Aside from food and drinks, trivia games are giving students another reason to go to bars and restaurants.
Mellow Mushroom features trivia every Wednesday night. In a restaurant where relaxation is a part of the creed and patrons find the names of bands such as 311, The Allman Brothers and Pink Floyd inscribed into tabletops, customers gather and play trivia on a large screen suspended from the ceiling of the restaurant.
“Our turnout on Wednesday night is usually about 80 to 150 people,” said Clark Gaines, co-owner of Mellow Mushroom. Gaines brought trivia to Mellow Mushroom after seeing trivia’s popularity in other Mellow Mushroom locations. “They have trivia in a couple other Mellow Mushroom restaurants in Georgia, and it’s been successful,” he said.
Gaines describes the crowd as mainly groups of college friends who come to socialize and participate in trivia.
“We have prizes. We give away t-shirts and gift certificates,” said Gaines.
Damon’s Sports Bar hosts popular trivia. Sarah Turner, a mass communication junior, waitresses at Damon’s. Turner said trivia remains a cornerstone of the Damon’s experience and attracts younger crowds. Damon’s subscribes to NTN, an interactive trivia network linked to other restaurants around the country. Players compete against players in both the restaurant and in other restaurants.
“We opened about four years ago, and we’ve had it right from the beginning. All of the Damon’s have trivia,” she said.
Damon’s trivia differs from trivia games at other restaurants, Turner said.
“It gives you hints,” Turner said. “It’s a different type of trivia; it’s not like a yes or no answer. They give you hints, and the more hints they give the less points you get.”
Many Damon’s patrons immediately begin interactive trivia once they enter the restaurant.
“People walk in, grab their trivia box and sit down to play it,” Turner said.
In addition to normal trivia games, elite trivia players can compete with people at other locations. With NTN’s Players Plus trivia, players sign up after they have so many points and compete with all the trivia players at all Damon’s, Turner said.
“If you look in between the games, they tell you rankings of people all over and who’s the highest,” she said. “But the serious people are Players Plus players. They’ve got their own code.”
The code enables the player to log into the trivia network and compete with those at other locations.
The diversity of players is key at Damon’s.
“It’s everybody,” Turner said. “Everybody comes in and does it. The only people who don’t really play it are at lunch and come in for only an hour on their lunch breaks. But besides that everyone plays.”