Mark Shapiro (born c. 1970) is an American businessman who was the former Director, President and CEO of Six Flags Inc. from 2005 to 2010.
He was previously the CEO of Red Zone LLC, which took control of the Six Flags board of directors in 2005 and ousted most of the company's previous management.
He attempted to lead the company in a more family-oriented direction, adding many family attractions and moving away from the roller coaster-heavy business model of the Kieran Burke era. With Six Flags filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on June 13, 2009, he was fired and replaced by Al Weber Jr. in 2010.
Biography[]
1970–1992: Early life[]
Mark Shapiro was born circa 1970 in Glenview, Illinois.
In 1992, he graduated as a Bachelor of the Arts from the University of Iowa.
1997–2005: ESPN & ABC Sports[]
After college, Shapiro began to work at ESPN and ABC Sports. He was an executive producer on the documentary series SportsCentury from 1997 to 1999.
Shapiro became senior vice president and general manager of programming at ESPN in 2001 and then executive vice president of programming and production in 2002. In 2003, Entertainment Weekly named Shapiro one of 2003's rising stars in the entertainment industry.
While at ESPN, he acquired new properties for the company as well as the rights to Monday Night Football, Wimbledon, and the NBA. Beginning in 2002, ratings on ESPN rose for 10 straight quarters in a row.
Shapiro left his position of executive vice president of programming and production at ESPN in May 2005.
2005–2010: CEO of Red Zone & Six Flags[]
From October 2005 to December 2005, Mark Shapiro was the chief executive officer of Red Zone LLC as the company pushed for its leadership of Six Flags Inc. in a bitter proxy battle.
In August 2005, Shapiro became the President and CEO of Six Flags, also serving on the company's Board of Directors.
As President and CEO of the company, Shapiro led an effort to make the Six Flags theme parks more "family friendly", implementing known children's IPs such as Bob the Builder and The Wiggles and upping the amount of costumed characters in the parks. This increased attendance, but ultimately the crippling debt that had slowly been attained by Six Flags since its purchase by Premier Parks in 1998 was too much to handle, and the 2008 Economic Crisis only made things worse.
On May 13, 2010, it was announced that Mark Shapiro had stepped down as President and CEO, just two weeks after the company had emerged from bankruptcy and his business partner Dan Snyder was ousted. The reason for his resignation was allegedly that Shapiro disagreed with the board's want to mostly focus more on thrill rides going forward, which was what Shapiro had been trying to get away from. He was replaced by Al Weber Jr. as the interim President and CEO of the company as they focused on reorganizing.[1]
2010–present: Post-Six Flags[]
In May 2010, Mark Shapiro became CEO of Dick Clark Productions, which Six Flags had established a relationship with under his tenure as CEO, and had a stake in. He left the position after Guggenheim Partners bought Dick Clark Productions in September 2012, following the sale of Six Flags' stake in the company.
In 2014, after working as an advisor to Silver Lake Partners and William Morris Endeavor during the latter's acquisition of IMG, he was given the position of chief content officer in the newly-acquired company. He was then named Co-President of WME-IMG in November 2016. He is also the co-owner of Los Angeles Football Club, a franchise of Major League Soccer.
On December 10, 2018, Mark Shapiro was named President of Endeavor, the company formerly known as WME-IMG.[2]
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ Mark Shapiro Leaves Six Flags. COASTER-net (May 13, 2010).
- ↑ Endeavor Names Mark Shapiro as President. The Hollywood Reporter (December 10, 2018).
