Event Recap: The Economist Pub Quiz in Washington, DC

Last night, the TrivWorks team had the honor and thrill of helping produce The Economist’s first-ever pub quiz night in Washington, DC!

In a truly special event, we were delighted to host an incredibly fun and festive trivia night in our nation’s capital, with uniquely “highbrow” questions about topics important to Economist readers such as politics, current events, business, economics technology and much more.

Over the course of the evening, attendees of the free event were treated to a fully immersive Economist experience. With over 130 energized enthusiasts of the magazine packed into the spacious upstairs area of The Pour House, located in the heart of Capitol Hill just steps from the U.S. Capitol Building, each participant was provided with a bright red Economist T-shirt and pen upon arrival. After kicking things off with a rousing welcome by Greg Ip, The Economist’s U.S. economics editor, groups were then instructed to come up with a team name, and encouraged to do so with the dry humor characteristic of the magazine.

Our pub quiz began with rounds of specially-customized trivia covering current world events, history, and “smart” Economist-esque pop culture questions about appropriately-themed movies and TV shows. Mr. Ip then announced his “Top 10 Economist Trivia Questions,” after which we plugged in his iPod and asked attendees to identify 10 songs selected at random – offering participants an exclusive peek inside the mind of an Economist editor.

Attendees were then provided with picture sheets, on which there were images of 10 celebrities which they had to not only identify for a point each, but could win 5 bonus points for correctly figuring out what they all had in common. Mr. Ip then raised the stakes by concluded the event with a round of “difficult” questions, which were worth double points.

After raffling off a bag of Economist goodies including an official Economist calendar, notebook and a copy of Mr. Ip’s The Little Book of Economics, Mr. Ip announced the overall winners, providing the enthusiastic team with $50 Economist gift cards, which could be used to purchase anything, anywhere (including a magazine subscription, perhaps?).

Throughout the event, Mr. Ip and other Economist staff circulated the bar and chatted with participants, much to their delight. We also had a great back-channel conversation running throughout the event on Twitter, as attendees shared their experience in real-time using our official #EconPubQuiz hashtag.

On behalf of TrivWorks, I would like to once again thank the incredibly imaginative brand team at The Economist for partnering with us on this unique audience engagement event. In addition to Mr. Ip and The Pour House, we are also so appreciative of the tremendous media promotion this event received from The Washington Post, Greg’s List DC and other outlets. It is such a joy to see a brand with as enthusiastic an audience as The Economist’s, and being able to produce unique trivia brand engagement experiences such as these is a tremendous honor and privilege indeed.

Enjoy your weekend, everybody! Will see you again next week.