OUR STORY
Hi there,
We’re Calum & Andy, co-founders of Sixes Social Cricket. Welcome and thanks for dropping by. If you're intrigued to know how, as two non-cricket-playing Scots, we ended up sticking cricket nets in pubs all over the world and inviting people down for a party...allow us to explain.
If not...head over to the bookings page and we'll hopefully see you at the bar!
The Early Days...
As long time traditional restauranteurs, we observed the similarly uniting and positive power sport and hospitality have on people.
We started to wonder what would happen if we blended the two worlds together...surely double the fun!?
As passionate playmakers at heart, the idea of playing sport with a beer or wine in hand, surrounded by, and competing against friends and colleagues had a strong ring to us! We were hooked.
And looking around us, back in 2020, the post pandemic world seemed very ready for re-connection.
So we set to work. Mission, 'play sport in a party bar,' commenced...we just needed to find a sport...
...The leap to Cricket...
The leap to cricket is a part of the story with absolutely no back bone unfortunately (sorry).
As mentioned, we're both Scottish, and did not go to one of the 2 or 3 cricket playing schools back in the Motherland.
Alas, many years living in London, the passion and following for the great game, amongst friends of many a nationality, had struck us hard. Granted, we'd only ever partaken in the social side of cricket regalia.
Unphased by this potential lack of skill and experience, we cracked on and soon set our humble VISION of CREATING THE WORLD'S BIGGEST CRICKET PARTY!
The uniting nature of Cricket heritage, the thrill of the game and the exciting new edge the modern interpretation of the sport was taking on across the globe made Cricket the perfect partner for hospitality.
Honouring tradition. Echoing the modern spirit.
While we were designing the Sixes game and customer experience, the world of cricket was evolving and the energy was exciting.
Womens cricket continued to explode, the USA was about to enter the sport for the first time and new audiences were being drawn to the game thanks to cricket bodies around the world presenting a wildly more modern image of the game through fast paced, vibrantly branded and heavily media backed tournaments like The Hundred. The game had never felt so thrilling.
We set about crafting an immersive, tech enabled, hospitality experience that would HONOUR TRADITION but ECHO the MODERN SPIRIT of Cricket.
OUR VENUES would become the STADIUMS (OR VILLAGE GREENS) drawing people together to CONNECT, through the THRILL of CRICKET, for ridiculously GOOD TIMES SHARED.
Humbled by the support & Growth...
You can possibly imagine the number of early Investment Zoom calls we were laughed off when we started pitching for our 'Cricket in a pub' concept back in 2020. Right in the thick of covid chaos, it would be fair to say that hospitality, even in its traditional form, was not seen as a savvy business move. We got it...
...but as Benjamin Franklin once said, "Energy and persistence conquers all things." So we kept going.
And finally, we got our lucky break when, our now good friends, David and Glen Nash, agreed to back the launch of our test site in a small unassuming Fulham pub. Open for only 5 days before Omicron locked us back down, it had done its job! The customer response during those initial days was more than we needed. We knew we were on to something.
Today we are humbled to be backed by an incredibly diverse group of investors who provide us with invaluable support and challenge as we build out the Sixes adventure.
After many iterations, we have now opened 13 UK Venues, an initial US venue in Dallas, Texas and proudly partnered with our first non-UK based Franchise partner to open a Sixes in Trinidad & Tobago in 2024.
We firmly BELIEVE that PLAY & CONNECTION are GOOD FOR THE SOUL. So watch this space! We have lots of plans for more growth across the UK, US and further afield throughout the remainder of 2024 and beyond.
JOIN US...
If you like what you hear and are interested in joining our Sixes adventure through either investment, franchise or brand collaboration, please drop us a line on the forms below.
Thanks for following along. And as always, Let's Play!
Calum & Andy