Life with The Company
Jul. 10th, 2008 07:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tealinI.
I park my bike behind the studio, so I get to see all the nitty gritty heavy lifting that goes into running the Mouse House. Usually there's some sort of big truck back there; often it's a Buena Vista Studios freight truck either coming or going from storage (resuscitating 2D means moving a lot of furniture) or else it's a garbage truck emptying one of the dumpsters. But on Tuesday it was a Glendale School District truck. Glendale School District? Have they decided to phase out school buses and truck their kids to a field trip? What could they possibly be delivering to Disney? Then I saw they were loading computer monitors into it. I'm sure there's a great big tax incentive behind it, but still – d'AWWWW. I wonder if the kids who use those monitors will know where they came from, or that the screen they're looking at was used to make the movies they watched not long ago.
II.
I pulled up to the bike rack and, next to the dumpsters, was a pile of wooden palettes. But they were not intended to be taken away by the garbagemen. How did I know this? Because stuck to them was a photocopy of Kuzco in a defensive action pose with 'NO TOUCHY!' in big black letters. It's great to know I work with people who are nerdy about their own stuff.
III.
We had a FIRE DRILL! It was very exciting! We all survived! Anyone driving down Riverside at that point must have thought they were looking at the oddest strike ever because everyone was clustered under placards sporting various Disney characters which designate evacuation groups.
Later we had healthy snacks and naptime. (Just kidding.) (About naptime.)
IV.
There's a company-wide initiative to reduce the number of Disney employee cars commuting every day – they've got carpools, vanpools, transit vouchers, and small bonuses for walking/biking, but with the recent release of Wall•E they've stepped it up. For the month of July, every day you take alternative transport to work, you get an entry in a draw whose prize is ... wait for it ... A BIG-SCREEN PLASMA TV AND BLU-RAY PLAYER! So you, too, can become a complacent blob! Who thought this through, and how much were they paid?
I park my bike behind the studio, so I get to see all the nitty gritty heavy lifting that goes into running the Mouse House. Usually there's some sort of big truck back there; often it's a Buena Vista Studios freight truck either coming or going from storage (resuscitating 2D means moving a lot of furniture) or else it's a garbage truck emptying one of the dumpsters. But on Tuesday it was a Glendale School District truck. Glendale School District? Have they decided to phase out school buses and truck their kids to a field trip? What could they possibly be delivering to Disney? Then I saw they were loading computer monitors into it. I'm sure there's a great big tax incentive behind it, but still – d'AWWWW. I wonder if the kids who use those monitors will know where they came from, or that the screen they're looking at was used to make the movies they watched not long ago.
II.
I pulled up to the bike rack and, next to the dumpsters, was a pile of wooden palettes. But they were not intended to be taken away by the garbagemen. How did I know this? Because stuck to them was a photocopy of Kuzco in a defensive action pose with 'NO TOUCHY!' in big black letters. It's great to know I work with people who are nerdy about their own stuff.
III.
We had a FIRE DRILL! It was very exciting! We all survived! Anyone driving down Riverside at that point must have thought they were looking at the oddest strike ever because everyone was clustered under placards sporting various Disney characters which designate evacuation groups.
Later we had healthy snacks and naptime. (Just kidding.) (About naptime.)
IV.
There's a company-wide initiative to reduce the number of Disney employee cars commuting every day – they've got carpools, vanpools, transit vouchers, and small bonuses for walking/biking, but with the recent release of Wall•E they've stepped it up. For the month of July, every day you take alternative transport to work, you get an entry in a draw whose prize is ... wait for it ... A BIG-SCREEN PLASMA TV AND BLU-RAY PLAYER! So you, too, can become a complacent blob! Who thought this through, and how much were they paid?
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no subject
Date: 2008-07-11 04:14 am (UTC)The most recent playlists include a lot of songs from their animated musicals covered and revamped by the Disney brand popstars. A lot of Cheetah Girls songs, Jonas Brothers--who sing a really fun rendition of Yo Ho Yo Ho (A Pirate's Life for Me). There was a lot of Crazy Frog, too, and what may have been the Hamster Dance song. Every once and a while, they'd pop out a classic like Supercalli, but Hannah Montana, HSM and the Jonas Brothers are definitely what the kids want to listen to.
I interned in marketing on the East Coast, and there was actually less a focus on profits than other companies I've worked with and more a focus on kids and parents. Sure, we targeted Moms like whoa, but the station was really paranoid about keeping everything wholesome and kidfriendly. We had strict rules about what we could do and say at events and how the on-air advertisements and PSAs were written. We absolutely could not target kids in advertisements--the focus had to be on parents. It was refreshing.
And, as a result of interning there, I know the lyrics to more Hannah Montana and High School Musical songs than any 20-something should know.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-11 04:25 am (UTC)That's a little surprising but oddly refreshing about the marketing... makes me glad. Thanks for sharing!