CourseHorse has you covered with a wide range of fun and accessible corporate events that you can schedule for teams of up to 250. CourseHorse offers everything from simple and accessible group trivia nights to cooking and mixology classes to art studios. CourseHorses also strives to make the process as simple for you and your team as possible by handling all of the scheduling and logistics involved in setting up your corporate event. Many of the events even come with included materials that can be shipped directly to your employees’ homes in preparation for the event. If you are interested in scheduling a fun and memorable corporate event, continue reading to learn more about the virtual offerings available through CourseHorse.
Can Corporate Events Be Fun?
While corporate events can feel like obligations and extensions of the work day, with the proper planning and attention to detail, these events can be fun, productive uses of your employees’ time and energy. The events put on by CourseHorse aren’t your bog-standard tedious lectures or presentations. Instead, they are engaging and interactive team-building activities that will bring your employees together to play games, compete with one another, learn new skills or just enjoy an evening together participating in a fun corporate event.
Not only are these events fun, but they can also have a lot of practical benefits for teams and employees. First, it can improve job satisfaction and employee retention since these events can make participants more fond of their company and its services. In addition, these events often double as team-building activities since many will find employees and team members working together to complete a task or simply getting to know one another better as they participate in laid-back, fun online activities. Taken together, these two practical benefits can lead to more productive workers and increased morale as employees work better together and have fonder opinions about their place in the company. If nothing else, these kinds of fun corporate events will give employees something to look forward to during their workday, which can reduce some of the stress and feelings of drudgery that come with a 9-5 shift.Â
Virtual Private Trivia Night
Bar trivia is one of the easiest and most surefire ways to bring a team together for a fun evening working together and enjoying one another’s company. These kinds of events are easy to replicate in a virtual environment, and CourseHorse offers a wide range of different Virtual Trivia Night options for companies and groups to customize their experience. All of these events are one-hour trivia contests where teams of up to 200 people will test their knowledge on various subjects as individuals or as small groups (depending on your preference and the size of your event). The event will be overseen by a trained, high-energy facilitator who will do almost all of the heavy lifting involved in getting your team engaged and having fun. Normally, trivia lasts for an hour and consists of four rounds of questions, but this can be customized and altered to fit your needs and the needs of your team.
CourseHorse offers dozens of different themed trivia options for you to choose from if you want a more focused event for your team. While general knowledge trivia is available, you can also opt for things like movie trivia, music trivia, or sports trivia. There are also thematic trivia events focusing on important social issues such as Pride Month trivia, Black History Month trivia or Women’s History Month trivia. Beyond this, there are also a huge variety of pop culture trivia competitions, including things as specific as Game of Thrones trivia, Seinfeld trivia, or True Crime trivia. If none of the options advertised are what you are looking for, there are even options available for customizing your own trivia night and working with CourseHorse’s team of trivia experts to build a personalized evening of trivia. With so many options to choose from, you are certain to find an event that meets your needs.
Virtual Terrarium Workshop (Materials Included)
One of CourseHorse’s most popular programs is their Virtual Terrarium Building Workshop, during which teams of up to 250 attendees will be guided through the process of building their own living terrarium that they can put on their desks or display at their homes. Attendees will learn the principles of Feng Shui as they carefully design their terrariums to create balance and harmony within the space. Using succulents, mosses, rocks and soil, participants will create their own personal oasis in a glass container and they will learn the skills they need to expand their terrarium designs to larger spaces and containers. All participants will have a package of materials sent to their homes, including the glass terrarium and a collection of succulents, reindeer moss, decorative rocks, succulent soil and crystals. This means that participants won’t need to do much to prepare for the event, since all of the plants will be provided for them.
Events like this are great activities if you are looking for a stress-reducing, creative activity for your employees to participate in. Building terrariums is a slow, peaceful activity that anyone can do on their own, so it isn’t competitive nor does it require a lot of energy. This makes it a great way to unwind after a long day of work and means that all of your employees will be able to participate in the workshop. Since the materials are provided, attendees will be sure that they have the supplies they need to start building their terrariums and they will have a baseline that they can build off of if they decide that they want to continue learning how to create these living works of art. Even if this is the only terrarium building that an employee ever does, they will still leave the event with a completed terrarium that they can display at their homes or on their workstations.
Virtual Mixology Workshop
Employees of a company going out for drinks after work is a time-honored tradition and the foundation of the modern concept of Happy Hour. Even if your employees are working from home, they can participate in this bonding activity and learn new skills in CourseHorse’s Virtual Mixology Workshop. In this program, attendees will learn how to make a trio of classic cocktails that they can enjoy as they unwind at the end of the workday. These drinks will vary from workshop to workshop (CourseHorse offers seasonal cocktail classes and special courses such as their Pride Month Mixology course) and in this program, attendees will learn how to make a classic Old Fashioned, a Mint Julep and a ginger lime margarita. In addition to learning how to make these drinks in particular, attendees will learn about the history of mixology and the general process of bartending, including how to modify recipes and make substitutions to ensure that a drink tastes exactly like you want it to taste. This means that not only will attendees be learning how to make a few specific cocktails, but they will also be learning how to start making complex drinks of their own.
All participants will have a package of materials shipped to them, including much of the necessary bar equipment like a Hawthorne strainer and a jigger for measuring ingredients. Depending on the cocktails covered in the course, the package will also include garnishes, artisanal syrups and bitters and cocktail picks. Attendees will receive a gift card that they can use to purchase the necessary spirits or they can use what they have available to them. These courses are fairly customizable for planners and attendees and the skills that participants learn can help them show off to their friends and family. Regardless of whether or not an attendee pursues more mixology training, everyone who participates in the class will end with a trio of cocktails to enjoy after work, making this a great way to wind down after a long day on the job.
Virtual Escape Rooms
Escape rooms are popping up everywhere and they are a great team-building experience and a chance to flex your problem-solving skills with friends and colleagues. CourseHorse offers a wide variety of virtual escape room options to allow teams of employees to participate in the process of solving puzzles and resolving a mystery without needing to leave their homes. In addition, unlike a physical escape room (which, as a room, can only accommodate groups of certain sizes), up to 200 attendees. These events will see participants divided up into teams that will work with facilitators to solve puzzles, gather clues, piece together information and ultimately solve a mystery, escape a room or resolve a central conflict within the game. This is a great opportunity to build teamwork skills and bring your employees together as they work to solve the puzzle in under an hour as an added bonus, like most escape rooms, these challenges reward lateral thinking skills and attention to detail, making them good ways to help your employees build transferable skills as they participate in an enjoyable evening of virtual puzzle solving.
CourseHorse has a number of different virtual escape room options available for you to choose from. If you are interested in a traditional murder virtual murder mystery, CourseHorse runs a Virtual Escape Room: Murder Mystery event that sees participants piecing together clues to solve a crime before the murderer strikes again. If you feel like your team would enjoy a bit of nostalgia with their puzzles, CourseHorse offers an Escape the 90s and an Escape the 2000s event where participants will be rewarded for their knowledge of those two decades. There is a Sci-Fi themed The Final Frontier escape event, a horror-themed Monsters and Ghouls event and even themed events like a Marvel Avengers or Jumanji escape rooms. CourseHorse can even help customize the events to fit your team's needs and desires, making this an ideal way to bring teams together for an evening of fun, competitive puzzle-solving.
Virtual Painting Classes
If you are looking for a less competitive or contest-driven fun corporate event, you may want to consider holding a virtual painting course for your team. These courses, which can focus on acrylic painting or watercolor painting, represent low-stakes, stress-free outlets to help your employees relax and flex their creative muscles. These courses aim to introduce attendees to the history of painting and the ways in which it can be a relaxing and enjoyable activity to wind down after a long day of work. Since painting can be a therapeutic and relaxing experience, hosting a virtual painting session can be a fun way to help your team unwind and de-stress after a particularly stressful day of work or near the end of a complex project. All of these courses are helmed by an experienced art instructor who can guide groups of up to 200 through the beginning steps of painting and help them open up their creative eye to the possibilities offered by a blank canvas.Â
CourseHorse aims to make these classes as accessible as possible, so as it is being set up, you’ll be able to choose from a wide catalog of images that participants will be able to paint. If none of these appeal to you, or you want to make the event extra unique, you can even send in your own photograph that will be transferred onto the canvas in advance of the program. Then, participants will have a canvas (with the image already sketched onto it) and a collection of acrylic or watercolor paints and brushes mailed directly to their homes. This makes the event an ideal place for painters of all levels to practice the art of painting in a relaxed and carefree environment. Mirroring the structure of a paint and sip course, there isn’t any pressure to already be a talented artist, since the structure of the program aims to be as beginner-friendly as possible. Also like a paint and sip course, the class is ideally enjoyed in a relaxed atmosphere with an adult beverage on hand. CourseHorse will even ship bottles of wine directly to participants for an added fee.
Virtual Sushi Making Course
One kind of practical and enjoyable virtual corporate event is a cooking class, like CourseHorse’s Virtual Sushi Making Course. This is because not only are the skills you pick up in a course like this practical skills that participants can make use of in their everyday life, but on a more personal level, they are courses that end with attendees having taken care of the trouble of making dinner after work. Sushi making, in particular, is popular because it is a well-loved food that is versatile and easy to make. You don’t need a lot of ingredients to make it a success and you can customize the offerings to suit your tastes. For example, if you aren’t a fan of raw fish, there is a wide range of vegetable options to choose from or you can use things like prepared fish, crab or other ingredients. Plus, sushi can be prepared as an easy lunch, a complete dinner or part of a serving platter for guests at a party. Once you know how to make a hand roll and some sauces, the possibilities are virtually endless.
This class is fairly open-ended and will give attendees the opportunity to customize the meal that they are preparing. All participants will have a package of ingredients shipped to them, including a bamboo rolling mat, reusable chopsticks, sushi rice, rice vinegar, sesame seeds, nori, soy sauce, wasabi, and pickled ginger. They will also receive a gift card that can be used to purchase the fish or vegetables that will make up the sushi filling. This means that attendees won’t be obligated to make salmon or tuna if they don’t want nor will they have to worry that the fish might not have fully survived the shipping process. Lessons will focus on broad techniques such as cutting ingredients, preparing rice, hand-rolling maki and preparing sashimi or sushi. This means that at the end of the course, each participant will have a unique set of rolls and sashimi ready to eat and they will have gotten hands-on experience making a meal that they can continue to replicate with the tools provided by CourseHorse.
Virtual Pizza Making from Scratch Workshop
If you don’t think that sushi is the route you want your team to take, CourseHorse offers a wide range of other cooking classes, like their Virtual Pizza Making Workshop. In this course, participants will get hands-on training in the process of making pizza dough, rolling out and topping that dough and baking the perfect pizza. This program aims to teach participants how to cook pizza in their home ovens, so minimal special kitchen tools will be required to get the pizza prepared. In this program, participants will learn the basics of pizza making and they will learn about the history of the dish and various regional and cultural traditions that are commonly associated with pizza making. This event focuses on preparing a classic Italian pizza from scratch, but once you’ve mastered the basics, you’ll be ready to start preparing New York, Detroit, St. Louis or even Chicago-style pizza in no time.
All participants will have a box of ingredients shipped to their houses in advance of the event and the program aims to be accessible for attendees of all skill levels when it comes to home cooking. The package will contain all the ingredients needed to prepare the dough and the tomato sauce and it includes a gift card for participants to purchase toppings like cheese, meat, peppers and vegetables. Since pizza is such a versatile food, you’ll be able to start making pizza regardless of the toppings you opt for. In addition, there are options available for gluten-free recipes and preparation methods, meaning participants with dietary restrictions will have full access to the lessons being taught (though gluten-free participants will need to provide their own flour for the course).
Virtual Cooking Baking Workshop
Perhaps you think that your employees would prefer a fewer strenuous, dessert-making experience over a full-on meal preparation cooking class. If this is the case, you may want to consider setting up a Virtual Cookie Baking Workshop for your next corporate event. This fun and laid-back baking experience will see attendees making two very popular cookies: traditional chocolate chip cookies and delicate lemon crinkles. An expert baker will guide your team members through all of the steps of preparing these cookies in their home kitchens, giving them recipes and techniques that they can replicate whenever they feel the desire to make fancy desserts. The practical skills that participants learn will be applicable on most baking projects and, most importantly, at the end of the session, all of the participants will have dozens of freshly baked cookies that they can enjoy as a group.
Every participant will have a package of supplies shipped directly to their homes, including all of the non-perishable ingredients necessary for baking the cookies and a gift certificate for purchasing the perishable items. Students can also substitute ingredients with ease to account for dietary restrictions or taste preferences. The cookie-baking course isn’t the only dessert-making option offered by CourseHorse. Interested parties can book a Virtual Truffle Making Workshop, a Virtual Ice Cream Making Workshop, or a Virtual Apple Pie Baking Workshop, among many other cooking workshops.
Virtual Wine and Cheese Tasting
A wine and cheese tasting is a staple part of any sufficiently fancy reception and is often a staple of a professional mixer or meet and greet. CourseHorse offers the opportunity to take this event and bring it right to your employees' homes with their Virtual Wine and Cheese Tasting event. In this event, participants will be guided through a tasting of wine and cheese pairings by an experienced sommelier who can explain for attendees the history and processes that have gone into the creation of each of the two wines and cheeses. In addition to the tasting, participants will have a chance to ask questions and have an open conversation about their feelings on each of the samples and the broader world of wine and cheese. This is a wonderful event to hold for teams that just want an opportunity to relax and enjoy a fun and sociable activity that can easily be translated to a virtual space.
All of the materials that participants require will be mailed directly to their homes, including two fine kinds of cheese provided by Murray’s Cheese (usually French Goat cheese and a Sharp Cheddar, but options will regularly rotate). In addition, participants will receive two bottles of wine, usually a French Sauvignon Blanc and an Argentinian Malbec. Alternative options are available through consultation with CourseHorse. This array of samples will provide attendees with a fairly straightforward introduction to types of cheese and wine they would be unlikely to encounter in most settings, making this a fun and easy corporate event to plan and build interest in.
Virtual Game Night
Beyond just trivia and escape rooms, CourseHorse offers various options for fun and accessible games, activities and icebreakers. These programs make for a fun and accessible way for any member of your team to participate in a group activity, and they let participants bond as they work together as part of a team. For example, CourseHorse regularly hosts a Virtual Scavenger Hunt that will see participants playing a range of minigames to uncover clues about the items that they need to collect from around their homes. In Virtual Game Show Bingo, participants will play a modified version of Bingo that will test their pop culture knowledge and their ability to do internet research. If you are looking for a more tactile gaming experience, the Virtual Brick Building Team Challenge will see teams working with physical LEGO bricks and playing a collection of games to see which team is best at building and communicating.Â
All of these games and more can be combined into a Virtual Team Olympics event that will see your employees or team members competing with one another for bragging rights and prizes. These events are infinitely customizable, and you can be in contact with CourseHorse to shape the exact kind of virtual game night you want your team to experience. This customization allows organizers to design a fun and accessible corporate event around the wants and needs of their teams rather than being locked into the options provided by a service provider. No matter what kind of games you hope your team will participate in, CourseHorse can help you incorporate the elements you want into your event, including adding specific kinds of trivia, scavenger hunt events or icebreaker minigames.