Disney Stores May Shrink/Be Sold

[trekkie1701E]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/dowjones/20030516/bs_dowjones/200305160045000050

If they close, I say GOOD RIDDANCE! Either change or close; TDS angers me to no end these days.

Daniel
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bringback_tds
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/preservethemagic
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/disneylands_50th

 

[Luke]

People might care more on a Disney forum - we are 100% Eisner free here babe !

 

[Janice & Mokey's Man]

Hey, we ain't too crazy about "you know who" over at Disney boards, either!

 

[Buck-Beaver]

I haven't liked the Disney stores for years, the product lines really suck. They were OK when you could find neat Henson stuff in them years ago. I don't think I'd ever have a reason to shop them, but it would be nice if they were more like the WB Stores - the ones in Japan are especially good.

Nevertheless, my Mother will be horrified. She LOVES Disney.

 

[Baby Animal]

I don't know if you've visited a Disney store lately, but for Finding Nemo, they have puppets for all three sharks. The hammerhead is unusable as a puppet, but the other two are great. If I had an extra $40 to spend on them instead of the Swedish Chef, I would have gotten them. It's too bad they didn't make any of the fish puppets. Now that would have been cool.

 

[frogboy4]

There mostly kiddie stuff in the stores and the one here has the same wooden cut outs in the window that they've had since it opened years ago. It's like they just don't care. I've seen some impressive Disney products that aren't in Disney stores. They need to be smarter. I don't think they should have opened more than one store per city anyway.

 

[Luke]

From how i understand it, the UK Disney stores are like what the USA stores used to be - lots of collectables and snowglobes, teapots, PVC's, cells, watches, dolls etc etc. They are only now just starting to take it to a more kiddy level. WB stores are great over here too - they always have a sale on though which is worrying - it's all Tweety, Friends, Harry Potter, Simpsons and Scooby.

 

[BoyRaisin2]

Simpsons, how'd the Warner Bros. stores get them? They're 20th Century Fox, aren't they?

 

[Luke]

Yeah i was wondering about that myself, but they do have Simpsons pens, t-shirts, stationary, alarm clocks and stuff like that. Maybe Warner Bros stores are owned by a different company in the UK and they just bought the name from WB ?

Edit :-

OK, looked it up. In 2001 the Warner Bros UK Stores were 40% owned by a company called 'ENIC Entertainment' and 60% Time Warner. In early 2002 it looks like they were 80% owned by 'ENIC Entertainment' and 20% by Time Warner. Mid 2002 'ENIC Entertainment' sold 60% of the company to a company called 'Warner Bros Studio Stores Management' with another 20% to follow later. So it looks like there was a buyout by the old people who managed the UK Warner Bros stores and they now own 80% with Time Warner owning the other 20%. So i guess that's why they can sell other peoples products.

This is exciting, brings me back to the good ol' days of the Henson sale !

 

[Buck-Beaver]

I'll have to check out those finding Nemo puppets when I have a little more cash....I'm kinda sorry I never got one of the large Simba puppets years ago.