As I was finishing reading Neil Gabler's
Walt Disney last week I came across an interesting bit o' information. Two notable things happened in the year 1955 that 50+ years later still find the world feeling the repurcussions. On April 15 of that year, Ray Kroc opened a franchised restaurant called McDonald's, in Des Plaines, Illinois. A quarter year later, on July 17, Walt opened Disneyland in Anaheim, California. At some point, the paths of Kroc & Disney crossed, and the former referenced his recent purchase of a fast-food restaurant chain, and posed to the latter his desire to open a unit inside Disneyland, which was denied. My first thought was how powerful a combination it would have been, and that Walt Disney certainly made a mistake in not seeing the potential of such a great concept as McDonald's. Then, of course, I was quick to remind myself that it doesn't look as though either company suffered anything from the avoided marriage. According to a Business Week report in 2004 concerning the top brands in the world, Disney was ranked #6 and McDonald's was #7. (Read the PDF
here.)
I then recalled John Greenleaf Whittier's poignant poem
Maud Miller, in which he said:
For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these: “It might have been!”
But, of course, hindsight is always 20/20. Can we really blame Disney for not accepting the offer? I think not, and here's why. In life we are frequently presented with opportunities (granted, not multi-billion dollar ones) that require split-second decisions, and sometimes we miss it. This little scenario was a gentle encourager to me in that although I may win some, and lose some, a miss doesn't necessarily mean I can't succeed in other manners.
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