The Sono Field House in South Norwalk is officially open. As athletes trot into the new high-tech complex, businesses are coming in, too, intent on blowing off some steam and building inner-office relations outside the office.
“It”™s really exciting,” said Jessica Clow, adventure area director at the Sono Field House. “We”™ve had our first corporate event with Diageo. They utilized some ground-based curriculum as well as the high ropes course.”
In addition to the three full-sized turf fields, the complex, located on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, includes media rooms, a ropes course, climbing wall and café.
“Every week there”™s more interest,” said Nina Marroccoli public relations and brand manager at the Sono Field House. “Everyone who comes in has been very excited about having the facility right in South Norwalk.”
Marroccoli said that area businesses have been signing up for the field sports leagues with great enthusiasm.
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“The corporate team-building is a major part of the business,” said Clow. “We have a special events planning team that works with them from the earlier stages with a site tour and defining what their needs and goals are to the logistics and put together a package based on their needs.”
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We can do everything from corporate development, where they can utilize the conference room the whole time and don”™t even need the courses, we can go out and do some ground-based activities and utilize our 52,000 square feet of space and then if they”™re into it we can get them all the way up to the high ropes course or the rock wall area. There we start to use the experiential learning piece to create moments, attach meaning to it and then taking it down and talking it out in the conference rooms.”
Clow said the scenarios are used to relate to the everyday work environment.
“Corporate teams are the only teams that don”™t get together to practice,” said Clow. “What we”™re able to create is an environment where they can see how to become a better and stronger team. We do a lot of work around ”˜what”™s the next step”™ and what they can do to move forward outside of here.”
Clow said there are packages for groups of five to 500 participants.
“Diageo came in and was looking for a staff appreciation event, something fun and new,” said Clow. “They decided they also wanted to do some processing. They had a team of people who have worked together closely for a long time who are integrating new members, so exploring bringing the members into their team was important.”
Clow said that Diageo decided to explore how two divisions of the company interact together.
There are sales team events that are timed, which is very important in that department,” said Clow. “We have programs designed for all different parts of a business.”
