Rose Parade Is Afloat in High Expectations

When dawn crawls out of the desert on Jan. 1, a larger-than-normal crush of humanity is expected to shoehorn into Pasadena for its annual dose of tradition. And as with all things when the calendar rolls over to 2000, there’s extra money to be made off this year’s Rose Parade.

Hotels for miles around are booking rooms at stratospheric rates. Bleacher seats are selling at a record clip. And corporations have been competing to cash in on the heightened exposure by sponsoring parade floats.

Meanwhile, the firm with the most to gain isn’t even building a float. The Walt Disney Co. will use the pageant to highlight the premiere of its latest movie--the name of which will be spelled out for the world to see in a human sign that will lead the parade. The grand marshal of the parade is Roy E. Disney, Walt’s nephew, who heads the company’s animation department.

In fact, Disney’s publicity potential so angered rival studio Universal that it scrapped plans to build one of the bigger floats and dropped out of the parade altogether, said a prominent float designer, Bill Lofthouse. Universal declined to comment.

Some Aren’t Y2Krazy

The hoopla surrounding the parade hasn’t been this intense since 1989, when the venerable event turned 100, said local officials.

“We expect it to be a crazy year,” said Leanne Lampe, director of public relations for the Pasadena Convention and Visitors Bureau. “You’re going to have to work hard to stay in Pasadena.”

But everything isn’t so Y2Krazy--at least not yet.

Unaffected by the commercial possibilities, Pasadena Tournament of Roses Assn. officials have kept the relatively modest $4,000 entry fee the same. And the company that will build the most floats for the parade (Theme: Celebration 2000, Visions of the Future) isn’t charging more.

But as a bleary-eyed world enters the year 2000, it will probably see a procession with bigger bands, more elaborate floats and some added features.

On New Year’s Eve, there will be three fireworks shows throughout Pasadena. The next day, the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds will buzz the Rose Bowl and the Rose Parade. And 250 bicyclists will begin a journey pedaling around the world from Colorado Boulevard.

But, of course, most will come to see the floats. Some 50 corporations and organizations, about three times the norm, jockeyed to get one of the six open slots for the parade. Each will fork over up to $300,000 to build an impressive display, but the cost is well worth it, they say, especially considering that some estimates say that 350 million people worldwide will tune in.

“If you went out to buy a TV spot for that many viewers, it would cost you millions of dollars,’ said Dave Kenney, publicist for Subway restaurants, one of the new entrants. Being associated with such an enduring symbol of Americana, he added, also brings prestige to a company.

“We consider it a coup to get in this event,” he said, adding that millennial madness had nothing to do with Subway’s decision to join this year.

The other organizations new to the Rose Parade are the Boeing Co., the William Wrigley Co., Panda Inn restaurants, Legoland California and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Tournament officials chose the companies after scrutinizing their public images and securing pledges that each will sponsor a float for three years.

“All the companies we allow in are wholesome companies,” said Kenneth Burrows, 64, a furniture manufacturer and Arcadia resident who is this year’s tournament president.

Among the firms represented in the parade, few will reap as much exposure as Disney. The night before, the Burbank-based entertainment conglomerate will launch “Fantasia 2000,” the animated remake of the 1940 film, with a West Coast premiere at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium.

Accompanied by the 120-member London Philharmonic, the movie premiere will keep with the millennium theme: The gala will seat 2,000, and each ticket will cost--no joke--$2,000.

To further drive the point home, a marching parade logo of 2,000 people will morph from the words “Celebration 2000” into “Fantasia 2000” as it leads the parade.

Self-promotion has gradually become more prevalent in the parade, said Lofthouse, who has been building floats since 1956.

“They’ve relaxed the rules,” he said, adding that many of the floats he designs would not have been approved by the tournament in the past because of their commercial themes. “Now I got Heinz making a Ketchup-factory float.”

Said Jack French, the tournament’s CEO: “It’s true, in the past we were firm that the float should not be a billboard for the company sponsoring it.”

He said that only the “interpretation” of the rules has changed, and that corporate promotion must be “entertaining, appropriate, not just a commercial for the company.”

Although some commercialism is expected on parade floats, the Disney theme has prompted some private grumbling among event boosters-- especially because Roy E. Disney is grand marshal and Disney broadcast subsidiary ABC has exclusive rights to broadcast the Rose Bowl game.

Tournament president Burrows denies any connection between the choice of grand marshal and the game broadcast or film promotion.

“None of that has anything to do with choosing Roy Disney,” he said. “Roy was a candidate because he was a visionary person.”

Disney officials agreed and said all decisions were made by the Tournament of Roses.

Meanwhile, other Pasadena businesses are cashing in on the expected onslaught of visitors.

Sharp’s Seating Co. is selling bleacher tickets as fast as it did during the 1989 centennial parade. “Right now, we’re about where we were in November of last year,” said Vice President Sindee Riboli. Tickets cost $30 to $65, and parking should be $20.

At Pasadena’s grandest hotel, the five-star Ritz Carlton Huntington, not a single room is available for New Year’s. The hotel was fully booked in January within days of the last parade, said Jennifer Smith, who carries the title “Millennium Concierge.”

“It’s usually busy for the Rose Parade, but this year it’s especially crazy with this being the new millennium,’ she said. “People are calling this year more than ever.”

The Doubletree had three rooms left early last week, at $379 a night with a four-night minimum. The Hilton was charging $325 a night, with rooms still available. The hotel’s director of sales, Alan Tate, said prices were up about 50% from last year. “We look at the millennium parade as a way to maximize profits,” he said.

Even the salt-of-the-earth Ramada Inn was charging $220 a night, twice what they charged for the parade last year, according to a receptionist.

Floats Being Built

At Lofthouse’s Phoenix Decorating Co., where 24 of the 55 floats are being built, workers are busy welding and grinding the heavy steel chassis and complex hydraulics that go into each display, which can weigh 30 tons.

AT&T;’s float has a 53-foot tower that must get through an underpass of the Foothill Freeway. That means engineers had to design a way to lower the boom. They also had to do wind tests to determine how strong a Santa Ana would blow it over and possibly take out a crowd of onlookers.

Although that scenario would make the parade a little too memorable, Pasadena boosters are hoping that the event will live up to the monumental expectations of visitors who could choose other Jan. 1, 2000, destinations--such as Las Vegas, New Zealand or London.

“People want to say they were somewhere at the dawn of a new millennium,” Lampe said.

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Float Timeline

Key moments in the year leading up to the Rose Parade: