Louie Gravance

What makes the difference between a transaction and a transformation? Between selling a stick… and bestowing a wand?

Louie Gravance, celebrated Disney Institute architect of service culture and author of Service is a Superpower, brings audiences inside one of the most ambitious guest experiences ever created: the wand shop at Universal’s World of Harry Potter. Informed by his experience launching this attraction, he reveals some of the strategies, artistry, and deliberate choices that transformed a simple retail moment into a lifelong memory for millions of guests.

With signature humor, storytelling, and real-world insight, Louie shows how every service professional—whether in hospitality, healthcare, retail, or finance—can turn ordinary exchanges into extraordinary experiences. Drawing on lessons from both Disney and Universal, he connects the dots between entertainment, empathy, and discipline to unlock the “wand work” hidden in every service interaction.

Audiences will learn:

• The psychology of story-driven service—how to script interactions that feel magical but never forced.
• Why you don’t have to like them to delight them—tools for handling even the most difficult customers.
• How to empower employees to create WOW moments without scripts or checklists.
• The secret of doing something you don’t have to do—and why that builds loyalty faster than discounts or perks.
• How “show business rules” (like never letting them see the wires) apply directly to your business.

This keynote isn’t just about wands—it’s about the power we hold in our hands every day to create connection, loyalty, and delight. For organizations looking to re-ignite their service culture, Louie Gravance offers not just a presentation, but a master class in making the ordinary unforgettable.

Healthcare professionals of all types are physically, emotionally and mentally exhausted from over two years an unrelenting pandemic. Some experts have even dubbed their condition as a type of post-traumatic stress of disorder caused by an overload of patients, high death rates, personal danger, and ever-shifting safety guidelines.

Perhaps it would be helpful to look at things a different way.

Isn’t it time to remind and re-enforce the superpowers healthcare workers have to create “magical service moments” that far exceed the significance of a theme park experience? In fact, aren’t these moments happening countless times a day and never recognized?

Author, speaker and former training designer for Walt Disney World, Louie Gravance asks the question, “What would ‘Disneyfied healthcare’ look and feel like? And what would it feel like to provide it?” This humorous and uplifting session explores ways healthcare teams can rediscover their service superpowers and the impact they provide endlessly to patients and co-workers alike.

Louie suggests the Disney cultural template of following the P.L.A.N.

• Purpose
• Language
• Actions
• Narrative-Shared

As he says in his book, SERVICE is a SUPERPOWER-Lessons Learned in a Magic Kingdom, “Every time we delight a guest or patient it makes us, the service provider, immeasurably stronger.”

ALL organizations are constantly engaging their internal and external customers in a NARRATIVE of sorts. Regardless of what anyone is selling or providing, a story is conveyed through every single transaction, involving every single sense we possess. This narrative drives everything from customer expectations to employee satisfaction and even your very BRAND ESSENCE.

• What do we look like?
• What do we smell like?
• What do we feel like?

Since all of your team members are telling a story with every transaction, shouldn’t it be the story you want to convey to your customers?  Every day?  Every transaction?

For over 40 years I’ve appeared on radio, network television, film, stage, in theme parks, as well as worked with corporate trainers in medicine, retail, foods, manufacturing, auto makers, insurance companies to name just a few. They are all, at their core, show business.

This is a lively and comedic talk that can be customized to your event and purpose.

When a WOW moment in customer service takes place it doesn’t happen only for the customer, it occurs for both, simultaneously.  Inspiring your team to make that connection is the single, greatest tool for maintaining a culture of service excellence.  This power-talk explores what a WOW moment looks, sounds and feels like and why delivering them is good for everyone involved.

Occasionally employees will ask themselves, “What’s in it for me?” and it’s not a bad question.  During this session…I answer it.

Every participant will come to understand that an investment of themselves is an investment in themselves and that every customer interaction is an opportunity.  An opportunity to define, not just what they’re willing to do, but what they’re willing to be.

More than that; every second is the “moment of truth” in the world of customer service.  I’ve learned a lot about maintaining a consistent service culture that delivers “magical moments” from my years at the Disney University, Disney Institute and the cultures I’ve been involved in shaping at such companies as Bank of America, SkyTouch Technologies and ING Financial.

This is a lively and comedic talk that can be customized to the needs of your event.

Every patient interaction involves and emotional interaction.  Whether you are asking a patient to fill out a chart or giving someone a bad diagnosis there is a level of emotion involved.  The people that are typically drawn to the healthcare industry know this at their core but, over time, tasks and regulations can obstruct the vision and purpose of what brought one to the business of healing in the first place.  A career at Disney helped to frame a consciousness that teaches “magical moments” don’t just happen at a theme park.  Let’s take the opportunity to re-engage our desire to bring humanity and caring to the world of health services. We will never forget the “great service serves the server first,” in all industries, but, perhaps, none more than healthcare.

This is a lively and comedic talk that can be customized to your event and purpose.