I'm sure some of you may have already come across this either on Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, but for anyone UK based there appears to be a company trying to start up in Kettering offering Gunge Experiences in a large soft indoor play area type venue. Information at the moment still appears to be limited but looks like they will be offering Gunge Tanks, Dunk Tanks, Gunge Pools and Stocks. Whilst it is listed as a family entertainment experience rather than a fetish venue, it does appear they will be offering private booking options. Whilst as I said there is relatively limited info at the moment it might be one for the community to get behind and keep our eye on. You can find them on Twitter @getgunged , Facebook https://m.facebook.com/getgunged/ and YouTube https://youtube.com/channel/UCGiO_kbZqxuxG9bDgg5N37A

I'm not connected or affiliated with this in any way, but looked interesting and couldn't see any info on here from anyone else.

I very much hope that they're successful, but my primary inkling is suspicion...Very newly formed, asking for donations/Kickstarter and incredibly ambitious - five gunge tanks and three dunk tanks, one of which they plan to fill with clay. What's more, on YouTube they claim to actually already have most of these, as well as "gunge cannons" (perhaps they've been a MostWam fan...). There are no pictures of any of the vast array of contraptions they claim to have. I'd suggest staying very cautious until they prove that they do have some of these devices already - if they're telling the truth a simple picture will suffice. But otherwise I fear a lot of people will be getting stung...

Hi,
We do understand anyone to be suspicious and it's totally normal to be, especially during this difficult time.

The last 15 years or so, we have hired inflatables, cash cubes, gunge tanks, dunk tanks, sumo suits, go karts etc all around the UK. Covid-19 has hit us very hard (as with the rest of the entertainment industry) and our bookings went from hundreds a year to zero. All in the space of months.

We noticed companies selling up, FunTime Leisure, Oakleys, Gunge Tank Hire, Mr Bounce and many more, so we decided to purchase their old stock at low costs in order to create something new and unique.

We are not affiliated with anyone else. It has been brought to our attention that Splat HQ is in Kettering, which was news to us until a couple of weeks ago.

The reason we don't use our company name is that we are still a hire company and when covid-19 goes (hopefully season starts in 2022), we need to keep both seperate, as there are different clientele in each business.

Every week, we are having new meetings to see where to take this. Yes, it's a new experience and one that would be new to us also. It's a learning curve but it doesn't mean that it cannot succeed. Our experience is with inflatables. But, we have a warehouse sitting there, which we are paying rent for, so we may as well use it for something.

We hope this clears things up a little. Thanks for your understanding

Very interesting idea and certainly a good time to buy up cheap kit. One suggestion I'd throw in, given the current heightened sensitivities re hygene and germs, etc, which will almost certainly continue even after the pandemic is over, personally I'd be very wary of going in a dunk tank full of gunge, or even water, that other people had been in. A dunk tank, where fresh gunge is used for each user, or something like a slow-moving "ghost train" where riders get buckets of gunge thrown over themselves from the side, or poured on from above, again with fresh gunge for each set of riders, might be seen as less infection-risky.

Good luck with the venture!

Thank you.

Yes, that did cross our mind and the only alternative we could think of at this time is to not have the Dunk Tanks. They take aproximately 3 hours to fill each time and it wouldn't be worth while.

The Gunge Tanks are easy as they can be cleaned and refilled between each person.

Before we add in games that are more "permanent" like Ghost Trains etc, we need to ensure that this takes off. Ultimately, it is still our warehouse for storing inflatables.

In the dunk tanks, can't you use chlorine or one of its alternatives to deal with the hygiene issue?

For alternatives to chlorine, see: https://www.intec-america.com/blog/healthier-alternatives-chlorine-swimming-pools/

Hmm,
How would that work with gunge?
Certainly something to consider, thank you

Chlorine could work, though you'd more likely want to look at bromine, as it is less likely to damage clothing and the smell is more tolerable. It also binds to bacteria and germs differently, so tends to last longer.

That said, if you're going to use any of these sorts of materials you'll need to do a good deal of research on swimming pool chemistry, and also ensure that you're providing information to guests. (You should probably have MSDS signage and such easily visible at your venue and in disclaimers anyway, to avoid any issues of liability and so people know what they're being covered in).

Even with this though, you'll still need to swap the water and gunge out regularly. One possibility is to request people shower before using the dunk tanks.

Do you think to start with it would be worth not using the Dunk Tanks? At least the Gunge Tanks can be cleaned between people

I'd love to see someone make a ghost train mechanism where people get gunged along the way! I believe messy world are doing something similar soon but no news on when?

I mean this with the absolute utmost respect but considering you've bought 3 dunk tanks already and have sorted yourself out a commercial unit to use, I would strongly advise you discuss things like hygiene in your weekly meetings.

You need to be careful not to go too far without having fully assessed the intricacies of doing this. Just so you don't finish up out of pocket that's all

Of course. Totally agree.
Hygiene is the most important factor and needs to be ironed out before anything

We do like the idea of showering before entry

I'd say with water is certainly workable, as long as you change it frequently. It shouldn't take too long to do this between every few users or on request.

With gunge it's a bit different - as it's going to depend on your cost price for it. As I say, having people shower before hand would solve this somewhat.

Bentonite clay will be a no go, but then again probably wouldn't be attractive for family / fun type customers anyway.

Hi,
Of course everyone needs to be protected and that is also why we have been wary in our posts. As previously explained, we are an inflatable hire company and we need to protect our branding also.
If we put out our company details all over the internet as being behind this project, it can attract all sorts of things. Ultimately we are a professional company that hires to executive clientele.

If this goes to plan, then we will rebrand everything to keep the 2 companies seperate.

Just to make anyone aware - there's not many inflatable companies in Kettering that have this type of warehouse, so it should give an idea of who we are.

Naturally, down the line we will be able to say more and more

Hope this clears things up for you all.

Not really, all the posts have been about hygiene (which you have read/accepted) and one about the owner of a connected company about being a persistent 'issue'.

The subject of keeping 1 family friendly company separate from a kink company wasn't mentioned (unless it was by someone who has blocked me or I missed a post, it happens), though it is a wise idea.

I am curious though as to what made you think this was a profitable venture to go into? The timing is bad and the outlay is large. You won't get customers for many months and I'm not sure how many you expect or how much you can charge to recoup outlay plus ongoing storage and consumables.

We never said it was a profitable venture to go into. It's a case of we purchased a few tanks at very little outlay and we are sat with them in a warehouse doing nothing.

If the idea doesn't take off, then that's fair enough. Of course it would be nice for it to take off but there will always be hires for them if it doesn't.

We are completely new to gunge, as mainly do bouncy castles, sumo suits, go karts, bunjee runs etc.

We thought that Covid-19 would be the best time to purchase because of the little outlay we have had to lay out.

We are happy to keep them as a hire item for when the season takes off (hopefully 2022), just thought of alternatives to use them for.

I'm curious...

You state in an earlier message and a post on Twitter that you bought stock from "Gunge Tank Hire", yet if you're the person that CallumLeighUK refers to above (Leigh Sumpter), you ran Gunge Tank Hire.

At the best that's deceptive, at the worst there is something much more sinister happening here.

For clarity, you may want to post details of who you are and your company info here and on your Twitter account, as there is certainly a number of questions being asked.

OK, we are running it at ES Promotions in Kettering.

That still doesn't answer the questions. You say you're "new to gunge" and have bough stock from Gunge Tank Hire - are you the same person?

If you can't answer that honestly one way or the other, you're not going to convince people here to patronise your business or invest in your ideas!

That's cool. just wondered about the reasoning behind the venture. Thank you.

Just to avoid any confusion, the picture of the warehouse isn't a stock photo. We put the logo over it to show how it would look when the branding had been completed.

As you see in the photo, the warehouse is full of our inflatable equipment and our plans are to use the first half of the warehouse for the gunge / dunk and the rear of the warehouse curtained off, storing our inflatables.

We have always had a Gunge Tank in our iteniary - https://www.es-promotions.com/our-services/general-equipment/hire-gunge-tank

However, it would go out approximately 3 times a year and we would fill the tank with Gelli baff.

We took an event from Gunge Tank Hire last year who informed us at the time that they were considering selling up and if we wanted the equipment, we would have first refusal.

Ok, let's try this to clear matters up.

Are you, or are you associated with, Leigh Sumpter?

Well I've sent an innocent Facebook message to es promotions so if it's you it's easy to confirm and if it's not it'll soon be clear.

Hopefully this will resolve the discussion one way or the other and we can move onwards and forwards together

No. We are not, or associated with Leigh Sumpter.

We bought stock from & had a job from them - that is all. In fact, the job we had was the Sidemen challenge on YouTube.

No problem Of course we would like to move forward with as much support as possible.

Thank you for confirming that.

Hopefully in this case the concerns others raised are just a misunderstanding and your venture goes well!

It won't take you long to reply on messenger to the message so this could all be over in no time, ball is now firmly in your court

Hope so, Kettering is not that far from me