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Episode: The Walt Disney Company
Pub date: 2026-06-22

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The Walt Disney Company is the most successful enterprise ever created for monetizing human nostalgia. Today it’s the king of global entertainment, holding the intellectual property rights to the childhood memories of billions of people (including, likely, all of you) and is a reliable, predictable profitable business. But it didn’t start that way.

During Walt’s era, Disney operated like an unhinged moonshot factory, blowing its finances on one seemingly crazy project after another, like the very first feature-length animated film or a theme park inspired by Walt's fascination with model trains (spoiler: Disneyland). Walt’s relentless ambition to bet the company over and over again not only created some of the most monumental artistic achievements of the 20th century (Snow White, Fantasia, Disney Imagineering), but also resulted in the accidental invention of the modern “flywheel” business model. In this episode, we tell the story of the ultimate marriage of art, commerce, and engineering — The Walt Disney Company: Walt's Era.

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00:00 Start
01:09 Intro
06:03 Walt's Early Life & Artistic Calling (1901-1919)
12:37 From Commercial Art to Laugh-o-grams (1919-1923)
23:04 Hollywood, The Alice Comedies & Oswald's Loss (1923-1928)
43:31 Mickey Mouse & The Synchronized Sound Breakthrough (1928)
01:01:53 The IP Flywheel & Mickey Merch Explosion (1929-1933)
01:09:57 Analysis: The Disney IP Flywheel Unpacked
01:59:02 Snow White & The Folly That Defined Animation (1937)
01:41:08 The Burbank Studio & Pre-War Struggles (1937-1941)
02:04:20 The Animators' Strike & Walt's Disillusionment (1941)
02:15:44 World War II & The Accidental Disney Vault (1941-1945)
02:24:27 Post-War Slump to Cinderella's Comeback (1945-1950)
02:33:46 Walt's Obsession: Model Trains to Disneyland (1950-1952)
02:38:44 Financing Disneyland: ABC, SRI & Davy Crockett (1953-1955)
03:17:00 Disneyland's Grand Opening & The Evolving Flywheel (1955-1958)
03:39:04 The Florida Project: Walt's Vision for EPCOT City (1958-1966)
03:54:20 Walt's Untimely Death & Roy's Legacy (1966-1971)
04:00:06 A Parks Company & Creative Decline (1971-1984)
04:09:44 Analysis: Why No Other Disney Flywheels?
04:17:15 The Seven Powers of Disney
04:20:30 Quintessence: Art, Commerce & Timeless IP
04:23:47 Carve-Outs + Outro

‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal, which is the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Listen Notes, Inc.