When Should You Start Planning Your Company Holiday Party?
Late summer, from August into September, is a great time to start planning your company holiday party.
If you’re the person organizing the company celebration, starting as early as August can take a lot of pressure off as the holidays get closer. Once the date, venue, and major vendors are sorted, the rest of the event can come together at a much more manageable pace.
In this article, we’ll look at why planning your company holiday party early matters, what's worth booking as soon as possible, and what can wait until later.
What Should You Book First?
If you’re only ready to think about a few things, start with these:
Date
Venue
Catering
Entertainment
These are usually the pieces with the least flexibility once holiday-party season gets busy. Everything else can wait.
Knotty Games’ handcrafted games give guests an easy way to play, mingle and connect.
Get the Date Out of the Way
There are only so many weekends during holiday party season, and a lot of companies are looking at the same ones.
If your team has some flexibility, it helps to come up with a few possible dates rather than getting attached to one right away. That gives you a much better shot at getting the venue and vendors you actually want.
The sooner you choose a date, the less likely you are to be left picking from whatever’s still available.
Pro tip: There’s no rule saying a holiday party has to happen right before December 25. Late fall can work just as well. So can a celebration in the new year, when calendars are quieter, and people have something to look forward to after the holiday rush.
Start With What You Know
Maybe there’s a venue everyone loved last year. Maybe you already know which caterer you want. Maybe the last company party involved a lot of people standing around with drinks, and you want to give them something more to do this time.
Think about what has or hasn’t worked in the past. It’s an easy way to start figuring out what you want this year’s party to look like. If your company is newer, or your team has grown a lot since your last event, ask around. Someone may have experience with a local venue or supplier that works well for a group your size.
There’s a big difference between spending the final few weeks choosing prizes and spending them desperately trying to find a venue that can fit your entire team.
Wall Ball Maze adds a quick, hands-on challenge to an indoor game zone.
Think About How To Keep People Connecting
At some point, everyone has caught up with the coworkers they already know and starts looking around for something else to do.
Games give people an easy reason to move around, join another group and talk to someone new without making the whole thing feel like a networking exercise.
It’s a lot easier to strike up a conversation with someone from another department when you’re both watching a Giant Jenga tower wobble toward disaster.
And if someone doesn’t want to play, that’s fine too. Half the fun can be watching coworkers get much more competitive than anyone expected.
Related Read: The Best Games for the Great Indoors
Make Sure the Venue Actually Has Room
Before you start planning what games you want to go for, take a realistic look at the room.
Ask yourself:
Where will guests naturally gather?
Which areas need to stay clear?
Is there somewhere that could become a game zone without getting in the way?
You want any activity areas close enough that people notice them, but not so close to the main traffic areas that they become an obstacle.
Choose Games That Work Indoors
You don’t need the biggest setup to make an indoor holiday party fun. In fact, choosing the right mix is usually more important than squeezing in as many games as possible.
A few quick head-to-head games can keep people moving. Familiar favourites make it easy for anyone to jump in. Something like Plinko can become part of a prize draw or giveaway while doubling as entertainment.
Related Read: 8 Creative Ways to Use Plinko At Your Next Event
How Organized Do You Want the Games to Be?
For a lot of company holiday parties, open play is great. Set up the games and let people wander over when they feel like it, and see which ones become the favourites.
But if your team is particularly competitive, you can add a little structure with a casual tournament. Split everyone into teams, keep a scoreboard, and find a ridiculous trophy that the winner (or loser) has to display at their desk until the next party.
Games can work well for giveaways too. Plinko is an easy example: each pocket can lead to a prize, a challenge or an extra entry into a larger draw.
Not all games have to take up a lot of room. Tower of Hanoi is a great tabletop option that gets people thinking, connecting and competing without eating up valuable floor space.
Get The Boring Stuff Out Of The Way Early
Before the party gets close, confirm things like:
When vendors can enter the venue
Where equipment can be unloaded
Whether an elevator needs to be reserved
Setup and pickup windows
Parking
Accessibility
Coat and bag storage
Who the day-of contact will be
Whether anything needs to move before dinner, speeches or dancing
None of this is particularly glamorous, but it all makes the event run better.
For Vancouver company holiday parties, sorting these details out early also gives your venue and vendors more time to coordinate delivery and setup.
Leave Yourself Some Wiggle Room
Planning early doesn’t mean locking yourself into every decision. It’s totally normal for your guest count to change, for a better theme to come along, or for the catering menu to need a few tweaks.
The point is to book the things that get harder to find as the season gets closer, then leave yourself room to have some fun with the rest.
That’s one of the best parts of starting early. You can change your mind without turning it into an emergency.
Find a Game Package That Fits Your Holiday Party
If games are a part of the night, we’ve got you covered.
Knotty Games has four curated packages to give you a starting point:
Classic 5 offers a versatile lineup of 5 games for smaller gatherings.
Party 8 adds more variety with 6 classic games and 2 signature games.
Celebration 12 creates a larger, high-energy game zone with 8 classic games and 4 signature games.
Signature 16 offers 10 classic games and 6 signature games for the full Knotty Games experience at large corporate events and celebrations.
You can choose one of our pre-selected combinations, build your own package from the Knotty Games fleet, or tell us what you’re planning and let us help.
Send us your guest count, venue, available space and the kind of party you have in mind. We can help put together a setup that feels right for the room and the people in it.
Ready to get one thing crossed off your holiday party planning list? Take a look at our curated game packages or build your own from the Knotty Games list.
Knotty Games provides handcrafted game rentals for company holiday parties and corporate events throughout Vancouver, the Lower Mainland and the Sea to Sky Corridor.
