Being A Games Demonstrator

For my seventh #BlogMas post I thought I’d share my newly discovered life vocation.
While seeking employment, I felt encouraged to sign up with the good people at Asmodee to become a games demonstrator.
After sending them an email expressing my interest and completing the standard admin stuff, a box of games turned up complete with two purple games demonstrator t-shirts.

I was on the team.
Being a Zero hours contract meant that it’s not exactly regular work that’ll pay the mortgage, but I can pick and choose which of the available days and locations I wish to work.
So far, I’ve only demoed in Waterstones and John Lewis, but it’s been an absolute blast. The first few times I was chaperoned by a more experienced demonstrator who was full of helpful advice and ideas, but then I was on my own. Yes, some days are a bit on the quiet side and can be a bit of a drag, but there are games to be occupied with.
Then that magic moment happens and someone wanders over and wants to know about everything on the table. “What’s this?”, “What about that?”, “What do you do with this?” and it’s great showing off the games. It has been stressed that we are not salesmen. We are not expected to get people to buy the games, only increase their awareness and appreciation of them. Regardless, there is a sense of immense satisfaction seeing a copy of Ticket To Ride: Europe or Pandemic making its way to the till to be purchased by someone who didn’t even know the game existed mere minutes before.

So let this be a big thank you to Asmodee for helping me to discover a job I can do that doesn’t even feel like work.