Walt’s
Revolution!: By The Numbers
Harrison “Buzz” Price
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For all the books that have been written about limited-interest subjects like amusement parks and roller coasters it never ceases to amaze me how bad many are. Most seem to be lists about things that don’t matter or give information that readers will never use again. Then there are some like Mark Wyatt’s “White Knuckle Thrills” or Todd Throgmorton’s “Roller Coasters of America” that make me realize I wasted both my money and my time on a book (authors note: my warped copy of MW’s book is now my permanent “writing table” I use so I can sit on my futon and scribble).
With all of this negativity you are probably thinking that I was going to flush Buzz’s book with some of the others I have endured. Not so. In fact, it is quite the opposite. I found this book to be one of the best I have read on the amusement industry. Many people gush about the business of fun but have nothing substantive to add to the discourse. The difference with Buzz is that he has something to say- he has stories to tell. For those of you who have never heard of him, Harrison “Buzz” Price, founded E.R.A. (Economic Research Associates) and did the feasibility study on Disneyland. Throughout his life he worked on hundreds of different projects in a variety of fields.
The book is broken into a lot of chapters, with six main areas: Walt’s revolution, subsequent development of the theme park, changes in technology, project management, a look at fifty years of change in the attractions industry and “What does it all mean?” The interesting thing is that Buzz breaks down heavy-handed concepts for non-math wizards like myself, but he does not dumb them down. The book is filled with interesting thoughts, equations and figures that do take a touch of work to comprehend. However, once readers have a firm grasp on everything he offers they walk away with a better understanding of this industry.
His story- Buzz has led a life that is interesting because it has him working all over the globe. He seems to be part George Bailey and part Richard Feynman. But, Buzz is obviously a unique character never to be duplicated. Sure, there is a lot of info. on Walt and Disneyland. However, Buzz goes beyond this area, for which he is the arguably most famous, into other things like aluminum production and industrial processes. He shows the reader the numerical connections between these industries & the amusement industry (and applicable courses of action that work in both).
His analysis- If there is one thing that Buzz loves it is numbers. I will admit that after picking up the book at IAAPA I was a little nervous because I saw deltas and other characters I usually reserve for hazing rituals, not math. But, Price kept things at a level this history major could understand. Not only was I enjoying what I read, through basic explanations and charts Buzz was able to teach me a thing or two. His thoughts and calculations on things like Disney’s market share (chapter 2), the survival struggle between California’s Marineland and Sea World (chapter 5), the current strategy of Six Flags (chapter 6) and the amusement industry surviving recession (chapter 17) all went into great detail about their respective subjects. Add in lines like “CAPEX is not a castrated rooster” a graph with a loss label of “Shit Happens” and I came away from this book with both a smile and a great sense of understanding about how amusement parks “work.”
Park Concept- One of the things that really caught my attention was the fact that Buzz talked about the ideas and information structures that make amusement parks function. He says that the most important things aren’t the rides or the theming, but the coming together of all the parts of a facility that we don’t think about to create the full experience. For instance, chapter 14, Roller Coaster Math, is a quick version of market and feasibility studies. In these pages Buzz tells the reader what the important decisions are and the results, both positive and negative, that come from these choices. The few chapters that break down what goes into theme park concept taught me more than any other single source I can remember.
Peripheral Industries- As I said earlier, one of the things I like about the book is Buzz’s use of common threads throughout his story. While they are not amusement parks in the traditional sense Buzz brings in other industries that use theme, entertainment, attendance studies, etc. and shows how the two industries learn from one another. His sections on gaming, LBE (location based entertainment), nonprofit attractions, and CalArts demonstrate how much of what amusement parks do translates into other fields.
In conclusion, it probably won’t come as a big surprise that I put this book up there with only a handful of important industry writings, namely Judith A. Adams’ “The American Amusement Park Industry,” Scott Rutherford’s “The American Roller Coaster,” Klaus Shutzmansky’s “Roller Coaster: Der Achterbahn Designer Werner Stengel,” Tim Onosko’s “Funland U.S.A.”, Tim O’Brien’s “The Amusement Park Guide,” and Manes & Stevens’ “Painted Ponies” as the pinnacle of industry writing. To me, what this book teaches makes the cover price a steal. Buzz’s life of calculation that he has put down on paper (in painstaking detail) is invaluable to people that hope to make an impact on the amusement industry or considers themselves students of it.
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Amusement Park History, Copyright 2004.