Why treasure hunts make a great excuse to explore your city

August 06, 2021

5-min read

Paris Stevens

exploring the city of london

"Play has been found to speed up learning, increase job satisfaction and enhance productivity, so you’ll be having fun racing around the streets while also getting some measurable results for your company. "

We don’t play enough games as adults. Life is no fun when it’s all work and no play. Just for a moment, take yourself back to how it felt racing around on a treasure hunt as a child. Thrilling, right? We think so. So we’ve recreated it for adults, because why should adults miss out on the fun? We believe we need more fun in our stressful, ‘always on the go’ adult lives.

Treasure hunts are also the perfect platform for gaining some key outcomes beneficial to a productive work environment: encouraging teamwork, physical activity and getting outside after spending way too much time working indoors! 

Treasure hunts will remove your sense of time and space as you engage wholly in playing the game. Play also stimulates the imagination, which helps you to think outside the box to solve problems. You learn better when it’s fun and you're relaxed — studies show that play stimulates the cerebral cortex to grow and improves our memory. And play is good for your mental health and wellbeing. On top of all this, sharing laughter with your colleagues helps you to connect, making your communication easier when you get back to the office.

Combine all these benefits with exploring the city of your choice and treasure hunts are clearly a winner. City breaks are awesome for getting away from it all to de-stress, and visiting new places keeps your brain active. A treasure hunt in a city offers the same benefits — the thrill of exploring and the refreshing nature of leaving your desk for a new location. 

The thrill of a chase

Treasure hunts get your team active, which is so important if your job is sedentary. Take a look at the Dan-Brown-esque Urban Explorer, which combines an interactive app for exploring the city and unlockable GPS hotspots for questions and tasks. After completing each hotspot, you get to collect virtual scavenger hunt items. 

Play has been found to speed up learning, increase job satisfaction and enhance productivity, so you’ll be having fun racing around the streets while also getting some measurable results for your company. 

Educate

Treasure hunts are a great way of showing your team around a new city. Perhaps you’ve relocated your office and want to get your team to familiarise themselves with a new area, or perhaps you just want to explore somewhere new away from the town or city you work in. 

Treasure hunts also work well if you’re onboarding new staff or introducing staff members to a new work campus. While on the hunt, your team will likely be exploring places within the city that they would never have known about otherwise. 

You could end the day with a virtual team quiz to include any team members who couldn’t make the treasure hunt due to working remotely (we can even design the activities to be custom-made so that it all ties in!).

Fun memories

As well as encouraging some team skills, you’ll be able to get creative with video and photo challenges along the way. You’ll be using team strategy to compete via the live scoreboard and ‘photo wall’. The photos can be included in your future newsletter or on social media, so make sure you show your best smile, highlighting that your team works hard and plays hard!

Location, location, location

It’s all about location with a treasure hunt, but don’t worry if we haven’t listed your location — our treasure hunts can be played anywhere! Whether you decide upon the most convenient location logistically, or you choose somewhere new to explore, we have it covered. 

There are so many travel apps and web resources to choose from when taking a look at the area before you start your treasure hunt. You’d think the old, battered and well-loved paper travel guide in the rucksack would’ve lost its place in our affections...But there are so many stylish travel guides available that you could treat your team members to a gift they can treasure at home. Take a look at Luxe City Guides, LOST iN City Guides, Citix60 City Guides and Moleskine City Notebooks (not actually a guide, but a notebook which includes maps and directories, and is useful for work notes). 

Leave it to us

A treasure hunt is quick and easy to book with Wildgoose. And if you’re on a tight budget, we’ll give you all the support you need to manage the event yourself. 

But for ultimate peace of mind, leave everything to us. Our experienced events team will take the reins so that you can enjoy the treasure hunt! From start to finish, our team will keep your employees engaged and answer any questions they may have. Take a look at some of our client testimonials or our case studies for inspiration. 

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