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Walt Disney Co. CEO Josh D’Amaro sought to distinguish his company from the pack at its annual upfront presentation Tuesday by observing the chaotic state of the entertainment industry. After a Devil Wears Prada 2-inspired sizzle reel and an introduction by Anne Hathaway (“The new boss claims he is nicer than Miranda Priestly. We’ll see,” she quipped.) D’Amaro sought to frame Disney’s place in the larger media ecosystem.
Amazon, Netflix, Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery… the past few years have seen a flurry of deals to consolidate and grow. Disney, of course, did that too. But ever since it closed its deal for Fox, it has been content to rest on its laurels and lean into its strengths.
“Everybody, in their own way, is racing to assemble something. Studios. Streaming services. Sports rights. Live events. And brands that audiences feel something about,” D’Amaro told the audience of advertisers and media buyers in the Jacob Javits Convention Center. “It is, in a way, a real compliment to this company. Because what they are racing to assemble is, more or less, the picture of what we already are.”
Disney, by contrast, has the franchises, the scaled streaming service, sports and the studios. And more importantly, D’Amaro argued, it has the je ne sais quoi that everyone else is chasing.
“I can still remember exactly where I was standing the first time I saw the castle. I can remember it in a way I do not remember most things from when I was 8 years old,” he told the crowd. “And if you have ever taken a child to one of our parks, or been the child taken to one, you know exactly the feeling I am describing.
“That feeling, the one that does not fade, the one that becomes part of who someone is, that is our entire business,” he added. “No focus group invents that. No algorithm produces it. No amount of capital can buy it. That is what every audience, every sponsor, every brand in this room is actually trying to buy.”
Disney had Mickey and Minnie Mouse greeting guests as they entered the cavernous space, and some attendees were lining up to take photos. Who needs a celebrity when the characters are stars too?
“The thing is, you cannot acquire a hundred years of trust. You can’t put generations of belonging on a balance sheet,” D’Amaro said. “Disney is part of people’s lives in a way few brands have ever been. And in a world of infinite choice and constant distraction, that kind of presence is rare and getting rarer.”
“In a marketplace where everyone is racing to assemble what we already have, Disney is in a category of one,” he added.
