Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create the "Happiest Place On Earth

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal Volume 12 | Issue 3 Article 3 5-15-2012 Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create the "Happiest Place On Earth" Lauren A. Newell Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/drlj Part of the Business Organizations Law Commons, and the Dispute Resolution and Arbitration Commons Recommended Citation Lauren A. Newell, Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create the "Happiest Place On Earth", 12 Pepp. Disp. Resol. L.J. Iss. 3 (2012) Available at: https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/drlj/vol12/iss3/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Law at Pepperdine Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal by an authorized editor of Pepperdine Digital Commons. For more information, please contact , . Newell: Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create [Vol. 12: 415, 2012] PEPPERDINE DISPUTE RESOLUTION LAW JOURNAL Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create the “Happiest Place on Earth” Lauren A. Newell* I. INTRODUCTION Poets rhapsodize about it, the Beatles sing about it, philosophers debate it, psychologists study it, and chocolate induces it. Disney,1 on the other hand, claims title to it: happiness. Walt Disney, 2 founder of The Walt Disney Company (Disney or the Company) 3 and the creative force behind the Parks4 and Resorts,5 referred to his flagship Resort in California as “the happiest place on Earth.”6 As Disney has expanded its presence beyond Disneyland,7 the media have employed the phrase “the happiest place on * Assistant Professor of Law, Ohio Northern University Pettit College of Law; B.A., Georgetown University, 2004; J.D., Harvard Law School, 2007. I would like to thank Dan Shapiro for his mentorship and advice, as well as for teaching the wonderful course that inspired this Article. Special thanks also to Caroline and Rod Salvati for their boundless encouragement, love, and support 1. For the sake of brevity, this Article assumes a certain degree of familiarity with The Walt Disney Company’s theme parks, resorts, products, films, and terminology, so many references to attractions at the Walt Disney World Resort and to Disney characters are not defined. See generally DISNEY, http://disney.go.com (last visited July 13, 2012); see also Attractions at Walt Disney World Resort, WALT D ISNEY WORLD, http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/attractions/ (last visited July 13, 2012) [hereinafter Attractions]; see also All Characters, DISNEY, http://disney.go.com/characters/#/characters/allcharacters/ (last visited July 13, 2012) [hereinafter Characters]; see also infra Appendix A for Disney-specific definitions. 2. See infra Appendix A. 3. See infra Appendix A. 4. See infra Appendix A. 5. See infra Appendix A. 6. Anthony Lane, Wonderful World: What Walt Disney Made, THE NEW YORKER, Dec. 11, 2006, available at http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/12/11/061211fa_fact (quoting Walt Disney’s reference to the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, California); see also infra Appendix A. 7. Disney currently owns, operates, manages, and/or licenses, directly or indirectly, six Resorts worldwide, with a seventh currently under construction. The Walt Disney Co., Annual Report (Form 10-K), at 7, 11 (Nov. 23, 2012) [hereinafter Annual Report]. These include the Disneyland Resort in California, the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida, the Tokyo Disney Resort in Japan, Disneyland Resort Paris in France, the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort in China, Aulani, a 415 Published by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 2012 1 Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal, Vol. 12, Iss. 3 [2012], Art. 3 Earth” (the Happiest Place on Earth or the HPOE8) to refer also to other Resorts, including the Walt Disney World Resort in Lake Buena Vista, Florida (Walt Disney World or WDW).9 For WDW to deserve the title of the HPOE, it must cultivate an atmosphere that stimulates happiness to an unusually great extent. This Article examines, in the context of negotiation theory, the degree to which Disney creates happiness for those inside WDW, particularly WDW’s guests10 and cast members (Cast Members or CMs11). It begins with a brief discussion of happiness, the emotion 12 in question, and of negotiation theory. This Article next examines how Disney creates at WDW a negotiating environment conducive to the stimulation of happiness. It then analyzes personal observations 13 of Disney’s negotiations with guests and CMs and offers suggestions for how Disney could negotiate more effectively. Finally, this Article concludes with a judgment about Disney’s success in presenting WDW as the HPOE and with contemplation of how lessons learned from Disney are applicable to other companies. A. Emotion Theory: An Understanding of Happiness Emotions are influential and ever-present factors of daily life. Although the words used to describe emotions vary across cultures, the emotions themselves seem to be universal.14 The emotion of “happiness” is a positive emotion15 generally understood to refer to a state involving positive feelings or positive judgments about feelings. 16 Theorists distinguish between the different senses in which happiness can be understood. One useful construct Disney Resort & Spa in Hawaii, and the Shanghai Disney Resort in China (under construction). Id. at 7-11; see also infra Appendix A. Disney also operates several other resort and vacation facilities, including through the Disney Vacation Club, which offers ownership interests in resort facilities through a vacation ownership plan, the Disney Cruise Line, a vacation cruise line with three ships in operation and one under construction, and Adventures by Disney, which provides all-inclusive, guided vacation tour packages, mainly at non-Disney sites. Annual Report, supra note 7, at 11-12. 8. See infra Appendix A. 9. See, e.g., Millie Alexander, “Go Where the Dream Takes You”: Disneyland Then and Now, THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN, Apr. 24, 2005, at T01 (noting that, at that time, the so-called happiest places on earth included all five of Disney’s then-existing Resorts); see also infra Appendix A. 10. See infra Appendix A. 11. See infra Appendix A. 12. See infra Appendix B for definitions of terms relevant to emotions. 13. The information and assertions made throughout this Article and not attributed to another source come from interviews I conducted, my personal observations, and my first-hand experience derived from recent trips to WDW to conduct research for this Article. 14. See STEVEN PINKER, H OW THE MIND WORKS 365 (1997). 15. See infra Appendix B. 16. DANIEL NETTLE, H APPINESS: THE SCIENCE BEHIND YOUR SMILE 29 (2005); see also infra Appendix B. 416 https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/drlj/vol12/iss3/3 2 Newell: Happiness at the House of Mouse: How Disney Negotiates to Create [Vol. 12: 415, 2012] PEPPERDINE DISP (...truncated)