Introduction
Deb publishes ALL EARS®, a free weekly electronic newsletter that has about 125,000 subscribers from around the world.
Bitten by the Disney bug at an early age, Deb Wills has combined her skills in computer technology with her love of the Disney theme parks to create Deb’s Unofficial Disney Travel Guide. In the last 21 years, she has developed the site into one of the most up-to-date, independent resources about Walt Disney World, Disneyland and the Disney Cruise Line on the Internet, with tens of thousands of pages of information, thousands of photos, menus from every WDW restaurant and more than 10.0 million “page views” and more than 700,000 unique visitors per month.
In conjunction with the website, Deb publishes ALL EARS®, a free weekly electronic newsletter that has about 125,000 subscribers from around the world. ALL EARS®, which started publication in September 1999, informs readers on what’s happening at Walt Disney World with previews, interviews, news, reviews and much more. A promotional companion newsletter, Ears the Deal™ goes out several times a month to more than 90,000 subscribers.
Deb is internationally recognized as an expert on Disney vacations ranging from Walt Disney World to the Disney Cruise Line, Disneyland and Adventures by Disney. A veteran of countless trips to Walt Disney World and Disneyland, Deb also set sail on more than 35 cruises. She has appeared on numerous podcasts as a guest host/speaker and has made several presentations to standing-room-only crowds at MagicMeets (a summer gathering of Disney fans in Pennsylvania) and the Pacific Northwest Mouse Meet.
Deb has contributed to Bob Sehlinger and Len Testa’s “Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World” and previously was a member of the PassPorter Guide Books review team.
Deb actively participates in events designed to raise funds and awareness in the fight against breast cancer, which she herself survived in 1986. Deb participated in more than a dozen of the breast cancer walks (both as a walker and a crew member) that were formerly sponsored by Avon, for which she raised more than $750,000 since 2001. Deb was the featured speaker at the 2010 Washington DC Avon Walk for Breast Cancer closing ceremony. For her special efforts in the fight against breast cancer, Deb received the 2006 Food & Friends Spirit of Friendship Award. Deb now raises funds for another charity, FORCE – Facing Our Risk of Cancer Empowered, which fights and raises awaress of hereditary cancers.
Some of Deb’s earliest Disney memories are of attending the New York World’s Fair and experiencing “it’s a small world” and Carousel of Progress. Deb’s first trip to Walt Disney World was in 1972. Later in the 1970s, Deb organized and managed several trips to the Orlando theme parks for disabled adults from the Washington, DC area. She began yearly trips to Orlando in the early 1990s and soon she was at the Guest Services window in the Magic Kingdom, purchasing her first (of many) annual passports. Originally from the New Jersey shore area, Deb spent most of her adult life in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC and is now a Florida resident.
She co-authored “PassPorter Walt Disney World for Your Special Needs” with Debra Martin Koma in 2007. The second edition of this book, PassPorter’s Open Mouse for Walt Disney World and the Disney Cruise Line was published in 2009. In its 400-plus pages, the book delivers in-depth, painstakingly researched information on a wide spectrum of accommodations for special needs travelers.