Some Notes About Hosting Trivia

(Cross-posted to the Trivia blog.)

Janelle emailed me today and part of it was asking for some advice about setting up a trivia night at a pub in Calgary. Apparently pub quizzes are mostly big in Charlottetown, Boston and Britain but are pretty rare in other places. The part of her email about trivia is quoted and my reply is blow that.

and third, is regarding trivia.

there is a bar only a block/two away from my place. it's a rather nice bar, and have most delicious wings on wednesday nights. something they don't have any night is Trivia. i would like to approach them with an offer to do trivia, to see how it goes over, see if it brings in more business during the week, and also as a place to do trivia! i havne't been to trivia since i was on the island during christmas at churchills. the reason i'm asking you is cuz you've done trivia, and i kinda would like to know some of your sources for finding ideal trivia questions. i'd like it to be challenging, but have the typical fun questions in there too, like the simpsons token question, and a music montage maybe. are you able to give a gal some tips? muchly appreciated!

As for Trivia I can tell you it's fun as hell doing the hosting. I enjoy it just for being able to walk around the room and interact with everyone there and feel freer than when you're just there stuck with the people at your own table. It feels like you have this special power where you're the one who gets to break the normal social rules and just talk to whomever you like. Also the getting to tell people that they're wrong is a fun little power trip. :)

For getting a bar to agree to do it, you could mention a few of these points that you've probably already thought of:

• It isn't as disruptive an activity as a live band or DJ or other special event that might drive away regulars.
• It ensures a lot of repeat business.
• It can attract a lot of people who might not normally go out during the week or at all.
• The crowd it would attract would be infinitely more well-behaved than a typical bar crowd.
• When you keep people for the extra hour or two to complete a trivia round it would more than make up for any prizes you give away, even if it's just one or two teams

Also if you say that you would take the initiative to do some postering or other simple word-of-mouth publicity to attract an initial crowd that would re-assure them that it would be worth trying.

For the questions my advice would be to ask the kinds of questions that you find you obsess over yourself. So if you're into a lot of movie and TV trivia than do that as the main focus. People will enjoy it more if it feels like you are having an enjoyable time, and if you can throw in other little tidbits about a question or topic as you do the trivia.

There are some pretty interesting links to trivia resource sites here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pub_quiz#External_links .

And also there's the trivia blog that I should be updating more regularly with the questions and answers from the Tuesday trivia here that might be of some inspiration ;) http://weknowstuff.blogspot.com/

Good luck with that, I hope it turns into something interesting for you. And hell, when I mentioned being scared of feeling isloated in some new city if I do move, you just gave me an idea of one way to get out of the house and meeting people ;) so that's very much for that.