Publications

August 1992 (Revised June 1993)
Case

Euro Disney: The First 100 Days

By: Gary W. Loveman and Leonard A. Schlesinger

The Walt Disney Co. theme parks historically have thrived on the basis of a formula stressing excellent customer service and a magnificent physical environment. The formula has proven successful in Japan, as well as the United States. With the controversial opening of... View Details

Keywords: Multinational Firms and Management; Service Operations; Service Delivery; Corporate Strategy; Customer Focus and Relationships; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Japan; France; United States

May 2002 (Revised May 2003)
Case

Performance Indicator

Performance Indicator is a start-up that holds patents on the use of color-change technology to indicate when golf balls have been damaged by exposure to water. Because golfers put two to five used golf balls into play for every one new ball they buy, the used golf... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Patents; Entrepreneurship; Sports; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

28 Apr 2003
Research & Ideas

Supply Chain Risk: Deal With It

president of strategy and new business development for books and entertainment retailer Borders Group (Ann Arbor, Mich.). "There's not as much slack as there once was." "Slack" in the supply chain refers primarily to... View Details

Keywords: by David Stauffer

29 Jan 2021
Op-Ed

How Influencers, Celebrities, and FOMO Can Win Over Vaccine Skeptics

reinforce the positive consequences of taking the vaccine, such as the ability to visit family, go to work, and have more entertainment options. With those factors in mind, we offer three customer-centric recommendations to speed adoption... View Details

Keywords: by Rohit Deshpandé, Ofer Mintz, and Imran S. Currim

December 2019
Case

Steemit: A New Social Media?

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Alexander White and Karen Elterman

This case discusses the alternative social media site Steemit, including the principles it was founded on in 2016 and the challenges it faced in 2019. Steemit was a blockchain-based platform that aimed to differentiate itself from other social media companies by... View Details

September 2022 (Revised January 2023)
Case

Bear to Bull: An Analyst’s Journey with Netflix

By: Aiyesha Dey, Joseph Pacelli, Jennifer G. Lawson and Tom Quinn

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said “hell freezing over” was more likely than him upgrading the “sell” rating he had maintained on movie and television streaming giant Netflix since 2011, despite meteoric subscriber and share price growth. In 2022, however,... View Details

Keywords: Accounting; Asset Pricing; Cash Flow; Investment; Stocks; Equity; Analysis; Attitudes; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; United States

May 2012
Case

Westlake Lanes: How Can This Business Be Saved?

By: Richard G. Hamermesh and Alisa Zalosh

Shelby Givens, a new MBA, is the general manager of Westlake Lanes, a near-bankrupt bowling alley that her grandfather founded decades earlier. Givens has been given one year to turn a profit; if the goal is not met Westlake will close. During the first few days on the... View Details

Keywords: United States; Operations Management; Small And Medium-sized Enterprises; Turnarounds; Strategy; Leading Change; Marketing Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Operations; Transformation; Growth and Development Strategy; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; United States

09 Jun 2024
Blog Post

The EC Formula: MBA Class of 2024 Looks Back

back. Working in strategy resonates with this, as I will have to make assumptions about what the future looks like. Having a deep understanding of technology and entertainment while also being able to imagine a future with that... View Details

Web

Harvard Business School

served as director of BET Holdings, the parent company of Black Entertainment Television. Franklin Anderson MBA 1971 Franklin Anderson co-founded and led Cleveland's Hough Area Community Development Corporation (HADC). Before coming to... View Details

01 Dec 2022
News

Full Court Press

first lady, Jeannette Kagame. Inside Kigali’s three-year-old, $104 million BK Arena (named for the Bank of Kigali), pregame entertainment features a troupe of thunderous, polyrhythmic drummers and dancers.The seats and court are adorned... View Details

Keywords: Dan Morrell

01 May 2019
What Do You Think?

What Should the Leadership of YouTube Do?

littleny Can YouTube’s Users Help the Company Deal With Its “Moral” Problem?* This month’s mini-case described the dilemma faced by Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube: how far to promote “sustainability,” viewership, and (to some) free speech at the risk of losing what is... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Entertainment & Recreation; Entertainment & Recreation

06 Aug 2019
Cold Call Podcast

Super Bowl Ads Sell Products, but Do They Sell Brands?

Kenny: : "This flat tire needs a man," says the narrator of the Goodyear Tire commercial that aired during the inaugural Super Bowl between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs in 1967. The ad featured a damsel in distress with a blown tire on a... View Details

Keywords: Entertainment & Recreation; Entertainment & Recreation; Entertainment & Recreation; Entertainment & Recreation

July 2017
Case

Centerbridge Partners and Great Wolf Resorts: Buying from a Highly Regarded Competitor

By: Josh Lerner, John D. Dionne and Amram Migdal

The case examines the March 2015 Centerbridge Partners investment decision regarding whether to acquire Great Wolf Resorts, a North American family-oriented indoor water parks and hotel operator, from a private equity (PE) competitor, Apollo Global Management. The case... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity Financing; Commercial Mortgage Backed Securities; CMBS; Secondary Buyouts; Business Ventures; Acquisition; Finance; Borrowing and Debt; Cost; Cost of Capital; Equity; Private Equity; Financial Instruments; Debt Securities; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; North and Central America; United States

August 2014
Case

Netflix: Designing the Netflix Prize (A)

By: Karim R. Lakhani, Wesley M. Cohen, Kynon Ingram, Tushar Kothalkar, Maxim Kuzemchenko, Santosh Malik, Cynthia Meyn, Greta Friar and Stephanie Healy Pokrywa

In 2006, Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, was looking for a way to solve Netflix's customer churn problem. Netflix used Cinematch, its proprietary movie recommendation software, to promote individually determined best-fit movies to customers. Hastings determined that a... View Details

Keywords: Crowdsourcing; Prizes; Digitization; Algorithms; Recommendation Software; Disruption; Transformation; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Sharing; Applications and Software; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; United States