Latest / The Christian Reeve Podcast / Chris Waters (Constructed Adventures) | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #68 |

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Chris Waters (Constructed Adventures) | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #68 | · The Christian Reeve Podcast

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  It's another episode of the Christian we've podcast, but
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  before we get into it, are you subscribed?
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  If not please make sure to subscribe.
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  Like and share the video and spread the word because the
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  Christian read podcast is here to stay.
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  I love doing this and I love all of you that support me.
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  So, thank you. And yeah, let's get into this
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  podcast, shall we? Boom.
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  Hello. And welcome to another episode
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  of the Christian. We've podcast today's guests.
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  He's a YouTuber but he is more well known as a an immersive
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  treasure. Scavenger hunt architect?
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  I think I got that, right? Yeah.
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  The way from Portland Oregon. Welcome to the show.
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  Chris Waters. How you doing?
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  Hey, I'm great Christian. Thank you so much for having me.
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  Oh no, it's a pleasure man. Arie, I found Chris through read
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  it. And I was just kind of Blown
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  Away by what you do for a living.
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  I just sounds like so much fun. It's like if you put lead to say
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  that but It's kind of like every kid's dream but then you like,
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  realize it as an adult, kind of things, you know, being because
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  like treasure hunts when you're a kid is just the most exciting
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  thing ever. Oh yeah.
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  You know, you see movies, like The Goonies, our National
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  Treasure of things like that and I'm like, I want to go on a
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  treasure hunt and you, I don't know.
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  I feel like everyone at some point in time has tried to put
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  together some like treasure scavenger hunt and for someone
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  and I hear a lot of success stories, I hear a lot of horror
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  stories and it, I, you know, I A someone and it blew up and I
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  started doing it I got better and better and better at it and
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  now go up. You mean it did?
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  Well, if what you mean, yes, it will but the internet, there's
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  no explosions and trying to think if I've done anything even
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  that have involved explosions and I don't think so, not yet at
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  least maybe. All right, so yeah, let's let's
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  jump straight into this. So it's a very I've never heard
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  of it like actually worded, like, This.
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  But what does it mean by immersive exactly.
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  Like what's the difference between that and a standard kind
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  of treasure hunt? Yeah, exactly.
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  And you know immersive is such a it's almost like a buzzword,
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  it's weird my industry so to speak it could it could range
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  everything. You know, a lot of people that
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  like, to lump it in with Escape rooms because those are popular
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  and most. Yeah, on them and then there's
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  things like immersive theater or like you go in and there's
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  actors and right, there's other things.
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  Like, alternate reality games, like the big args, where like
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  it's, it's more or less, like, kind of Internet digital.
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  Usually, it's a marketing thing. The idea with immersive is a
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  kind of blurs, the lines between like, what's normal everyday
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  stuff and what's part of the game.
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  And so it's, some can delve way more into immersive with, like,
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  lots of actors. And there's a story and there's
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  like, there's motivations and things and some are a little bit
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  more light on immersive where it's like, you're told to Go
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  somewhere and sit on this bench in this park and wait for
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  further instructions and that's it.
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  And so now you're just sitting here and you're looking around
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  like a woman jogs by and you like she part of it and like
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  someone's like walking their dog is like is that dogging on it?
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  So that's kind of the idea with these days and it's the fun
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  thing that I hear from the you know the players that play them
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  it's like doesn't matter. Like most of the people aren't
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  in on this game right there. Just random people walking
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  around but you don't know that. And so everybody becomes a
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  suspect and that's part of kind of the Version and then of
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  course someone like slips up behind you with you know, a wax
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  sealed envelope and they're like I was instructed to give you
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  this and they walk away and you're like what's going on and
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  then you know you go to the next stop where you know you have to
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  give a password to a bartender in the bartender's, like I've
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  been expecting you like here's your favorite drink, like here's
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  a box you to open or here's this that.
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  So it's that's kind of the immersive part of it.
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  Is you just, you don't know who's in on it, who's not, and
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  it makes it so much more fun this, right?
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  Randomly reminds me, because I've been on similar things.
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  Like, I've done the escape room stuff and I remember, I have a
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  friend. I haven't spoken to her many
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  many years, but yeah, he invited me to his birthday, but like, it
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  was probably the coolest birthday thing I've ever been to
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  because normally it's just, like, a party or whatever.
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  Right. But he invites me to this, like,
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  I don't even know how to put it. Was basically an underground bar
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  / restaurant, but like, it was I have detective themed, I guess
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  so. Like as soon as you got to the
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  the, I guess, entrance reception, whatever.
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  Like the guys, is, in character. Like, yeah, he was like, pardon
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  my language, like a proper asshole, right?
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  And the guy whose birthday it was was loving it.
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  He was this Banner in meanest guy and eventually he got what
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  he wanted out of the guy and we got lights or let in into the
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  secret place and then you quite a quickly realized that it's
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  just a restaurant with food and stuff but like everyone stays in
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  character. Like even the waiters and
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  waitresses the whole time, which, you know, worked in
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  hospitality and that's grueling enough.
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  So, having to her, then act and character on top of things.
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  But yeah, man. Sounds, it sounds really cool.
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  But what I really want to know is like because this isn't a
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  standard kind of career path or now, you know, the standard
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  thing that one would get into. So like how did you actually get
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  into this and also talk to us about the process of setting up
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  your treasure hunts. Yeah.
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  Can tackle that because the first question is a very long
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  answer and second question, another very long answer.
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  So you might have to re remind me of the second part but
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  fantastic. You said you found me on Reddit
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  and stats that's how I started. Yeah for those that might have
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  not been paying attention in the last decade, especially the last
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  two weeks with Wall Street bets read.
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  It is the like seventh most popular website in the world
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  like ping-pong. See, you know, somewhere in the
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  top ten that giant Message Board.
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  Yeah, it's huge. Yeah, giant Message Board,
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  basically consisting of tiny subreddits.
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  Like everything has a subreddit, right people that play ukulele?
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  Have a subreddit people that are fans of Liverpool have a
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  subreddit like, there's a subreddit for people, taking
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  pictures of like Corgi butts, right?
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  Like the dogs that I am. Is, yeah, there's Corgi, but
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  summer, it's very active. And there's a subreddit called
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  secret Santa and it's the largest international gift
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  exchange anonymous. Exchange in the world, 100,000
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  people sign up every year, you get matched with somebody,
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  somebody else gets matched with you and then you stalk them and
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  you try to ship them a gift. You think they'll like, it's
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  like, you know, I think the recommended amounts $25 minimum,
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  some people get, you know, shafted some people sign up and
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  don't give a gift and that sucks.
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  They've got stopgaps to make sure and kind of re-gifting, you
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  know, Bill Gates, does it and like Snoop Dogg's, done it and
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  celebrities, Adam Savage. And so like the person that gets
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  Bill Gates, is there sand Anna is going to get like thousands
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  of dollars in stuff and it's really thoughtful to.
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  It's not just like, always a bunch of Microsoft Xbox stuff.
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  You get that but then you also get stuff based on like your
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  Reddit profile or whatever else you like.
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  Anyway, I've been doing it for years.
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  I think I've done it for like eight or nine years now.
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  And then five issue years ago, I got matched with a guy who lived
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  21 minutes away from me, which just like doesn't happen, right?
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  100,000 people. All getting matched, the odds of
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  getting somebody even in your state, or Province or wherever
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  is very very low. But I got this guy and I was
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  working at a tech company. I was making good money and I
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  had a poker game that I just happen to have like taking down
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  three weeks in a row and I was just like, screw it.
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  I'm going to build this guy and his girlfriend like this
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  elaborate treasure scavenger hunt to find his gift.
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  That I don't even know what I'm gonna get him yet.
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  And so I just started building it.
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  And I kept coming up with like crazier ideas are like, okay,
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  well, what Tiff like I send them to the zoo and there's, you
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  know, Clues to animal pens. And they're going to use the
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  plaque to decode a cipher, that sends them to a restaurant where
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  the server says, or whatever you want, everything's been paid for
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  and then dig in an envelope to with two tickets to a mirror
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  maze and halfway through the mirror.
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  Maze. Someone's like are you mr.
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  Royal Scotsman which was like his user red handle.
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  I was just trying to give you this and then you know, to the
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  top of a hike and down with speak and so it's like you just
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  became more and more. Elaborate because Like, wow,
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  that would be really cool idea. If I could do this and I'm like,
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  well, I could just do it. So I had a dear friend of mine
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  who's now my best friend and roommate, and he helped me
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  hand-deliver a century old suitcase to this guy to start
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  this thing off. And when they were at the zoo
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  and kind of self-contained, he was like, this is a great idea.
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  You're gonna start a business, I'm going to build your website,
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  people would pay money for this. What's your business name?
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  And I was like, oh no constructed Adventures, he's
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  like cool bought the URL made like a Really basic Squarespace
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  website with like pictures of Nicolas, Cage from National
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  Treasure. And like the lip some lorem.
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  You know, when you first create a website and I like a
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  paragraphs going to go here and it's just gibberish.
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  That was still on there that website got posted when my my
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  gifty, the guy who I did, the adventure for posted to Reddit
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  and it hit the front page and so it blew up, I got, you know,
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  eleven thousand hits on this website and I was Off to the
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  Races that it is a side Hustle. And then a couple years ago,
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  jump ship from working full-time to do this full-time.
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  That's awesome. And Back stories like that
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  actually give me hope with what I'm doing that maybe this by
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  actually become my career and that's all it takes.
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  Dude. It's I mean like, it's wild
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  because I'm half like a artists and yeah, business and I listen
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  to a lot of podcasts. And one of them is how I built
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  this with guy Raz. Which is basically like he
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  interviews like the founders of Instagram and Airbnb in Spanx
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  and Craig, Boyd, massive companies.
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  And his last question, he always asks, which is fascinating to me
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  is, how much of your success is hard work?
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  And how much of it is luck? And there are a couple, like,
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  self-centered people. I can't remember the names, but
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  they're like, it's all hard work, right?
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  And you're like, okay Boomer like no, it's not.
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  There is so much luck involved with this.
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  And like, I think back, you know, when I talk, Story people
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  like, oh yeah, you got lucky. And I'm like, yeah, I did get
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  lucky. I work, very hard, don't get me
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  wrong. And I'm pretty good at my job.
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  I'd like to think. But I'm very lucky and like, you
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  know, you think of people like Ed Sheeran, right?
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  Who like there's for every Ed Sheeran who just Usher happened
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  to what a walk into the cafe that he was singing in.
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  There's millions of Ed Sheeran's who are just as talented, who
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  will never never have Usher walk into the cafe that he's singing
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  in, right? Like so there's like a matter of
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  being good working hard and also just like getting lucky and that
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  was you know look I think it's definitely the combination you
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  know like he's a trained as an example.
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  I think is a great example because I mean he busted his ass
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  for so many years and a lot of people don't know this and I'd
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  forgotten about this. He was he was on a show in the
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  mid-2000s. It was in the UK.
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  I think it was it was who Fame Academy or it was Brit School.
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  Something like that. Some pop BBC show.
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  What? And he was on that show and back
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  then. I mean, you know, he was okay,
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  pretty talented but nothing like, you know, amazing.
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  And even he would say back then like, you know, he didn't in
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  quite have it. Yeah, which makes you kind of
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  think that like, that took a long long, long, long, long
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  long, long, long, long time to build up and I have to say, from
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  personal experience with everything that I've been doing
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  for the last two or three years, it's taken many years to bit
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  like music. I've been given a lot of Ments.
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  So like compliments on that and some people are like oh why are
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  you so naturally talented and I'm like, no way.
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  This takes many years of practice.
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  And like I'd say, it took me like at least Put three or four
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  years before I could actually like hold the tune.
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  Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
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  It's like stages. Yeah.
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  And there's something to be said about Talent.
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  Right. There are people that just like,
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  will never be singers because like they just aren't good but
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  then like you can take, you know, you can get better.
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  I have a twin brother who's a designer for Disney and like,
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  he's extremely talented and he works really, really, really
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  hard. And, you know, that's kind of
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  one of those those tricks that you see with, like, influencers
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  or, you know, so, These are things like that where it's like
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  Barry very rarely. Does anybody become a celebrity
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  overnight like you have to work at it and like there's that what
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  the Malcolm Gladwell is the Tipping Point, right?
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  There's that point, we're all of a sudden like, you know, you get
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  lucky right, you get you, you know, even after I started this
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  business, I still worked full time.
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  I just did, you know, I would work not my 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. job
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  at this company. Getting yelled out of the
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  phones. And while I was working,
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  Working, I was hand lettering, you know, letters for envelopes
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  and practicing, and then I would go home and I would work on the
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  website and I would work on these adventures and then one
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  weekend, I would Scout. And the next weekend, I would
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  run it. I did that for two years and I
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  basically just like sacrificed my social life because this was
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  more important. And then when I did jump ship, I
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  got lucky again, you know, it was another like moment, where I
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  was like, okay, I have the money.
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  I have the savings. I'm good enough.
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  It's big enough. I did it.
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  I got featured in a the how we built this podcast, like the
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  very end and that kind of set me off to the races.
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  And then since then I just kind of kept the momentum going
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  pandemic side. But you know, whatever.
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  So what point were you like? Okay, I got quit this job.
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  I just don't, I'll have got I got it go full time with this
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  like, what was the decision process there?
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  Was it like I need more time or was it like this popping off?
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  Don't have time for this job anymore.
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  Like what was the decision? So, I was working in Arizona,
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  for the software company, is actually a great job and then I
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  moved to San Diego, California to get basically the same job at
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  a different company because, like, San Diego's.
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  Awesome. I could, you know, go surfing.
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  And I could, I could do all that.
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  And the new job was awful. It was, it was, I went from a
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  company that was a publicly traded company that like, they
• 14:39
  had everything figured out, right?
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  If you didn't get along with your manager, there was like a
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  thousand other teams. Just like, put you on in, like,
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  they always worked with you, right?
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  Like, every day at established Sops and they could figure it
• 14:51
  out, and this new company had like, it was old enough to wear
• 14:55
  it at lost. Like the, let's just throw money
• 14:57
  at these problems and make them go away.
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  Like the tech companies, get a ton of money and they're just
• 15:01
  like, all right, we're gonna get ping-pong tables and do all
• 15:03
  this. But like so they were, they
• 15:05
  weren't so knew where they had that but they were still so new.
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  We're like, whoever the managers were we're just a top performing
• 15:11
  members of the team, so they weren't Like, you know, there's
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  a difference between being a good like performer, being a
• 15:18
  good manager, right? Very different skill sets,
• 15:21
  especially if you're like sandals or account management.
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  And so I got on and like, it was I could already tell I was like,
• 15:26
  this is not going to be a good experience and so I gave it the
• 15:28
  good honest go and then I remember I remember the moment.
• 15:31
  Basically, what happened was I was so stressed out of this job
• 15:35
  and they expected so many more hours where it's like, you're
• 15:37
  getting paid for 40 hours a week, but they wanted 60 that I
• 15:40
  couldn't do this business on the side.
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  I couldn't go home and build. And so, one day I remember, I
• 15:46
  had a terrible day at work and I went, I went surfing because
• 15:49
  that's like how I clear my head. You know you go out there and
• 15:51
  you know, you just you and the oceans, very relaxing and also
• 15:54
  kind of scary and I remember it was just super crowded, the
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  waves were kind of mushy, the waves weren't good and on the
• 16:03
  first or second wave that I tried to catch, I just like poor
• 16:07
  poor pop-up, I biffed it fell off my board the leash which
• 16:12
  like attaches your ankle to the board snap.
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  And let's swim back to shore, chasing my board and so I'm
• 16:17
  sitting on the beach just like bored need a new leash and I'm
• 16:21
  like, okay this is like that rom-com moment where like the
• 16:24
  guys fiance leaves him and he's like, crying in the rain and
• 16:27
  like the car comes like splashes in, and it was like that when I
• 16:30
  was like, screw it. I'm gonna get out of this.
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  I'm gonna do this. I think I can make this business
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  work. I'm starting to get people that
• 16:37
  want me to travel, and I couldn't travel because like
• 16:40
  what I'm going to fly out one weekend, fly back fly out the
• 16:42
  next week, like just wouldn't work.
• 16:45
  And so I put in notice, and I basically went from there, I put
• 16:49
  a notice and then worked on getting blown up and I blew up
• 16:53
  again. And now Off to the Races, I'm
• 16:56
  intrigued I kind of probably already know the answer, but you
• 17:01
  sound like we do or you least you approach, you know, your
• 17:05
  leisure activities in the same way I do, what?
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  When I'm in a situation where I need to think, right?
• 17:10
  It's like when that was happening where you sort of
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  consciously? Think it like that day you like,
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  Okay, I'm going to go surfing and I'm going to think that
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  Ponder this while I'm doing that or was it just kind of like you
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  know what, I need to just go do something else and the thoughts
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  will come to me was it kind of like that?
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  Yeah it's a little bit. Surfing is great because you can
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  either go out and get a great workout or you can just do swim
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  past like you can paddle past the break and just sit on your
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  board and just like watch the sunset, right?
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  Like you can get kind of whatever you want and your
• 17:41
  phone's not on you as you know, like sometimes like I need to be
• 17:45
  creative. I'm gonna go for a walk and I
• 17:47
  bring my phone and listen to a podcast or talking to some, but
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  it was just a great way to kind of clear your mind.
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  So I just doing it a lot whenever I live out near the
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  coast and, you know, want to get in the water and so it is, it's
• 17:58
  a great way to clear your mind, but it's also just like screw
• 18:00
  it. I want to do this because it's,
• 18:02
  you know, a good end of the day and it doubles as a workout.
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  Yeah, maybe it's just like a creative thing.
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  You know, I've had like other guests on the show that while
• 18:10
  I've had a lot of creatives on the show naturally, but I found
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  the Our minds work in similar ways.
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  And what I mean by that is like, for instance, for me, you know,
• 18:19
  years ago used to be skateboarding but now these days
• 18:22
  it's like it just go for a walk and listen to music like today.
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  I did that I've taken to doing this every morning now.
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  Where I just wake up have a coffee.
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  Go out for a walk for like an hour.
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  All right. Yeah, it's funny as well because
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  when I was a kid and my dad would like drag me around on
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  summer walks and stuff. I would complain like to no end
• 18:41
  as like this sucks and now I'm like totally did I've just
• 18:44
  become my dad, it's tragic. It is weird how that you're
• 18:48
  absolutely right, your stuff where I was like, Young Chris
• 18:52
  would be horrified, but Young, Chris would be pretty jacked
• 18:54
  that like old Chris builds treasure hunts for a living.
• 18:56
  So hell yeah. But these whole thing of like,
• 19:01
  you know, spending time with yourself where you're not really
• 19:06
  thinking about like you kind of consciously know like the whole
• 19:08
  point of this exercise is to kind of get my brain working and
• 19:13
  thinking about the problem. But Obviously sitting there
• 19:15
  actually thinking about it doesn't really help like weirdly
• 19:19
  enough. It's always and I found this
• 19:21
  with so many other things in life.
• 19:23
  It's reverse psychology. It's like by getting away from
• 19:26
  the problem and dudes like totally different that actually
• 19:29
  helps to solve the problem. And then it just hits you like
• 19:31
  in that moment. Bringing it back to you you
• 19:34
  sitting there on the beach you know, I mean look the the whole
• 19:37
  Surf and thing that has no fucking idea.
• 19:40
  So nothing to do with you. No problem but like that wave.
• 19:44
  And everything like on a normal day, you just black bear.
• 19:46
  I just go back out and get this fixed noise, but like that was
• 19:49
  almost like a metaphor for like your situation.
• 19:52
  Like it's like this was the Catalyst.
• 19:54
  Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's like life life isn't
• 19:58
  necessarily easy but like you can kind of sense it where it's
• 20:02
  like if you're going in a direction and you're just
• 20:04
  hitting road block after road block after road block, you
• 20:06
  know, those people like don't give up, don't do that.
• 20:08
  It's like yeah you should give up sometimes because sometimes
• 20:10
  like it's not, right? Like if you are trying to push
• 20:13
  in a certain direction, And you are just getting crushed every
• 20:16
  step of the way you need to try a different direction and it
• 20:19
  could be in a similar Direction but just a different Lane.
• 20:21
  But oh man. Like that was just that was that
• 20:24
  Catalyst of like, okay, being jobless is not worse than my
• 20:28
  situation right now. Like I can I can figure it out
• 20:33
  and I can totally relate to that.
• 20:35
  Like yeah, I've said this before in the podcast but like I
• 20:39
  trained to do marketing those my degree.
• 20:42
  And I've done that for the last Wow, been unemployed for the
• 20:46
  last year, but before that a lot 2020.
• 20:49
  Whoo. Now it's the greatest thing
• 20:51
  that's ever happened to me. And I'll explain why in a bit.
• 20:54
  But prior to that year, you know, I'd worked in the field of
• 20:58
  marketing for three years. And I had a similar experience
• 21:02
  funnily enough like in sometime in the beginning of 2019, I was
• 21:05
  living abroad and I got into a bit of acting.
• 21:07
  I've never done it before and I started doing all of that and I
• 21:11
  rediscovered like my love for just all things creative.
• 21:16
  And I kind of had this like disillusion moment, which I'd
• 21:19
  had at University, but I just like, I just put it down to
• 21:22
  like, oh, whatever, you know, just ignored my feelings.
• 21:25
  You know, I ignored my feelings for so many years and then it
• 21:29
  got to a point where it's like, I can't do this anymore, I can't
• 21:31
  do 925, I can't do working in shops and stuff that I hate and
• 21:36
  marketing. Look don't get me wrong
• 21:38
  marketing's, great field to be in, it can be stressful.
• 21:41
  But look, they pay you to do like Writing or yeah like yeah
• 21:46
  we dick ulis money for just essentially nothing and I would
• 21:50
  laugh at that but then it got to a point where I was like you
• 21:53
  know what, this doesn't make me happy.
• 21:54
  I hate the politics, it's not me.
• 21:57
  And when I started sometimes yeah yeah.
• 22:00
  Like when I started doing the creative stuff again, I felt it
• 22:05
  where he kind of began in 2019. But like towards the end of 2019
• 22:10
  early 2020 is when it really like sprung almost like a Tower.
• 22:14
  And I've been saying this, a lot of my friends that me being
• 22:17
  unemployed is the best thing that's happened in my life so
• 22:20
  far. Like Ivo, it's taken me like not
• 22:25
  being able to find a job. That's put me in a position
• 22:28
  where I've worked harder than I don't think I've ever worked in
• 22:30
  my entire life. Like this podcast YouTube
• 22:34
  channels, you name it, like and bring it back like that.
• 22:39
  The point I'm trying to make here is that like, as you said,
• 22:42
  like, there's different things, you try.
• 22:44
  Life. And sometimes it doesn't work
• 22:46
  out and like, I guess, I thought I'm supposed to do marketing,
• 22:49
  but I guess I kind of thought to myself.
• 22:51
  Like, maybe maybe not, everyone is supposed to follow their
• 22:55
  dream. And, you know, maybe I'm just
• 22:56
  one of those people that's supposed to do the 9 to 5 and
• 22:59
  maybe I do a little bit of stuff in my free time or whatever.
• 23:03
  I kind of, I was giving up as sad as it sounds like I was that
• 23:06
  was me giving up? And then I feel like life has
• 23:10
  kind of said, you know what, you're not going to get a job.
• 23:13
  You're going to keep doing this, you're going to use this time
• 23:16
  which I was, because I did it. I don't know how it is in the
• 23:18
  States, but in the UK, when, when you're unemployed and
• 23:22
  you're too can benefit and all that crap.
• 23:24
  They want you to do to apply for jobs and stuff, right?
• 23:28
  Yeah. Which I do every day and I've
• 23:30
  had interviews and stuff. Like it's not like, I haven't
• 23:32
  tried, but it's like it's just not happening and in the
• 23:36
  beginning, it used to bother me. Now, I'm like it.
• 23:38
  This is society. This is the universe stop.
• 23:41
  It's the universe saying, no, no, no keep doing this.
• 23:43
  Because it's going to work out and like, eventually you can get
• 23:47
  away from this, boy benefit stuff, probably go self employed
• 23:50
  or whatever which is funnily enough.
• 23:52
  Something I've been kind of fearful of over the years.
• 23:55
  I call self-employed, I don't know.
• 23:58
  But that's what you should do in life.
• 24:00
  Get out of your comfort zone and do those things that are like
• 24:04
  scary and you know, because let's be real.
• 24:06
  Like yeah, you could do the safe option have a job but like even
• 24:09
  in a job they could just fire you any minute.
• 24:11
  So you never really safe. Yeah, it's so interesting
• 24:16
  because I agree with you. I when I worked for that
• 24:18
  company, I always would tell people like, I'm, I'm not a guy
• 24:21
  who's meant to sit behind a desk, all my life, right?
• 24:24
  And it's like, when you go to school, like that's basically
• 24:25
  what you do is, like, you go to school.
• 24:26
  There's no like entrepreneurial classes or like small business
• 24:29
  classes, you just kind of do it and, but I do the caveat to that
• 24:36
  is, it is not for everybody. There are people that just have
• 24:39
  really great fulfilling lives, they work.
• 24:41
  And I have a, my best example is like, when I first Go to the
• 24:43
  business and I went full time. I was like, everybody should
• 24:46
  have their own business. This is great.
• 24:47
  And I had a friend whose she's a nurse practitioner.
• 24:49
  So she's a nurse wonder how she's doing now, but she was
• 24:52
  like, honestly, like I love what I do.
• 24:55
  I love what I do. I work three, four days a week.
• 24:57
  I make great money and I have tons of time off.
• 25:00
  Like, I've got a great thing and I'm like, actually, yeah, that
• 25:02
  sounds pretty great, you know, so they're definitely something
• 25:05
  to be said about, it's not for everybody for sure.
• 25:07
  It's stressful. You tend to work a lot more at
• 25:11
  least specially in the beginning, but it is Is really
• 25:13
  nice where it's like, you know, I have this and I have a couple
• 25:17
  consultation calls later today, and I'm doing a live stream on
• 25:22
  my YouTube channel, like later tonight.
• 25:24
  And, and that's what I'm doing, you know, and it's fun because
• 25:27
  it's me and it's me telling stories, and it's me talking to
• 25:29
  people and helping people. And it's not me picking up the
• 25:32
  phone getting yelled at by some angry client for something that
• 25:35
  I have no control over. Yeah, totally agree with you
• 25:42
  actually. I'll do you want to press this a
• 25:44
  little bit more before we go up we go back to fun stuff because,
• 25:48
  you know, I think it's interesting for people to know
• 25:51
  your sort of journey into this and stuff and you know, to know
• 25:54
  like what has could become before, because it gives, it
• 25:56
  gives people hope Jen. And I mean, and I think one
• 25:59
  thing I wanted to add to what you were saying, just then, is
• 26:01
  that, like, and I know it's cliche.
• 26:04
  So, forgive me for those listening at home, like, It
• 26:07
  really is about whether or not you're happy.
• 26:09
  Like if you're happy working in a factory work in a factory.
• 26:14
  Like if you're happy because that's the thing, we compare
• 26:16
  things so much in life and like I had to learn to do this years
• 26:20
  ago is to just don't give a fuck what people say or think like
• 26:23
  are you happy, do you enjoy your life?
• 26:26
  If you don't change it, no one's going to change it for you.
• 26:29
  It's up to you. But if you enjoy your life, it
• 26:32
  doesn't matter what other people think.
• 26:33
  It doesn't matter what other people are doing.
• 26:35
  It matters, what you are doing? That's Always the first most
• 26:38
  important thing ever. Different people.
• 26:42
  Find fulfillment and different things, right?
• 26:44
  Yeah. Like they want to work and they
• 26:46
  want to get married. They want to have a family and
• 26:48
  that is awesome. And yeah, now I think you're
• 26:50
  finding a lot more people don't. I'm definitely the people who,
• 26:53
  like, no like before for 2020 happened.
• 26:56
  I was traveling 80% of the year. I was traveling all over the
• 26:58
  world. Like clients are just
• 27:01
  bankrolling me to fly out to their state or country and build
• 27:05
  a ridiculous thing for their For their business partner or their
• 27:09
  family or something. And I go and I do that and then
• 27:11
  like, you know, it's a Barcelona do proposal and I'm like, you
• 27:14
  know, I'm gonna hop over to Switzerland because I've always
• 27:17
  wanted to see Lucerne, you know, and like girlfriend the time was
• 27:21
  like, hey can I come and like, you know, I'm like yeah, you
• 27:24
  just stay in the hotel. Like it's no, no extra cost.
• 27:27
  All you fucking cool. So like to explore a lot of cool
• 27:33
  places and I built up my reputation.
• 27:36
  Well enough to where I was. Act out far enough in advance to
• 27:39
  where I could. You know, if somebody reached
• 27:41
  out and I'm like, hey I want you to come to one in Houston,
• 27:43
  Texas, which I don't like Houston Texas.
• 27:46
  I can be like, sorry, can't because like I'll find another
• 27:48
  client before then. So I don't have to go to Houston
• 27:51
  Texas again. But yeah, it allows me to be a
• 27:55
  little bit picky and also, you know, do cool things.
• 27:59
  You know, there's in the beginning, you take every client
• 28:02
  you can and you get some times where it's, like, I'm doing this
• 28:05
  adventure for this guy and it's like, he really Don't care about
• 28:08
  this, like he's his friends who hired me like this a lot and
• 28:11
  like, I wish I'd known that. So it allows me to be picky
• 28:14
  about who I work with the people that I build the adventures for
• 28:17
  and also where I go where the best places you've been so far.
• 28:22
  Kauai Hawaii was was one of my favorites.
• 28:26
  I've been to, I've done one on Maui and one in Kauai.
• 28:31
  A lot of the major cities are pretty fun like in United States
• 28:34
  like San Francisco's awesome, New York's, awesome.
• 28:37
  Barcelona was incredible. It's just like there's just so
• 28:40
  much going on, trying to think, let me look at my, I can pull up
• 28:44
  my like, a master list of Adventures and see what's
• 28:47
  anything else that rings a bell. DC.
• 28:50
  Washington. DC is fun because it's very like
• 28:52
  National Treasure Nashville, Tennessee.
• 28:55
  I really enjoyed Seattle Washington actually is very,
• 28:57
  very cool but you got to worry about the weather.
• 29:00
  Yeah. But I'd say Hawaii, you know,
• 29:03
  understandably Hawaii and Barcelona were probably my
• 29:06
  favorite too. Your life is so cool event
• 29:11
  planner and a global pandemic is not fun.
• 29:13
  I can tell you that that was you know, it's been nice because
• 29:17
  I've been able to like get a nicer camera and get a
• 29:19
  microphone and do finally start the YouTube channel of like
• 29:22
  tutorials and build up the subreddit do those things.
• 29:25
  So hopefully when I come out of this thing I've got a lot more
• 29:29
  going on. But man whole when that pandemic
• 29:33
  it just like English just like well You're just suspended
• 29:38
  because I'm not going to fly to another state and try to put
• 29:41
  this on, you know, the way maybe in a way.
• 29:44
  It's kind of a blessing in disguise.
• 29:45
  Like you said, you got a chance to do other things.
• 29:48
  I think sometimes it's good to take a break as well, like I'm a
• 29:52
  massive workaholic. Like I work, like I said that
• 29:55
  this is the most up were ever worked in my life ever and
• 29:58
  sometimes I do have to like force myself to just take a day
• 30:01
  where I don't do anything because it's because if that's
• 30:04
  there that's that's the the blessing and the curse thing
• 30:06
  with with Join what you do. It's like, yeah, it's great to
• 30:09
  enjoy. What you do?
• 30:10
  That's that should be the goal, but the same time.
• 30:12
  Yeah, you need to take a break because otherwise, your body, I
• 30:15
  saw this the other day. It said, you need to choose a
• 30:18
  rest day or your body will choose it for you.
• 30:23
  And my rest days, always on a Sunday and less like, I do an
• 30:26
  adventure that day because like I'm not super religious in any
• 30:29
  way but like, it's an easy excuse of just like, I'm like, I
• 30:33
  don't take calls on Saturday or Sunday because most of the time
• 30:35
  the adventures on a Saturday, and in that case, Like it's all
• 30:37
  hands on deck, that's the only focus but yes, Sunday is usually
• 30:41
  the day but sometimes I want to sometimes I wake up and I'm
• 30:43
  like, I'm going to shoot this little video really quickly.
• 30:46
  That'll be fun. You know, I find joy in this and
• 30:48
  like it's a cool experience sitting there and be like, okay,
• 30:52
  like what if you know, what if I'll utilize this cryptex, and
• 30:58
  we'll do this as the password, and then this awesome plaque
• 31:00
  that I found over here is going to be like, the key to the
• 31:03
  cipher and they open it up and it sends to the next location.
• 31:07
  No, that kind of Inspirations find.
• 31:08
  It doesn't feel like I'm just doing a marketing email, you
• 31:12
  know? I'm just going to do this and
• 31:13
  this and this some days I wake up and I'm like I don't want to
• 31:15
  answer any emails but I love you.
• 31:19
  Yeah, talk us through the process of like actually setting
• 31:22
  these up because I mean, I'm kind of intrigued.
• 31:24
  Is it just huge? You have a team sometimes.
• 31:27
  Like, talk is for like a normal day?
• 31:29
  Yeah, great question. So it is just me.
• 31:32
  I have people that I hire out, okay?
• 31:34
  Like, I'd like a, you know, CPA, like some of the tools like the
• 31:37
  business Seaside and if things or just like making sure I don't
• 31:41
  go to jail for like tax evasion accidentally or something like
• 31:44
  that. Yeah.
• 31:45
  And then I hire people when I'm in the area I have on my website
• 31:50
  there's a link at the top. That's like hey do you want to?
• 31:54
  You know, throw your name on this list and if I'm going to
• 31:56
  come do an adventure in your town, I'll check you out, vet,
• 31:59
  you and reach out and pay you to come help.
• 32:01
  You know can be something as simple as like, you know,
• 32:03
  handing envelope to somebody at some point in time or it could
• 32:06
  be something much more Pending on your abilities and skills and
• 32:09
  like what you have to offer and some people are like, listen, I
• 32:11
  just want to find an envelope and like having fun smile on my
• 32:13
  face and other people, like I own a boat or a restaurant or
• 32:16
  I'm an actor musician, or like I train dogs, and we could train a
• 32:19
  dog to do something like, you know, just it gives me options
• 32:22
  with this but to step back as far as how this works.
• 32:27
  Basically, what happens is, somebody reaches out on my
• 32:29
  website, sometimes people call me or email me, but the websites
• 32:32
  just the best because it helps me stay organized.
• 32:35
  And they basically give me the The purpose, like what the
• 32:38
  reason for the adventure is most of the time, it's a marriage
• 32:41
  proposal anniversary, it's a birthday.
• 32:43
  Usually like a decade like, you know, 21 30 40, 50 know,
• 32:48
  sometimes it's like a marketing promotion thing for companies
• 32:52
  where they want to do like a big group game and they want to be
• 32:55
  like we want to send people of These Bars to try this liquor
• 32:59
  and we're you know we want to do it in a cool fun way this
• 33:02
  memorable and then the date and the location and then we That we
• 33:08
  Overlook a 15 20 minute conversation, just to make sure
• 33:10
  like, you know, where the right fits very early on doesn't
• 33:14
  happen much anymore, but very early on people would be, like,
• 33:17
  I want you to come. Do a bachelor party for me in
• 33:20
  New York City and my budgets $200.
• 33:23
  And I'm like, dude, I can't even fly to New York City for $200.
• 33:27
  Like, this is not like we have, we definitely like I do
• 33:30
  something in my website. You missed to accentuate, like
• 33:35
  it's gonna be expensive, you know.
• 33:37
  Doing any type of event just costs money, just the random
• 33:40
  cost of things but what do you reckon was like, you is the
• 33:43
  minimum? Do you think minimums usually
• 33:45
  five thousand dollars America? I was going to say like it.
• 33:47
  I think that's it's going to yeah, like yeah, I couldn't
• 33:51
  imagine anything less than that. Like yeah, I charge a flat rate
• 33:55
  myself, so I'm making the same amount.
• 33:56
  Roughly the flat rate changes a little bit based on like, how
• 34:00
  big, you know the event is. But usually it's the same
• 34:03
  because usually it's a one day event in this like good formula.
• 34:08
  And then it's just whatever it costs on top.
• 34:09
  And so the nice thing about that is like, you know, the
• 34:11
  difference between you driving yourself, you having a black car
• 34:15
  drive you around you having a limousine drive you around.
• 34:17
  Are you having a helicopter fly around?
• 34:19
  Is like zero to two to three thousand dollars.
• 34:22
  So it's like do you want a helicopter that's going to be
• 34:25
  two to three thousand dollars So at the very end I'm just going
• 34:27
  to charge you two to three thousand dollars however much
• 34:30
  that helicopter cost right? If you go to a restaurant and
• 34:33
  the server says everything's been covered order whatever you
• 34:36
  want. You spend $75 and 43 cents.
• 34:40
  I'm just going to charge you that at the very end on top of
• 34:43
  my flat rate. So what ends up happening is we
• 34:45
  have conversations, I send a pretty in-depth survey that has
• 34:48
  everything from like phobias and allergies to like on a scale of
• 34:52
  the movie Hitch with Will Smith to the movie National Treasure
• 34:54
  with Nicolas Cage. Like how do you want your
• 34:56
  adventure to feel, you know, where you want the budget to go?
• 34:59
  Do we want to involve more people?
• 35:02
  And then we start to work out? Like what the what the theme is
• 35:07
  If there is a theme, what the perceived purpose, like, if
• 35:10
  someone's getting proposed to, we're not going to get them out
• 35:13
  of the house saying like you're getting proposed to needs to be
• 35:16
  a cover story. There used to be like you need
• 35:17
  to, you know, here's a cryptex. You need to get it open and then
• 35:21
  follow the clues and figure this out and then maybe they get it
• 35:23
  open like, right when the person is proposing.
• 35:25
  And there's a ring inside, and he pulls out the ring and he
• 35:27
  like proposes to them, right where she equal opportunity.
• 35:32
  But after the survey, I send a contract Deposit and then
• 35:38
  usually we have like six months to a year till the adventure.
• 35:41
  And so then that point I'm just checking in with them once a
• 35:44
  month being like hey I haven't taken your money and run off to
• 35:46
  Mexico. You're still dating the person
• 35:49
  that you're throwing this proposal for you're still, you
• 35:51
  know, friends with the person or it's your kids or parents and
• 35:55
  then usually a little more than a week in advance.
• 35:57
  I fly out. Oftentimes, I'll schedule a kind
• 36:00
  of back to back to back to back so I'll do like a tour of
• 36:02
  Adventures and then take a month off but I'll fly out and I will
• 36:07
  Will Scout all the areas that have been like Priya
• 36:11
  pre-research to everything. So it's like, when I, what area
• 36:15
  do you live in? Sorry, Manchester you can't
• 36:19
  gesture. So, in that case, I'll have gone
• 36:21
  on TripAdvisor and Google and like Manchester Visitor Center,
• 36:25
  and I will found the places that are cool.
• 36:27
  And I will have worked with you to see if there's any places
• 36:31
  that have emotional, meaning to, you know, girlfriend or parents
• 36:34
  or friend, or whoever it is, right?
• 36:36
  And it's a proposal there. Any emotional spots, right?
• 36:39
  You got to hit a lot of those like, first date spots, if you
• 36:41
  can or like places where there are memories.
• 36:44
  And so it's kind of combining those and it's just like, this
• 36:47
  is an awesome bar or this is an awesome parkour.
• 36:49
  This is a really cool opportunity to do something
• 36:52
  spectacular. And then the week leading up,
• 36:55
  sometimes there's a drip free drip-feed of like breadcrumbs.
• 36:58
  We're like, they'll be at the grocery store and someone will
• 37:00
  come up and be like happy birthday.
• 37:02
  Like here's an envelope and you know, it'll be like you need to
• 37:05
  be completely available on this day at this time.
• 37:07
  Time further instruction to come.
• 37:08
  And then, you know, they're at work and like the secretary's.
• 37:12
  Like hey, this came in for you. It's another whack sealed
• 37:13
  envelope and it like, has more information, some of them are
• 37:17
  very puzzle heavy, some of them are not at all, it just kind of
• 37:20
  varies on the person and whether they're the kind of person that
• 37:22
  like Puzzles and then yeah, then the day of I plan on GPS tracker
• 37:28
  on them and the whole day is scheduled.
• 37:30
  So, you know, at 10:00 a.m. they, you know, a car pulls up
• 37:34
  and they get in Google Maps. Says it should take 13 minutes
• 37:38
  to get to this restaurant where the services order, whatever you
• 37:41
  want. Everything's been paid for and
• 37:43
  then they get instructions to go here and they, you know, an
• 37:46
  actor comes up and has this. So the whole day's scheduled
• 37:50
  myself, and the people that I hire our behind the scenes,
• 37:52
  pulling all the strings, making sure everything is like running
• 37:55
  smoothly until you know, whatever the grand finale is,
• 37:59
  Who is some of the coolest people that you sort of worked
• 38:01
  with when setting these up? I have a lot of actors that I
• 38:07
  work with. Now, I love working with improv
• 38:09
  actors because they're just kind of fun.
• 38:11
  They're not super, you know, like involved.
• 38:14
  Like they just want to have a fun time and do cool things and
• 38:17
  they're like they're okay, playing a role in public, you
• 38:21
  know, and committing to that role.
• 38:25
  So, yeah, the actors and sometimes I'll work with like
• 38:27
  Street musicians, like street performer, To like they come up
• 38:30
  and then like this person, breaks out of the performance to
• 38:32
  do something just for them and like play that it's yeah it's
• 38:36
  really just that but actors are just they're fun to work with
• 38:40
  what is some of the not so great places you've been where like
• 38:44
  maybe I don't know like maybe a place you didn't necessarily
• 38:48
  want to go or turned up and then it was like this isn't exactly
• 38:53
  what I thought it would be. Yeah, Houston Texas is the big
• 38:56
  one and it's just like Yeah, Houston.
• 39:01
  Texas is just there not to say there aren't cool spots, but
• 39:05
  it's like, if you go to like San Francisco, California there is
• 39:09
  just so much like quirkiness and culture and it's like oozing
• 39:13
  with like stuff. Like there's bronze plaques and
• 39:16
  statues everywhere. There's this, you know, Tower
• 39:19
  up. Here you go to a Speakeasy bar.
• 39:22
  That looks like a pawn shop. We have to haggle your way in
• 39:25
  and Houston Texas. Just like it has stripped It's
• 39:29
  just as far as the eye can see it's like oh you have a Denny's
• 39:32
  next to a Burger King next to the T.J.Maxx next to a Best Buy
• 39:36
  next to for Starbucks and then between that I like the weather
• 39:41
  was just like brutal, like it's so hot and it's so humid and the
• 39:44
  road so I can everything's far apart.
• 39:47
  Not a huge fan of Florida either Florida.
• 39:52
  Pardon me, at least in like the Miami area.
• 39:54
  It just, it felt almost like empty.
• 39:57
  Just kind of felt like buddies. Like there's, I don't know,
• 40:00
  there are some places that are more apt and people get more
• 40:05
  into it and feels like, you know, Texas and Florida were two
• 40:08
  places. I was just not a fan of, but
• 40:09
  once again, you could go to Austin, Texas, which is way
• 40:12
  different, or you could go to. Don't even know what part of
• 40:16
  Florida is a good part of Florida, but most of the time, I
• 40:26
  want to keep this on the - I've just before we Bring it back to
• 40:29
  the positive, just to get the negativity out the way.
• 40:31
  I'm gonna bring it down. But you know, I think it is,
• 40:34
  he's kind of interesting because people assume, hey, this is a
• 40:37
  great job. It must be great all the time,
• 40:39
  but shit happens. Right?
• 40:42
  What are some moments that like, were, you know, maybe the worst
• 40:46
  things to happen or Worse, moments, mistakes people,
• 40:50
  reacting badly like for some of your bad stories.
• 40:53
  Yeah, in this, this happens to I do a lot of consultation and I
• 40:57
  teach a lot of people and the first thing Is like, something's
• 40:59
  going to go wrong every single time, like you can't run an
• 41:02
  event without having something, go wrong because there's just
• 41:05
  too many factors, right? The reason Escape rooms works.
• 41:08
  So well is because they're in this contained environment with
• 41:11
  cameras. Something running the show they
• 41:13
  have play tested. It millions of times, pardon me
• 41:19
  and but with these events like you can play test things but you
• 41:22
  just there's some things you can't test out especially in the
• 41:25
  area. We can advance the first The
• 41:29
  first one that went really wrong was Adventure.
• 41:31
  Number I've done 74 or three of them.
• 41:35
  Now, how long have you been doing this?
• 41:37
  By the way, I started the first one constructed.
• 41:40
  Mentioned. Number one was December 2015, so
• 41:44
  five years. Yeah.
• 41:48
  But the first, the first one where something really went
• 41:50
  wrong was constructive Ventures ever 11.
• 41:52
  And it was a team off-site for one of the teams that I worked
• 41:57
  with. At the company that I worked for
• 42:00
  like, at starting to build up. And then like, we do an offset.
• 42:02
  Like, oh, that'd be cool. And one of the big things for me
• 42:05
  is I one of the things that makes this fun is the surprise,
• 42:09
  right? You just like wake up and
• 42:11
  there's a knock at the door and all of a sudden you're thrust
• 42:13
  into this adventure. And like, that's a really fun
• 42:15
  experience. You didn't see it coming, but
• 42:17
  with this team off-site, they all knew this was coming.
• 42:18
  So I wanted to create a surprise, but what I ended up
• 42:21
  doing was they were all working together and then halfway
• 42:24
  through, I basically like split them up so they were competing
• 42:27
  against each other. At this point in time they had
• 42:30
  already stopped at a bar, some of them were a little drunk.
• 42:34
  And the instructions were like everything.
• 42:36
  Relied on them reading like this envelope and really sticking,
• 42:40
  like taking every piece of information about.
• 42:42
  You need to go south one block and then move over.
• 42:46
  And so it's just like it just got.
• 42:47
  I got so far up my own ass with like detail and like I am I've
• 42:52
  been thinking about this for three weeks so of course like
• 42:55
  this is how it's going to work but like drunk, 12, drunk
• 42:58
  people. You are not going to follow
• 42:59
  directions with one line in a paragraph.
• 43:02
  You need to hit them over the head with it over and over and
• 43:05
  over again. And so they still had fun.
• 43:08
  Thanks alcohol. But like, for me, it was like
• 43:11
  this did not go well and another one which was number 17 called
• 43:16
  Margarita Madness. And it was a woman.
• 43:19
  Basically, was she basically got Clues to go from bar to bar to
• 43:23
  bar to bar. And at every bar there was
• 43:25
  another friend that friend brought them a margarita and
• 43:27
  then that friend was part of the adventure.
• 43:28
  Didn't know what happened next, besides bunch of the friends
• 43:31
  like showing up late which was really frustrating.
• 43:34
  They were all military and fun fact with military especially in
• 43:37
  San Diego. Most of the time you can bring
• 43:40
  your military ID into bars and you're fine.
• 43:43
  And it works out well for people that just get out of like the
• 43:45
  basic training in there like underage.
• 43:48
  So they still get in but it was just it was a busy day in San
• 43:52
  Diego and none of them brought their state IDs.
• 43:55
  Even though they all knew that they were going to, it was
• 43:57
  Margarita themed and they didn't bring Fridays and so they like
• 44:00
  didn't get let into the first bar and then I was like, oh God.
• 44:04
  And so I had to rebuild the adventure as it was going and it
• 44:08
  was wrong. How did?
• 44:10
  Yeah, so what I do is I always have extra envelopes with their
• 44:15
  name written on it that have been waxed already.
• 44:18
  Yeah. And then opened with a knife and
• 44:22
  so then if I need to I can just lick the envelope shot and it
• 44:25
  still looks like it's been wax-sealed but like you know the
• 44:28
  illusion still Are so essentially called a bunch of
• 44:30
  bars and I was like, hey I'm doing this thing, I have people
• 44:33
  that are of age but the tri-di can I bring them in and so I'm
• 44:39
  moving friends around and coordinating basically just like
• 44:42
  rebuilding the instructions as the event went.
• 44:45
  And luckily since they went to bars like they get into a bar
• 44:47
  restaurant and they'd be there for an hour.
• 44:49
  So it's like cool. Me and my team have an hour to
• 44:51
  find a new place. Get get in touch with the
• 44:54
  server. Take the envelope service,
• 44:55
  initially going to give after and give them a new envelope and
• 44:58
  then Onward forward and let's switch it up.
• 45:02
  What? Some of the best moments, the
• 45:04
  best things you've been able to pull off and Grace times, you've
• 45:07
  had doing this. Yeah, back either a left or a
• 45:09
  lot of best moments. The proposals are my favorite
• 45:14
  because they're so high stakes and like, you know, you're
• 45:17
  creating potentially the best. If someone's life, you know, has
• 45:20
  anyone ever said no? No, of course not I wouldn't
• 45:22
  take them as a client. If that was the case I've ever
• 45:24
  had you know, like a moment happens like easily.
• 45:28
  Because for me as far as and this is important Valentine's
• 45:31
  Day. Coming up this surprise in a
• 45:33
  proposal should not be that you're proposing.
• 45:36
  It should be how you're proposing.
• 45:37
  So whenever somebody reaches out to propose, literally the first
• 45:41
  question I ask is like, he's there a universe where he or she
• 45:44
  says, no. And most of the time there's a
• 45:46
  chuckle and it's like, no, we've been dating for eight years.
• 45:49
  No, we have gone ring shopping. No, we are doing foster classes
• 45:53
  together, knowing that we will practice together.
• 45:56
  So it's like, okay, I've had a couple Couple people where
• 45:59
  there's a pause and it's like, how long have you been dating?
• 46:01
  And then like seven months and I'm like, I just can't do it.
• 46:04
  I'm just not going to take that. Like, yeah, I would be fine, but
• 46:08
  like, I don't want you to spend the money.
• 46:10
  I don't want to take that time for that kind of risk.
• 46:13
  So, no, I can't imagine someone saying no in that scenario
• 46:17
  because, like, especially when you build this whole thing up,
• 46:20
  that someone's clearly spent a lot of time and money on and
• 46:22
  then they just go. No, I'll fuck you.
• 46:25
  In that case. Like I feel like most people
• 46:28
  like Most of the people that have gotten supposed to have
• 46:30
  seen it coming, you know, where it's like, oh, all of a sudden.
• 46:33
  There's this like elaborate day. Like what else, could it be?
• 46:37
  So, they'd have time to, like, get out if they wanted to, or,
• 46:41
  you know, if they just say yes. And then later be like, no, like
• 46:44
  I didn't want to crush you on the day of, but like know.
• 46:47
  So yeah, its proposals have been my favorite.
• 46:49
  I've pulled off some really fun things.
• 46:51
  I had a woman flown via helicopter to a wild animal
• 46:56
  park, where an otter came out and handed a clue.
• 46:58
  Ooh, I did another one with a sloth or they like went into
• 47:02
  like a sloth enclosure and it was like, asleep, holding an
• 47:04
  envelope and they just like, grabbed it.
• 47:06
  Like, pet the sloth and like, headed out.
• 47:09
  I had people dive free, dive down for like, a treasure chest
• 47:13
  in Hawaii. That was very cool.
• 47:16
  I've had people intercepted like in airports and kind of like,
• 47:20
  you know, I was trying to push the envelope of like, what's a
• 47:23
  cool experience, I can get away with and how can I get away with
• 47:25
  it without getting in trouble? Getting out of me getting Really
• 47:28
  in trouble. Oh man, have you ever had any
• 47:33
  kind of, like, weird behavior from the people sort of,
• 47:36
  receiving this? Like anything that just sticks
• 47:40
  out or just where you will have hurt a bit strange?
• 47:42
  Or, I mean, the biggest thing is, is nothing strange anymore.
• 47:45
  At this point. My, the thing is, especially for
• 47:49
  people that might listen this, that want to build their own, a
• 47:51
  go to my subreddit, because there's a lot of cool
• 47:53
  information and my YouTube channel, Shameless plug.
• 47:56
  But you, when you build this This, you're so wrapped up in
• 48:00
  the day and you've given so much thought into this.
• 48:03
  Sometimes it's easy to forget that the person hasn't because
• 48:06
  they don't know. This is happening.
• 48:07
  So something that's super obvious to you is not going to
• 48:11
  be obvious to somebody else. You know, a really good example
• 48:14
  is like a cryptex like most people have read or seen The
• 48:18
  DaVinci Code, right? Where it's Dan Brown are there
• 48:22
  we go. You know, you have the cylinder
• 48:25
  where you have a stripe and you have to line up a password You
• 48:28
  line up the password and you get it correct, make sure can
• 48:32
  actually see it and you pull it apart and here I can actually
• 48:35
  make the sound for podcast, right?
• 48:37
  You pull it apart and inside there's a key or there's
• 48:40
  something. But assuming that, somebody
• 48:43
  knows what a cryptex is, is a big mistake because some people
• 48:46
  get it and they're like, what do I do with this?
• 48:48
  They don't know. Oh, I need to line up the, you
• 48:51
  know, the letters with the line or the arrows.
• 48:54
  Like I've had people that figure out the password and don't know
• 48:57
  what to do with it which like you wouldn't I think you'd have
• 48:59
  to explain what you do sometimes.
• 49:01
  So I always kind of, especially if you do it with doing
• 49:04
  something. A lot of people you need to
• 49:05
  factor in like the slowest, dumbest fattest person and you
• 49:09
  never make assumptions that anybody has any idea what's
• 49:12
  going on. Always err on the side of being
• 49:14
  too detailed and to clear with your instructions.
• 49:17
  People like to do like a vague riddle which could have like a
• 49:20
  thousand answers in the like I can't believe they didn't get
• 49:23
  that answer and you like of course they did.
• 49:24
  This is terrible riddle. I like don't use riddles anyway.
• 49:28
  So, That's the big thing is, people react in weird ways and
• 49:31
  they do weird things and that's just how people are.
• 49:38
  What's the weirdest request you've received, as far as, like
• 49:43
  setting up a treasure hunt, I've had a lot of requests.
• 49:47
  I mean I'll get you know a handful every month and most of
• 49:51
  them don't come to fruition because you know Logistics or
• 49:54
  money or something like that. I had one guy that wanted to To
• 49:59
  ask a girl on a date with this and I was like, bro, you're set
• 50:03
  in your bar way, too high, don't do it.
• 50:06
  Like you're setting yourself up for failure because of this is
• 50:09
  how you start like where do you go from here?
• 50:11
  And also, like you're going to spend and that didn't go very
• 50:14
  far because once I was like, yeah, it's going to be thousands
• 50:16
  of dollars. They're like, ooh, actually.
• 50:17
  Okay, no, I'll just DIY it. I've had that I've done a re do
• 50:21
  proposal where they just like, they did a proposal that was
• 50:24
  very like spur of the moment and wasn't Add one, but they wanted
• 50:29
  to do something more grandiose and so I did that.
• 50:32
  That was a lot of fun. I think it was anything else.
• 50:36
  Yeah. And then every year for read it
• 50:38
  secrets and I sign up and whoever my gift is, I send them
• 50:41
  on a wild adventure to find their presence will call it h,
• 50:46
  g-sync, make the perfect treasure hunt, definitely like
• 50:52
  seem like Serendipity or what seems like Serendipity where
• 50:56
  everything just kind of works, right?
• 50:58
  Right. You know we're we're selfish
• 51:00
  humans we like to have things be about us, right?
• 51:03
  You can argue that everything you do is a selfish act but as
• 51:07
  adults you kind of get, you know, push down and like you
• 51:11
  don't just be like me, me, me me me.
• 51:12
  Because everyone's like, okay fuck that guy.
• 51:14
  Like, I don't want to hang out with that person.
• 51:15
  That makes it all by himself. But like, you know, a birthday
• 51:18
  or proposal is about you. And so it feels really good when
• 51:23
  everything's about you. Right.
• 51:24
  Like you go to the bar and it's your favorite drinks already
• 51:27
  there, right? Verbiage in the clues is like
• 51:31
  you know callbacks to like your conversation you had with your
• 51:33
  siblings. Childhood like the wax seal is
• 51:36
  your favorite color. It takes all of your favorite
• 51:39
  things and it basically makes this day that's completely about
• 51:42
  you that you were completely unprepared for or you didn't see
• 51:47
  coming, but you're still kind of prepared for I can put that put
• 51:50
  that in the right way, but it's like, you're completely
• 51:52
  blindsided by it. So you get this wonderful
• 51:54
  surprise where everything just revolves around you.
• 51:57
  There might be challenging. And puzzles, but it's stuff
• 51:59
  based on something that you can already do, right?
• 52:02
  You're not just getting hit with some impossible puzzle.
• 52:04
  You never heard of you either already know about it or like,
• 52:07
  you know, you're ready for it prepared for it, you get that
• 52:09
  dopamine hit. So, I think that's really.
• 52:12
  It is just making sure everything just feels so
• 52:14
  wonderful. I just want to say is well, if
• 52:17
  anyone the I love or friend of mine, a family is listening
• 52:21
  right now. Like I've never had anything
• 52:23
  like surprise. Never had a surprise party.
• 52:25
  Never had a proper party for that, man.
• 52:27
  Yeah, so Get me this. I want.
• 52:30
  This is awesome. And for Christians, friends, and
• 52:34
  family. If you want me to come out
• 52:37
  there, I will cut you a deal. So I can fly out there
• 52:40
  Manchester and do it in. Like, I will, most people would
• 52:44
  charge more for international Avengers.
• 52:46
  I will charge less. I want I was not because I want
• 52:50
  to go out there. You know, you're telling me that
• 52:54
  I have an opportunity for someone else to fly me out to
• 52:57
  another country. I will do whatever I can to go.
• 53:00
  Go to the other country. I've done.
• 53:02
  Plenty in Phoenix, Arizona, in San Diego, and see how all of
• 53:06
  these places because I'll do them again.
• 53:08
  But like, if I have the opportunity to do an adventure
• 53:11
  in a new place that will take precedence, do you, uh, know,
• 53:14
  this was some harsh but you have a turndown people just based on
• 53:17
  that like oh not feed X again, screw that like some more or
• 53:22
  less. It's less about the place
• 53:24
  because I like to I like to shit all over Houston in Florida but
• 53:27
  like realistically, if Did it. I might do it again because like
• 53:30
  I'm doing now have establishments and contacts and
• 53:33
  gets easier. Okay.
• 53:34
  I have turned down People based on how they act in the first
• 53:38
  call and how they are. I'll have people that reach out
• 53:42
  and then like I will not have a 15-minute conversation with you
• 53:44
  until you tell me the cost and I'm like, cool, sorry, not going
• 53:47
  to work. Like I do, I'm not going to work
• 53:49
  with you because if people approach this and the only thing
• 53:52
  the number one thing they care about is money, it's going to
• 53:55
  make for a bad experience because it's going to hamstring
• 53:57
  me because Are trying to nickel and dime this thing.
• 54:00
  And it's nice. When I have somebody that trust
• 54:02
  me, that's like, you know, I'll come up with an awesome idea and
• 54:05
  it's like, okay, here's an idea. Like here's a, here's a great
• 54:08
  one that I love and this guy and it was in Idaho Falls Idaho,
• 54:13
  which means it can be anywhere you do anywhere, right?
• 54:15
  I don't even know if you've ever heard of Idaho or Idaho Falls
• 54:18
  that you probably don't need to because it's a state that you I
• 54:22
  can't even pick out a map and I live in the United States, but
• 54:25
  it's a Tiny Town. I'm joking, but it's a Tiny
• 54:27
  Town. The guy there.
• 54:30
  His wife hired me. She was awesome and he was
• 54:32
  awesome. And he he owns Her a couple
• 54:39
  franchise. He owns a couple.
• 54:40
  He actually did really well for himself.
• 54:42
  And so we were researching with like what he what, he loved.
• 54:47
  And one things he loved his philanthropy left, giving money
• 54:49
  Charities, and things like that. And so part of the budget, when
• 54:52
  I send the budget, or that their contract with the budget, it's
• 54:55
  like, I'm expecting it to cost this much for me to travel.
• 54:57
  I'm expecting it to cost this much for the materials.
• 55:00
  I'm expecting it to cost this much for the people that I hire.
• 55:03
  And then I always have a flex budget, which is like this.
• 55:05
  Could go into any of these things by go over budget or if I
• 55:08
  have. Great idea.
• 55:09
  And so the idea that ended up having was, we found this
• 55:13
  amazing restaurant. It was very well reviewed.
• 55:16
  It was like, and this mom-and-pop kitchen, and I love
• 55:18
  using those types of places. And I reached out, just like I
• 55:22
  normally do like, hey, can I send him here?
• 55:23
  We're going to have a puzzle to figure out and they open up.
• 55:25
  And as actually cryptex, they have to open this up and they he
• 55:31
  finally gets it open inside is a hundred dollar bill and it's
• 55:35
  like, you're going to use this hundred dollar bill and you're
• 55:37
  going to tip The server who's been picked out specifically,
• 55:40
  she's had a tough month etc, etc, etc.
• 55:41
  And I'm basically taking his own money and he donating his own
• 55:45
  money to somebody, but the experience that he got, you
• 55:49
  know, with this kid, you know, this girl who just like, you
• 55:53
  know, had a tough week. Tough month, worked with the
• 55:55
  manager, like, who deserves to get a hundred dollar tip on a
• 55:58
  you know, fifty dollar meal. And it was this person and like
• 56:02
  made for such a great experience even though it was like pretty
• 56:06
  simple. But that was, that was kind of a
• 56:08
  A fun risk that I took with like someone else's money and it
• 56:12
  ended up being super memorable. So some men.
• 56:18
  Yeah, I want to ask you, like, obviously Easter must be like a
• 56:20
  big season for you given like the whole, you know, structure
• 56:25
  of the business, what it is, you know, and that was the kind of
• 56:28
  Easter Sunday know, like, Easter eggs, like the scavenger okay,
• 56:33
  maybe, I don't know. Is it a thing in America?
• 56:35
  Like because what? Okay, Alex get in the UK, what?
• 56:38
  Yeah, when I was growing up, like an Easter egg hunt, a
• 56:40
  treasure hunt use. Yeah, you would just go around
• 56:43
  when chocolate eggs, and Yeah, you get an idea.
• 56:46
  You wouldn't know, I'm trying to think of what Valentine's day
• 56:49
  ends up being big, okay? Because it's always like
• 56:52
  romantic and people are doing a bigger experience Eastern, not
• 56:56
  as much just because like, I mean, how often it's like, who's
• 57:01
  going to spend that much money on an Easter egg hunt, right?
• 57:04
  Somebody will guarantee you. Somebody will the reason us do
• 57:07
  is like this is one of the reasons why I wanted to know
• 57:09
  about the requests. Because given that, you know,
• 57:15
  Okay, like you're charging a lot of money but like it's worth its
• 57:20
  high quality. That's the reason why.
• 57:22
  But obviously, when things are more expensive that tends to
• 57:25
  attract, you know, richer people, and they want to do more
• 57:27
  outlandish things. They want to spend a lot of a
• 57:29
  hell of a lot more money. And like you said before, it's
• 57:31
  not all about money, but like, I would think, like, even with,
• 57:35
  like Easter egg, you know, if they say, hey, I want a gigantic
• 57:38
  egg like, yeah, maybe make that happen.
• 57:41
  It's definitely in the realm of possibility.
• 57:44
  And, you know, it's just like, I'm I've only been doing this
• 57:47
  for five years and I've only been doing it for full-time, you
• 57:50
  know, two and a half and 2020 was effectively a wash.
• 57:53
  I did to Adventures before the pandemic hit and then one
• 57:57
  Adventure at the very end because it was very close and it
• 58:00
  was for the red Secret Santa. So I went from doing, you know,
• 58:03
  God 20 to 30 a year to doing three and so we'll just see like
• 58:10
  once once we finally get through to switch, it looks like Going.
• 58:14
  Well, at least in the US guess what?
• 58:17
  Actually is my mic a company if you guys had the Super Bowl with
• 58:22
  so many fans there. Like I was I was sitting there
• 58:25
  like going Jesus, I hope like all those people are going to be
• 58:28
  okay because that's that's Florida.
• 58:30
  It was in Florida. Okay, them figures.
• 58:32
  Yeah, exactly kind of it was still, but there was so many
• 58:35
  people that are not from Florida.
• 58:37
  That surprised me like. Yeah.
• 58:40
  Okay. That for example, there's a lot
• 58:41
  of professional wrestlers that I know that that were Were there
• 58:44
  and I was thinking like I mean you guys have to wrestle week in
• 58:48
  week out in what is essentially like bubbles, you know, like
• 58:52
  yeah, that's kind of why it's being allowed to happen.
• 58:54
  It's because they form these Bubbles and they don't really go
• 58:57
  out of them. So then when they did this, I
• 59:00
  was like, really like duh, I know it's mind-blowing to me and
• 59:04
  we'll see if it becomes a super spreader event or not.
• 59:07
  I feel like it's like we've become so desensitized.
• 59:10
  I check the end carve website every day that has like a nice
• 59:13
  cow. Made by that like kid and it's
• 59:15
  like, well u.s. is very close to 500 thousand deaths and no one's
• 59:18
  really talking about it because like, you know, Trump
• 59:20
  impeachment, everything else is going on.
• 59:22
  So it's just become like, everyone's kind of bored of it
• 59:24
  now, like. So it's very America, right?
• 59:28
  It's very American to become like Board of the pandemic
• 59:31
  because it's like not new news where it's like we rather talk
• 59:33
  about Game. Stop stop you don't get it.
• 59:37
  Give you that was awesome story but I honestly think it's bad.
• 59:40
  Like I mean And this is the one of the reasons why I actually
• 59:45
  try to keep my mentions about on the podcast or anything that I
• 59:48
  do to a minimum. There was a point on YouTube
• 59:50
  where I was doing like, regular updates, trying to casino is
• 59:53
  interesting to say like, hey, here's what's going on in the UK
• 59:56
  and I found that there's other people around the world that
• 59:59
  like, you know, don't know that because obviously, you know,
• 1:00:01
  news is distributed, you don't, I'll go on you.com every single
• 1:00:07
  morning to see, like, what the world news is, right?
• 1:00:10
  Yeah, plus, they don't always necessarily report like Accurate
• 1:00:13
  stuff, you know, like I wouldn't trust the BBC.
• 1:00:15
  I would trust other providers but like my point being that
• 1:00:19
  like, you know, in the u.s. you have like a certain idea of
• 1:00:22
  what's going on, the UK and vice versa, but you won't really know
• 1:00:25
  unless you talk to someone. Who's there living it?
• 1:00:27
  You know. Yeah and that's why I was
• 1:00:29
  originally doing it and then after a while is that you know
• 1:00:31
  what, I'm sick of talking about this, I'm sure people are sick
• 1:00:33
  of hearing about it. I need to do stuff that will
• 1:00:36
  take people's minds off it, hence podcast.
• 1:00:40
  But anyway, moving it forward. I want to know about your props,
• 1:00:44
  like, in terms of setting these up.
• 1:00:48
  Do you make your own props? Do you have someone who makes
• 1:00:51
  them for you? Like what's the process of
• 1:00:53
  building this stuff? Yeah.
• 1:00:55
  So I very rarely will make any kind of prop.
• 1:00:59
  Okay, I'm trying to look around and see if I have anything like,
• 1:01:03
  what? Just looking at everything
• 1:01:04
  behind you, to be honest with ya.
• 1:01:05
  These big chests that. Yeah, I did one.
• 1:01:13
  It's from Legends of the Hidden Temple.
• 1:01:15
  If you remember that show, I don't know if that show aired
• 1:01:17
  there but it was like this kid show.
• 1:01:19
  I did like a competition for somebody's birthday.
• 1:01:22
  This was actually really fun one.
• 1:01:24
  I had a another podcast called endless thread which talks about
• 1:01:28
  Reddit. The whole point was Finding Me
• 1:01:31
  for their interview. They had to like do an adventure
• 1:01:33
  and halfway through. They got this key which like
• 1:01:37
  you'll need to use it later and when they finally arrived it's a
• 1:01:40
  bottle opener. And so like I usually do crack
• 1:01:42
  open. The three beers Is that I had on
• 1:01:43
  the table, I'll do I'll use a lot of like leather bound
• 1:01:46
  journals. Mmm.
• 1:01:49
  I feel like, for the podcast side of this, you don't know
• 1:01:51
  anything. But like leather bound journals.
• 1:01:54
  So honor, but for those listening, it's like that the
• 1:01:58
  stuff looks like really good quality.
• 1:02:00
  To be honest, you do it looks like, you know, so is it is?
• 1:02:03
  It's not like, Okay, the reason I said prop because it's
• 1:02:07
  obviously because of the acting industry.
• 1:02:08
  Like sometimes you have, like, if you take this leather bound
• 1:02:11
  sort of diary thing that you Your hand right there to me.
• 1:02:14
  That looks like genuine leather. Is it ever ok?
• 1:02:18
  So use real material. This is genuine leather.
• 1:02:20
  This was got there's a little kiosk in Pike Place Market in
• 1:02:24
  Seattle, which is like that, famous Market, where they throw
• 1:02:27
  the fish, there's tons and tons of little shops.
• 1:02:29
  And every time I go to Seattle, they're my favorite people, and
• 1:02:33
  I will buy I will buy tons of the journals big ones.
• 1:02:41
  Small ones and they're all leather, or there's some type of
• 1:02:44
  something. And they use this interesting,
• 1:02:46
  kind of like recycled paper, and I'll use them or give them as
• 1:02:50
  gifts. The smaller ones, I'll do like
• 1:02:53
  an Indiana Jones, Nathan Drake, Uncharted Style Adventure, where
• 1:02:57
  like the journal is filled with to the brim with like drawings
• 1:03:02
  of maps and encoded messages and stuff.
• 1:03:04
  And as they go through the Sure stuff starts to make sense or
• 1:03:08
  it's like there will be a drawing of like a statue and
• 1:03:11
  then like some coordinates of like oh a compass steps and
• 1:03:14
  they'll get to a park in the book.
• 1:03:15
  Like wait that's the statue and then they like Sam from the
• 1:03:19
  statute and then they're like, okay we'll get a compass and
• 1:03:21
  we're going to take these steps and then it gets to like, you
• 1:03:23
  know, there's a key hanging from a tree on the other side of the
• 1:03:26
  park they walk to and that opens the chest that tells them where
• 1:03:28
  to go next, right? So, yeah, the big thing for me,
• 1:03:32
  one of my big. I did a YouTube video on my top
• 1:03:35
  ten rules. For adventures.
• 1:03:37
  And one of them is like presentation is everything.
• 1:03:40
  Yes. And it's not difficult to go to
• 1:03:44
  a craft store, go on Amazon and get brown envelopes.
• 1:03:48
  Instead of getting like white legal envelopes that like you
• 1:03:51
  know, you just going to send a bill in the mail and like you
• 1:03:55
  can wax even get a wax seal for five ten dollars and you can get
• 1:03:58
  wax ceiling sticks and it's not difficult to go that extra step
• 1:04:02
  to make things nice, but you can buy They're good chess, you can
• 1:04:07
  get and sometimes I'll have somebody that will build
• 1:04:11
  something for me if it's in the budget.
• 1:04:12
  But most of the stuff you can find online or just like in
• 1:04:16
  shops. Yes, I was going to ask you.
• 1:04:18
  That was my next question. It tells about where you Source
• 1:04:21
  it. So you like we just talked in
• 1:04:22
  General Stores, then you just find the stuff and you go.
• 1:04:25
  Okay. I need a diary, that's all gone.
• 1:04:27
  Yeah, yeah, some and sometimes, sometimes there's like and it's
• 1:04:31
  at the point now, it's like I have gambits and I use the term
• 1:04:33
  Gambit. It's like anything that propel
• 1:04:37
  Forward in the adventure, I have gambits that just work.
• 1:04:41
  They're just they're fun. They can work with so many
• 1:04:43
  things like I love doing the journal Gambit we're just a
• 1:04:45
  bunch of stuff in a journal. It's cool experience.
• 1:04:47
  Every journals going to be different.
• 1:04:48
  So whatever goes inside is completely different but still
• 1:04:51
  the notion of like all of the clues are housed in this and
• 1:04:54
  everywhere they go. You'll see behind me.
• 1:04:57
  There's a chess board. It's got letters written on it.
• 1:04:59
  There's another YouTube video that I teach how to do that.
• 1:05:01
  It's called a nights to or puzzle where you move a chess
• 1:05:04
  piece around the board and it spells out a message.
• 1:05:06
  Just a cool experience. It's a puzzle that's not too
• 1:05:08
  difficult but just challenging enough to do during a meal and
• 1:05:12
  you can take any message as long as it's 64 characters, like 64
• 1:05:16
  letters, and you can make that the message, so it's still for
• 1:05:19
  them even if it's using those gambits.
• 1:05:23
  But then, yeah, there will be some times where I'll just like,
• 1:05:26
  I'll find something online. Like I have I have pens that
• 1:05:29
  when you write something and you run a flame across the page,
• 1:05:33
  it'll it'll erase that ink. So you can hide Something behind
• 1:05:37
  that and it's like I just haven't used that yet because I
• 1:05:39
  have yet to find time and I'm also super worried that someone
• 1:05:42
  just going to freaking light the page on fire and not, you know,
• 1:05:46
  but it's all I'll find things where it's like, this is going
• 1:05:49
  in the book. This is going on the list and
• 1:05:50
  I'm going to use it eventually can't use it yet and then it's
• 1:05:53
  just about finding the right client and the right player to
• 1:05:56
  use this Gambit on how much does this tend to set you back as far
• 1:06:01
  as like, cost is concerned that the regular basis?
• 1:06:03
  I'll go, I understand that we'll probably it will vary according
• 1:06:05
  to like, The details of what people want and stuff but like,
• 1:06:08
  on average, like how much is this certain you back all this
• 1:06:12
  and sent me back anything? Because the client pays for it.
• 1:06:15
  Oh, if I use a journal that's part of the materials cost, this
• 1:06:19
  journal was $20. And so at the very end of the
• 1:06:21
  adventure, it was like, yeah, you pay me my flat rate.
• 1:06:24
  This is how much the meal cost. This is how much the journal
• 1:06:26
  cost and that's it. So most of the stuff is covered,
• 1:06:30
  by the client, oftentimes, I'll get lucky and they're like, hey
• 1:06:33
  y'all, we don't need to keep like, most people want to keep
• 1:06:36
  Keep like a chest, right? Just because they look cool but
• 1:06:39
  some people don't and especially like the corporate big group
• 1:06:41
  clients they never do. And so that's one of the
• 1:06:44
  reasons, well, do like a big corporate thing because a I can
• 1:06:47
  charge a lot more because companies don't care.
• 1:06:49
  Yeah. Like I'm gonna get that guy
• 1:06:56
  proposing to his girlfriend because most companies have
• 1:06:58
  worked with event planners and most people that are getting
• 1:07:01
  somebody to build a proposal have not.
• 1:07:04
  And so I want to I like to keep things as Parent as possible but
• 1:07:08
  you know if a company's got it going to have 10 teams.
• 1:07:10
  I'm going to buy 10 Crypt x's and then like, if they want to
• 1:07:12
  keep some of them, they can like it's fine for me.
• 1:07:14
  I'm going to charge them regardless, but if they don't, I
• 1:07:17
  will keep it. And then I can either keep it as
• 1:07:19
  props for myself or I can use that for the next one.
• 1:07:22
  And then, you know, go there, what are the major differences
• 1:07:25
  between? Like, how you approach to
• 1:07:27
  corporate events versus how you approach the individual events.
• 1:07:30
  Oh God. They're wildly different and
• 1:07:33
  corporate events are just large group games which I've done.
• 1:07:36
  Non-corporate, larger games, think of like a bar.
• 1:07:38
  Crawl, treasure hunt type thing when it comes to the big games
• 1:07:42
  and if I don't know what time it is over there, but in four and a
• 1:07:46
  half hours, I'm going to be doing a live stream, talking
• 1:07:49
  about one of my big group games on my YouTube channel with my
• 1:07:51
  twin brother who's my designer. But with big group games, it's
• 1:07:55
  all about crowd control with the small Adventures.
• 1:07:59
  You're on the rails. So it's like, if I'm going to
• 1:08:01
  send you an adventure and it starts at 10 a.m.
• 1:08:04
  I can, you know, I know, By 2:00 p.m. you're going to be at this
• 1:08:08
  bar because I have scheduled it so but when you have 20 30 50,
• 1:08:12
  100 500 people, you can't do that.
• 1:08:15
  And so it becomes about making it open ended at least in my
• 1:08:18
  opinion. Often times I use a map which
• 1:08:20
  you can see right there. There we go.
• 1:08:23
  I can't figure out which way is left it, the map behind me and
• 1:08:29
  basically every team will get a map and they'll have
• 1:08:32
  checkpoints, they have to find and hit but they can hit those
• 1:08:34
  checkpoints in any order. That they want.
• 1:08:37
  So you're kind of in control of your own destiny, as far as like
• 1:08:40
  the route. You want to take most of the
• 1:08:42
  time, I'll do something along the lines of like, okay, here's
• 1:08:44
  the deal. Your team has to find the finish
• 1:08:48
  line and then once you find the finish line, which is like a bar
• 1:08:51
  or a restaurant or a private room, somewhere, once you find
• 1:08:54
  that finish line, you have to have a password and so becomes
• 1:08:58
  like two challenges, find the bar, get the password and
• 1:09:01
  oftentimes finding the bar will be something along the lines of
• 1:09:04
  like you know, they Have to do a bunch of scavenger hunt items
• 1:09:10
  where they have to like, you know, video tape record, you
• 1:09:13
  know, doing fun, stupid things, interact, serenading strangers,
• 1:09:16
  or like, you know, doing a dance of public.
• 1:09:18
  That's kind of fun things that you see all the time.
• 1:09:20
  And like, once they text that into a certain person, they hit
• 1:09:24
  that threshold where it's like the bar is here, right?
• 1:09:27
  This is where the bar is go here.
• 1:09:29
  And then you could do a password, pardon me, another
• 1:09:32
  thing I'll do oftentimes is I'll do like there are 10 Keys
• 1:09:37
  actually yours. This, I'm holding up as like a
• 1:09:43
  little orange key. I bought like hundreds of these
• 1:09:47
  and painted, you know, 20 of them orange 20th and green 20 of
• 1:09:51
  them blue, 20 of them purple and at every stop, there's some type
• 1:09:54
  of challenge or puzzle or something.
• 1:09:56
  And when they complete that they get one of the keys.
• 1:09:58
  And what they need to do is they need to find the bar and that's
• 1:10:01
  why the scavenger hunt things and once they get there, the
• 1:10:03
  bouncer is going to be like, I need you to give me ten
• 1:10:06
  different color keys. So if they have all ten key,
• 1:10:09
  He's they can do it and maybe there's 15 stops.
• 1:10:12
  So they don't have to hit every stop.
• 1:10:14
  And they can choose the route. They want to take based on the
• 1:10:17
  strength of their team, and I'll some challenges will be, you
• 1:10:21
  know, very easy to find. But like, a very difficult
• 1:10:24
  challenge when they arrive and some will be very difficult to
• 1:10:27
  find. Once they find, they just like
• 1:10:28
  grab a key and some will be kind of a mix where it's like a
• 1:10:31
  physical challenge where it's like, there's one key that is,
• 1:10:34
  like, 10, miles, driving, distance away, you can go but
• 1:10:38
  you're, you're losing. Many miles are, you know, 20
• 1:10:41
  kilometers of driving distance. So it's like a risk-reward thing
• 1:10:44
  to give people like how we want to do this.
• 1:10:46
  If you have a bunch of people that are super puzzle heavy,
• 1:10:49
  they're going to go to the ones that have the most challenge,
• 1:10:50
  you're going to have ones that are you know, very athletically
• 1:10:52
  inclined. They're going to have to like
• 1:10:54
  this scale a hill to get to the very top and talk to somebody.
• 1:10:58
  So it's just about trying to spread these groups out.
• 1:11:01
  So there isn't just a log Jam and everyone's at one stop at
• 1:11:04
  the same time. Awesome.
• 1:11:06
  What advice would you give to people who'd like to get into
• 1:11:09
  this? It's sort of filled or this kind
• 1:11:12
  of thing. Yeah.
• 1:11:13
  Are you gonna reach out to me? I have a couple protégées of
• 1:11:15
  people that I just helped, and then mean, there needs to be
• 1:11:18
  more and having more people do this, like, before the pandemic
• 1:11:22
  happened, I was booked out, like, six months to a year, like
• 1:11:26
  I am, there's plenty of people. I know.
• 1:11:28
  Go me, very lucky, very good. Built up a thing.
• 1:11:30
  But like, there's people that reach out, or it's like, man,
• 1:11:32
  you're perfect. Like, you have the budget.
• 1:11:34
  You have a great attitude. It doesn't benefit me like this
• 1:11:38
  birthdays happening. We Can't just push it back and
• 1:11:41
  reschedule it but it's great when it's like I know somebody
• 1:11:43
  that could do this and I can kind of hand them a warm lead
• 1:11:47
  and then work with them and you know, eventually it's like hey
• 1:11:50
  I'm going to hand you this and I'm going to take a finder's fee
• 1:11:52
  but not off the bat because that would suck because they're still
• 1:11:54
  figuring it out, right? Just start try to create some
• 1:11:59
  magical experience for people. If you go on my YouTube channel,
• 1:12:02
  I spell out all the like the formula that I use all those
• 1:12:05
  things, including different gambits that I like to use the
• 1:12:08
  subreddits Great. To because it's a lot of people
• 1:12:11
  doing Recaps and asking questions.
• 1:12:12
  And being like, who, what about RFID codes, like, what about
• 1:12:15
  using playing cards? So, there's a lot of help.
• 1:12:18
  I've really, I hate people that are like, I don't share any of
• 1:12:22
  my secrets, unless you're paying me.
• 1:12:24
  Because it's like, all right, cool.
• 1:12:25
  It just like won't listen to you anymore.
• 1:12:26
  Like there has to be some level and if you want I do
• 1:12:29
  consultation. So I'm happy to actually
• 1:12:31
  schedule actually in 30 minutes. I have another consult call and
• 1:12:37
  yeah just but just start if you want to do this, Gonna have to
• 1:12:40
  do it as a side, hustle for a while, as you build it up, you
• 1:12:44
  know, there's you'll always be able to find an example.
• 1:12:47
  A reason to do it, a friend's birthday, or something like that
• 1:12:49
  and do it for free or cheap or at cost in the beginning, and
• 1:12:52
  learn and get better. And then eventually, you know,
• 1:12:56
  do it as business. Thanks for sharing, man.
• 1:12:59
  I just want to say on a side note, I think it's really cool
• 1:13:02
  that you're training people up to do that.
• 1:13:03
  That's a really awesome thing to do.
• 1:13:05
  And I agree, wholeheartedly, I'm very sort of We open with
• 1:13:11
  everything that I do as well because you know, I think in
• 1:13:14
  life we should share everything. It doesn't make any sense to
• 1:13:17
  keep things to yourself. I mean you know, especially
• 1:13:19
  well, it doesn't hurt me to have somebody else succeed.
• 1:13:23
  And like this is a, this is an industry that there isn't, you
• 1:13:26
  know, like if you want to become a barber, you have a great clear
• 1:13:29
  shot, right? You go to a school to do that
• 1:13:31
  and then you either buy a chair or you wrote your own, you know,
• 1:13:34
  it's like there's something but there is no like, oh yeah, if
• 1:13:36
  you want to be an event planner, the bills treasure hunts for
• 1:13:38
  living like, this is what you like.
• 1:13:39
  There's I can be the one that like Kicks Down the door and
• 1:13:43
  then like holds it open for other people to get through all
• 1:13:46
  the better and like there's the industry's awesome.
• 1:13:48
  It's very it's like it's like the board game industry.
• 1:13:51
  If you go by Settlers of Catan and you get four friends
• 1:13:54
  together, three friends and you play it, you have an awesome
• 1:13:57
  night. Like the next day a your friends
• 1:13:59
  are going to go by Settlers of Catan and you're going to go
• 1:14:01
  back and buy another board game, right?
• 1:14:03
  If you, if somebody else hires somebody and they have a great
• 1:14:07
  experience, they want more and so Are going to try to find me.
• 1:14:11
  It's like Escape rooms, right? They escaped her Ministry, loves
• 1:14:14
  each other because like, you know, the worst thing that can
• 1:14:18
  happen with an escape room is that somebody has a bad
• 1:14:20
  experience because then they'll never go to any other scape
• 1:14:22
  room. If they go to an escape room and
• 1:14:24
  I have a great time, they're gonna hit every single one and
• 1:14:26
  so it's like everyone's building each other up.
• 1:14:29
  Everyone's helping each other exchanging tips and tricks to
• 1:14:32
  make sure the user experiences as fun as possible because it
• 1:14:35
  you know, Rising tie-dyed brings up All Ships.
• 1:14:38
  Absolutely. Couldn't agree more.
• 1:14:41
  Yeah, just switching things up. I just wanted to share a quick
• 1:14:43
  story with you. This is something I mentioned to
• 1:14:46
  you off camera for both those listening.
• 1:14:48
  Basically me and Chris happen to have the same microphone and I
• 1:14:52
  realize this has nothing to do with everything we're talking
• 1:14:55
  about. But I wanted to bring this up
• 1:14:56
  because of what we were talking about in the beginning about,
• 1:14:59
  you know, how, it's funny, how things work out, how they work
• 1:15:02
  out for the good. Now, I did, I was working for
• 1:15:07
  this this business in the country.
• 1:15:09
  Called dystonia in saw. The tail end of 2019 going into
• 1:15:14
  2020 funnily enough. I actually quit the job early
• 1:15:17
  February of last year and then came back to England after
• 1:15:21
  having lived there for three years.
• 1:15:22
  Right. And here's the funny thing.
• 1:15:26
  So I'm in that job I'm at that point I'm sort of let's say six
• 1:15:30
  months to eight months into back into YouTube and properly doing
• 1:15:34
  it but I don't have any professional equipped than
• 1:15:36
  everything I have is trash. You know, I'm still building up
• 1:15:38
  even at this moment. Figure out.
• 1:15:40
  How is things get bad? Just got these LED lights, you
• 1:15:43
  know, a month or two ago and they really stepped up my game.
• 1:15:46
  Yeah, it just happens is gradual progress, but the funny thing
• 1:15:51
  that I wanted to share is that this particular microphone.
• 1:15:54
  I have was a microphone that I was using back then.
• 1:15:57
  Now I was working for this company.
• 1:15:59
  I won't say, who because I never give specifics, but it was this
• 1:16:02
  company. And they wanted me to do like a
• 1:16:08
  podcast podcast, sort of like A podcast like a business kind of
• 1:16:11
  thing where they had articles they wanted me to sort of say
• 1:16:13
  it. Yeah, you know in a podcast e
• 1:16:17
  way they call it business podcast.
• 1:16:19
  Let's say it's a bit this podcast and they had this guy in
• 1:16:24
  the state's doing all their stuff for them.
• 1:16:26
  And then he said like oh yeah, I want to charge you more and they
• 1:16:30
  were like nah. Oh we've got English guy here.
• 1:16:33
  We'll just use him and I was like make sense to me.
• 1:16:36
  I need the experience everyone's a winner, right?
• 1:16:39
  Because Wanted to do podcasting and get into that anyway.
• 1:16:43
  So I start doing it. It's very different though.
• 1:16:45
  It's like I have to put on my best, professional voice and you
• 1:16:50
  know, yeah, this shit I have my voice to this is Riley
• 1:16:52
  television, anchor voice. Yeah, everyone everyone has like
• 1:16:55
  their different voices that they do, and I had to do that, and it
• 1:16:58
  was actually a lot harder than I than I thought it would be, but
• 1:17:01
  it was a good Practice for the podcast and since then I've done
• 1:17:07
  likes or to podcast, this is my main one.
• 1:17:10
  We're close to 70 episodes now. So it's really it's going.
• 1:17:13
  It's going well. But back then I think I did
• 1:17:17
  maybe like 20 episodes of that business podcast.
• 1:17:22
  And if people are interested, by the way, I can shoot you links
• 1:17:26
  to that baby, show notes. Maybe, I don't know, I don't
• 1:17:31
  think it's that interesting person.
• 1:17:32
  Just me talking about like boring manufacturing stuff.
• 1:17:36
  I don't know if anyone's really interested in that.
• 1:17:38
  Maybe some people people manufacturers would be, but
• 1:17:41
  yeah. Anyway the funny thing.
• 1:17:45
  The thing I wanted to get to the actual point of the story is
• 1:17:48
  that at the time I was sort of gradually coming to an end with
• 1:17:52
  this company. I really was homesick after
• 1:17:54
  three years of abroad. I wanted to come back to the UK.
• 1:17:56
  I wanted to keep that job and always negotiating that with
• 1:18:00
  them, but it didn't seem like it was going to happen.
• 1:18:02
  And I said to them. Well, look, if we can't come to
• 1:18:05
  an agreement on that, maybe we can come to an agreement on this
• 1:18:09
  podcast, E-Type stuff. Maybe I can do this on a
• 1:18:11
  freelance basis for you and, you know, I was going to try to
• 1:18:16
  negotiate in that deal to keep the microphone because I knew
• 1:18:18
  that that would be good for me, but we didn't even get to that
• 1:18:22
  point. And they rather harshly kind of
• 1:18:25
  said to me, like, I don't know if it was just there more, just
• 1:18:29
  a cultural difference, or I don't know whatever, but they
• 1:18:33
  kind of said like, oh no, ya know, we need good quality and I
• 1:18:37
  was kind of like so you don't think that I can deliver good
• 1:18:39
  quality and I knew that they met.
• 1:18:41
  They said that it was the mic but I think they kind of
• 1:18:44
  expected like everything in general.
• 1:18:46
  Yeah, I kind of got a little bit offended if I'm honest and I was
• 1:18:50
  a bit annoyed because I was like, oh I'll get a good
• 1:18:52
  microphone one day and this is the weird funny thing.
• 1:18:57
  Back then, I was looking at that microphone.
• 1:18:58
  Oh, this is a good microphone. I like this, I'll keep that in
• 1:19:01
  mind. And then fast forward to about a
• 1:19:04
  year later, a friend of mine, showered to steal Z this, he's a
• 1:19:10
  twitch stream of mine. He's been on the show, he's a
• 1:19:12
  really good guy. So, I'm just doing this trick
• 1:19:14
  stream and he decides to just randomly donate a bunch of money
• 1:19:18
  to me, and I'm still Blown Away. Even to this day, I'll show him
• 1:19:20
  out every single chance I get an opportunity to do so because
• 1:19:23
  it's the first and only time that someone's ever like donated
• 1:19:26
  anything to me and it was a big amount and I was through that I
• 1:19:30
  was able to get like a cheap guitar to do music again and to
• 1:19:33
  get this microphone. And as soon as I bought it and I
• 1:19:36
  got it and I unwrapped it. I was like, man, I have this
• 1:19:39
  microphone in my hand like six to eight months later after
• 1:19:43
  being told, oh, yeah. You know basically like, you
• 1:19:47
  know, you're not going to get to have a microphone like this.
• 1:19:49
  You're not going to get to do this.
• 1:19:50
  And now I'm doing this and it's way better than doing that
• 1:19:53
  business podcast thing and, you know, I'm on track to doing
• 1:19:58
  things like getting my first sponsor and stuff so you know
• 1:20:01
  things are headed in a good direction right now.
• 1:20:04
  It's awesome. And I just I just wanted to
• 1:20:05
  quickly share that story because I found that funny and I just
• 1:20:09
  find it funny that we had the same microphone as well.
• 1:20:11
  Yeah, the main point behind all of this is that like things will
• 1:20:15
  work out and the universe works in very weird ways and I think
• 1:20:18
  if anything I was given that opportunity back then to
• 1:20:21
  practice with that microphone specifically because I was gonna
• 1:20:25
  get it later Didn't realize that at the time and it's just weird.
• 1:20:29
  It is funny to think about manifestation and just like yes,
• 1:20:33
  you know, knowing what you want, you don't have to know how
• 1:20:34
  you're going to get it, but you can have that idea and you can
• 1:20:37
  visualize it a little bit and yeah, you will get everything
• 1:20:40
  you want. But I think the important thing
• 1:20:42
  is that you have to believe, like most people, don't believe
• 1:20:44
  they give up like me with this whole YouTube thing.
• 1:20:47
  Like, things are beginning to happen.
• 1:20:49
  Now very, very slowly. And that's the thing.
• 1:20:52
  That's so, it's a waiting game. It's not a slow and slow and
• 1:20:55
  slow, and all of a sudden, there's a Tipping Point Then you
• 1:20:57
  just like, oh yeah, nope I grew they just got to kind of keep
• 1:21:01
  banging your head against the wall and improving and whatnot.
• 1:21:03
  But yeah and then hopefully coming out of a global pandemic
• 1:21:07
  and ready to you know, keep going.
• 1:21:09
  Absolutely. Absolutely right move, bringing
• 1:21:11
  it back to yourself. So you currently reside in
• 1:21:14
  Portland, Oregon. Yep.
• 1:21:15
  One of the best and worst things about Portland.
• 1:21:18
  Oregon Portland's weird as hell. That's kind of our thing.
• 1:21:23
  Keep Portland Weird we were we popped up in the news.
• 1:21:27
  Who's over the summer because of the protests because of the
• 1:21:32
  George, the murder of George. Floyd and Portland.
• 1:21:35
  Portland is an interesting City. It's the whitest city whitest.
• 1:21:41
  Major city in that it states organize a not good history of
• 1:21:45
  racism. Fun fact about Oregon.
• 1:21:48
  Yeah, it was like illegal to live here and not be white until
• 1:21:51
  like the 1920s which is just like not long enough ago.
• 1:21:56
  So that's Problem. But despite that, it's very
• 1:21:59
  inclusive. It's very LGBT inclusive.
• 1:22:02
  It's very yeah, like, it has its issues because America and we
• 1:22:07
  all have those issues, but it is very weird and very quirky and
• 1:22:12
  there's lots and lots of just cool stuff.
• 1:22:15
  It is very rainy all the time Pacific Northwest is like, just
• 1:22:21
  it just constantly draining it actually supposed to snow or
• 1:22:23
  supposed to get with the winter storm which doesn't happen.
• 1:22:26
  It doesn't It's no in Portland Oregon despite how North it is
• 1:22:29
  like it's so far north, you think it would snow?
• 1:22:31
  No, it's mostly rain. Yeah, it's so everyone's kind of
• 1:22:33
  panicking right now and like buying food for like the next
• 1:22:36
  three days. Well, because they don't, you
• 1:22:39
  know, they don't shovel snow. They don't have snow plows
• 1:22:42
  because it doesn't snow enough. Like why bother spending the
• 1:22:44
  money on that but it's beautiful.
• 1:22:47
  It's, you know, you can drive a couple hours and you can be in
• 1:22:51
  the forests of Endor from Star Wars.
• 1:22:53
  Right lie. No wait a second, all super
• 1:22:56
  close. And then the coast is right
• 1:22:58
  there. Water is very cold, not a fun,
• 1:23:00
  surf trip. But yeah, Portland's amazing.
• 1:23:05
  I've only been here for a year. I'm actually going to be moving
• 1:23:07
  again. In mid-june when my lease is up
• 1:23:10
  leaning toward La, I was actually didn't have a home for
• 1:23:14
  about two years because I didn't need it, you know, it's true.
• 1:23:18
  Wow, so much. Yeah, just put everything in
• 1:23:20
  storage and got a p.o. box and just bounced around from
• 1:23:23
  Adventure to Adventure to Adventure.
• 1:23:24
  And then I say we did so living in hotels, do something kind of,
• 1:23:28
  or just like, you know, I'm 35, I have friends that are now
• 1:23:31
  successful enough to where they have a house with a spare
• 1:23:33
  bedroom. And so like I'll be on the east
• 1:23:35
  coast of the US and I'll be like, hey can I stay with you
• 1:23:37
  for a week or two? And they're like, hell yeah.
• 1:23:39
  And so like, you know, get to see friends and stuff, but it's
• 1:23:42
  been nice, especially in 2020, having like a house and a bed
• 1:23:44
  and stuff. But I was going to say because
• 1:23:47
  I've never had to go while had one guest on the show who's a
• 1:23:50
  professional wrestlers, he could kind of travel know, he could,
• 1:23:54
  he could relate to that. Yeah.
• 1:23:57
  But yeah, it's not often. I talk to someone who doesn't
• 1:23:59
  have like a why you have a fixed location now, but you didn't
• 1:24:01
  before, like, how does that life kind of compare?
• 1:24:04
  Do you ever kind of feel like a shit?
• 1:24:06
  Like I don't have like a base of operations or like how was?
• 1:24:09
  Yeah, that it was. It was stressful at first
• 1:24:12
  because it was like, I jumped ship in October 2017.
• 1:24:17
  And then, in March 2018, my lease was up.
• 1:24:21
  And this is when I was in San Diego, California, and I just
• 1:24:24
  gotten back home after being gone for an entire month.
• 1:24:27
  Like change because a month and a half.
• 1:24:30
  And I was like I just spent thousands of dollars for my
• 1:24:33
  stuff just to sit here. I am I think that when it's like
• 1:24:40
  and I already knew where I was going to be for the next like
• 1:24:42
  five six months where it's like yeah this is my schedule.
• 1:24:45
  Like I'm going to be in Nashville and then I'm going to
• 1:24:47
  be in New York and then I'm going to be in you know like
• 1:24:51
  Chicago and I'm going to be here and here and here and then I go
• 1:24:54
  home for two weeks and it's like how about set of going home for
• 1:24:56
  two weeks. Just like how I can go.
• 1:24:57
  Visit my parents. I can go stay with my brother.
• 1:24:59
  I can go visit friends, I can use all the points that have a
• 1:25:02
  mass in just get a hotel room somewhere, right?
• 1:25:04
  Like so it kind of just became that where it became this fun
• 1:25:07
  challenge. It was stressful for sure, but
• 1:25:09
  it wasn't as difficult as I thought.
• 1:25:11
  And so coming out of this, I might do that again.
• 1:25:14
  I'm just trying to figure it out.
• 1:25:15
  It really it's hard to justify spending like one to two
• 1:25:19
  thousand dollars a month on a place to live when I'm not
• 1:25:22
  leaving their, you know, but okay.
• 1:25:25
  So you said that, you know, In 2020 and now to like you're not
• 1:25:31
  really getting the opportunity to do them for obvious reasons,
• 1:25:34
  right? Which is giving you time to work
• 1:25:36
  on. All the other things that in a
• 1:25:38
  way you've been neglecting, like I would imagine, you've kind of
• 1:25:41
  got like two options sort of moving forward, like let okay,
• 1:25:44
  hypothetical? Yeah, we get through this
• 1:25:46
  pandemic back to business, right?
• 1:25:49
  Do you are a like employ someone to do all this stuff for you
• 1:25:54
  recording managing all that stuff and you just focus purely.
• 1:25:57
  We in the business or do you be like sort of doing on our on-off
• 1:26:02
  sort of things like one month you're doing it one month.
• 1:26:05
  You go back to doing the stuff but your home-based like yeah.
• 1:26:09
  I mean what what do you reckon is realistically the option for
• 1:26:12
  you moving forward? We're going to see, I think one
• 1:26:15
  of the things that I have now going forward as I'll have a
• 1:26:18
  slightly more established The following is the right word, but
• 1:26:23
  like I kind of like if you go to the YouTube channel, I've got
• 1:26:24
  stuff there, it's kind of exciting.
• 1:26:26
  Wherever you first started YouTube channel, you're like,
• 1:26:27
  why isn't anybody subscribing? And you're like, oh yeah,
• 1:26:29
  because I have like one and a half videos shot on my phone and
• 1:26:34
  they're not very well, edited it or not edited at all and so like
• 1:26:38
  I've got a laptop and so I can edit video you know, all I want.
• 1:26:42
  And I have a camera that will travel with me just like a
• 1:26:46
  little Fujifilm mirrorless camera that will travel with me
• 1:26:49
  wherever I go. Anyway, And if I need to set
• 1:26:52
  this thing up in a hotel room with a ring light, and do a
• 1:26:54
  quick video, I will do that. And so my goal, when I start to
• 1:27:00
  travel again, definitely won't be able to do.
• 1:27:03
  Like, I don't know if I can do a live stream every Wednesday and
• 1:27:06
  but I'm going to try, you know, if I could do a live stream on a
• 1:27:08
  Wednesday night, just like a quick Q&A, why not?
• 1:27:13
  And you know some of the videos can be were there.
• 1:27:15
  One minute really simple videos. I'm just about to record one
• 1:27:19
  after this basically a About using a deck of playing cards
• 1:27:23
  and a really fun puzzle where you could literally write a
• 1:27:26
  password, on the side of a deck of playing cards and Shuffle it
• 1:27:30
  up. And then you build a puzzle
• 1:27:31
  based on putting the cards in order.
• 1:27:33
  And when they put them in, order the passwords on that side.
• 1:27:35
  It's not going to be super difficult.
• 1:27:37
  I can literally just zoom in on a deck of cards as I do this and
• 1:27:40
  do a quick voiceover and it's a video.
• 1:27:42
  So we will see. I do tend to get wrapped up in
• 1:27:45
  an adventure when I do injure. So this might be pie-in-the-sky
• 1:27:50
  goal, but I do Want to try to keep this thing going because my
• 1:27:53
  goal and I come out of this is like am got a patreon and
• 1:27:56
  patreons up to a hundred bucks a month, which isn't something,
• 1:27:59
  but it isn't nothing, right? It's like, you know, it's it's
• 1:28:03
  it's that. And if I could build that up to
• 1:28:05
  the point of getting this content and being like 50/50
• 1:28:09
  event planner content creator, it'll give me a much nicer
• 1:28:11
  work-life balance. I think it'll make me excited
• 1:28:15
  either time that I switch over. I think you have the same
• 1:28:19
  problem as me, which is a don't get me wrong.
• 1:28:21
  Because a lot of the time when people hear the word problematic
• 1:28:23
  owner, that's a negative thing. No, it's a good problem to have
• 1:28:26
  you're too busy. So am I right?
• 1:28:28
  I've said this so many times to people like I need an editor,
• 1:28:33
  graphic designer social media guy because I do so much with
• 1:28:37
  content creating and I've said this to friends like I just
• 1:28:40
  don't there's not enough hours in the day to do all of this
• 1:28:43
  stuff. Unfortunately, if you have the
• 1:28:44
  same problem that I have and it's like you're just not big
• 1:28:47
  enough to be able to afford it, and I'm saying that a nice way,
• 1:28:50
  right? Like, it's just Do you write?
• 1:28:52
  And this is how I was with events where it's like, you
• 1:28:54
  start off and you desperately need an assistant, which you
• 1:28:57
  cannot afford an assistant and then you get to the point.
• 1:29:01
  You know, the way you fix that is just like getting better
• 1:29:04
  getting faster and getting like Sops, you know standard
• 1:29:07
  operating procedures. But then eventually, you can get
• 1:29:10
  something and they have available where it's like, there
• 1:29:12
  are three or four people that all pay ten thousand dollars a
• 1:29:15
  piece for a year for an assistant to the assistant makes
• 1:29:17
  30k and it's like I would have trouble.
• 1:29:20
  I had an turn ones that a guy that wanted to intern and I had
• 1:29:23
  trouble finding stuff for him to do because I just like it's
• 1:29:27
  tough because you also don't trust people to do.
• 1:29:29
  Like, I don't trust people to do as good of a job as I am, even
• 1:29:32
  if they're better or to understand my vision.
• 1:29:34
  So it could be a little bit tricky.
• 1:29:35
  I don't mean to sound mean where it's not.
• 1:29:39
  You are big enough to having a assistant but it's like dude,
• 1:29:43
  dude. Dude the money for that right
• 1:29:45
  now. I totally know.
• 1:29:47
  I don't take it offensively like you I'm a business guy.
• 1:29:49
  Like the thing is, I've had people It's come to me and be
• 1:29:52
  like, hey I'll do this for free. Oh I'll essentially I do this
• 1:29:56
  work for you and I just, you know I don't believe in not
• 1:29:59
  paying people for their work. You like II know exactly what I
• 1:30:03
  would give someone as far as like work is concerned, like,
• 1:30:06
  I've already got stuff lined up in my head.
• 1:30:08
  I haven't like properly, formulated everything, but I
• 1:30:10
  know it would be like social media editing graphic.
• 1:30:14
  Those are like the three, you know?
• 1:30:16
  And eventually like videographers, lay it on the
• 1:30:18
  line, like when I go. Okay, so for instance like one
• 1:30:21
  Things that I do that, I haven't done in a while is urbex.
• 1:30:24
  And I want to do that as a big thing in the future when I have
• 1:30:28
  money to travel and equipment or this shit, right?
• 1:30:32
  Like I had the vision and the ideas and everything but it is a
• 1:30:35
  case of as you say, being big, having the money and not so much
• 1:30:38
  about being but it doesn't really matter how many
• 1:30:40
  subscribers or whatever, it's more about the money thing.
• 1:30:43
  Like and I've always been very good at like reinvest in money
• 1:30:48
  and like using it and making things work and I've been Been
• 1:30:51
  able to do that in the past year and a half.
• 1:30:53
  I've been able to raise the bar ever so slightly.
• 1:30:56
  But, you know, as you know it's a gradual process, it takes time
• 1:31:00
  and I think in a way it's kind of good that it that it goes
• 1:31:03
  that way. I mean it's kind of forced me to
• 1:31:05
  be creative and and try other things and work around the
• 1:31:10
  things that I don't have and try the best to create content and
• 1:31:16
  make things work, you know. And that's if anything that's
• 1:31:18
  more important than actually having the equipment.
• 1:31:20
  It's like yeah you Buy all the equipment in the world who don't
• 1:31:22
  have the ideas and the vision and the structure then doesn't
• 1:31:26
  mean anything, you know. Yeah.
• 1:31:27
  But anyway, yeah, I just I just want to say like a massive thank
• 1:31:33
  you for agreeing to be on the show.
• 1:31:35
  It's been an absolute pleasure talking to you and hearing about
• 1:31:39
  your life and this just crazy fun job that you have my final
• 1:31:46
  question for you today is, do you have any kind of like a Our
• 1:31:51
  upcoming projects that you'd like to share with us or maybe
• 1:31:53
  some final thoughts that you'd like to share.
• 1:31:56
  Yeah. I mean just in anything that
• 1:31:58
  Shameless plug if you want to find me it's constructed
• 1:32:00
  Adventures. So constructed past tense
• 1:32:03
  Adventures plural.com, I have the things that place are most
• 1:32:07
  active. Our Instagram at constructed
• 1:32:09
  underscore Adventures, YouTube. You could literally honestly
• 1:32:12
  just Google constructed adventures and you'll find all
• 1:32:15
  of these things. But Instagram YouTube and the
• 1:32:17
  subreddit of the three. Biggest I have gosh I probably
• 1:32:21
  have Seven or eight Adventures that have either been suspended
• 1:32:24
  prior to 2020, or they're just kind of waiting for me to sign a
• 1:32:27
  contract. And so, once once I get the jab
• 1:32:33
  in the arm, I'm off to the races and I'm going to be traveling.
• 1:32:36
  And I'm very, very excited. So it doing that couple other
• 1:32:39
  potential projects just working with people, maybe a like
• 1:32:44
  there's a treasure hunt kind of like a escape room style
• 1:32:47
  treasure hunt that we're in talks with doing potentially
• 1:32:49
  Maui, which can be really fun. And then yeah, I'm it's been
• 1:32:53
  fun. I've been helping somebody build
• 1:32:55
  a treasure hunt into a book that they're writing which is kind of
• 1:32:57
  exciting to oh my God. Yeah, so cool.
• 1:33:00
  So it's it's been it's been exciting and fun but yeah that's
• 1:33:04
  all I got going on brilliant, man.
• 1:33:06
  Yeah, literally. Thanks again for appearing on
• 1:33:09
  the show, everyone listening to the question read podcast.
• 1:33:12
  If you're listening on YouTube Spotify, Apple podcast where
• 1:33:15
  ever you're listening to the show.
• 1:33:16
  Make sure you go and check out constructed Adventures.
• 1:33:19
  I had a little look well. Do my podcast research, and it's
• 1:33:24
  very professional, the way you set it up and everything and
• 1:33:26
  it's, yeah, it's a lot of fun. Definitely something I should
• 1:33:28
  check out and you build an adventure Adventures are fun and
• 1:33:32
  the world needs more. Absolutely.
• 1:33:34
  I couldn't agree more. Yeah, I hope that you guys have
• 1:33:37
  enjoyed this. If you're not already, if you're
• 1:33:40
  watching on YouTube, make sure to like, share and subscribe.
• 1:33:43
  If you're listening on Spotify, Apple podcast Google podcast
• 1:33:46
  wherever you listen to the Christian roof podcast.
• 1:33:48
  Please leave us a review. Leave us your thoughts feedback.
• 1:33:51
  Let me know what you like dislike.
• 1:33:53
  I want to hear your thoughts. I want to know what you think
• 1:33:56
  and also let me know if there's any guests that you'd like to
• 1:33:58
  see on the show. Any particular topics that you'd
• 1:34:01
  like to hear on the podcast? Let me know.
• 1:34:03
  My dams are always open. Thank you very much for
• 1:34:06
  listening and until next time. Peace out.
• 1:34:08
  One love. I'll see you in the next one.