Yes, a band or DJ in the corner is good for a corporate event (god forbid the room is filled with only the noise of business-related small talk), but it’s not exactly one that gets the room going. If we’re all being honest, it’s the free bar that brings the room to life.
The reality is that you can do so much more with business events to actually make them interactive, engaging, and memorable and to either really bring a team together or to help networking move past merely handing out business cards that people lose anyway.
Your corporate event can be so much more than people mingling in a room. With our corporate event entertainment ideas, your guests will be talking about the day/night for the right reasons.
Interactive Photo Booth Entertainment Station
Starting strong with an idea that literally never fails for corporate event entertainment: an interactive photo booth. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a corporate event or a wedding; everyone loves a photo booth, but an interactive one with more than your average props is so much better.
360 video experience
A 360 photo booth is one of your most engaging options. You might have seen videos of them before, but essentially, a camera arm spins around your guests, usually while music plays, and they do whatever poses they want to do.
You can add special effects like slow motion or boomerang (reverse) or a confetti or a fog machine if you want something even more spectacular. Your guests can then download the video using a QR code, or we’ll text or email it.
Roaming photo booth
If you’re hosting a big corporate event, we’d recommend a roaming photo booth. It’s a bit more of an innovative way to entertain and engage your guests who might be a little bit lost in that networking small talk.
The concept is simple. One of our friendly staff will take our handheld portable ring light booths and walk around the venue, asking guests if they want their photos taken.
Like with the 360 video experience, they can download the photo using a QR code, or we’ll text or email it.
Professional Comedian
A comedian is a great way to lighten the mood in the room. And you don’t need to find money in your corporate event entertainment budget for the likes of Kevin Hart or Dave Chappelle; you can use trustworthy booking websites like GigSalad or The Comedian Company and search for someone to hire in almost any state in the US.
You can look to spend anywhere from $100 per hour to the thousands, but it’s well worth it to sort of break the ice in the room and get everyone laughing.
Top tip: before you book your comedian, have a look at their Instagram and other social media pages to see how funny they actually are.
Professional Magician
Similar to a comedian, a magician is so good at breaking the ice and bringing some classic entertainment to the room. You can use GigSalad again, or you can search for something like ‘professional magician in X state’ and type in the state you’re in, and you should find plenty of options.
Again, check their social media before you book them. There would be nothing worse than booking a kids’ magician who pulls colored cloth out of a hat for a room full of 100 professionals sitting in silence.
Casino Night Entertainment
Renting casino equipment and games is one of the best corporate entertainment ideas if you want to make the event a bit more of a theme.
You can hire blackjack and poker tables, which is great if you want to get some competition going, and companies will come and set it up and host the section of the event with professional dealers, so it really will feel like a casino night.
White Felt Casino events or US Casino Rentals are good companies to look at.
Trivia or Team Competition
Why not bring a bit of healthy competition to the event? Again, it’s another perfect way of making the occasion more interactive, and it’s one of the more cost-effective options because you can design the trivia or team competition yourself. Some of the best ideas for trivia or team competitions are the following:
- ‘Who Am I?’: Give 3 to 4 anonymous facts about an employee submitted before the event.
- Name That Tune: Play 10 seconds of popular songs from different eras. Teams write the name of the song title and the artist.
- Corporate Feud: Base this on the famous Family Feud game show. Teams guess the most popular answers to work-themed or general survey questions.
- Scavenger hunt: Design a scavenger hunt by putting items all around and outside your event room, and split your guests into teams. You can then make riddles, use songs with hints, or design trivia questions that reveal clues to where the hidden items are.
Retro Gaming Area
A retro gaming area is so nostalgic, and you can hire everything you need for just the day. We’d recommend going for arcade retro gaming rather than something like console gaming, which is a bit more niche. Everyone loves arcade games and has some memories attached to them.
Some of the most popular retro arcade games you can look at hiring are the following:
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- Pacman machine
- Space Invaders
- Mario Kart (not so much retro retro, but still fun)
- Tekken
- Tetris
- Sonic
You might not find all of these, but it’s an inspiration.
Interactive Cocktail or Mocktail Bar
Whether it’s a cocktail or mocktail, an interactive bar area is the perfect idea to bring some party energy to the room. You can hire a professional mixologist (you sometimes have to buy the alcohol and drinks to stock the bar) who will take your guests through professional cocktail-making lessons. And, of course, the best bit: they get to drink it after they’ve made it.
Wellness or Reset Station
This one is very on trend right now, and we guarantee your guests will love it. The health and wellness industry, and all of the bells and whistles that come with it, is massive on social media, so some would say it’s one of the best entertainment ideas for corporate events.
You could hire a massage therapist, spiritual healer, fortune teller, Reiki master, yoga instructor, Pilates instructor, guided meditation specialist; the list could go on.
Top it off with a healthy reset station with delicious healthy snacks, lemon and ginger tonic shots, green smoothies, etc., and we know your guests will love it.
A Silent Disco
These are so funny from the outside. If you’ve ever been to a silent disco and taken the headphones off for a minute to listen to a silent room, shoes squeaking, and some people singing so out of pitch, you’ll know how funny it is.
For your guests, it’s so much fun, and they seem to make people more carefree with how they move and sing because people can’t hear them (unless they take the headphones off).
Silent Events or Party Headphones are great companies to contact, but you might need to search for a silent disco company slightly closer to your area.
As far as corporate entertainment ideas go, this one isn’t too expensive considering how much fun it can bring to your event.
Live Band or DJ
We had to finish with this one. Yes, we said that entertainment for a corporate event should be more than a live band or DJ, but you should definitely have this in the background or hire a live band or DJ for the end of the event, especially if it’s running into the night.
By the end of the event, everyone should be a little looser and ready to enjoy some music, so it’s the perfect way to get people dancing and finishing the night on a high.
You have so many great options for entertainment for corporate events, but we know that all of the above will leave your guests talking about the day/night for all the right reasons. Book your photo booth today with Kande Photo Booths, and take our corporate party entertainment ideas to make your next event one your guests will never forget.