
Board Games Night At The Shop
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I always knew from the founding of My Carbon Coach that I wanted it to be much more than just a shop. I wanted it to be all about community and support. Over the past three years this has predominantly manifested through the litter picks I organise under the Tidy Up Taunton Banner. So when I moved into my beautiful shop at the start of 2024 and it had an upstairs space I just knew it was meant to be.
My Carbon Coach on Lower Middle Street used to be a restaurant, and so the upstairs had been an additional seating area. And strangely enough before it was the Mango Tree vegan restaurant it was a board games cafe called Hexagon. It’s funny how these things work out.
And so at the start of October having spent some time painting, and buying in new tables and chairs it was time to launch some events. I picked Thursday nights as that’s traditionally a late night shopping evening, and created five different evenings. A board games night, a cosy craft club, Animal Crossing evening, arts club, and finally a third attempt at getting an eco book club off the ground.
Tickets were a very cheap introductory £2 per person and within 24 hours both the board game and the craft evenings were fully booked which really blew me away, how cool! Then it was just a case of waiting for last Thursday to roll around. I was nervous. I’d never hosted a board games night before! What if my selection of games was outdated? What if my snacks weren’t up to scratch?
Thankfully I was worrying unnecessarily. As everyone turned up there were smiles all around. A few people had brought their own games, and while I’d arranged the tables into separate groups of threes it turned out that everyone was up for a big 8-player game of Camel Up. The rules were explained, the board was set up, cards dealt, and everyone got on with placing bets on the camel race.
There’s been some wonderful feedback too, the main one being that as soon as I announced the next gaming session six of the attendees booked spots for it, high praise indeed. But there’s also some things I can work on, having some background music to fill some of the pauses, and while it wasn’t not allowed the first go around, just making it super clear that everyone is welcome to bring food along or to order takeaways to get delivered to the shop. I was also told that £2 is way too cheap for a ticket!
Because of the success of this pilot I’ve now decided that every Thursday (with a few exceptions) is going to be board game night upstairs at the shop! I love board games myself, and it seems that Taunton does too despite there not being a board game cafe here since the Hexagon cafe closed its doors years ago. Please do keep an eye on the ‘Workshops and Events’ page here on my site for the next dates.