Shopping Centers Today is the news magazine of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)
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O'Neill, vice president of the Guinness World Records creative division. Moscow's Kuntsevo Plaza shopping center presented a GWR Live event at its opening celebration, last November. The exhibition included appearances by Guinness titleholders Sultan Kösen (reportedly the tallest man in the world), Jyoti Amge (supposedly the smallest woman in the world) and soccer free- style star John Farnworth. Visitors had the opportunity to take part in seven Guinness World Records title attempts — and five records were actually broken, including the fastest time for laying out pieces on an oversized chess board. The show generally includes a stage and individual 6-square-meter (about 65 square feet) pods for the various record attempts. The company can set up in one main venue or in smaller stations throughout a mall. "The retailers tend to like that [the latter], because we attract people to where their store is rather than just one central area," said O'Neill. Individuals who break a record are en- tered into the Guinness World Records database, which contains some 50,000- plus records at present; the book version contains about 3,500 entries. Some chal- lenges are part of GWR Live's own stock — such as the largest number of spins in an office chair, or the fastest soccer ball kick — but Guinness can customize events for individual retailers. At Ku- wait's Marina Mall, for instance, Baskin- Robbins backed a challenge for anyone who could identify the most ice-cream flavors in 60 seconds. "We work with the sponsors and the key anchors to research records that would use their products or service," said O'Neill. The cost for putting on a GWR Live event runs from about $15,000 upward, depending on the number of challenges and the size and duration of the event. The events typically run any- where from one day to one week and may help boost mall traffic by up to 70 percent, says O'Neill. GWR Live is seeking new global markets, such as Australia and South America, and the company has put to- gether a team of representatives in the U.S., where it hopes to hold its very first event this year. "I knew the kids would love it and get it," said O'Neill. "But what I didn't realize is that it would ap- peal so much to adults and the moms and dads who were kind of pushing the kids out of the way and wanting to get in on the action themselves." S C T F o r l e a s i n g , c o n t a c t S a m P r o s s e r , h e a d o f c o m m e r c i a l a c c o u n t s , a t sam.prosser@guinnessworldrecords.com. 26 S C T / A p r i l 2 0 1 6 r e T a i l i n g T o d a y