Woody, Buzz, and the rest of the Toy Story gang have arrived at Hong Kong Disneyland, inhabiting a themed land excerpted from the popular animated films.
 A giant talking statue of Woody, the lanky toy cowboy, adopts epic, Paul Bunyan proportions to welcome visitors at the entrance. Tinker toys, Lincoln Logs, and giant pencils help reinforce the feeling of being shrunken to a toy's-eye view of the world.
Toy Story Land opened to the public Nov. 17 and is the first phase of a much larger expansion project for Disney's Hong Kong park. When completed in roughly two years, it will have cost HK$3.6 billion (US$460 million) and expanded the park by 23 percent to 311 acres.
Toy Story Land features a cast of actors and costumed characters with lots of photo opportunities for the family. There are roving plastic toy soldiers, Woody and Jessie the cowgirl from "Toy Story 2," and Rex, a giant talking dinosaur. A Hong Kong Disneyland exclusive interactive robot also patrols the area; known as Cubot, it consists of three stacked blocks with multiple faces, bodies, and voices that joke with guests in Cantonese, English, and Mandarin.
 Two new thrill rides take adventurous guests high above the park. "RC Racer" is a toy car set on a U-shaped track; it races 27 meters (89 feet) high backward and forward; "Toy Soldier Parachute Drop" lets delighted guests gently fall from 25 meters (82 feet) above the ground. The two thrill rides also offer a view of the renovation ongoing outside Toy Story Land. For less adventurous visitors, the new addition also features a "Slinky Dog Spin," a train carousel mimicking the toy from the movies.
After Toy Story Land, Hong Kong Disneyland's next two expansion phases are Grizzly Gulch (opening in 2012) and Mystic Point (2013). Toy Story Land was already present in Disneyland Paris, while Grizzly Gulch and Mystic Point will be exclusive to the Hong Kong location for five years after opening.
By the time the project is complete, Disneyland will have some extra competition, too. Hong Kong's other local theme park—Ocean Park—will have completed its own multibillion-dollar renovation, and the first Disneyland in mainland China will be only a few years away from opening. Construction broke ground for Shanghai Disneyland in April.
 Marketing and Retail
The Toy Story expansion is more than a facelift for theme park attractions. It also provided the catalyst for Hong Kong Disneyland's most extensive marketing campaign ever, incorporating local and international partners. The park paired with various retailers to spread brand awareness for Toy Story Land, while retail and food and beverage offerings within the park are likewise expanding.
Terruce Wang, vice president of sales and distribution marketing, says that since August, Hong Kong Disneyland representatives have visited 16 cities throughout Asia Pacific to roll out the Toy Story Land trade launch. More than 4,000 travel trade partners and media friends participated in launch events during the past three months or soft openings preceding the official November opening.
 "In conjunction with the multicity trade training and education programs Disney conducted across Asia, the company also collected views from its trade partners in a survey conducted during a two-day Toy Story Land Travel Trade Preview to ascertain professional opinion to the new products," Wang says. "Ninety-five percent of agents polled believed that their clients would enjoy the new Toy Story Land, and 93 percent felt their clients would choose a trip to Hong Kong because of the new themed area."
He anticipates the Toy Story Land opening will make Hong Kong Disneyland more appealing to young adults, while also lengthening guests' stays.
Director of Marketing Frederick Chan says Toy Story Land provides staff to explore new storytelling experiences within the park and also to stimulate imagination in the community via merchandising synergy.
"Many well-known lifestyle brands have developed a range of creative co-marketing initiatives with us, giving new opportunities and platforms to bring an endless supply of Toy Story magic to Guests not only in the resort, but also throughout Hong Kong," he says. "Locally in Hong Kong, a lot of never-been-seen-before creative collaborations and co-marketing synergetic creations have been launched with local lifestyle brands such as Bossini, Harbour City, and Broadway to reach to guests in unique ways and surprises."
Here are a few ways in which Hong Kong Disneyland is partnering with known local brands and national companies:
 Bossini: Hong Kong-based apparel brand Bossini launched a new Toy Story-themed fashion collection. Part of this collection is available at Hong Kong Disneyland. It encourages guests to dress up for playtime in Toy Story Land.
- Harbour City: Coinciding with the first months of Toy Story Land, Harbour City (a major shopping mall located in an area of Hong Kong with dense pedestrian traffic) presented "Toy to the World @ Harbour City" from Nov. 9 to Jan. 2, with various costumed characters from the Toy Story movies inviting shoppers and tourists to visit the theme park.
- Broadway: An electronics chain store with 37 shops throughout Hong Kong is launching a marketing campaign with TVC and print advertisements shot in Toy Story Land and offering tickets and Toy Story-themed premiums to customers.
- Other partners: Citibank Visa Credit card has various Disneyland promotions; Kodak Express Outlets is giving Toy Story photo albums with purchase of 60 or more prints; select cinemas in Hong Kong will offer moviegoers a chance at free Disneyland tickets with purchase of Coca-Cola combos.
 To specifically target the mainland China market, Hong Kong Disneyland is also driving an array of Toy Story Land promotional activities, including a TV series with the most influential children's show in China, "Dragon Club," which will be broadcast in more than 200 cities and regions nationwide. Meanwhile, to target young adults, Hong Kong Disneyland is strengthening its digital campaign to promote its expansion, with efforts including engaging China's most popular video site, Youku (equivalent to YouTube), and one with China's largest travel sites, Ctrip.
As for overseas markets, the resort has also developed Toy Story Land websites in Chinese, English, and Japanese to provide information about the new themed area and launched a marketing campaign to reach guests in 14 Asian cities through the Disney Channel.
Chan says retail and food and beverage offerings have also expanded considerably with the first phase of the park expansion. "To celebrate the opening of Toy Story Land, our merchandise offerings will also be expanded and enhanced, including approximately 50 Toy Story Land merchandise items exclusively available at Andy's Engine (a specialty gift shop) and about 130 Toy Story franchised merchandise items also available throughout the park," he says. "The merchandise team has also sourced classic toys that fit right in with the toys of Andy's backyard, as well as developed a new limited edition Woody Marquee Jumbo Pin."
The most popular characters for merchandise sales are consistently Buzz or Woody, but Chan says in-park merchandise sales of Rex, Slinky Dog, and even Toy Soldiers jumped almost 10 times in the weeks preceding the grand opening of Toy Story Land.
Expanded food and beverage offerings include frozen yogurt and pizza cones and themed items such as Jessie's Snack Round-up, an over-sized cookie box that features Jessie, Woody, and various trademarked friends in colorful and unique graphics specially developed by a team at Pixar.
After a Rough Start, Mickey Finds His Footing in Hong Kong
Open since 2005, Hong Kong Disneyland is a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company and the Hong Kong government, and both parties have been discussing an expansion to the property since 2007. During the first year of operation, the park seemed unprepared to deal with the influx of mainland tourists during Golden Week holidays. During its second year of operation, attendance numbers dropped dramatically, by nearly 1 million guests.
 Some Legislative Council members questioned the government's investment in the park. Some members of the public were disappointed by the park's size—the smallest Magic Kingdom in the world even after the expansion (Shanghai Disneyland will be roughly three times the size when it opens in five years).
Despite some critics, the Hong Kong park continues to make a major contribution to Hong Kong's tourism sector, diversifying the sorts of activities visitors from the mainland or abroad (along with local families) can enjoy in the city. According to a Hong Kong Disneyland summary of business highlights for the fiscal year ending October 2010, a government economic study found Hong Kong Disneyland visitors contributed HK$9.6 billion (US$1.2 billion) additional spending to the Hong Kong economy; since the resort opened, it had created more than 67,000 job opportunities for frontline workers and the travel industry.
Profit and attendance figures for the recent fiscal year ending October 2011 will be revealed in January 2012. In the previous fiscal year, the park was still losing money (HK$720 million, roughly US$92 million) but had improved considerably from the $HK1.32 billion ($US169 million) lost during the prior year. In 2010 revenue was up 19 percent to HK$3 billion ($US385 million), and attendance figures jumped 13 percent to more than 5.2 million; the latter finally surpassed the annual tally set at the park's grand opening year. The first phase of the new expansion follows improvements all around the theme park and resort, as it achieved record hotel occupancy at 82 percent, up 12 percentage points from the prior year's 70 percent.
Doug Meigs is a Hong Kong-based journalist. He writes about a range of topics, from arts and culture to social and environmental issues.
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