PW-FEB20-30-32-Industry-Influencer.qxp_Feature 02/03/2020 11:19 Page 30
Industry Influencer
Founded over 40 years ago as an animatronics company, Sally Corporation has since evolved into Sally Dark Rides, creating blockbuster experiences at parks the world over and setting the pace of change. Park World editor, Becci Knowles talks with chairman and CEO John Wood about the origins of the company and the chance meeting that changed everything…
and Sammy Boy …… we liked ‘S’ names,” says John with a smile. The process was the invention of friend and co- founder Dr. John Rob Holland: “He created the first character in dental school to aid in a creative communications presentation and named her Sally, after a classmate” says John adding, “the name just stuck”. John continues: “I wanted to get in on the business, so I
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worked on completing all the figure finishing for the talking mannequins until we established an art department.” You would be forgiven for thinking John had an engineering background, “not so” he says, laughing, “and we quickly found out that we should hire someone to build the characters and I should stick to selling! I always believed passionately about what we could do, it was a powerful communication device [the animatronic] - it could teach, it could promote, it could entertain, and it could educate.”
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We started Sally as a company in January 1978 with moving and talking mannequins. Sally [the mannequin] was our first character, then came Sam
While I was
there, I met a man who was an ex Six Flagger from Atlanta, called Bill Barnes. Bill asked me, ‘are you going to IAAPA?’ and I said, ‘what’s IAAPA?’ (remember it was 1978!). He said, ‘you really need to call IAAPA and join up, call them soon as you get home.’ So, I did.
On one occasion John put an Elvis figure in the back of his
car and drove him up to Nashville Tennessee to a suite at the Opryland Hotel for its grand unveiling at the Shopping Center Show. “He had only just died and yet there he was, in the back seat of my car in all his sparkles. So, I often take credit for starting the rumour that he was still alive!”
Thinking on his feet The market that Sally thought the product would sell best in was retail, but it wasn’t to be; “we went to the retail show two or three times up in New York City, and while we sold some product, particularly Santa Clauses, it didn’t turn out to be a good market for many reasons. Firstly, they didn’t have much in the way of budgets, and secondly, they weren’t mechanically inclined. They would literally come around the curb not expecting to see us and go ‘oh my god’. It was a rude awakening for them.” John decided it was time to try something different. “I started going to the Florida attractions, I sold a character to
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