A MAGICIAN'S BLOG 

The question I get more than almost any other, usually from someone planning their first company party, is some version of this. What if people don't want to participate? It is a fair worry. You are spending real money on entertainment, and the nightmare version in your head is a room of forty adults being made to do something they do not want to do. So let me tell you what I am actually looking for when I work your room, because it is close to the opposite of what people exp

"Hi, so we had a couple quick questions. We've never done this before, and my boss saw another magician at a company retreat and was really blown away." That is almost word for word how these calls start. Somebody gets handed the holiday party, usually someone in HR or an office assistant who was never hired to be an event planner but is now planning an event. And here is the part most of them do not know. When you say "we want a magician," you are not describing one thing. Y

Spencer Grey performs close up magic for guests at a Bay Area corporate party. When people hear there is a magician at their company party, they picture the tricks. Cards, coins, something vanishing. But the tricks are honestly the smallest part of the job. I tell clients this all the time. There are plenty of amazing talented magicians out there. That is not the problem. The hardest thing is finding somebody who is not only entertaining but also knows how to read a room, and

When people hear there's a magician at their company party, they picture the tricks. Cards, coins, something vanishing. But the tricks are honestly the smallest part of the job. The real work is knowing which group to walk up to, knowing which group to leave alone, and knowing how to join a conversation that was going fine before you got there. That's what clients are actually paying for, and it's the part nobody sees. So here's what a Silicon Valley magician is really doing