percentage of the recently recovered Hong Kong tourism market that hit over 60 million visitors last year.