\n<\/p>\n
Disney didn’t sell such dresses at the time, but Mr Mooney immediately realised that the company was missing an incredibly lucrative trick.<\/p>\n
“I was standing in line with mothers and daughters, all dressed head to toe in princess regalia that they had made at home,” says Mr Mooney, 63.<\/p>\n
“I said to a few of the mums ‘if Disney made official dresses like this would you buy them?’, and they all replied that they’d buy lots.<\/p>\n
“So I rushed back to [Disney headquarters] in Burbank [Los Angeles], and we launched the Disney Princess series pretty quickly.”<\/p>\n
Not only did Mr Mooney and his team introduce dresses based on those worn by Disney’s best-known female characters, they set to work on everything from books to lunchboxes, dolls, magazines, computer games, pyjamas, and tie-ups with food producers.<\/p>\n
The idea was to start selling basically everything that female Disney fans, both young and old, might like to buy, all featuring one or more Disney princess.<\/p>\n
“By the end of 2001 sales across the Disney Princess lines were something like $300m, and today it is more than $6bn a year,” he says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n