On a warm, midsummer Monday evening, the bingo players assemble at Trail house in Santa Rosa. A bicycle shop seems an unlikely location for a bingo night. However, Trail house isn’t your traditional bike shop, and this isn’t your traditional game of bingo, evidenced by a healthy attendance of Millennials eager to shout, “B-I-N-G-O!”
Santa Rosa native Jake Ward crafts a unique bingo and trivia experience, updating the traditional games with inventive twists played out to a modern soundtrack. The events draw loyal crowds yearning to reconnect with their community in a post-pandemic world.
Ward hosted his first weekly trivia night at Chevy’s in Railroad Square in 2013; by 2016 he was hosting several weekly trivia nights around the North Bay. By 2018, Ward decided to launch the North Bay Trivia and North Bay Bingo Companies.
“Most people don’t realize that when you go to a trivia night, they are often organized by national corporate entities. One business we work with had a company that was a corporatized-trivia and that went under, and we were able to take over and its extension of supporting local,” Ward says. “We’re seeing a shift from the national companies that do these events, to local people organizing them.”
The events and the businesses that host them are a reflection of the locally minded, community-ethos that permeates much of the North Bay. Ward hires local artists and entertainers to assist in running the events and shifted away from working with chain restaurants to local businesses, which he feels is more gratifying to support. The support for local businesses is proving vital following the crippling financial blow of COVID-19.
“As soon as outdoor dining was approved, some businesses started reaching out to get bingo and trivia night going again. It’s become pretty common as a way to generate revenue on slower weeknights. People will come out on a Monday or Tuesday night,” Ward says.
Shady Oak Barrel House in Santa Rosa works with Ward in hosting events. The events are proving essential in the business’s ability to bounce back from the pandemic. Owner Steve Doty didn’t qualify for the safety net of government assistance and says the nights of Ward’s events are more important than before in terms of revenue.
“We’re so busy those nights that we have the events. It’s a weird feeling to have to turn away people, but I have to because the events are so popular,” Doty says. “On paper the thing we sell is beer, but we also sell our place and community and Jake is a big part of that.”
Shady Oak lays claim to the biggest beer garden in Santa Rosa, a space Doty and Ward developed in the safest possible way to host events at the taproom when outdoor dining returned. Ward admits that initially, he had hesitations on resuming the events and being complicit in telling people to gather in a crowd.
“It became a question of what is the safest way we can possibly do this?” Ward says. “The answer sheets and markers we use are things everyone touches. We laminated answer sheets that we sanitize with alcohol, we place hand sanitizer at every table and spaced them six feet apart for social distancing.”
Jessika Frazer, an event host who works with Ward, says the returning crowds thus far have been friendly and understanding with the changes. Frazer has seen this respectfulness extend to the business hosting as well. “If you can get rapport with people who go to these events, it translates to the restaurants and building community rapport for the wait staff and being treated respectfully,” Frazer says.
The demand for the return of bingo and trivia nights comes as something of a surprise to Frazer and Ward. Frazer recently hosted North Bay Trivia’s first event at Bear Republic in Rohnert Park and says the room was full of people eager to play.
“People told me that it’s what they look forward to each week, and something that’s fun and interactive where they feel like they are being responsible,” Ward says. “These nights seem to be more popular after COVID-19 than before, and maybe that’s due to the isolation from 2020. Its live entertainment and connecting people socially as well.”
Ward is pleasantly surprised with how much of a win-win the events are in generating vital revenue for the hosting businesses and the event emcees that make supplemental income from hosting. Another surprise for Ward is the growing demographic interested in these events.
“It’s been interesting to see a lot of Millennials and Gen Z that want to go out and do this,” Ward Says. “The joke about bingo is: it’s just for the little old ladies. That’s proven not to be the case.”
To learn more about the events and schedule, visit northbayevents.com
