When I was little  my favorite place to go on vacation is DisneyWorld. Mostly because you get to hang out with all of the cool cartoon characters you seen in the movies or on tv in real life. However there was one random character that I would see at the park that I never really knew the origins of.

Florida’s Orange Bird:

So I did some research on this super cute orange bird! In 1970 Disneyworld was in need of more investors to expand there park so it came to no surprise that the Florida Citrus Commission wanted to invest in one of the world’s most famous theme park. They invested nearly three million dollars into the park however they weren’t really sure what kind of ride or area they could sponsor in the park.   Disney however came up with the idea of putting the Florida Citrus Commission’s sponsorship to use in the Enchanted Tiki Room Attraction. They had a ten year agreement where they changed the name of the attraction to this: 

Also on the other end of the attraction there was a bar area that served orange juice and citrus sweets to people. The Florida Citrus Commission also wanted to have some kind of mascot for the product. Disney did not want to use any of there regular characters like Mickey Mouse, Goofy etc. so they made a brand new character: THE ORANGE BIRD!

He was feature in two commericals in the early 1970’s

And also was featured in two animated shorts. The one below is called Foods and Fun: A Nutritional Adventure

However since Disney’s created the actual cartoon of the Orange Bird the Florida Citrus Commission had to pay a fee every time they wanted to use that character in public use. And knowing Disney that meant it was a very pricey fee to pay. Every time a contract had to be renew or if they Florida Citrus Commission wanted to add another Citrus bar inside the park the most expensive it was becoming. It was becoming a point where the  Florida Citrus Commission was not selling enough products in the bars and making enough money with the Orange Bird to justify the cost.

Then with the frustration of  a lot of back and forth negotiating and money fees being hiked every couple of years the Florida Citrus Commission and Disney World decided to cute ties with each other in 1987. Ending any and all presence of this cute Orange bird! 

However in 2004 Tokyo Disney decided to make products of the Citrus Bird  and it was such a massive good response that it came back to Disney World by 2012! So now you can see him more visibly in Disney products, comic books and more!

Until Next time!