THOUGHTS FROM THE DEN

Home of the FOX-N-OTTER Blog

This blog is about the discoveries, values, and journey of the creative family behind FOX-N-OTTER. We sought to build unique games that would appeal to enthusiasts but also be flexible and family-friendly able to be adapted and enjoyed for all ages.  It has been a great journey!  Around each corner there are new people, new challenges, and rewarding connection opportunities.  Blogs often serve different purposes.   Ours is simple.  This blog is best seen as a collection of sunglasses that show the tint in which we see our world.

Everyone approaches life with unique perspective. This is our attempt at showing you the way we see the world as game-designers and the authors of storylines.  We put YOU in the game. We want YOU to be the main character in our fast-paced stories.  We hope through this blog you begin to see how we embrace our role in that process.  We don't consider ourselves to be "The Voice of the Industry," and there are plenty of people more qualified to talk about the history and progression of Escape Room culture.  This writing space is a glimpse of our perspective as designers, engineers, game-makers, and authors.  We hope you catch our passion for the craft.

Small Business Owners

American Dream Project

By foxnotter | April 6, 2022

At least weekly, guests still ask me if we switch out our games often. I know why they ask, they wonder if Escape Rooms are like movie theaters, with different shows every couple of months. I recall wondering the same when we opened our very first games in 2017. Every community has to answer this…

2020 The Great Escape Room Challenge

By foxnotter | December 11, 2020

In 2017 Ferrin and I (Julie) birthed a dream. We wanted to bring a special kind of experience to Asheville. Our love for Escape Games had grown to a critical mass. We wanted to see it shared with families and first-timers in a unique way that enthusiasts like ourselves would love, but that was accessible…

Escape Quest Rooms Vs. Escape Rooms

By foxnotter | October 30, 2017

Are Escape Games just boring now?   What is an Escape Quest?  Would someone really like one and not the other, or do they serve the same client? Some critics say that the Escape Room era came with the creative force of a hurricane but peaked and is done.  Like any industry, the newness of the…

What “NOT” to do in Escape Room Design

By foxnotter | October 17, 2017

Running an Escape Room gives an owner/designer plenty of time to solicit customer feedback.  Some folks out there that visit our establishment FOX-N-OTTER Adventure Puzzle Rooms in Asheville, NC often have visited dozens before us.  To date, the person that visited the most Escape Rooms had personally paid for, and journey’d through 93 different scenarios. …

Escape Room Success Rates and Times

By foxnotter | September 26, 2017

Escape Success Rates Escape Room success rates and victory times are NOT about who visits your business. The percentage of those that “get out” and “win” is not directly related to how smart they are. In fact, even though people embrace their escape time with pride, it has little to do with how they performed.…

Secret Expectations for Escape Rooms

By foxnotter | September 19, 2017

Whether you are a franchise or create all your own storylines and props, there are a few unspoken rules that directly relate to your success.  These are secret expectations everyone else has for you.  You can discover them on your own, but why face the frustration?  We are going to share them right here!  Be…

Facebook Marketing Your Escape Room

By foxnotter | September 6, 2017

  Facebook can be useful far beyond the scope of what you spend.  It is an easy tool that gives incredible feedback about the people that spend money at your escape room business.  You can easily learn about the demographic by testing various campaigns and spending very little.  For a few bucks you can launch advertisements into…

Marketing an Escape Room

By foxnotter | September 6, 2017

There are so many ways to market a product or service.  Knowing how to market your new escape room experience is tough, hopefully this post will save you time and money.  With internet marketing firms breaking geographical barriers that used to exist, everyone can reach everyone now.  In fact, that is part of the problem.…

Escape Room – Remixed

By foxnotter | August 18, 2017

     We don’t consider FOX-N-OTTER Adventure Puzzle Rooms to be the first Escape Room company in Asheville at all.  In fact, give respect and honoring nods to A-Escape and Enter the Conundrum for pioneering the way and showing continually creative options to Asheville without featuring franchise models!  Great entrepreneurs at A-Escape and Enter the…

Organic Escape Room?

By foxnotter | July 28, 2017

Part of what makes FOX-N-OTTER a unique and exciting Asheville Escape Room is that we believe in providing an organic escape game experience.  Organic is a trendy, perhaps over-hyped word, but it is rarely applied to an experience, so I’ll explain.  Escape games are popular worldwide because they give participants an active role in discovery,…

bloopers from overthinking and oversearching

Escape Room Bloopers & Humor in Human Error

By foxnotter | July 14, 2017

There is a reason why blooper-reels, failblogs, outtakes, and captured moments of human blunder are so popular.  People enjoy watching other people fail.  Sometimes it is because of cringeworthy falls or hilarious retorts to situations, but there is just something about the fumbling nature of humans that makes us laugh and feel good.  With all…