Disneyland was born exactly one year, one month and one day after me. I literally grew up there because Dad started there on opening day and it was the one place he could take me to give my mom a break that didn’t cost anything! By the age of 9, I was the family tour guide, albeit my tours put a heavy emphasis on Tom Sawyer’s Island.
I was always drawn to the entertainment industry and was performing as a musician at the age of 16. Fast forward to the early 70s, along with sporadic gigs with my two best music pals, Ross Garnick and Bradley Kopp (both of whom are the real deal musically), me and a legendary guy named Tom Campbell who I really looked up to as a songwriter, musician and general powerhouse of a producer, started a little listening room in Denver on weekends and formed a concert production company focused on social justice and environmental causes that still exists today. Somehow amidst the music, I managed to graduate from the University of Colorado in 1976 with a degree in communication. I then promptly did what I had sworn not to do-went to work for Disney where my dad was, by then, an executive. I couldn’t help it. Disneyland’s Entertainment Division was doing amazing things like the original Main Street Electrical Parade and it was too tempting. Only Disneyland had the perfect balance of creative storytelling and access to the best possible lights and knobs (cool show tech).
By 1978, Tokyo Disneyland was under development so me and a couple of fellow renegades name Steve Kasper and Tom Carr formed Pony Farm Productions on the Disneyland backlot (our “studio” was an original farmhouse and sat next to where the horses were kept). We figured out a way to convince the Powers-that-Were that they needed a team to create a portfolio of multi-media assets for the Tokyo project so we had a ball building them and got a trip to Japan out of the deal. EPCOT was also beginning to be more than the famous movie of Walt in front of the domed-city painting, so I also managed to figure out how to wiggle into that project and wrangled a side-hustle as an apprentice Imagineer, working along-side some real legends.
California was getting crowded and cranky by the late 70s and relocating to Walt Disney World sounded like fun. It was as far as ypou could get from the critical gaze of Corporate HQ, it was more of a “lets try it” vibe and my family lived there so I spent the next three years building a media production operation in Florida. I bounced between Marketing, Operations and Project Development and by the early 90s, I got promoted to Vice President of Disney Production Services, overseeing the operation of the Disney-MGM Studios facilities and production groups, the WDW Resort Entertainment division, and a little jewel called Disney IDEAS (Innovation Design Entertainment Art and Storytelling), a full-service trans-media content studio we snuck in under the radar.
Again, against all odds for a guy who couldn’t even spell “MBA””, I took advantage of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and acquired IDEAS from Disney in 2001. Today, several mortgages and a thousand adventures later, IDEAS is a successful brand and experience design firm using the power of purposeful storytelling and “design-doing” to create high performing brands, transform organizational cultures and design and enhance immersive experiences for location-based entertainment, hospitality, healthcare and large enterprise clients around the world. In 2023, IDEAS was acquired by The Summit, a consortium of creative communication firms and I still get to play as Chief storytelling Officer.
Community service has always been important to me. Right now, I’m on the board of PCI Media, the world leader in positive behavior change communication. I also work with The Allen Family Foundation, created in honor of my parents to help great organizations and dedicated community servants make this world a little better. I’ve done a bit of teaching too, as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Central Florida where I taught the business of storytelling (as Woody Allen once said, “If it wasn’t a business, they woulda called it ‘Show-Show’).
To the point of this Zennovation experiment, I’ve done a lot of speaking over the past couple of decades, to business, professional associations and education groups. I like to tell stories about how human beings innovate, how 21st century brands work and, of course, stories about how we tell our stories. I’m also working with my brother Rick, on a fun collection of personal tales and inspirational lessons about our 102 years of family Disney experience.
A few folks have graciously allowed me to be part of their writing including: Video Production for Web, Broadcast and Cinema, by John Rice and Brian McKernan, McGraw-Hill, 2002; Wake me Up When the Data is Over: How Organizations Use Story to Drive Results, by Lori L. Silverman, Jossey-Bass, 2006, A Deliberate Pause: Entrepreneurship and Its Moment in Human Progress, by Larry Robertson, 2009 and Story Intelligence by Richard Stone. MY book, Zennovation!- is under construction.
I currently reside in Orlando Florida with my wife Pam. I often collaborate with my daughter Olivia, also a graduate of The University of Colorado, and a talented writer, designer and artist working in theater, multiple fiction genres and online.
