We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Heather Barr a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Heather, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Alright, so you had your idea and then what happened? Can you walk us through the story of how you went from just an idea to executing on the idea

I feel like as an escape room owner, I am constantly going through this process. It’s not just the arduous process to start the business itself with the usual things like business licenses, website design, booking systems, building codes, etc. It’s also staying relevant by constantly creating new experiences to keep your customers coming back. In the escape room industry, most owners will keep their experiences the same for many years if they change them at all. That can be fine if you live in an area with high turn over like schools or tourism but can lead to declining revenue over time. Over the past 10 years that we have opened, the industry has come a long way and escape rooms are much more advanced than they used to be. The cost of building new experiences and props has gone up quite a bit so to combat that, we have started expanding out instead of replacing older rooms that are still consistently booking. That way we can still have a consistent flow of returning customers and locals but offer more options for the tourist or first time customers. Going back to the question building a new experience starts with an idea and can take 1-2 years to fully execute each time. For me, I try to keep all my notes and ideas that I think of throughout the years in one place. That way, when I am ready to build, I have something to go off of. I will usually start with a theme and what I want to accomplish with the room. Things like the “vibe” of the room, how I want the puzzles to feel, do I want it to be more of a faster or slower pace, etc. Then I start taking those answers and combining them with the theme of the room and some puzzle ideas I may have already had to create some fun customized props/games. I usually spend months flushing out the flow of the room, the layout, which puzzle leads to which; all while paying attention to how each puzzle contributes to the overall story of the room so it feels cohesive and not like a bunch of random puzzles in a themed room. During that process we also start to figure out the layout of the room, start building renderings of the design and what I want it to look like. Although that can change along the way depending on what issues arise during the building so being flexible definitely helps keep the stress level down! Once the long process of building is done, it’s testing, adjusting, training then maybe a few months breather before the process starts all over again!

Heather, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I think when most people think of what it takes to own an escape room they imagine coming up with these cool ideas then hiring out contractors/builders/programmers or some type of build team to conceptualize their ideas. Perhaps even just buying a premade kit and installing it. Everything we do HERE though, is painstakingly planned out and built from scratch by me. We create everything from the decor, props, lighting, all of it.

My name is Heather Barr and I’m the owner of The Locked Inn escape room in Grover Beach, CA. I kind of fell into the industry by accident but it was definitely one of the best things that ever happened to me. I spent most of my adult life working in radio wearing all hats from audio production, to sales, on air host, etc. Although I loved it, I was ready for the opportunity to be my own boss. Being a business owner is a non stop job and you are working in some capacity 24/7 so I think it’s important to love or believe in what you do…and I really do.

The Locked Inn first opened its doors in August of 2015. We started in a time when most guests had never heard of escape rooms. Listening to guests feedback and watching the industry grow, we carefully sculpted the coming rooms to exceed expectations. We worked hard to make sure the experience was unique and that the Locked Inn remained a shining example of a local business. We strive everyday to set ourselves apart not just in the escape room itself, but in many of the small touches we add for every room. There are many escape rooms these days that have moved to the more automated introduction where you are ushered into a room to watch a video. We prefer to have that one on one time with the guests to customize their introduction based off their needs. It does require we have one game master per group that is running so that adds extra cost, but we do everything we can to make the guests feel like it is an “experience” not just an escape room. Other touches like different scents based on which room they are in and surprises before they even enter the room really set us apart. We also build our rooms to be much larger than a traditional style escape room, so it gives the guests more of a flow through the multi room experience and keeps them guessing as to what is coming next. It could be a wall opening up as a door you didn’t know was there or perhaps you are going to walk back out the door you came only to see it’s now a completely different room!

Today, our experiences have been rated among the 100 in the world through Morty, the only escape room tracking/rating app on the market. I think as the sole owner/designer/builder one of the things I am most proud of is all that me and my employees have been able to accomplish over the years. Each time I step away from the day to day stuff to work on a new build they pick up the reigns and keep everything running for me. Not matter how much fun it sounds (and it can be) the builds are hard on everyone. Most of my employees have stuck around for 5+ years with me and I am incredibly grateful to have them. We have all learned so much about building (and repairing!) and I am still learning new techniques everyday. I am so excited to see some of the cool unique things that we might create in the future!

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

I think any business owner is constantly facing challenges they need to overcome. For me, just looking back at each build and remembering all the literal blood, sweat and tears that went into each one. When I first started I had all the confidence! I thought “hey, I’m handy for girl. I’ll figure it out!” When it comes to down to it though, there are so many aspects that go into building an escape room it was a lot to learn…and I’m still learning! I can’t tell you how many times looking back where I thought to myself “CAN I do this?”. How many times I’ve sat and cried, overwhelmed by the daunting task of basically building a 1600 square foot apartment by myself with included hidden doors/flooring/lighting/animatronics….I could go on! On my very first build I tried hiring a contractor who ended up ripping me off after 2 weeks of work so I decided then I was just going to learn how to do it myself so it didn’t happen again. That brings us to today. Still learning. Still pushing my limits with each design to see IF I can build it. Asking myself “how can I make this work”. I definitely don’t consider myself a master designer or builder…half the time I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing. I guess what I am doing is just the best I can to create a really cool experience that will surprise or amaze my guests while trying to learn a little bit more with each build to better myself.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

I wouldn’t be where I was without my team. I currently have 6 employees most of whom have been with me for years. As I said they keep the place running when I’m not able to be there and have learned so much over the years as well. I think the easiest answer for this question is just appreciation. Sometimes it may not come natural, but I always go out of my way to tell them how much I appreciate them. I think we have all had that one toxic job at some point in our lives and I have made it a point to make sure that it is never like that here. There is a lot to learn when you first start here so I try to be patient when teaching and I don’t get mad when people make mistakes. I lay out clear boundaries up front and we all respect each other. Of course, no one is perfect so I try to place people based off their strengths and weaknesses. If they want to make more money it’s up to them to really focus on where they might fall short. When they have the full routine down for every aspect (opening/greeting/operating some props/resetting/running rooms) consistently mistake free, they get paid more. That leads into the other obvious answer which is paying people what they are worth. I’m not stupid, I know a main reason I’ve kept so many of my employees is it’s a good atmosphere that pays really well.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://TheLockedInn.com
• Instagram: @thelockedinn
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheLockedInn
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-locked-inn-live-escape-room-grover-beach
• Other: [email protected]

Image Credits

The photo with the owl is my manager Cody holding Zsophia the owl from a local rescue we support called Conservation Ambassadors.