Disney recently announced their celebration of Minnie Mouse’s 94th birthday, by having her be styled by the Stella McCartney brand, swapping the familiar red polka dot dress with a blue pantsuit. There are various reactions to this move, as with any change in the socially-empowered internet time, which we won’t really tackle or dive into. More than anything, I’m here to discuss this topic in a positive light in the perspective of a brand who cares to expand their reach by means of adapting into what the market currently heading towards, hopefully it makes sense to you too.

First off, I personally think everybody should only take this as a marketing ploy to make some noise. I mean, when you even read/hear the narrative of even ‘responsibly sourcing sustainable fabrics‘ while doing this on her 94th instead of 100th birthday – eh? Seems like a test to garner reactions and make her a bit more relevant considering most of the Disney noise found online is related to Marvel’s characters.

Nothing’s really changed, Minnie is still Minnie. It’s not like she’s never worn anything other then what we’re used to see her in. There’s a staple look we’re all accustomed to, but there are themed costumes we tend to ignore beyond this fact. It’s the same how Mickey is a wizard, a captain, and so on. So it’s not really a big deal, isn’t it? If they decided to not highlight the outfit and feature a lot more names (not just Minnie) dressed up in some kind of blue theme, people would probably shrug it off. What this has reminded me, however, is the possibility of Disney to make all their characters more fun and adaptable to any demographic, by change of costumes. It’s not really about taking Minnie Mouse out of her character, but opening up the opportunities to make her ‘more relatable’ to everybody else, as is the trend or direction of any brand in this woke society. This is a business, after all, which needs to gain more traction one way or another.

Putting this in an NFT perspective, let’s venture the idea of a showcase collection of Minnie Mouse outfits. Following the X/10,000 collection model, it somehow seems reasonable to dress Minnie Mouse 10,000 unique ways, with every token showing some kind of benefit for the owner, such as a one-time use discount per month into any Disneyland. Not only does it create a ‘returning customer’ easily, but it strengthens a loyalty model into the brand in another upcoming technological aspect. This one, in particular, is with Stella McCartney, but imagine a seasonal with other brands, where that even breeds further benefits to the owner, in association with the brand. Let’s say of the 10k pcs, there are 10 Stella McCartney outfits in there, which entitles the holder to a Stella McCartney X Disney exclusive item, or maybe even the same discount? What if it includes all owners into a raffle, where by NY/Paris fashion week, 10% of them will be airdropped a direct invite to watch the Stella McCartney show? We’re not even scratching the royalty share that other projects have been trying to implement, which makes owning a token even more lucrative. How about immersive experiences exclusive to NFT holders? I can only imagine parents scrambling to get one for their kids… or them LOL

Mind you, we’re only talking about one character in the Disney franchise, with just 10,000 tokens. Obviously, the market grasp of this brand is titanic, considering how many of the kids who grew up watching Disney, are now hooked into the Marvel Universe as well, with live-action remakes to re-cycle the love for the brand. With Disney stating how ready they are for their own Metaverse, looking and hiring more people towards the Metaverse concept, even a “Culture Trends Marketing Manager” job posting that specifically states “NFT,” metaverse, and crypto in the job description, only time will tell how they’re planning to engage the world with a more magical, maybe exclusive, experience.

People garnered reactions towards one outfit change. When the time comes that they decide to take this route and showcase thousands, I’m guessing people would FOMO into the hype than criticize every one outfit, bragging how their Minnie is ‘rarer’ than yours, and how they have these perks within the Disney economy and its affiliates… which is growing bigger and bigger…. that’s if you even manage to have one.