Life Insurance Created This Part 1 // Disneyland Walt Disney Studio was founded in 1923 in Los Angeles by Walt Disney (1901-1966) and his brother Roy. After a distributor essentially stole one of his early cartoon characters and his animators, Walt made sure he owned everything he made after that. Mickey Mouse debuted in 1928 and became an immediate sensation, starring in the first cartoon with synchronized sound. His animated features and, eventually, television programs achieved steady success, and by the 1950s, Walt became intrigued with creating an amusement park where parents and children could have a good time together. Back then, the only amusement parks in the country were dilapidated places with seedy characters, but Disney dreamed of an immaculately clean, family-oriented park with imaginative attractions. After failing in the pursuit of traditional means of financing to build what would become Disneyland, Walt decided to provide his own financing. A large part of this was generated by borrowing money from his cash value life insurance. Disneyland opened in 1955 and hosted more than 3.5 million visitors in that first year. It became an immediate, resounding success. Disney is quoted as saying that money was the biggest problem he faced throughout his life, and that was certainly the case with Disneyland. “It takes a lot of money to make these dreams come true. From the very start it was a problem. Getting the money to open Disneyland. About $17 million it took. And we had everything mortgaged, including my personal insurance… We did it [Disneyland], in the knowledge that most of the people I talked to thought it would be a financial disaster — closed and forgotten within the first year.” Part 2 // McDonald’s Ray Kroc worked playing the piano, then selling paper cups, before he sold multimixers for milkshakes. In 1954, Ray Kroc (1902-1984) took notice of a successful hamburger stand in San Bernardino, California, which he called on, intending to sell brothers Dick and Mac McDonald more multimixers. He learned they were interested in a nationwide franchising agent. Kroc, 52 at the time, decided his future was in hamburgers and partnered with the brothers. He opened his first McDonald’s in Des Plaines, Illinois, in 1955 and bought out the McDonald brothers in 1961. Kroc did not take a salary during his first eight years, and to overcome constant cash-flow problems, Kroc borrowed money from two of his cash value life insurance policies (and also his bank) to help cover the salaries of key employees. He also used some of the money to create an advertising campaign around emerging mascot Ronald McDonald. As the franchising of McDonald’s took off, Ray Kroc needed all franchisees and suppliers to buy into his vision, working not for McDonald’s but for themselves, together with McDonald’s. This helped maintain quality, speed of service, and methods. Along the way, it was franchisees that created some of the classic items on the menu like the Big Mac, the Filet-O-Fish, and the Egg McMuffin. McDonald’s grew to more than 700 restaurants within 10 years. Today, McDonald’s serves more than 50 million people each day through more than 36,000 locations in 100 countries. As the brand expanded, McDonald’s gave back. One very noteworthy involvement has been the Ronald McDonald House Charities. In 1973, Fred Hill, a football player with the Philadelphia Eagles, had the need for such a facility at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, where his child was being treated for leukemia, but he had no place to stay during his daughter’s medical care. Hill’s dilemma led to the first Ronald McDonald House. Today, RMH has grown to 368 Ronald McDonald Houses in 64 countries, providing supportive housing and over 7,200 bedrooms to families around the world each night. Part 3 // The Pampered Chef Doris Christopher hoped to one day be a home economics teacher. She graduated college from the University of Illinois at Urbana in 1967. She soon married and got her dream job teaching high school home economics. But her career paused when she became a stay-at-home mother. Once her daughters were in school, Doris began to think about returning to the workforce. She had a number of part-time jobs, but finally, she came up with a simple plan to offer professional-quality kitchen tools directly to consumers through in-home cooking demonstrations. All her time working with homemakers convinced Doris that women needed quality, time-saving tools designed to help make cooking quick and easy. She had seen the success of Tupperware’s business model, and she developed her own detailed multi-level marketing business plan. To get started, she needed capital, so she borrowed $3,000 from her life insurance policy. With money in hand, Doris started The Pampered Chef in the basement of her suburban Chicago home in 1980. Doris helped changed American culture, moving families from just waiting at the kitchen table to enjoying making meals together at the kitchen island. By 2002, the company had grown into a $700 million operation that was acquired by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Corporation for $1.5 billion. Today, the company boasts a sales force of over 65,000 consultants in five countries, with sales of over $300 million. Tume in for Part ,Foster Farms, tomorrow July 15 at 3pm!