Escaping boundaries, figuratively and literally, ranked high on the Thursday agenda for the Benco Dental MarComm Department.

Among an itinerary outlined by Manager @RachelAPugh at the nation’s largest privately owned dental distributor from its home office in Pittston, Pennsylvania:
* 10 – 11:30 a.m.: Team brainstorming session at the home office.
* 1:30-2:30 p.m.: Everhart Museum, Scranton, Pa. – Featured exhibits: Wolves, Magic Mirrors and Spinning Wheels: The Anatomy of Fairy Tales and Some Enchanted Land; The Paintings of John Willard Raught
      * 3- 4 p.m.: Electric City Escape,  507 Linden Street, first floor, in the Marywood University Entrepreneurial Launch Pad.  The breakdown: a physical adventure game where players are locked in a room and have to find clues, break codes, and open locks in a series of puzzles within 60 minutes in order to win.  These puzzles will challenge wit, patience, and problem-solving skills to beat the clock.

Our challenge: Escape the Art Gallery, included the following instructions for our team: “According to our observations, you have one hour until the next security sweep. We need you to steal back a famous Pollock painting from within a private gallery at the Electric City Building. You and the team must find the painting and escape the gallery before security returns.”

Venturing outside the realm of our daily assignments to brainstorm on new projects and physically escaping the walls of a 12 x 12 ft. room required constant teamwork. For a group of eight marketers, graphic designers, videographers, database publishers and copywriters who frequently spend entire workdays focused on solitary pursuits, the process offered a chance to combine efforts and unite in victory.

Success occurred on many levels – our team created a list of out-of-the-box ideas and solutions at the office and escaped the Electric City challenge with the painting in a timely fashion. (Apologies to @LoriahVanStone, our resident Escape Room expert, for failing to capture team T-shirts in a record-breaking fashion. But, there’s always next time.)

We were inspired on many levels: by the entrepreneurial vision of our Electric City Escape creators, new business c0-owners and recent Marywood grads Ryan and Amy Hnat, by the unique artistic visions presented at the Everhart, and by each other’s contributions throughout the day’s adventures.