Author: Rob A
F1® Arcade asked me to share a rundown of my work party, I asked how honest I could be and well let’s hope they don’t edit it too much…
Before we start, I need clarification are we all on the same page that no one wants to go to a bar with a sticky floor cough Infernos cough for their work summer party? Or am I talking to the wrong audience?
I, for one don’t think I can handle another summer party where Denise from finance is far too drunk and falls down the stairs, or Sam from tech breaks his arm (who won that arm wrestle eyyyy… ) so here is where F1 Arcade trumps everywhere else.
I take my (unofficial) job title as social secretary very seriously, I asked for my colleagues summer party ideas but knew there was only one winner, and luckily they all agreed. The F1 Arcade’s events team were superb, I submitted my request online and then Angie got in touch and helped me organise it all along with some pre orders. A massive thank you to Angie and all your support! Pre orders were a great chance to get your orders in early – it also meant that when we turned up we were greeted with a box of beers and a few bottles of wine, for reference we ordered The Grand Slam package. I “accidentally” ordered a bottle or three of the Provence Rosé (sorry finance), lets be honest a pale rose for a summer party – finance can’t really argue with the logic can they.
Open racing – perfection. We had eight sims and everyone is assigned a “team” / sim – and then your team take it in turns and race against the other sims. It meant that we raced against different people, had the opportunity to jump out the sims and cheer on other team mates and also tuck into the food before some of the team members ate all the food (should I name and shame…). There were quite a few of us, but I think this would work for smaller groups as well. The sim selection was random, which again worked well for our team and was good for integration which is important for corporate parties (showing my experience as social sec here…).
We were welcomed and shown to our semi private event space where we were already set up for racing… ready to jump straight in! It was slick, although I do recommend reminding the team to set up a drivers profile before racing – there is always one. Whilst we were racing we had a bar tab to spend, great addition – we could add some extra flat breads to the mix and a couple of mocktails.
A few of us stayed after racing, and the venue is great – we tried a few of their cocktails, enjoyed watching people shout at their friends and generally the music was a great vibe. We also had arcadians to use - I read somewhere that 48 is a good score for the React Wall, well... step aside. I got 54. Clearly my reactions are better than my racing.
I am a strong believer that there has to be something for everyone at work socials, I don’t want anyone to not feel included which is why I can not recommend F1 Arcade enough. We all thoroughly enjoyed it, even those that were feeling a bit apprehensive before hand. There were loads of options for drinkers and non drinkers, drivers and non drivers, sports fans and non sports fans. People (Ben) who questioned my staff summer party idea quickly admitted he was wrong – thank you for admitting that Ben.
We went early June 2024, it wasn’t too warm – it’s UK after all. BUT I think they have Air Con so I reckon it would still be great in the heat of summer. We are now discussing maybe doing a work team bonding session at F1 Arcade later on in the year.
Find out more about our event spaces at F1 Arcade London and F1 Arcade Birmingham here. Come and join us for your work summer social or any celebration this summer.
