Give your team a recreational reboot through creative, multicultural and immersive team-building experiences.
Innovative ideas are never in short supply in Toronto, a city that has always been ahead of the curve when it comes to inventive business trends and productive team-building concepts. Now more than ever, groups can gain a new perspective on old obstacles with engaging activities that promote original thinking along with good old-fashioned communication.
1. Tour the town on a group scavenger hunt with Urban Capers
Historical, multicultural, social, creative and competitive, the hosted tours by Urban Capers Scavenger Hunt are a couple of hours well spent for groups of 10 to 500. Players track down destination missions, answer tricky questions and complete creative challenges before time runs out. Discover the unsung secrets of the St. Lawrence Market, the whisky tales of the Distillery District, the mysteries of the Royal Ontario Museum and the hidden history lurking Downtown.
2. Level the playing field with a bocce-golf game hybrid at Lob
At Lob in Riverside, groups can bond over a competitive and fun game in which players toss balls down a series of nine different tracks toward a marker, trying to knock each other out of play. Perfect for company meetings, entertaining clients, fundraising or product launches, Lob is like a backyard turf game with a built-in pub, plus burgers and fries. Corporate-party add-ons include medal packages, celebratory cake and a DJ.
3. Kick it up a notch in the kitchen at Le Dolci
Pastry, bread, macarons, croissants, pies, scones, cinnamon buns, doughnuts, cupcakes—the menu is long at Le Dolci Bakery & Culinary Classroom in the Junction neighbourhood. Fun and easy-to-follow classes in a variety of culinary arts educate and entertain groups in the making of their favourite sweets. There’s even cake and cookie decorating. The best part? You get to taste your wares, of course.
4. Test your useless knowledge at a trivia night with Quiz Coconut
Fun, affordable and inclusive, professional trivia events never get tiring. The pros at Quiz Coconut have this down pat, bringing customizable pub-style trivia fun to your meeting or corporate event. Catering to groups of 20 to 500, the entertaining hosts help build rapport, integrate new people into the office or just lift spirits in general. Great for people of all ages and cultural backgrounds, accessible to newcomers and native Torontonians alike.
5. Sing it loud and proud at a private karaoke night at Bar Mordecai
One of Toronto’s top cocktail bars—right in the thick of the Dundas Street West strip—doubles as a superb destination for karaoke. Visitors to the basement at Bar Mordecai find a colourful environment of four separate karaoke rooms, each lavishly decorated with a different music theme—settle into the Elvis Room, the Vegas Room, the Jolene Room or the Pop Room. A larger outer bar, the Green Room, is a welcome retreat between vocal sessions.
6. Energize your team with a trip to Sgt. Splatter’s Project Paintball
Burn stress through movement at this paintball palace, a combat zone of ramshackle buildings and decrepit cars. Canada’s largest indoor paintball field has been heeding the battle cry for more than 25 years, unleashing the warriors within this 3,250-square-metre space spread over two storeys. Open 364 days of the year.
7. Challenge their puzzle-solving skills in Looking Glass Adventures
The escape-room trend is here to stay. Designed with groups of different stripes in mind, the corporate-friendly escape-room experiences at Looking Glass Adventures are the best in town. Visitors choose from four private games: sift through the artifacts of a renowned archaeologist, wander through the attic of a paranormal researcher, go on assignment like a secret agent or comb the shelves of a cryptic wizardry shop. And if you need help, there’s no shame in getting a tip from the in-game phone.
8. Send the team’s taste buds on a sightseeing culinary adventure
A food tour is a great way to venture out into the city, exploring the delicious and multicultural culinary delights of the various food-forward parts of town. Sip and savour some of the best food Toronto has to offer, whether it’s a dash through Kensington Market, a tasting exploration of Chinatown or Little Italy, a walk through St. Lawrence Market or a pub-crawl to the city’s top breweries. Bonding through eating is a ritual as old as time itself.
9. Think on your feet with an improv class at The Second City
Business professionals can improve their communication skills—and maybe get to know each other a little bit better at the same time—through storytelling and public speaking at the largest improvisational and sketch-comedy school in the world. The Second City training centre will help your team connect through laughter, based on your specific corporate culture and objectives, strengthening interactivity, agility and sales-effectiveness.
10. Indulge your inner Picasso at the Paint Cabin
Add a dash of colour to your team-building event with a session at the Paint Cabin. Groups get their creative juices flowing, along with a few drinks, cheered on by visual-arts instructors. A Leslieville site accommodates from five to 15 people, while a newer Liberty Village location can handle up to 100 guests. Workshops can be as varied and as custom-tailored as you like, as your team takes to their canvases, creates wooden signs or explores print-making. You can also break out the blacklight paint for a glow-in-the-dark DJ paint party.
11. Reinstate recess at Pursuit OCR, Toronto’s largest indoor adult playground
Groups get in touch with their inner child at Pursuit OCR, testing their speed and strength through climbing and crawling, jumping and plunging. The team-building obstacle course winds through itself, an open-concept, 2,800-square-metre industrial space, offering almost 20 different challenges involving monkey bars, a climbing wall, aerial ropes and a foam pit. You don’t have to be an athlete, but it helps.
12. Get everybody out for an engaging and energizing game night
Find a mix of entertainment, bonding, learning and camaraderie with the disrupters at It’s Game Night. Specializing in unique interactive antics, with facilitators that are with you every step of the way, they promise fun and games during work hours or after, at your workplace or at the event space of your choice. Go head-to-head with your workmates with Game Shows, Office Olympics, Mafia Mysteries and even a Mobile Escape Room.
13. Settle a few scores on a glow-in-the-dark battlefield
Archery Circuit is safe and fun, and best of all—painless. Snipe and shoot your colleagues playing combat archery tag using foam-tipped arrows in an immersive black light arena. Simply choose from an assortment of bows, don face masks, arm guards and helmets, and get primal. All the equipment for archery, nerf blasters or dodgeball is provided, along with orientation. Suits from six to 30 players.
14. Strap on a harness and drive your workmates up the wall
Tailored climbing programs are a definite specialty at Toronto Climbing Academy in Scarborough for groups of six to 100. Taking your co-workers indoor climbing is both thrilling and challenging, plus it encourages problem-solving and cooperation—not to mention the obvious confidence boost. Team-building initiative challenges can include blindfolded climbing, team tag, follow-the-leader and more.
15. Go big with global-scope corporate-event facilitators
Teambonders
With 25 years of experience throughout North America, the corporate-event facilitators at Teambonders get your team thinking outside the box. Inclusive, interactive and custom-tweaked events hinge on a variety of activities, including scavenger hunts, game shows, puzzle-solving, challenge games, food and drink, music and more. Camaraderie and cooperation are key and the variety of both in-person and virtual events to choose from is considerable.
Team Higher Ground
This international team-building company is renowned for its inventive training and interactive techniques. They work with some of the world’s most successful companies through more than 50 different kinds of events, broken down into eight categories, that include culinary, giving back, nighttime and adventure learning. Activities can include a cake back-off, Olympic parody, team dance-off, spy school, go-kart racing, catapult-building and more, promoting strategy, leadership and communication.
Teamland
Fitness, wellness, exploration, charity, cooking, creativity—embolden your group with a Teamland experience and see the refreshed look on everyone’s faces. Inventive activities can be filtered through the website’s Idea Generator, sifting through in-person, virtual and hybrid activities like beekeeping, ice-sculpting, office Olympics, carnival games, scavenger hunts, game shows and sushi-making – the list goes on. Highly recommended by a very elite international client list.
