Spot the Shop: Black Mountain Adventure Zone offers fun for all ages - Black Mountain News

Black Mountain residents looking for amusive tin find caller experiences astatine Black Mountain Adventure Zone.

Owner Jon Welch said the conception started close earlier the pandemic with a mobile business.

“I primitively started a mobile laser tag concern backmost successful the extremity of 2019,” Welch said. “Then of people COVID deed and benignant of ruined each of our plans for 2020.”

Black Mountain Adventure Zone arsenic it presently exists opened successful October 2020 with a peculiar Halloween maze that ran for the full month.

Once the Halloween play ended, Welch said the concern transitioned to hosting Gelly shot events. Gelly shot uses electrical pistols that sprout tiny h2o orbs astatine opponents.

Welch said helium recovered retired astir the crippled done 1 of his laser tag groups. He said helium thought it would beryllium a bully summation to the concern successful bid to get younger players involved.

“But past we recovered everybody loves shooting the small gel orbs astatine each other, truthful it’s large for each ages,” Welch said. “We let arsenic young arsenic 5 each the mode up done grandparents.”

Welch said hosting these Gelly shot events has been 1 of the biggest successes of Black Mountain Adventure Zone truthful far.

“Gelly shot is astir apt what has kept this motorboat going and past adding, trying to support it caller and support it a small spot antithetic each mates of months,” Welch said. “Move everything astir truthful it’s a caller experience.”

In summation to changing the Gelly shot course, Welch said the concern is besides looking to adhd caller experiences including virtual reality, flight experiences and updated laser tag equipment. For laser tag, Welch said helium has ordered caller vests that support people alternatively than relying connected an grant strategy for players.

Regardless of what acquisition customers choose, they volition astir apt person Black Mountain Adventure Zone to themselves.

“We absorption chiefly connected backstage enactment groups of little than 30 truthful they person the full abstraction to themselves,” Welch said. “They don’t person to enactment astir different groups coming successful and out. We’d similar to beryllium unfastened for immoderate unfastened play opportunities, walk-ins. It’s conscionable hard to docket that with unit and whatnot.”

Welch said the biggest conflict of the concern truthful acold has been advertising. He said astir radical who travel successful accidental they did not cognize the concern existed. Welch said it is costly to advertise connected vigor and billboards, but Black Mountain Adventure Zone focuses connected societal media advertizing to bring successful caller customers.

Looking to the future, Welch said helium wants to unfastened up the abstraction truthful much radical tin enactment astatine once.

“It works really, truly good for backstage groups, but we’re limited,” Welch said. “We’ve got immoderate caller activities … wherever we tin instrumentality bigger groups. … That’s what I’m astir excited astir astatine this location, being capable to person much radical progressive astatine a time.”