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The Emporium on Main Street, U.S.A. is a big part of the park experience whether you are in Anaheim, Orlando, Tokyo, Paris, or Hong Kong. Who of us hasn’t stopped and made a purchase on the way out of an exciting day at the parks? When I was with the Walt Disney World Company, it was said that more business at the Emporium occurred in the last couple of hours at the park then the entire rest of the day combined. It was also said that the square footage of those stores far exceeded what could be sold in any comparable square footage of a major department store.
The Emporium and all major gift shops at the right when exiting Disney theme parks are perhaps Disney’s best gift shop revenue generators.
Simply stated, each Emporium is huge business for the company. It also explains why it remains on the right side of the street as guests exit the park (for that matter, all the major retail locations in any Disney park are on the right of the guest when they exit). This is because most guests are right-handed and as a result, they tend to move toward the right when looking for products and services. Therefore, the right side of any Disney park as you exit is a major piece of real estate to Disney’s bottom line.
My favorite Emporium is in Disneyland Paris. Not so much because of the merchandise, but because of a unique antique found in the center of the store. Because theming is so replete in this park, one may pass by barely noticing its existence. But if you have the opportunity, head inside and take a closer look, because it says so much about trust.
Is it simply theming, or is there a story behind the show?
In the center of the store is a device actually used in stores like this a century ago. The purpose of this device is to make change for each purchase. According to Eddie Soto, former Imagineer and show producer responsible for Main Street U.S.A. at Disneyland Paris, they found this invention through research photos. In the old days, cashiers were not trusted to handle change. They would take the money, place it in a basket with the sales slip, pull the rope, and it went on a track up stairs, where management would make the change, and then send the basket back downstairs to the customer.
From here a small basket wheels itself upstairs to management.
Imagine if that were the status quo at the Emporium today. Lines at the end of the day would go back to the castle with guests waiting to make their purchase. If any store followed that sort of thinking, they would lose significant business. Fortunately technology, if not trust, evolves.
What does trust look like in your organization? During my time with Disney, I ran into obstacles with senior management in the mid- to late-1990s in providing facilitators laptops to use in their programs. Senior management didn’t trust facilitators to not lose them. They didn’t trust that laptops would not be used for personal purposes. Every reason centered in some way around trust. For that matter, the same arguments centered around trust when we were campaigning for cast members to have company-authorized beepers, and then later, corporate cell phones. Sometimes cost was brought up, but after that was put to bed, the issue of trust would come around.
In contrast, Ritz-Carlton is known for trusting all its hotel employees with up to $2,000 a day in handling a customer disputes. The cynic would easily dismiss such a notion thinking that such a policy would be frequently abused. But Ritz-Carlton carefully trains its employees in issues around service recovery so that they make right decisions in the moment of crisis. Teaching correct principles and letting your employees make decisions for themselves is foundational to establishing trust and credibility in an organization.
The Ritz-Carlton succeeds on a foundation of trust and confidence in its employees.
There’s an adage that says:
A manager whose business went bust
Shook his head and exclaimed in disgust,
“Employees are inept.
So I checked their every step
And got killed by high costs of low trust.
A wise man whose work I respected said “I would rather live my life largely trusting others—and then at times be disappointed—than to live my life largely as a cynic.” In balancing between trust and inefficiency, ask yourself the following:
- Do I trust other people? How do my actions show that I trust others?
- Am I trustworthy? What qualities cause others to trust me?
- Do I trust myself? What do I do that shows trust in myself?
You may not step inside the Emporium in Disneyland Paris anytime soon, but remember next time you put processes, rules, or procedures in place to ensure trust, consider this question: What will this look like 25, 50, or 100 years from now?
Next time, we head to three Magic Kingdoms with Figaro the Cat. It’s about learning from one’s mistakes.
