TEAM MUNZEE

February 11, 2015

From Corporations to Crops: A Story of #HeartHealth

Heart disease is the number one killer of men and women in the United States, so as we celebrate American Heart Month it’s important to listen to the stories of those around us. The following story is from Kevin Becker, owner of Shutt’er Down Ranch- a partner of the Munzee Marketplace. Although Kevin may work in the fields all day raising chickens, building greenhouses and maintaining the ranch, it wasn’t always this way.

“I spent my entire adult life in the middle of corporate America. Each week was two or three new cities with no sleep, no exercise and a room service diet,” Kevin said. “All this changed on one of those trips in 2010 when my 49-year-old heart decided that enough was enough.”

Two days later Kevin’s three children watched as their father headed into open heart surgery. The surgeon explain that there was a 25 percent chance that Kevin wouldn’t survive.

“I decided right then and there that I was going to take control of my health,” Kevin said.

He kept that promise and a year later Kevin, Seth Thomas, and Cory Sparks started Shutt’er Down Ranch in Farmersville, TX. It’s been five years since that wake up call and Kevin is 50 pounds lighter and his heart is as healthy as ever. Kevin attributes his success to changing the way he eats. He altered his diet to all natural or organic foods whenever possible, and now runs a business producing the very same food he eats.

“I had no idea that it would be so difficult to find all natural foods, not to mention the outrageous costs,” Kevin said. “I’m so excited to be a part of Shutt’er Down Ranch and helping change the way people eat organically.”

The Munzee Marketplace is proud to partner with Shutt’er Down Ranch and bring healthy, cost-effective food to the people of North Texas. The Marketplace already has a hard time keeping SD Ranch’s cage-free, organic chicken eggs in stock and there are plans in place to expand this partnership even further. One of the first steps in living healthy is looking at the food you eat, so take Kevin’s story to heart and take care of yours.

December 31, 2014

Top 14 of ’14: The Overall, Best of the Best for this year.

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! From special icons and big events, to huge announcements, 2014 is going to be a tough act to follow. Here we have the 14 best things about 2014, ranging all things Munzee. In no particular order Team MHQ has decided on what they think made the year so special.

MHQ Gets an Office!

MHQ may have hit the ground running in 2014, but at the end of 2013 they still didn’t even have an office! So when the 3 (at the time) full time members of the team moved into their new office in McKinney, TX they knew it was a start to a big year. Having a home base (that wasn’t Rob’s living room) solidified their full time role with Munzee and paved the way for the company’s growth. Little did they know that growth would come quicker than expected…

New Hires

While the first office in McKinney was a huge step for Munzee, the 350 square foot space filled up quickly. After hiring Intern+ Matt and a month later UI Designer Peter and Master of Media Dylan, it was time to look at expansion. Even in the final months of the year our team began to grow more with development on both technical and business sides. Munzee will only grow from here- especially considering the growth of the company’s business ventures.

The Munzee Marketplace

What started as a convenience store to provide the downtown McKinney workers with an affordable snack option has grown into something much bigger than anyone at MHQ could have imagined. The Munzee Marketplace is now McKinney’s premier option for local, organic, fresh foods. The Marketplace has partnered with various local vendors and has big plans on the horizon that make Munzee proud.

MHQ Bash

All the extra space from the Marketplace was handy for MHQ’s first official event. In connection with Downtown McKinney’s Oktoberfest Celebration, MHQ Bash featured three days of activities that nearly 200 people joined us for. After seeing some of the great events our players have thrown over the year, we knew we had to go big. We learned a lot about how to plan and execute events (a learning experience to say the least) and we know next year’s Bash will be even bigger.

Official Virtual Garden

Speaking of learning experiences, there’s still a lot the players have to teach us. Much like MHQ Bash, players have made their own virtual gardens for a while and needless to say we have been super impressed with what our players have created. So in connection with the emerald family jewel we made our first official virtual garden outside of McKinney and our players helped us fill it in. It took a little maneuvering and some help from our players with our design, but we’re proud of the new garden and excited to release more official gardens around the world.

The Traveling President

President Rob Vardeman may have done a bit of Virtual Garden scouting during his world travels this year as well. CoachV started his presidency with an oath to expand the player connection and he has not wavered on that promise. For as busy as we keep Rob in the office he still made as many trips to as many events as possible this year. From Germany to California to Canada and everywhere in between, the President racked up the frequent flyer miles, sometimes squeezing trips into a 24 hour span- and enjoyed every minute of it.

Copa Do Munzo

It’s hard not to enjoy world travels, especially when you’re in Germany days after they won the World Cup. Rob got to experience just this during his trip to Cologne, Germany. To celebrate the world’s favorite sport, Munzee blasted the world with football special icons and held a competition where players could vote on who they thought would win in the Copa Do Munzo competition. As many guessed, Germany won the cup and Rob was on hand to reward the faithful football fans.

Special Icons

Much like the footballs that bounced across the map, this year featured a lot of special icons. From 8-bit ghostzees to non-exploding London dynamite, the unique and eclectic assortment of specials got players out at odd hours and in new places hunting for munzees. This year’s specials not only took the game to different levels, but also gave us an opportunity to do good for others as well…

Charity Fundraising

The benefit of special icons is that they are constantly interchangeable and can be used in unique ways, like helping raise money for charity in a fun way. Our players came out in full force multiple times this year to use Munzee for good. The Autism Puzzle Hearts brought in $5000 for the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation, The RMH Virtuals garnered $25,000 for the Ronald McDonald House of Spokane, and the ALS Ice cubes raised $54,000 for Project A.L.S.. Needless to say 2014 was a big year in many ways!

3rd Birthday Celebrations

July 2014 also marked Munzee’s official 3rd Birthday Celebration, or #FiestaThree as we called it. We kicked off the month-long celebration by introducing Ruby Munzees, held various events every third day of the month and even had Pinata special icons that players could smash open. The whole month was a huge celebration and our players even sent in special Happy Birthday pictures and videos for Munzee. Players also took advantage of Rovers in order to get the Birthday Barker badge. Speaking of Rovers…

Rovers

During one of his many trips this year, Rob and other members of Team MHQ announced the arrival of Rovers at Munzee Madness 3 in California. Rover is a supplemental piece to the game, and in fact a game within the game of Munzee. Rover is an extremely unique part of Munzee because although it is not a munzee type it encourages players to travel and expand their personal maps. Since its announcement in March, all the active Rovers in the world have traveled a whopping 61 million miles!

Clan Wars

Another huge part of this year was the Munzee Clan Wars. Players battled it out month after month, fighting for that number one spot and the ever-glorious Super Chuck. This aspect of the game has shown MHQ how dedicated our players really are and the lengths they are willing to go in the name of Munzee. As we head into the new year we’re sure our players will take the battles to an even higher level and the Clan count will only grow from there!

Podcast/ Videocast

In case you couldn’t tell from our world-traveling President, Munzee is all about transparency and our player relations are extremely important to us. So what better way to interact with our players on a weekly basis than with a podcast? Our weekly update on all things Munzee has evolved a lot over the year. We’ve recently turned our podcast into an interactive videocast that players can now ask us questions each week, which has furthered the connection we get to make with our players. Be sure to join us Tuesdays at 1 pm (MHQ Time) for the live videocast where you can interact with us, ask questions and see us stumble over our words!

Eventzee

As big as 2014 was, 2015 is going to be even bigger. Perhaps the biggest announcement of the year was the development of our new app Eventzee! The private events-based app will not only expand the Munzee events system, but will help our business grow to new reaches and in turn grow the Munzee map as well. We’re currently beta-testing the app and fixing any final kinks, but Eventzee will be a huge part of the new year.

Thank you to all of our players for a great 2014. We can’t wait to see what happens next!

December 30, 2014

Munzee: 2014 By The Numbers

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! Over the next few days we’ll be looking back on some of our favorite moments of the year. You guys grew the game in a big way this year and our numbers prove it. Check out 2014 By The Numbers!

Edit: The numbers below show what are labeled Virtual and physical deploys. These numbers should be 2014 and 2013 deploys, respectively.

December 30, 2014

Top 4 of ’14: Team MHQ’s Top Events

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! Over the next few days we’ll be looking back on some of our favorite moments of the year. 2014 was a record-breaking year for Munzee events! Although there were events all across the world, the following brought out big numbers in attendance and President Rob was on hand at all of them.

MUNZEE MADNESS III

ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA- USA

March 01, 2014

The original large scale Munzee event was back for its third year in the Yorba Regional Park located outside Los Angeles, California. Members of Team Munzee joined Rob for his 2nd year for some Fun in the Sun. Unfortunately the rain decided to crash the party, but it didn’t slow down the true Munzee spirit of the players who had traveled from almost a dozen states for the annual event the first weekend in March. Several events over the course of the weekend included dinners, time at the park, and mega points at nearby Anaheim Angels stadium and Disneyland. This annual event is hosted in part by Munzee reseller Elliot of the Munzee Madness clan (see where the name came from now). 🙂 Members of Team MHQ also announced the Rover!

EURO MUNZEE 2

COLOGNE, GERMANY

July 19 and 20, 2014

More than 100 Players from almost a dozen countries traveled to Cologne for multiple events and the opportunity to play host as Rob visited from MHQ. The main location was a biergarten surrounded with mystery virtuals deployed by players from around the world. Side trips to the Köln Dom, the Rhine river, and nearby parks allowed for fun times to socialize and score maximum points. Munzee reseller John of EUMunzeeshop was on hand to take care of player needs. Rob also revealed a new line of hats, clothing and stickers!

CAPPING THE COAST

MERRITT ISLAND, FLORIDA- USA

November 15, 2014

New to the Munzee scene and showing explosive growth over a 6 month period, the Space Coast of Florida was home to a huge event in November. Over 100 players traveled from distances up to 1000 miles away to join Rob as the event was sponsored by Munzee resellers Dale & Barb of the Space Coast Geocaching Store. The event was the perfect temperature to soak in the sun, cap a ton of points, and then unwind in nearby Port Canaveral at sunset to watch the massive cruise ships departing on their ocean voyages. A month later Rob rejoined over 60 Florida Munzee Hunters in Celebration, FL near DisneyWorld for an event to celebrate all things Munzee. The Trail Munzee was introduced in Celebration with many players capturing the first trail ever deployed and spending time enjoying the unique town.

MHQ BASH

McKINNEY, TEXAS- USA

September 26-28, 2014

MHQ’s first official event went BIG. In connection with Downtown McKinney’s Oktoberfest Celebration, MHQ Bash featured three (kinda four) days of activities. Nearly 200 people joined us throughout the weekend and proved just how far our players were willing to travel for the game they love. Friday night we rented out Franconia Brewery, a traditional German brewer based in McKinney, for a night of laughs and socializing. Bright and early the next morning we hosted the Amunzing Race Scavenger Hunt, followed by tours of MHQ. The weekend was rounded out with a mystery munzee poker tournament, capping The Village at Fairview and brunch with Team MHQ. Other highlights of the weekend included the Grand Opening of the Munzee Marketplace on Thursday, a World’s Collide event that took over downtown McKinney, and a special sneak peak at Eventzee! I wonder what MHQ has planned for next year…

What were your favorite events of 2014? Be sure to follow along the rest of the year as we look back on more big moments from 2014!

If you’re interested in hosting a Munzee event contact events@munzee.com today and be on the lookout for news about our new app- Eventzee!

December 29, 2014

Top 4 of ’14: Special Icons

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! Over the next few days we’ll be looking back on some of our favorite moments of the year. To start things off, here are some of the icons that made this year so special. As many of you may have noticed a few of these have been re-released to the map for the rest of the year as well!

ALS Ice Cubes

SEPTEMBER

MHQ’s base in McKinney, Texas may usually be warm in September, but the Munzee community helped freeze us over in our fight to end ALS. This September we sold special virtual icons featuring ice cubes in connection to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and gave all proceeds to ALS research. The campaign was an overwhelming success and in two weeks we raised a donation of $54,000 for Project A.L.S..

Copa Do Munzo Footballs

JUNE

In celebration of the world’s favorite sport, Munzee blasted the world with football icons. From the first whistle in Brazil on June 12 until Germany hoisted the cup on July 13, 704 footballs bounced across the Munzee map. We also held a competition where players could vote on who they thought would win the Cup. As many guessed, Germany won the cup and in hand our players were rewarded too!

Autism Awareness Puzzle Hearts

APRIL

To celebrate and bring awareness to April’s Autism theme, Team Munzee deployed 680 special icons on the map. 680 represents the 1:68 ratio of children born with autism currently. The amazing efforts of our active Munzee community lead to over 8,055 hearts captured in the month of April! Player captures raised a total of $4,027.50 in donations towards the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism.

3rd Birthday Piñatas

JULY

As a part of our #FiestaThree 3rd birthday celebration, we released special piñata munzees around the world. What better way to celebrate Munzee’s third birthday than to hit a paper-mâché donkey until it gives you candy? We released 3,333 piñata specials and just like in real life, munzee piñatas were about getting as many different kinds of candy as quickly as possible. When you capped a piñata you randomly received one of three types of candy and a corresponding special icon. It was a hit! Get it?

What were your favorite icons of 2014? Be sure to follow along the rest of the year as we look back on more big moments from 2014!

December 23, 2014

Year End Special Icons!

Expect the Unexpected! As Team Munzee winds down and prepares to spend the holidays with our families, we want to offer our players something to keep them busy during the rest of the holiday season. As many of you have captured, our blue gifts have been on the map all month long, but Santazee may have let a few more things slip off his sleigh. Along with the blue gifts we’re launching red gifts to the map as well. But that’s not all!

It’s been a big year for Munzee and for those that missed out on various parts of the year, we wanted to bring back a few of our highlights. So, starting December 26th at midnight (00:01 MHQ Time) we’re re-releasing a few icons. These special icons, along with the two gifts, will stay on the map until the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s eve (23:59 MHQ Time). 200 of each icon will be on the map (Blue gifts will reduce to 200 when the rest go live) and they’ll sit in one place for 6 hours or until capped, when it will then bounce to a new spot in the world. For those that have captured these already, this is technically a new icon so it will show up in your specials list as a new icon. All of the icons can be seen on www.munzee.com/gifts once they go live on the 26th. As with all special icons you are not able to capture one on your own munzee, but you are able to capture an icon on any other munzee (even if you’ve capped it before).

All will launch on December 26 at 00:01 and stay on map until December 31 at 23:59

: Football- More Kicks- Points: 20 split cap & owner

: Blue Gift- Points: 25 split cap & owner

December 9, 2014

Announcing the 2015 Munzee Theme Contest!

The end of 2014 is near and it has been a wild ride. From freezing over McKinney, TX with ALS Ice Cubes to introducing new munzee types, Munzee has truly lived up to its 2014 theme of “Expect the Unexpected.” So now that the new year is upon us, we need our players’ help coming up with a new theme for 2015. Who knows Munzee better than our faithful players? We’re accepting submissions starting today (12/9) and we’ll continue through December 14, 2014. Then starting on December 15th we’ll take our 5 favorite themes and let the rest of the Munzee community vote on which is the winner. Voting will run until December 22 and we’ll announce the winner on January 1, 2015.

So to break it down:

Theme submissions: 12/9-12/14
Top 5 Voting: 12/15-12/22
Theme Announcement: 1/1/2015

To submit a theme CLICK HERE and include your username and theme phrase.

We’re really excited about this opportunity and we hope our players see just how important this. We based our entire year around “Expect the Unexpected” and we’re sure the theme you pick will do the same in 2015. As for general guidelines, this is pretty limitless. We ask that you keep the theme short and not use any well known phrases from other brands (Just Do It, Put A Smile On, Etc.), but other than that, the future of Munzee is in your hands!

December 9, 2014

The Winner of the 2014 Munzee Photo Contest!

After weeks of photo submissions from our players, the 2014 Munzee Photo Contest has found its winner. Among hundreds of submissions, the top 5 photos were chosen and we invited players to our Facebook page to vote on which image perfectly embodied the Munzee experience. The winner, who captured the photo below, is Luciano Reis (fotoluca) and he found the combination of urban construction and rural landscape to be a perfect balance of Munzee’s wide variety of play. Read on to learn a more about fotoluca and his submission!

Name:
Luciano Reis

Username:
fotoluca

Where you live:
São Francisco, Portugal (Lisbon area).

How long have you played Munzee?
Since 2011.

Where was this photo taken?
Near a small chapel in Samouco.

Why did you choose this photo?
This picture has all the components that you can expect when you Munzee: a beautiful landscape, sunny weather, blue and green. It’s a mix of urban and countryside. It actually speaks for itself.

How does this photo make you think of Munzee?
It’s all about perspective, when we have our Munzee “mode on”, we see the world in another way. Nice weather means nice walks, and of course, more points!

fotoluca would also like to share his social, so cap away!

Thank you again for all of the submissions from our players. It was great to see so many people share their Munzee experience. Don’t stop now though, keep growing the map and sharing your experiences with your fellow Munzers via all social platforms!

November 11, 2014

Videocast Episode 2: Say Cheese!

Our second videocast has now been converted to an audio podcast for your enjoyment!

http://munzeepush.munzee.netdna-cdn.com/Munzee Videocast 2.mp3

You can also re-watch the videocast HERE.

This week we talked about:

Changes in the weather for our area and most of North America.
November MunzPak orders are still available through the end of the month.
Webisode #1 in A Tale of Trails — follow us on YouTube — yes it’s supposed to be silly. We are not trained actors or cinematographers.

On the videocast we also announced a new Munzee Photo Contest for our players!

We’re looking for some new promotional images for Munzee and who better than our players to help us with that? We need high-res photographs that embrace the heart of Munzee. Whether it’s wilderness of cityscapes, we want you to show us what you see when you Munzee. Please email all submissions to photocontest@munzee.com. We will take submissions through the end of the month. The photographer that is chosen will win a Munzee prize pack valued at $127.

If your photo is chosen you’ll get:

5 virtuals
5 mystery virtuals
5 rubies
5 diamonds
2 hotels
2 motels
1 social

Although we will only choose one winner, there is a chance that other photos submitted could be used in future Munzee materials, so all submissions become property of Munzee Inc. upon email.

Photo Contest guidelines:

Photos should be of scenery and not focus on a single group of people or faces.
Should not include any previously trademarked brands or items.
All submissions must be owned by the photographer submitting them.
Munzee code of conduct still applies and all photos taken on/in private property must have written approval to be in the running.

High quality photos must be a minimum of  1600 x 700 pixels in size, with a 72 DPI, and can be either .jpg or .png file types.

Remember to join us Tuesdays at 1 pm (MHQ Time) for the live videocast where you can interact with us, ask questions and see us stumble over our words! To learn more follow us on Google + and if you missed last week’s videocast click HERE.

November 4, 2014

Team Munzee Tuezday: Cody A. Robertson

Here at Munzee we’re constantly encouraging our players to meet and greet and build the personal relationships that make this game so great. Our team continues to grow and we’re excited with the addition of our new Director of Business Development, Cody Robertson. We hope to work with Cody to further expand our business and in turn our game. So read on about Cody!

Name and Title: 
Cody A. Robertson – Director of Business Development

Where are you from? 
I was born in Plano, Texas and grew up in Allen, Texas. After my time at the University of North Texas was over, I moved to Laguna Beach, California for a little over a year. Although I really enjoyed the beach, the great Southern California weather, and numerous attempts at trying to learn how to surf, I missed Texas and my family so I moved back and lived in Dallas and Plano for a number of years before building a house almost three years ago in my hometown of Allen so I could be closer to my Mom and little Sister.

Tell us about yourself:
I turn 31 in December and it is very true what they say, once you hit 30, everything starts hurting for no reason. It’s probably not for no reason though, I played numerous sports growing up and sustained a laundry list of injuries and I am definitely paying for them now. I am a huge sports fan and my favorite team is the Texas Longhorns. I have been a fan of them since I can remember and I bleed Burnt Orange. That’s me below on my 8th birthday, decked out from head to toe in Texas Longhorns gear.

I love English Bulldogs and plan on getting another one very soon. Mine passed away last year. His name was Goose (as in Grey Goose Vodka (My favorite spirit), not from the movie Top Gun) and he was an awesome dog and I was lucky to have him in my life. I have an incredible girlfriend named Shauna and I can’t imagine my life without her. We are planning to get married sometime next year and from there, starting a family. I have three amazing little sisters, Lauren who is 20 years old and is a Junior at Tarleton State University, Katelyn who is 18 years old and is a Senior at Allen High School, and Brooke who is 17 years old and is a Senior at Van Alstyne High School. All in all, I have a pretty amazing family, a great woman by my side, and some really good people I get to call my friends. Life doesn’t get much better than that.

How long have you worked for Munzee?
I officially start working for Munzee on Monday, November 10th.

What do you enjoy most about Munzee?
So far, I have really enjoyed meeting everyone at Munzee and slowly getting to know them. The culture at Munzee is incredible and I am really looking forward to working with everyone and helping to grow the business.

What are some of your other hobbies?
Other than spending time with my girlfriend, friends, and family, I am a huge BBQ nut and love to try out new spots as they open and regularly visit the ones that are good. In addition, I love, love, love cars of all shapes and sizes, but at heart, I am a Ford Mustang kind of guy. My goal is to have a shop behind my house some day that can house at least 50 cars, maybe more. I’m a bit OCD (people that know me well would say I am really OCD) so I would also have to list keeping things clean and organized as a hobby of mine. In addition to everything listed above, I am a huge music fan and listen to just about anything that has a good beat and sounds good. In the last 3 months, I have seen Wade Bowen, Randy Rogers, Lil Wayne, Drake, and Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers in concert.

Famous last words?
“I hope there’s a snow cone stand, wherever I’m going.”