“ A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, so is a lot.” – Albert Einstein
Our friends at Bar Activity have some free quiz downloads available, got to the Members’ Area for more details.
Quizzes – why run one?
- Quizzes are a proven way of building trade on quiet nights in the week
- A Quiz is a relatively inexpensive way of entertaining your customers for several hours
- Quizzes are a great way of encouraging new customers into your pub and introducing them to the full extent of your offering: wet, dry and entertainment
- Quizzes get people talking and this word of mouth advertising of your premises will encourage other people into your pub
- Quizzes help build repeat trade giving customers another reason to come into your pub on nights when they might ordinarily not do so
- Quizzes are fun and create a brilliant atmosphere in your pub for both customers and your staff
So I’ve decided to run a quiz …. Things to consider:
Is it too long or too short?
- Too long and customers will lose interest and perceive the night to be boring.
- Too short and you won’t keep customers on the premises long enough to maximise your sales to them
- Are the questions up to date and accurate?
Nothing spoils a quiz more, than ambiguous, incorrect or out of date answers – bickering between teams and the quizmaster/mistress over accuracy etc is not a pretty sight!
Is it easy to understand and play?
In short – keep it simple! The more convoluted and complicated the rules are the less people are likely to play – this is one of those lowest common denominator moments
Does it appeal to everyone?
Whilst you can’t please all the people all the time your quiz must at least appeal to the broad cross-section of your customers i.e. the young and the old, men and women, sports fans and history buffs etc.
If it doesn’t then you stand the chance of losing some potentially high spending groups of customers
Do the same people/teams win every week?
If they do then it may be for a variety of reasons (the last of which is cheating, accusations of which you should try to avoid):
Very large team – if twenty people turn up and sit as a team then the chances are that age range and special knowledge will give them an advantage over smaller groups or individuals – so you might wish to consider limiting the size of teams permitted
The quiz is skewed towards that group/person – you will need to ensure that you have a balance and variation in the types of questions asked, the subject matter and the difficulty that will result in a reasonable spread of correct answers for the majority of players
Now for cheating – you should make it clear that the quiz is for fun (and emphasise that it is free if you are running a free to enter quiz) and that the use of mobile phones etc is frowned upon … a good line is that “we don’t have a phone a friend option in this quiz!” If you suspect that a team is blatantly cheating far better to have a quiet word in the break than show them up amongst their other friends.
How much (if anything do I charge)?
This is a business decision only you can make. In my experience a free to enter quiz is much the best way to attract significant interest and participation.
If you are going to charge make it a nominal fee, say, £1 a team or individual entrant.
You might also consider donating the entry fee to your house charity (the more you collect over a year the better chance of free publicity when you present your annual cheque to them).