The most important investment a theme park can make is not a roller coaster or dark ride. It\u2019s in finding a new generation of fans.<\/p>\n
Companies that choose to stick with their current customers will \u201csunset\u201d along with that generation. Successful brands choose instead to find ways to cultivate new generations of fans. The Disneyland Resort is doing that this summer with a new show featuring children\u2019s TV star Bluey<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cBluey\u2019s Best Day Ever\u201d opened in Disneyland\u2019s Fantasyland Theatre last weekend. A line of families stretching from the theater all the way back to Sleeping Beauty Castle on the show\u2019s first day testified to the popularity of this animation franchise from Australia. For those who made it into the theater, Disneyland rewarded them with a delightful variety show featuring storytellers, live music and dancers.<\/p>\n Disney loves to use its own IP, but the company made the right move in licensing the Bluey franchise. If you want to appeal to kids, why not turn to the characters that they already love? Disney saw a gap in its appeal and spent the money to fill it.<\/p>\n \u201cBluey\u2019s Best Day Ever\u201d also helps fill a post-pandemic gap in the Disneyland Resort\u2019s entertainment lineup. The park lost a lot of live entertainment when it reopened from the lockdown. It\u2019s great to see families filling the Fantasyland Theatre again. But the resort still needs an immersive live theater production like \u201cAladdin\u201d<\/a> or \u201cFrozen\u201d<\/a> to complete its line-up.<\/p>\n The new production does not immerse guests in Bluey\u2019s world the way that Aladdin or Frozen welcomed people into those stories. Human beings do not inhabit Bluey\u2019s canine world. By bringing human musicians, dancers and storytellers onto its stage, \u201cBluey\u2019s Best Day Ever\u201d plays as a celebration of the Bluey franchise rather than an extension of it.<\/p>\n Which is fine, and something that kids and their parents will love. Bringing Bluey from the screen to real life helps Disneyland create a unique connection with young Bluey fans \u2014 one that the park hopes will help make them Disneyland fans for life.<\/p>\n But other theme parks are winning fans with the type of fully immersive live theater productions that Disneyland used to offer. Right now, Universal Orlando Resort leads the way with amazing productions of the How to Train Your Dragon-themed \u201cThe Untrainable Dragon,\u201d the Wizarding World-themed \u201cLe Cirque Arcanus\u201d and \u201cThe Bourne Stuntacular,\u201d all of which far exceed any show that Disneyland has to offer. At Universal Studios Hollywood, \u201cWaterworld\u201d remains a fan favorite after 30 years. Knott\u2019s Berry Farm just reopened its renovated Bird Cage Theater<\/a>, providing new life for the melodramas that it presents there.<\/p>\n These shows draw in and connect with new fans in ways that the story theater and variety productions that Disneyland has been offering in recent years cannot.<\/p>\n \u201cBluey\u2019s Best Day Ever\u201d is a big win for Disneyland. At the same time, its debut reminds long-time fans of what Disneyland is missing. That\u2019s the flip side of winning new fans. As they stick around, they remember what brought them and will hold a brand to its past standards of excellence.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The most important investment a theme park can make is not a roller coaster or dark ride. It\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":237166,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[2223,163,165,164,1341,420,136],"class_list":["post-241999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-amusement-parks","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-disneyland","tag-things-to-do","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/237166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}