September 11, 2025 • 35 mins
This episode explores how customer experiences can be transformed from ordinary to extraordinary. Chris Parker is joined by Vance Morris, a former Disney executive turned business advisor, who shares how the principles behind Disney’s magic can be applied to any business context. The conversation is lively, practical, and full of insights that leaders can implement immediately.
Vance Morris began his career as a security guard at a birth control manufacturing facility before moving into leadership roles at Disney, where he helped open and run resort operations. He later built his own businesses in home services, applying Disney’s disciplined systems and signature customer experience to industries that few would call glamorous. Today he coaches and trains companies to craft unforgettable customer journeys.
Listeners will walk away with concrete tools to create memorable experiences, from scripting everyday interactions to using thoughtful gestures that spark loyalty and delight. Vance makes clear that the companies who stand out are those that pay attention to the details most overlook. This matters now more than ever as leaders seek ways to differentiate in markets defined by choice and commoditization.
For executives navigating complexity, the episode is a reminder that clarity, rhythm, and intentional design in how people experience your business can accelerate growth and deepen trust. These lessons align with the need for organizations to simplify, systematize, and build confidence in every interaction, ensuring that strategy comes alive in practice.
Vance Morris is a former Disney executive with experience opening and operating world-class resorts. After leaving corporate hospitality roles at institutions such as the Smithsonian and the Kennedy Center, he built multiple home service businesses and turned them into laboratories for customer experience design. He now coaches entrepreneurs and executives through consulting, speaking, and immersive training programs, often taking groups behind the scenes at Disney to see how world-class systems create magic. He was invited onto the show for his expertise in turning complex operations into memorable experiences that drive loyalty and growth.
Learn more: https://ebullient.com/podcast/memorable-experiences/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Hello, this is Chris Parker withthe Business Simplicity podcast.
And I had a conversation with Vance Morris, who was a security
guard at a birth control manufacturing facility and early
in his career and then spent time as a Disney executive, you
know, creating magical experiences and setting up some
of the the amenities at some of their parks and then applied a
(00:22):
lot of that to other industries like carpet cleaning.
And we just had a lot of fun, you know, getting into the magic
and the mix and the methods to make memorable experiences.
So Vince, why would this be really valuable for someone to
listen to it? Sure thing, Chris.
I think one of the big things isthat we dropped some really
practical Nuggets on that you can implement really right away.
(00:47):
I mean, it's something you can just take that nugget this
afternoon and come up with an idea and implement it and then
see some results. Welcome to the Business
Simplicity podcast, where Chris Parker explores how leaders cut
through complexity to acceleratestrategy execution and growth
with calm, clarity, and confidence.
(01:09):
Welcome back to the Business Simplicity podcast.
This is Chris Parker and I'm having Vance Morris on for a
conversation and I'm very, very curious to learn from Vance
about some of his stories. He is previously a Disney
executive. I'm sure we'll get into that.
And he also apparently started his earlier career as a security
(01:34):
guard at a birth control facility, if I read that
correctly in one of the emails, as well as a number of other
steps. And now he's doing coaching and
advising for companies that are wowing customers with an, you
know, improved customer experience.
And those that have listened know that customer experience is
close to my heart and perhaps even closer is Disney.
(01:58):
So, you know, the fact that I have a a Disney exec, previously
Disney exec on here. Outstanding.
Thank you so much for joining. So maybe Vance, can you connect
some of those dots, you know, tell the story of security card
to Disney, to entrepreneur, to coach and trainer?
(02:18):
You know, I think it's been a anamazing story.
Can you can you connect some of those dots and then we'll dive
into customer experience. Yes, certainly.
And I appreciate you having me on, Chris.
Thank you so much. Yeah, you know, I probably will
be the only birth control factory security guard you run
into all day today. So I'd like to consider that a
(02:40):
little bit unique. And and I bring that up really
as you need to be memorable. And I think that's really one of
the big lessons from Disney and from a lot of the marketing that
I do is that it takes something from your background that is
(03:02):
memorable. If I just said I was a coach or
consultant, then you know, OK, you just lumped me in with
10,000 others. But I used that to kind of break
the ice and say, OK, well, this guy might be interesting because
who wants to admit to being a security guard at a birth
control factory, which I did for2 summers during college.
(03:28):
So a buddy of mine and I worked in New Jersey for a birth
control factory. Who knew you needed security
there? But anyway, after, after school
is when I started my Disney career.
So I think that really was greatbecause that set the basis and
(03:49):
the foundation for everything that I'd be doing moving
forward. And one of the big lessons that
I learned at Disney, aside from swooping down and picking up
pieces of trash really quickly or being nice and doing
autographs and those things, is that Disney runs on processes
and systems. That was my first big lesson.
(04:11):
And you know, I look back on it and this was 1990, so Internet
hadn't really come around yet. Nobody, not everybody had a
computer on their desk and we certainly didn't have a handheld
device. And during the opening of the
Yacht and Beach Club Resort, I was on the opening team.
My boss walked me into this training room and there's just
(04:33):
mountains and mountains of threeinch binders.
I'm like, what is all this? He goes, well, these are all of
the SO PS and OG TS on how to open and operate a Disney
resort. And I was just floored that
there was that much detail in their systems and processes and
leaving nothing to chance. So I took that lesson and
(04:57):
continued that throughout my career.
I am living proof that people dosurvive after leaving Disney.
We don't just curl up in a ball somewhere and you know, or get
institutionalized. We're we can be a functioning
member of society after we leavethe company.
I spent about 8:00 or so years in corporate hospitality and so
(05:22):
I was with the Smithsonian museum system for a while as
director at Kennedy Center for Performing Arts.
So a couple of big corporate ishmuseum style experiences along
the way. I started to feel that I make a
(05:43):
lousy employee because I don't like to be told what to do.
And I know we alluded before we started recording that probably
is the reason that I have two exwives.
So I mean, we can always ask them some other time.
But yeah, I just don't like to be told what to do.
So I started my own business andI was looking at starting a
(06:05):
restaurant and quickly realized that I do not have the capital
to start a restaurant. Most concepts I was looking at
were requiring you know, $1,000,000 liquid cash and well
I just didn't have that laying around.
So next went with the next best thing, which was starting a
carpet cleaning business, which I'm sure is what every small boy
(06:27):
dreams of doing. When they're that's the obvious
alternative. From high end themed restaurant
to carpet cleaning. OK.
I mean, I barely vacuumed at thepoint, so you know, but the
franchise I was looking at, system I was looking at was as
top quality. I could look any customer in the
(06:48):
eye and say every single one of our products works as
advertised. And I figured I would take their
products and my experience and marketing knowledge and set out
at the beginning creating a premium level service.
Because I don't know about Amsterdam, but I can tell you
here in the States we have telephone poles with phone
(07:11):
numbers stapled to them about people who will clean your
carpet for $49.00 or something silly.
So we were the complete oppositeof that really focusing on an
affluent market and we grew thatfocusing just on that.
People started to ask me, jeez, Vance, you don't look like
you're working too hard, how areyou doing this?
(07:34):
So that kind of birth, the coaching and consulting and
advising business. And if you Fast forward to
today, I still own the home service business.
We actually added two. I have a Oriental rug washing
facility and a mold remediation company put a general manager in
place and said just run the systems.
(07:58):
I got marketing systems, operation systems, marketing
systems, don't screw at anything, just manage the
systems. And so I spent about 90 minutes
a week on those businesses. Now most of that time spent with
the general manager revealing operations and things like that
and his ideas for improvement because I didn't want it to just
(08:21):
be mine because if it's going tomove along without me, well,
it's got to be able to grow. So I so every week we meet and
he says, well, you know, why don't we try this or why don't
we try that? And once we've talked it
through, then great, have at it.On the consulting side.
One of the fun things I get to do is actually take business
(08:44):
owners to Disney for three and four day full immersion boot
camps. Really seeing how Disney makes
the sausage, so to speak. I have some private clients and
I have group coaching, so got a number of irons in the fire.
But once you put systems and processes in place, you really
(09:06):
it's just managing those things.And to me, systems generates
freedom. And for me, that's freedom to
come and go from a my business as I please and it'll still run
without me to freedom to choose the clients I work with because
not everybody's going to make a great client.
(09:27):
So that's my story in a nutshell.
And. In a nutshell, seems fascinating
and I'm in love because you're getting paid to go to
Disneyland, you know, like, OK, that's a that's a dream.
Let me grab on to a few points of that.
So when you first started with Disney at the, at the yacht and
beach club, you were surprised at the discipline and the
documentation. The SO PS launched that and you
(09:51):
did other things at Disney as well.
And then is that you applied that to say, let's say more
mundane services and activities like carpet cleaning.
What are a few things that you literally took from Disney that
would be not expected? So kind of some unexpected
things that you applied to. Let's just play with carpet
cleaning that made a significantdifference that you know, you
(10:15):
know, like like how did the Disney or your previous
experience, maybe if not Disney,you've done other things, frame
your need for discipline and documentation as well as unique
memorable experiences. And then you deployed that and
carpet cleaning of all things like like can you, what was the
mental strategic process that you went through?
(10:35):
Sure. Well, some of the things that I,
I don't want to say I stole themfrom Disney because then the
Disney attorneys are going to come after me, but appropriated.
The first one was really about the systems and keeping them
simple. So and I saw the freedom that
those systems gave the employees.
(10:56):
So they actually, you know, learning to work in a restaurant
or valet or what have you, you know, they had their system in
the three inch binder and they learned it and they repeated it.
And most importantly, they practiced it before going out
live. And I think that's key there is
(11:18):
that you need to practice your thing before you put it out to
the public. I mean, you wouldn't start a
Broadway show without rehearsalsand just throw everybody on
stage the first night you have rehearsal.
But the systems that we use wereextremely simple.
And if you think about who's working at Disney, it's a lot of
(11:40):
minimum wage or younger employees.
And if they had difficult systems, well, the whole thing
would fall apart. So Disney runs on three words,
what to do, how to do it, and most importantly, why do we do
it that way? And I've taken that framework
everywhere I've gone, and we have a what, how, why for
(12:04):
everything that we do. It doesn't matter whether it's a
marketing system or something inoperations, we have what we do.
Let's say it's answer the telephone and then we have, how
do we do it? So we, you know, Disney has
figured out how to create experiences out of all the
boring, mundane things we do dayin and day out.
(12:26):
So they'll tell you, all right, here's how you answer the phone.
The most important of it, especially if you want strong
employee engagement, which most companies do, is the why.
Why do we answer the phone this way?
And it could be for any number of reasons, you know, to, you
(12:47):
know, be open and welcoming to the guests so that they start
their vacation, you know, on theright foot to separate us from
everybody else out there if we have a unique way of answering
the telephone. I actually use this with a
insurance company. He was a franchise.
(13:08):
He was an Allstate guy. So they were probably 5 or 6
other Allstate guys in his town and probably another 30 or 40
insurance agents. And he was having a tough time
breaking out. I mean, it's a commodity
business. I mean, you know, the dentist is
a dentist is a dentist. There's only so many ways you
can clean teeth. So insurance is highly
(13:30):
commoditized. He's like, I got to break out of
this. So we're sitting down in his
office doing a brainstorming session, and I'm looking around
and he's like the rock'n'roll guy.
He's got posters of The Who and Led Zeppelin and autographed
guitars and gold records all over his office.
And I'm thinking, dude, you're the rock'n'roll insurance agent.
(13:53):
And he's he. Yeah, I've been thinking about
that, but it doesn't sound too professional.
I don't worry about it. You know, it's, it's, it's going
to be different. And his receptionist, I'll never
forget the receptionist latched on to that and said, well, why
don't we answer the phone this way, you know, because normally
you'll get, you know, thank you for calling Dave's Allstate.
(14:14):
How may I help you? We've all heard the phone
answered that way. Well, she suggested, and it'll
sound a little corny, but she suggested, thank you for calling
Dave's Allstate, the agency thatrocks now, right?
It is a little corny to say it in the 1st 15 times, fine, But
(14:35):
answering the phone that way does a bunch of things.
One, it sifts, sorts and screensout anybody that would be a bad
customer for them because they're like, what, what, what's
this, you know? But the people that are
attracted to that are going to make fantastic customers.
And he's, trust me, he's busy and it separates him from
(14:59):
everybody else. That was his separating factor
that made him not look like the rest of the insurance agents in
Saint Louis. So I think Disney has that part
figured out. And I've stolen that and used it
everywhere, you know, and, and Ithink that's the lesson.
You look at your customer journey and you identify each
(15:20):
point where there is an interaction with the customer
and you just think and brainstorm.
How do we make an experience outof that?
Yeah, well, I love the focus as well and, and the fact that you
brought up a a really clear customer or persona and, and
(15:40):
build your customer experience to turn off the people you don't
want to serve. I love that cause, cause so
often I, I see people who want to do everything for everyone
and therefore you satisfy and you're memorable to nothing
'cause you are just bland and boring.
So how did you do that in the, in the carpet cleaning?
Like how did you identify that niche that we're going to go all
into? You mentioned it a little bit.
(16:02):
You know, it's kind of like an up, you know, higher
expectation, affluent something,you know, that there's a
definition there. So you had a target niche there.
And then how did you design for them to be differentiated to, to
be not, you know, on the telephone pole, you know, pull
this phone number? Well, certainly our our
marketing was directed to an affluent market.
(16:28):
We actually say part of our USP is that we are here for
homeowners. So that immediately eliminates
rentals completely. And, you know, I've been in a
lot of rentals and every once you have a in a while, you have
a Unicorn that actually takes care of the property.
(16:48):
But 99% of the time rentals are just absolutely disgusting, you
know, and they, they haven't been maintained.
And I'm like, I don't want to work in that environment.
My employees don't want to work in that environment.
So I would, I want to clean that.
So just by identifying the fact that we are only for homeowners
(17:10):
really helped us separate in thebeginning because we didn't have
a a persona in the marketplace yet.
We didn't have a reputation yet.So we had to start it with the
marketing. And as we grew, we continued.
So Walt Disney came up with the term called plussing, which is
(17:35):
constant process improvement or,you know, continually getting
better. And so I'm always looking at
ways how do we plus what we're doing.
One of the big examples, I thinkin on our customer journey, one
of the boring, mundane things wehave to do is get into the home.
(17:55):
So if we can't get in the house,we can't do our thing, we can't
do the cleaning. So we created a complete script
and experience out of getting into the home.
Now I'm going to go through it, but I want to preface it with it
took us like a year to come up with the final iteration.
(18:16):
So we were constantly adding little things to it.
And we're like, oh, we did that.OK, great.
We should probably add this. And it was a group effort.
So it was not just me coming up with it.
It was, you know, hey guys, you know, you do this every day.
How do we make you know? An experience based on real
experience. I think that's super valuable.
It's based on real experience, it sounds like.
So you're, you know, getting in the home and resolving those
(18:38):
little tensions and finding those plus moments.
Yeah, so. Yeah, so it looks kind of like
this. So it's, and I highly recommend
everybody script out and document what they're doing
because then that way it's clearto everyone.
So we park in the street, we don't park in the driveway
because God forbid I got an oil leak, now I got something else I
got to clean up. My technician gets out of the
(19:01):
van in a clean, crisp uniform because he carries extra
uniforms in case he gets dirty on the job beforehand.
He also doesn't smell because I don't allow Cologne or smoking
while you work. There's nothing worse than, you
know, the Marlboro Man showing up in your house smelling like
he just took a shower in Axe. I mean, it's just disgusting.
(19:23):
So he's walks up to the house and he's got a special mat with
him and a little gift, and he goes and he laces the doormat
down in front of the door. We knock on the door.
We don't ring the bell because friends knock.
Salespeople ring the bell, We take a couple of steps back and
Missus Mcgillicuddy will answer the door and we'll say, hi, my
name is Josh. I'm here to create your healthy
(19:44):
home. May I come in?
So we don't just barge in, we ask permission.
We also say our mission, which is to create a healthy home.
Our job is to clean, whether we're cleaning up holstery,
tile, carpet, whatever. But our broader mission is to
create healthier homes, and people latch onto that.
(20:06):
And as we're walking in and we've said that we present
Misses Mcgillicuddy with a gift.Now, I don't know about anybody
else, but I have never had a home service person who comes to
my house, Pest control, home inspector, electrician,
whatever. Nobody's given me a gift as
they're walking in the front door.
(20:27):
And we do it because, well, I figured we're going to
somebody's house. If you go to somebody's house
for a party or something, you'rebringing a bottle of wine, some
hors d'oeuvres or something. So I figured, well, we should do
the same. So we gave Misses Mcgillicuddy
the gift. And it's, it's nothing huge.
It's a custom little blue box. It's got a bottle of spot
(20:47):
remover, a bag of cookies, and alittle note from me thanking us,
thanking them for allowing us into their home.
That is our entry into the home.The gift does two things.
One, again, it separates us fromeverybody else because nobody's
doing it. My competitors know that I'm
doing it and they don't copy it,which I beyond me.
(21:10):
Oh, and I forgot about the mat. So, But before we walk in, we do
an exaggeration of wiping our feet on the mat, kind of like a
show so that people see us. And then we put booties on our
clean shoes. So that gift again separates us,
but it also starts a process called reciprocity.
I give something to you, you feel compelled to give something
(21:31):
to me. And we saw a 26% increase in our
mid tier package or about $65,000 a year in additional
sales by implementing the gift. So that's how I dignified
getting into the House. Or did the gift act as a
souvenir as well? Like was it like in a tin or
(21:51):
something with your number on itor something like that?
Or was it more disposable? It's a no, it's it's a cardboard
box. I mean it's a nice one, don't
get me wrong. It's custom printed and
everything. The the box is not meant to be
kept but the innards are. So there's a bottle of our spot
remover and they get this regardless of whether we
actually clean for them or not because we don't know if we have
(22:13):
the job when we're walking in. Sometimes they just want an
estimate. So but the leave behind spot
remover that'll last them six months and they'll have that in
their kitchen cupboard for the next 6 months staring at our
name and our phone number. No, great.
I'm I'm I love it again, Disneyfied something that's
that's necessary. It's a service, but typically
(22:35):
you wouldn't think it's like a sex and sizzle type of service.
You know, this is, this is, you know, carpet cleaning.
I'm wondering to go off in a completely different tangent for
selfish reasons, cultural differences.
And let me ask the question first because I'm a massive
Disney fan and my father worked with Wedd Enterprises around the
(22:56):
time I was born, grew up in Southern California, literally
have a Disney tattoo not showingyou and I I do not like
Disneyland Paris. For me, it just doesn't work.
You know, I think like the Disneyfication maybe too much by
the book and not by the essence.It falls down.
(23:21):
You know, I I would much rather,and as I think as Disney park
prices increase, the difference of a flight to Florida to, you
know, from from Europe at least to Florida or California as a
total cost of a Disney trip is also coming down for me at
least. How do you feel or how have you
observed how Disneyfication doesor does not cross borders, if
(23:47):
you even have your opinion? Yeah.
This is a big lesson opening up what was then Euro Disney, which
was a misnomer. I mean, they changed that name
quickly to Disneyland Paris. And they did try to cram a lot
of Americanisms into into Paris.And on the paper it sounds like
(24:14):
a good idea because, oh, everybody loves to come to
Disney World. Well, let's just replicate that,
you know, with some subtle changes to architecture and
things like that, but not realizing the vast differences
and how Europeans and especiallythe French, how they vacation
(24:36):
and how they take holiday. So yes, they, they started off
bad. I have a number of friends that
were on the opening team of Disneyland Paris and they tell
the stories that it was hard. Could it have been avoided like,
like the one, the thing that I'll grab onto is, is the wine?
Cause 'cause when they opened, Disney had no wine.
(24:58):
Well, other than in Anaheim Club33, you could get wine there,
but that's a whole other, other story.
But they, they, if I remember the, the lore and I read the
books about it, there was no wine until, well, they changed
it. And and then one of the big
shifts was I think it was Bush Senior or it was a president
that came over and that then metwith the French Prime Minister
(25:21):
in the park. And that was kind of when the
French said, oh, OK, this is OK then, you know, and I think it
was a combination of shifts. I'm wondering, could they like
you, you crafted the carpet cleaning experience over a year
plus refining based on experience tweaking plussing.
Do you think like the Disney Paris disaster for the first
(25:44):
couple years could have been avoided intellectually or do you
or do you just have to go through that experience to
discover your customer? Like what What's what's your
thought on that? Thank you.
Yes, I, I think you do need to go through that and Disney does
this with every major opening, whether it be just a single
(26:06):
attraction and I'll pull any of the Star Wars attractions at
Galaxy's Edge down in Orlando orCalifornia.
When they opened up Rise of the Resistance, it was a disaster.
Things were breaking all the time.
It didn't work. The weights were 8 hours long
and then you didn't get on the, I mean, it was horrendous for at
(26:28):
least the first four to six months and it took them that
amount of time to get it workingright.
Did that hurt Disney? Not at all.
You know, I mean, yeah, there were some cranky people, but 80%
of the people that are at Disneytoday, if you went down there
(26:48):
today, they've been there before.
It's only 20% new, so. It's still 20% new.
That's it. That's how many people haven't
been there before. That surprises me.
And so, yes, I think that they go through that.
You have to go through that for the growing pains to learn.
(27:12):
And they know that they're therefor the long haul.
It's not like they're going to shut their doors down in five
years if things aren't going well.
They're there and they're going to make it work.
And now we're on what, year 30 something for for Disneyland
Paris? I think it works more and more.
I think they've they've adapted it to be a little bit more
French. In my, in my experience, I've
(27:33):
one of my favorites with Disney Sea in Tokyo.
I think the Japanese service culture is just on point, even
more service oriented than the Americans.
Like I bought a watch there. It broke.
I sent it back and saying, how can I buy a replacement?
I got a box back wrapped in a Disney towel with an apology
from management with a replacement watch.
(27:54):
I was just like, like, OK, sold for life.
I love you. I will, I will promote you
always and it forever went to Shanghai shortly after it
opened. It still was learning itself.
Clearly they were trained and they were still figuring out
what it meant to be Disney. And and I've heard recently that
they're going to do something something in Dubai, which would
be even closer for us here. So.
(28:15):
Yep, yeah, they just said it's going to be enormous.
Yeah, yeah. So that's that's, that's that's
an yeah exciting thing. So if we, if we come into how to
apply this to other businesses, you have something and I'll put
it in the show notes called Wow 52 waze.com.
(28:36):
Wow, you know, wow as in number 52 waze.com.
And people can download a list of 52, which I think are very
practical, very simple ways to add some spice and magic to
their experience. And, and some of these you've
(28:56):
mentioned. Let me see if I can find it here
again, who's on my e-mail. But things like, oh, I can't,
where did it go? But off the top of my head, oh,
here it is. Simple things like personalized
thank you note, birthday, anniversary card.
You know, these are these, theseare things create a before and
after portfolio. I've been, maybe I'll have my
(29:19):
wife listen to this. She's an interior designer and
I've been basically begging her,you know, from an experience
design perspective to leave likea little booklet with the before
and after, like a little mini coffee table book that they
could then proudly leave on their table.
So then their friends and familywould come over and they go, Oh,
you went from this to this And then, oh, call Melanie.
(29:40):
You know, those are the types ofthings.
So it's, I would really recommend people go to to
wow52ways.com. But is there like a, a special
super impactful recommend? Like it's like a simple thing
that that most companies can consider that they're probably
(30:01):
messing up right now. Anything that jumps out.
Most companies are missing what grandma used to teach or mom
used to teach, which is write a darn thank you note.
Literally by hand. You write the thank you note and
we, I implemented that within the first year of being open and
(30:25):
I at the time it was me. So I was handwriting thank you
notes to my cleaning customers, thanking them for allowing us
into their home. And we look forward to serving
them again in the future. Nobody does that anymore.
And you know, and now you've gotthese services and there's
nothing wrong with the services,you know, send out cards and
(30:46):
handwritten and all these other things.
That's where you can automate it, but you lose the, the human
touch to it. You lose the heartfelt thank
you, you know, I mean it, it, itjust dry it.
It is so simple and it separatesyou from everybody else because
nobody else is doing it. And to receive physical mail
(31:08):
these days, that is not a solicitation for a credit card
or something like that. It's like Christmas in the
mailbox. You know, you're like, Oh my,
who sent me a letter? You know, and I will tell
people, don't get sucked into the automation.
I mean, if you're a major company, I get it.
(31:30):
Coca-Cola is not going to send thank you notes to every time
somebody buys a can of Coke. I get it.
But if you know you have a service where you know you're,
you're selling 50 somethings a week, yeah, you should.
Now it got beyond me. So it was getting to the point
where I couldn't, I just didn't have 3 hours to write thank you
(31:52):
notes anymore. So we went and we hired a bunch
of grandmas. We went down to the local Senior
Center and we brought Donuts andcoffee and the same 3 grandmas
for about the last eight years have been writing our thank you
notes for us. I love it.
Still handwritten, maybe not forme, but it's still handwritten.
(32:13):
It still has that essence of we give a crap and you know, it's,
it's just you find ways to do it.
And what does that cost me? You know, if you're looking at a
low or no cost. 1 The coffee andDonuts for the three grandmas is
nothing and it's postage and some cards for everything else.
(32:34):
But people remember it, you know?
They remember how you make them feel.
And love it. Just a card like that will will
do it for you, yeah. A couple stories in cards
because Joe Pine, who sort of coined the term the experience
economy and the Harvard BusinessReview probably 20-30 years ago,
has become a bit of a friend over time.
And they, they make Gilmore as his partner, the Pine and
(32:57):
Gilmore, they, they make unique themed Christmas cards every
year and then hand signed and I look forward to it because every
year it's some, it's some like cartoon about the state of the
world in something silly. And you know, it almost doesn't
even matter what's in it, although it's always fun and
well thought through, But the fact that it's repeated, you
(33:18):
know, it keeps me engaged with those guys.
It's, it's really lovely. And my, one of my, I guess my
first, well, one of my first roles jobs, even in high school
and in the university, I worked with Nordstrom and the, and the
Europeans wouldn't know Nordstrom, but Nordstrom for so
long was the pinnacle of customer service in retail.
(33:38):
It just kind of defined that space as service.
And when I finally got on the sales floor after the working in
the soccer room, you were given this customer book.
And for loyal customers, you know, you, you were trained to
write down who they are, who is in the family, what sizes they
were, what their preference was,Did they like the advisor guess
or whatever, 'cause I was in men's, men's clothes.
And indeed, we had the opportunity, you know, to send
(34:01):
the cards. And I haven't thought of that in
so long. I'm so digital these days.
It's like like what a smack in the face to do something
lovingly, caringly, authentically analog.
I love it. So the I would, I would urge
people go to go to wow52ways.comand you can also go to
vancemorris.com and learn about maybe even going to, you know,
(34:23):
behind the scenes at Disney and then applying that and afford
it. That sounds like an absolute
dream service. And also on vancemorris.com,
you're doing consulting, speaking, coaching.
And so there's other ways that I'm sure you could help
organizations with this. Vance, thank you so much.
This is, this is connected me tomy inner child.
(34:47):
I, I made a decision early to never 'cause I think I've passed
it. But at one point I had like a
annual pass for Disney, a Disneyland park for over half my
life. And it's, you know, I'm too
close to Paris and I didn't do that anymore.
But to bring that kind of magic and spirit into work life is is
such a gift. So thank you very much.
(35:08):
So again, wow. 50 twoways.com vancemorris.com Vance, thank you
so much for joining. Appreciate you having me, Chris.
Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to the
Business Simplicity Podcast. If this conversation resonated,
please share it with a fellow leader.
Navigating Complexity Visit ebullient.com to discover how we
(35:28):
can partner to simplify your strategy, align your teams, and
accelerate meaningful growth.
Hello, this is Chris Parker withthe Business Simplicity podcast.
And I had a conversation with Vance Morris, who was a security
guard at a birth control manufacturing facility and early
in his career and then spent time as a Disney executive, you
know, creating magical experiences and setting up some
of the the amenities at some of their parks and then applied a
(00:22):
lot of that to other industries like carpet cleaning.
And we just had a lot of fun, you know, getting into the magic
and the mix and the methods to make memorable experiences.
So Vince, why would this be really valuable for someone to
listen to it? Sure thing, Chris.
I think one of the big things isthat we dropped some really
practical Nuggets on that you can implement really right away.
(00:47):
I mean, it's something you can just take that nugget this
afternoon and come up with an idea and implement it and then
see some results. Welcome to the Business
Simplicity podcast, where Chris Parker explores how leaders cut
through complexity to acceleratestrategy execution and growth
with calm, clarity, and confidence.
(01:09):
Welcome back to the Business Simplicity podcast.
This is Chris Parker and I'm having Vance Morris on for a
conversation and I'm very, very curious to learn from Vance
about some of his stories. He is previously a Disney
executive. I'm sure we'll get into that.
And he also apparently started his earlier career as a security
(01:34):
guard at a birth control facility, if I read that
correctly in one of the emails, as well as a number of other
steps. And now he's doing coaching and
advising for companies that are wowing customers with an, you
know, improved customer experience.
And those that have listened know that customer experience is
close to my heart and perhaps even closer is Disney.
(01:58):
So, you know, the fact that I have a a Disney exec, previously
Disney exec on here. Outstanding.
Thank you so much for joining. So maybe Vance, can you connect
some of those dots, you know, tell the story of security card
to Disney, to entrepreneur, to coach and trainer?
(02:18):
You know, I think it's been a anamazing story.
Can you can you connect some of those dots and then we'll dive
into customer experience. Yes, certainly.
And I appreciate you having me on, Chris.
Thank you so much. Yeah, you know, I probably will
be the only birth control factory security guard you run
into all day today. So I'd like to consider that a
(02:40):
little bit unique. And and I bring that up really
as you need to be memorable. And I think that's really one of
the big lessons from Disney and from a lot of the marketing that
I do is that it takes something from your background that is
(03:02):
memorable. If I just said I was a coach or
consultant, then you know, OK, you just lumped me in with
10,000 others. But I used that to kind of break
the ice and say, OK, well, this guy might be interesting because
who wants to admit to being a security guard at a birth
control factory, which I did for2 summers during college.
(03:28):
So a buddy of mine and I worked in New Jersey for a birth
control factory. Who knew you needed security
there? But anyway, after, after school
is when I started my Disney career.
So I think that really was greatbecause that set the basis and
(03:49):
the foundation for everything that I'd be doing moving
forward. And one of the big lessons that
I learned at Disney, aside from swooping down and picking up
pieces of trash really quickly or being nice and doing
autographs and those things, is that Disney runs on processes
and systems. That was my first big lesson.
(04:11):
And you know, I look back on it and this was 1990, so Internet
hadn't really come around yet. Nobody, not everybody had a
computer on their desk and we certainly didn't have a handheld
device. And during the opening of the
Yacht and Beach Club Resort, I was on the opening team.
My boss walked me into this training room and there's just
(04:33):
mountains and mountains of threeinch binders.
I'm like, what is all this? He goes, well, these are all of
the SO PS and OG TS on how to open and operate a Disney
resort. And I was just floored that
there was that much detail in their systems and processes and
leaving nothing to chance. So I took that lesson and
(04:57):
continued that throughout my career.
I am living proof that people dosurvive after leaving Disney.
We don't just curl up in a ball somewhere and you know, or get
institutionalized. We're we can be a functioning
member of society after we leavethe company.
I spent about 8:00 or so years in corporate hospitality and so
(05:22):
I was with the Smithsonian museum system for a while as
director at Kennedy Center for Performing Arts.
So a couple of big corporate ishmuseum style experiences along
the way. I started to feel that I make a
(05:43):
lousy employee because I don't like to be told what to do.
And I know we alluded before we started recording that probably
is the reason that I have two exwives.
So I mean, we can always ask them some other time.
But yeah, I just don't like to be told what to do.
So I started my own business andI was looking at starting a
(06:05):
restaurant and quickly realized that I do not have the capital
to start a restaurant. Most concepts I was looking at
were requiring you know, $1,000,000 liquid cash and well
I just didn't have that laying around.
So next went with the next best thing, which was starting a
carpet cleaning business, which I'm sure is what every small boy
(06:27):
dreams of doing. When they're that's the obvious
alternative. From high end themed restaurant
to carpet cleaning. OK.
I mean, I barely vacuumed at thepoint, so you know, but the
franchise I was looking at, system I was looking at was as
top quality. I could look any customer in the
(06:48):
eye and say every single one of our products works as
advertised. And I figured I would take their
products and my experience and marketing knowledge and set out
at the beginning creating a premium level service.
Because I don't know about Amsterdam, but I can tell you
here in the States we have telephone poles with phone
(07:11):
numbers stapled to them about people who will clean your
carpet for $49.00 or something silly.
So we were the complete oppositeof that really focusing on an
affluent market and we grew thatfocusing just on that.
People started to ask me, jeez, Vance, you don't look like
you're working too hard, how areyou doing this?
(07:34):
So that kind of birth, the coaching and consulting and
advising business. And if you Fast forward to
today, I still own the home service business.
We actually added two. I have a Oriental rug washing
facility and a mold remediation company put a general manager in
place and said just run the systems.
(07:58):
I got marketing systems, operation systems, marketing
systems, don't screw at anything, just manage the
systems. And so I spent about 90 minutes
a week on those businesses. Now most of that time spent with
the general manager revealing operations and things like that
and his ideas for improvement because I didn't want it to just
(08:21):
be mine because if it's going tomove along without me, well,
it's got to be able to grow. So I so every week we meet and
he says, well, you know, why don't we try this or why don't
we try that? And once we've talked it
through, then great, have at it.On the consulting side.
One of the fun things I get to do is actually take business
(08:44):
owners to Disney for three and four day full immersion boot
camps. Really seeing how Disney makes
the sausage, so to speak. I have some private clients and
I have group coaching, so got a number of irons in the fire.
But once you put systems and processes in place, you really
(09:06):
it's just managing those things.And to me, systems generates
freedom. And for me, that's freedom to
come and go from a my business as I please and it'll still run
without me to freedom to choose the clients I work with because
not everybody's going to make a great client.
(09:27):
So that's my story in a nutshell.
And. In a nutshell, seems fascinating
and I'm in love because you're getting paid to go to
Disneyland, you know, like, OK, that's a that's a dream.
Let me grab on to a few points of that.
So when you first started with Disney at the, at the yacht and
beach club, you were surprised at the discipline and the
documentation. The SO PS launched that and you
(09:51):
did other things at Disney as well.
And then is that you applied that to say, let's say more
mundane services and activities like carpet cleaning.
What are a few things that you literally took from Disney that
would be not expected? So kind of some unexpected
things that you applied to. Let's just play with carpet
cleaning that made a significantdifference that you know, you
(10:15):
know, like like how did the Disney or your previous
experience, maybe if not Disney,you've done other things, frame
your need for discipline and documentation as well as unique
memorable experiences. And then you deployed that and
carpet cleaning of all things like like can you, what was the
mental strategic process that you went through?
(10:35):
Sure. Well, some of the things that I,
I don't want to say I stole themfrom Disney because then the
Disney attorneys are going to come after me, but appropriated.
The first one was really about the systems and keeping them
simple. So and I saw the freedom that
those systems gave the employees.
(10:56):
So they actually, you know, learning to work in a restaurant
or valet or what have you, you know, they had their system in
the three inch binder and they learned it and they repeated it.
And most importantly, they practiced it before going out
live. And I think that's key there is
(11:18):
that you need to practice your thing before you put it out to
the public. I mean, you wouldn't start a
Broadway show without rehearsalsand just throw everybody on
stage the first night you have rehearsal.
But the systems that we use wereextremely simple.
And if you think about who's working at Disney, it's a lot of
(11:40):
minimum wage or younger employees.
And if they had difficult systems, well, the whole thing
would fall apart. So Disney runs on three words,
what to do, how to do it, and most importantly, why do we do
it that way? And I've taken that framework
everywhere I've gone, and we have a what, how, why for
(12:04):
everything that we do. It doesn't matter whether it's a
marketing system or something inoperations, we have what we do.
Let's say it's answer the telephone and then we have, how
do we do it? So we, you know, Disney has
figured out how to create experiences out of all the
boring, mundane things we do dayin and day out.
(12:26):
So they'll tell you, all right, here's how you answer the phone.
The most important of it, especially if you want strong
employee engagement, which most companies do, is the why.
Why do we answer the phone this way?
And it could be for any number of reasons, you know, to, you
(12:47):
know, be open and welcoming to the guests so that they start
their vacation, you know, on theright foot to separate us from
everybody else out there if we have a unique way of answering
the telephone. I actually use this with a
insurance company. He was a franchise.
(13:08):
He was an Allstate guy. So they were probably 5 or 6
other Allstate guys in his town and probably another 30 or 40
insurance agents. And he was having a tough time
breaking out. I mean, it's a commodity
business. I mean, you know, the dentist is
a dentist is a dentist. There's only so many ways you
can clean teeth. So insurance is highly
(13:30):
commoditized. He's like, I got to break out of
this. So we're sitting down in his
office doing a brainstorming session, and I'm looking around
and he's like the rock'n'roll guy.
He's got posters of The Who and Led Zeppelin and autographed
guitars and gold records all over his office.
And I'm thinking, dude, you're the rock'n'roll insurance agent.
(13:53):
And he's he. Yeah, I've been thinking about
that, but it doesn't sound too professional.
I don't worry about it. You know, it's, it's, it's going
to be different. And his receptionist, I'll never
forget the receptionist latched on to that and said, well, why
don't we answer the phone this way, you know, because normally
you'll get, you know, thank you for calling Dave's Allstate.
(14:14):
How may I help you? We've all heard the phone
answered that way. Well, she suggested, and it'll
sound a little corny, but she suggested, thank you for calling
Dave's Allstate, the agency thatrocks now, right?
It is a little corny to say it in the 1st 15 times, fine, But
(14:35):
answering the phone that way does a bunch of things.
One, it sifts, sorts and screensout anybody that would be a bad
customer for them because they're like, what, what, what's
this, you know? But the people that are
attracted to that are going to make fantastic customers.
And he's, trust me, he's busy and it separates him from
(14:59):
everybody else. That was his separating factor
that made him not look like the rest of the insurance agents in
Saint Louis. So I think Disney has that part
figured out. And I've stolen that and used it
everywhere, you know, and, and Ithink that's the lesson.
You look at your customer journey and you identify each
(15:20):
point where there is an interaction with the customer
and you just think and brainstorm.
How do we make an experience outof that?
Yeah, well, I love the focus as well and, and the fact that you
brought up a a really clear customer or persona and, and
(15:40):
build your customer experience to turn off the people you don't
want to serve. I love that cause, cause so
often I, I see people who want to do everything for everyone
and therefore you satisfy and you're memorable to nothing
'cause you are just bland and boring.
So how did you do that in the, in the carpet cleaning?
Like how did you identify that niche that we're going to go all
into? You mentioned it a little bit.
(16:02):
You know, it's kind of like an up, you know, higher
expectation, affluent something,you know, that there's a
definition there. So you had a target niche there.
And then how did you design for them to be differentiated to, to
be not, you know, on the telephone pole, you know, pull
this phone number? Well, certainly our our
marketing was directed to an affluent market.
(16:28):
We actually say part of our USP is that we are here for
homeowners. So that immediately eliminates
rentals completely. And, you know, I've been in a
lot of rentals and every once you have a in a while, you have
a Unicorn that actually takes care of the property.
(16:48):
But 99% of the time rentals are just absolutely disgusting, you
know, and they, they haven't been maintained.
And I'm like, I don't want to work in that environment.
My employees don't want to work in that environment.
So I would, I want to clean that.
So just by identifying the fact that we are only for homeowners
(17:10):
really helped us separate in thebeginning because we didn't have
a a persona in the marketplace yet.
We didn't have a reputation yet.So we had to start it with the
marketing. And as we grew, we continued.
So Walt Disney came up with the term called plussing, which is
(17:35):
constant process improvement or,you know, continually getting
better. And so I'm always looking at
ways how do we plus what we're doing.
One of the big examples, I thinkin on our customer journey, one
of the boring, mundane things wehave to do is get into the home.
(17:55):
So if we can't get in the house,we can't do our thing, we can't
do the cleaning. So we created a complete script
and experience out of getting into the home.
Now I'm going to go through it, but I want to preface it with it
took us like a year to come up with the final iteration.
(18:16):
So we were constantly adding little things to it.
And we're like, oh, we did that.OK, great.
We should probably add this. And it was a group effort.
So it was not just me coming up with it.
It was, you know, hey guys, you know, you do this every day.
How do we make you know? An experience based on real
experience. I think that's super valuable.
It's based on real experience, it sounds like.
So you're, you know, getting in the home and resolving those
(18:38):
little tensions and finding those plus moments.
Yeah, so. Yeah, so it looks kind of like
this. So it's, and I highly recommend
everybody script out and document what they're doing
because then that way it's clearto everyone.
So we park in the street, we don't park in the driveway
because God forbid I got an oil leak, now I got something else I
got to clean up. My technician gets out of the
(19:01):
van in a clean, crisp uniform because he carries extra
uniforms in case he gets dirty on the job beforehand.
He also doesn't smell because I don't allow Cologne or smoking
while you work. There's nothing worse than, you
know, the Marlboro Man showing up in your house smelling like
he just took a shower in Axe. I mean, it's just disgusting.
(19:23):
So he's walks up to the house and he's got a special mat with
him and a little gift, and he goes and he laces the doormat
down in front of the door. We knock on the door.
We don't ring the bell because friends knock.
Salespeople ring the bell, We take a couple of steps back and
Missus Mcgillicuddy will answer the door and we'll say, hi, my
name is Josh. I'm here to create your healthy
(19:44):
home. May I come in?
So we don't just barge in, we ask permission.
We also say our mission, which is to create a healthy home.
Our job is to clean, whether we're cleaning up holstery,
tile, carpet, whatever. But our broader mission is to
create healthier homes, and people latch onto that.
(20:06):
And as we're walking in and we've said that we present
Misses Mcgillicuddy with a gift.Now, I don't know about anybody
else, but I have never had a home service person who comes to
my house, Pest control, home inspector, electrician,
whatever. Nobody's given me a gift as
they're walking in the front door.
(20:27):
And we do it because, well, I figured we're going to
somebody's house. If you go to somebody's house
for a party or something, you'rebringing a bottle of wine, some
hors d'oeuvres or something. So I figured, well, we should do
the same. So we gave Misses Mcgillicuddy
the gift. And it's, it's nothing huge.
It's a custom little blue box. It's got a bottle of spot
(20:47):
remover, a bag of cookies, and alittle note from me thanking us,
thanking them for allowing us into their home.
That is our entry into the home.The gift does two things.
One, again, it separates us fromeverybody else because nobody's
doing it. My competitors know that I'm
doing it and they don't copy it,which I beyond me.
(21:10):
Oh, and I forgot about the mat. So, But before we walk in, we do
an exaggeration of wiping our feet on the mat, kind of like a
show so that people see us. And then we put booties on our
clean shoes. So that gift again separates us,
but it also starts a process called reciprocity.
I give something to you, you feel compelled to give something
(21:31):
to me. And we saw a 26% increase in our
mid tier package or about $65,000 a year in additional
sales by implementing the gift. So that's how I dignified
getting into the House. Or did the gift act as a
souvenir as well? Like was it like in a tin or
(21:51):
something with your number on itor something like that?
Or was it more disposable? It's a no, it's it's a cardboard
box. I mean it's a nice one, don't
get me wrong. It's custom printed and
everything. The the box is not meant to be
kept but the innards are. So there's a bottle of our spot
remover and they get this regardless of whether we
actually clean for them or not because we don't know if we have
(22:13):
the job when we're walking in. Sometimes they just want an
estimate. So but the leave behind spot
remover that'll last them six months and they'll have that in
their kitchen cupboard for the next 6 months staring at our
name and our phone number. No, great.
I'm I'm I love it again, Disneyfied something that's
that's necessary. It's a service, but typically
(22:35):
you wouldn't think it's like a sex and sizzle type of service.
You know, this is, this is, you know, carpet cleaning.
I'm wondering to go off in a completely different tangent for
selfish reasons, cultural differences.
And let me ask the question first because I'm a massive
Disney fan and my father worked with Wedd Enterprises around the
(22:56):
time I was born, grew up in Southern California, literally
have a Disney tattoo not showingyou and I I do not like
Disneyland Paris. For me, it just doesn't work.
You know, I think like the Disneyfication maybe too much by
the book and not by the essence.It falls down.
(23:21):
You know, I I would much rather,and as I think as Disney park
prices increase, the difference of a flight to Florida to, you
know, from from Europe at least to Florida or California as a
total cost of a Disney trip is also coming down for me at
least. How do you feel or how have you
observed how Disneyfication doesor does not cross borders, if
(23:47):
you even have your opinion? Yeah.
This is a big lesson opening up what was then Euro Disney, which
was a misnomer. I mean, they changed that name
quickly to Disneyland Paris. And they did try to cram a lot
of Americanisms into into Paris.And on the paper it sounds like
(24:14):
a good idea because, oh, everybody loves to come to
Disney World. Well, let's just replicate that,
you know, with some subtle changes to architecture and
things like that, but not realizing the vast differences
and how Europeans and especiallythe French, how they vacation
(24:36):
and how they take holiday. So yes, they, they started off
bad. I have a number of friends that
were on the opening team of Disneyland Paris and they tell
the stories that it was hard. Could it have been avoided like,
like the one, the thing that I'll grab onto is, is the wine?
Cause 'cause when they opened, Disney had no wine.
(24:58):
Well, other than in Anaheim Club33, you could get wine there,
but that's a whole other, other story.
But they, they, if I remember the, the lore and I read the
books about it, there was no wine until, well, they changed
it. And and then one of the big
shifts was I think it was Bush Senior or it was a president
that came over and that then metwith the French Prime Minister
(25:21):
in the park. And that was kind of when the
French said, oh, OK, this is OK then, you know, and I think it
was a combination of shifts. I'm wondering, could they like
you, you crafted the carpet cleaning experience over a year
plus refining based on experience tweaking plussing.
Do you think like the Disney Paris disaster for the first
(25:44):
couple years could have been avoided intellectually or do you
or do you just have to go through that experience to
discover your customer? Like what What's what's your
thought on that? Thank you.
Yes, I, I think you do need to go through that and Disney does
this with every major opening, whether it be just a single
(26:06):
attraction and I'll pull any of the Star Wars attractions at
Galaxy's Edge down in Orlando orCalifornia.
When they opened up Rise of the Resistance, it was a disaster.
Things were breaking all the time.
It didn't work. The weights were 8 hours long
and then you didn't get on the, I mean, it was horrendous for at
(26:28):
least the first four to six months and it took them that
amount of time to get it workingright.
Did that hurt Disney? Not at all.
You know, I mean, yeah, there were some cranky people, but 80%
of the people that are at Disneytoday, if you went down there
(26:48):
today, they've been there before.
It's only 20% new, so. It's still 20% new.
That's it. That's how many people haven't
been there before. That surprises me.
And so, yes, I think that they go through that.
You have to go through that for the growing pains to learn.
(27:12):
And they know that they're therefor the long haul.
It's not like they're going to shut their doors down in five
years if things aren't going well.
They're there and they're going to make it work.
And now we're on what, year 30 something for for Disneyland
Paris? I think it works more and more.
I think they've they've adapted it to be a little bit more
French. In my, in my experience, I've
(27:33):
one of my favorites with Disney Sea in Tokyo.
I think the Japanese service culture is just on point, even
more service oriented than the Americans.
Like I bought a watch there. It broke.
I sent it back and saying, how can I buy a replacement?
I got a box back wrapped in a Disney towel with an apology
from management with a replacement watch.
(27:54):
I was just like, like, OK, sold for life.
I love you. I will, I will promote you
always and it forever went to Shanghai shortly after it
opened. It still was learning itself.
Clearly they were trained and they were still figuring out
what it meant to be Disney. And and I've heard recently that
they're going to do something something in Dubai, which would
be even closer for us here. So.
(28:15):
Yep, yeah, they just said it's going to be enormous.
Yeah, yeah. So that's that's, that's that's
an yeah exciting thing. So if we, if we come into how to
apply this to other businesses, you have something and I'll put
it in the show notes called Wow 52 waze.com.
(28:36):
Wow, you know, wow as in number 52 waze.com.
And people can download a list of 52, which I think are very
practical, very simple ways to add some spice and magic to
their experience. And, and some of these you've
(28:56):
mentioned. Let me see if I can find it here
again, who's on my e-mail. But things like, oh, I can't,
where did it go? But off the top of my head, oh,
here it is. Simple things like personalized
thank you note, birthday, anniversary card.
You know, these are these, theseare things create a before and
after portfolio. I've been, maybe I'll have my
(29:19):
wife listen to this. She's an interior designer and
I've been basically begging her,you know, from an experience
design perspective to leave likea little booklet with the before
and after, like a little mini coffee table book that they
could then proudly leave on their table.
So then their friends and familywould come over and they go, Oh,
you went from this to this And then, oh, call Melanie.
(29:40):
You know, those are the types ofthings.
So it's, I would really recommend people go to to
wow52ways.com. But is there like a, a special
super impactful recommend? Like it's like a simple thing
that that most companies can consider that they're probably
(30:01):
messing up right now. Anything that jumps out.
Most companies are missing what grandma used to teach or mom
used to teach, which is write a darn thank you note.
Literally by hand. You write the thank you note and
we, I implemented that within the first year of being open and
(30:25):
I at the time it was me. So I was handwriting thank you
notes to my cleaning customers, thanking them for allowing us
into their home. And we look forward to serving
them again in the future. Nobody does that anymore.
And you know, and now you've gotthese services and there's
nothing wrong with the services,you know, send out cards and
(30:46):
handwritten and all these other things.
That's where you can automate it, but you lose the, the human
touch to it. You lose the heartfelt thank
you, you know, I mean it, it, itjust dry it.
It is so simple and it separatesyou from everybody else because
nobody else is doing it. And to receive physical mail
(31:08):
these days, that is not a solicitation for a credit card
or something like that. It's like Christmas in the
mailbox. You know, you're like, Oh my,
who sent me a letter? You know, and I will tell
people, don't get sucked into the automation.
I mean, if you're a major company, I get it.
(31:30):
Coca-Cola is not going to send thank you notes to every time
somebody buys a can of Coke. I get it.
But if you know you have a service where you know you're,
you're selling 50 somethings a week, yeah, you should.
Now it got beyond me. So it was getting to the point
where I couldn't, I just didn't have 3 hours to write thank you
(31:52):
notes anymore. So we went and we hired a bunch
of grandmas. We went down to the local Senior
Center and we brought Donuts andcoffee and the same 3 grandmas
for about the last eight years have been writing our thank you
notes for us. I love it.
Still handwritten, maybe not forme, but it's still handwritten.
(32:13):
It still has that essence of we give a crap and you know, it's,
it's just you find ways to do it.
And what does that cost me? You know, if you're looking at a
low or no cost. 1 The coffee andDonuts for the three grandmas is
nothing and it's postage and some cards for everything else.
(32:34):
But people remember it, you know?
They remember how you make them feel.
And love it. Just a card like that will will
do it for you, yeah. A couple stories in cards
because Joe Pine, who sort of coined the term the experience
economy and the Harvard BusinessReview probably 20-30 years ago,
has become a bit of a friend over time.
And they, they make Gilmore as his partner, the Pine and
(32:57):
Gilmore, they, they make unique themed Christmas cards every
year and then hand signed and I look forward to it because every
year it's some, it's some like cartoon about the state of the
world in something silly. And you know, it almost doesn't
even matter what's in it, although it's always fun and
well thought through, But the fact that it's repeated, you
(33:18):
know, it keeps me engaged with those guys.
It's, it's really lovely. And my, one of my, I guess my
first, well, one of my first roles jobs, even in high school
and in the university, I worked with Nordstrom and the, and the
Europeans wouldn't know Nordstrom, but Nordstrom for so
long was the pinnacle of customer service in retail.
(33:38):
It just kind of defined that space as service.
And when I finally got on the sales floor after the working in
the soccer room, you were given this customer book.
And for loyal customers, you know, you, you were trained to
write down who they are, who is in the family, what sizes they
were, what their preference was,Did they like the advisor guess
or whatever, 'cause I was in men's, men's clothes.
And indeed, we had the opportunity, you know, to send
(34:01):
the cards. And I haven't thought of that in
so long. I'm so digital these days.
It's like like what a smack in the face to do something
lovingly, caringly, authentically analog.
I love it. So the I would, I would urge
people go to go to wow52ways.comand you can also go to
vancemorris.com and learn about maybe even going to, you know,
(34:23):
behind the scenes at Disney and then applying that and afford
it. That sounds like an absolute
dream service. And also on vancemorris.com,
you're doing consulting, speaking, coaching.
And so there's other ways that I'm sure you could help
organizations with this. Vance, thank you so much.
This is, this is connected me tomy inner child.
(34:47):
I, I made a decision early to never 'cause I think I've passed
it. But at one point I had like a
annual pass for Disney, a Disneyland park for over half my
life. And it's, you know, I'm too
close to Paris and I didn't do that anymore.
But to bring that kind of magic and spirit into work life is is
such a gift. So thank you very much.
(35:08):
So again, wow. 50 twoways.com vancemorris.com Vance, thank you
so much for joining. Appreciate you having me, Chris.
Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to the
Business Simplicity Podcast. If this conversation resonated,
please share it with a fellow leader.
Navigating Complexity Visit ebullient.com to discover how we
(35:28):
can partner to simplify your strategy, align your teams, and
accelerate meaningful growth.
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