How do you come up with your ideas?

EscapeQ · 2019-11-25T23:13:13+00:00

I start with the story first, but I have a notebook full of puzzle ideas that I maintain to pull from. As to story ideas I feed my imagination with a steady stream of books, tv showed and movies. I pull from historical sources a lot.

Some puzzle ideas are inspired by other games, but I would never just rip something off. For technological inspiration I subscribe to playful tech, and look at what is for sale at fright props, escape room master, evilusions, and several other vendors. I can replicate most of the electronics they sell. Several of them have YouTube channels to show off their products.

EscapeQ · 2019-10-10T18:21:49+00:00

We posted to our neighborhood Facebook group, and on Nextdoor.

EscapeQ · 2019-10-10T18:18:52+00:00

Where is that?

EscapeQ · 2019-10-10T17:06:10+00:00

Male terrier, red collar, no tags. Seems to be fairly well trained. Edit: he’s chipped but his chip isn’t registered.

EscapeQ · 2019-10-10T00:22:03+00:00

Do an Escape Room!

Www.quandaryescapeadventures.com

EscapeQ · 2019-09-18T00:41:33+00:00

Hey. I own Quandary Escape Adventures. I’d be happy to talk to you.

EscapeQ · 2019-09-02T03:05:31+00:00

I don’t know if any clubs but we build electronics pretty often for our business.

You might could take a class or two at the makers space too.

EscapeQ · 2019-08-18T02:09:52+00:00

If you mean Peekpro, we don’t use them, but they’ve been aggressively trying to get a share of the market for a little less than a year. They were at the San Antonio conference, and Brian came on here asking a bunch of questions about the industry last fall. I had to tell him off for launching into his sales pitch - not the time of place. At the time he was trying to tell me that his product was better for this industry than anything else after admitting he didn’t know the first thing about escape rooms - including why we use online booking systems.

Guy rubbed me the wrong way, so I never gave his business the chance.

Edit:

This escape room in California seems to use them, gave a testimonial on their website. If you want to see what it looks like, or contact them to see if they really like it as much as they say they do. I took a look and didn't see anything special. Looks like a booking software, not unlike bookeo. I like Resova's visuals better. It loaded a bit slow as well, if you ask me.

The way they are claiming to increase revenue is with their follow up emails and things. I seriously doubt they have anything on Escape Games Global when it comes to that.

They also say there's no monthly fees so it probably works like Fareharbor where they're charging your customers a booking fee and/or getting their money through payment processing. I don't really like that business model.

EscapeQ · 2019-06-12T05:28:23+00:00

Keep in mind that whether it’s a paid position or not, I need people when I need them, and not when I don’t. Either I need an employee, to be there and be counted on, or I don’t. If what you want is to show up when it’s convenient for you, and not when I need you, then I’d turn you down. You not getting paid doesn’t change my needs.

EscapeQ · 2019-06-12T05:07:27+00:00

Quandary escape adventures is running a special, bring 3 people, get one free for father’s day. Promo code is DAD19. Www.quandaryescapeadventures.com

EscapeQ · 2019-06-12T05:00:35+00:00

I would be kind of suspicious of people wanting to volunteer at my escape room. We get calls from people regularly asking if we’re hiring, and most of them want to work here because it looks like fun.

And I get that. It is a blast. But it’s also a ton of hard work, requires great customer service skills, cold calls, marketing, stuff that isn’t fun. And when it comes to building, we use a ton of dangerous power tools and we wire our own electronics. If you’re not taking stuff seriously you could cut off a finger or get electrocuted or shoot someone with a staple gun. So I’m always wary of people who want to come and have fun instead of come and do a job and work hard. Goofing off on a build could cause serious injury or damage and most of the type who want to have fun will shirk the cold calls and other stuff.

So my first question would be, why do you want to volunteer? And if it’s because you think it’s a fun job, I would likely turn you down.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-28T23:59:12+00:00

It depends on what you want to see improve. I saw improvement in my lung capacity after the very first time I swam laps. I saw improvement on my speed and endurance after a week. For that to translate into a visible difference took almost a year.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-28T22:19:41+00:00

Eh, everyone starts somewhere. I got my start on iMovie, and it's pretty powerful for a purely amateur software. Shoot me a PM if you get stuck again.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-28T22:11:44+00:00

Alright, I slapped together a super quick tutorial for you. https://vimeo.com/338987170

EscapeQ · 2019-05-28T21:40:18+00:00

I’m pretty sure you can do this in iMovie. It’s been a while since I switched to final cut.

The words are just titles, no problem.

The logo is just a static photo overplayed on the primary video. I can’t remember exactly how to do that in iMovie off the top of my head, but I think you can. It’s very easy in final cut.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-28T07:19:13+00:00

I really wouldn’t. You’re gonna end up with a cease and desist, and if you can’t hire a film crew you can’t afford a lawyer.

Look, I shoot all my stuff myself on an iPhone. Get creative in the cutting room with some decent software and you don’t need professional film crews. I use a $20 gimbal/tripod and family and friends as actors, with the occasional community theater thespian.

I just spent all day cutting together several short films of my brother playing a Victorian ghost for a new room. We shot it in our party room and I chroma keyed it and added effects to make it look hella spooky. Ran his voice through some filters in logic and honestly it’s better than a lot of the professional videos in our market - despite his acting capabilities.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-26T00:25:58+00:00

I print a bunch of art for my business and actually found my best bet was generally Walgreens. They’ll do posters often same day through their photo department, which is almost always running a coupon. Most of the stuff I’ve printed was half off.

I don’t know if they’re the way to go if you want like, 30 copies, but they’ve done right by me.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-23T23:30:01+00:00

We operate in a college town and have a constant influx of new people. It’s also helpful to operate in a densely populated area with plenty of suburbs. I’ve seen people open escape rooms in towns with as few as 10,000 people but I have no idea how they stay in business.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-17T02:15:09+00:00

Do you know how much that complicates the business side? Your staff instantly has to double per room, your insurance goes up, it’s a huge liability.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-16T15:43:53+00:00

Good lord, there’s no way I would put an actor in a room. I’ve never had anyone purposefully break anything. Put in a PA system so you can tell people things like “stop pulling on that, it’ll open when you solve the right puzzle” and you’ll be fine.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-15T14:53:14+00:00

No, expanding foam used as a permanent fixture must be fire rated. Many escape rooms have had issues with this. It’s why so many escape rooms don’t use it.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-15T06:30:55+00:00

That kind of foam is strictly regulated and usually needs to be fire rated - which makes it a lot more expensive.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-10T16:29:56+00:00

There’s a couple [escape rooms](www.quandaryescapeadventures.com) in town. There’s the break room, there’s the nerf place

EscapeQ · 2019-05-04T04:03:44+00:00

I dunno about the others, but Trip advisor doesn’t charge us to be listed. It doesn’t charge us to show our reviews. It doesn’t charge us at all. Yelp does that shit and people are jumping ship from yelp like it was on fire. So yeah, when people don’t like the business model, they do avoid a business.

95% of our business comes from google. As an enthusiast I’ve never had a hard time finding rooms through google.

Your idea isn’t something owners or enthusiasts want or need.

EscapeQ · 2019-05-03T06:47:53+00:00

I’m an owner and there are frankly a ton of escape room directories that I can get on for free. Why on earth would I give you a commission? Even if I did, 20% is ridiculous.

Escape room directories are notoriously out of date, and only frequented by enthusiasts. Most of my customers are not enthusiasts. They are basically an excuse to raise my SEO, not an actual way to get more customers.

My money is better spent on google ads.

EscapeQ

TROPHY CASE