Earlier this month, Kevin and I took a half day on a Friday to go downtown and see The Office Experience. I actually happened to win tickets on the radio — so random! — so it was fun for us to make a little date day out of it with dinner afterwards.
The Overall Experience
Getting to The Office Experience was pretty simple. There’s a parking garage suggestion on their website that we used and it was seamless. The venue will validate parking so it costs $15 for three hours. Otherwise the event is very accessible from both city buses and the el train, and is even only about 1/2 mile walk from the Metra Electic line connecting to the south and southwest suburbs.
The Office Experience Modules
The overall experience is linear, you’ll walk through the experience in a specific order. The staff does a great job keeping the crowd metered and moving so everyone enjoys the venue in a timely fashion. Below are some of the key highlights from our experience.
The personalized ID badges at check in were one of my favorite touches!
Welcome Video and Prop Room
Your very first stop is a brief wait outside of the welcome video room with a map of [the fictional] Scranton, PA. It’s fun to see where everything is intended to be in the show while you’re waiting. Then, you’re ushered into a small room with a welcome video read to you by Dwight Schrute himself!
Thereafter, you’ll check out the prop room while you wait to enter the office area through the main entrance of the Dunder Mifflin office suite.
The Office: Main Room
It was SO cool to enter through the main office door to start this experience! Lights were dim so it’s a low quality pic with high quality mems.
The room looked exactly as you’d see it on the show, it was SO COOL! These photos are great but they don’t do the in-person experience justice.
Once inside, your first stop is the reception desk. We’ve never fancied ourselves the Jim and Pam types but it was fun to play the part!
Kev naturally had to take a quick sit at Jim’s desk and check out the little trinkets. And yes, the picture of Asian Jim and his family was in fact on the desk, classic!
Then, his absolutely favorite, a stop at Dwight Schrute’s desk. His desk was complete with bobblehead and jello-ed stapler.
We stopped at every other desk too, and some even had messages on the phone for you to listen to which was awesome! The attention to detail was epic.
Michael’s Office
Once you were done exploring the bullpen and other parts of the office, there was a line to take pictures and see Michael Scott’s office. We waited about 15 minutes in line, which was easily the most we waited anywhere in The Office Experience, with good reason.
We each got to sit in Michael’s chair and take some photos. They actually had an experience employee in there to take photos for you and it was one of the few mask-off photo ops spaces.
The lighting was a little harsh, but the space used to be a Forever 21 waaaay back in the day. Way back like I used to go shopping on my lunch breaks when I worked down the street in 2014 way back. But again, they may be low quality, but the experience was amazing.
“Conference Room, 5 Minutes”
After Michael’s office, you could pop into the conference room. As you can see, it was decked out in their birthday party’s finest.
Before we took off, we wanted to be sure to have our own personal camera time, so we took our seats by the window.
Much to our shock and disappointment, Kevin Malone was not in the background making thrusting motions. Maybe next time?
The Office Kitchen
For a smaller space, this had a lot of fun details.
We started by going through the kitchen, where lots of familiar mugs lined the kitchen drying rack.
Possible Office Experience design flaw? Jim didn’t attend the America’s Got Talent party Kelly hosted where she gave these mugs out as favors, so why is there a star mug with Jim’s face? If you have the answer, share with me in the comments!
Next, if you turn around and open the closet door you’ll find the office of Ryan Howard and WUPHF.com HQ. Decorated complete with Michael’s St. Pauligirl sign and all!
In addition to these two details, the freezer and fridge were also decently stocked. More notably, the freezer had a large brown package with the word “sprinkles” written out on it… LOL but also pure shock!
The Annex
The Annex at The Office Experience is surprisingly packed with details and stuff to do, almost as much so as the main room.
First up was a game of Flonkerton! Sadly, the boxes are bolted down, which was a bummer even to the employees. Can’t blame them! But it was a fun photo op all the same.
Afterwards, you clearly have to accept your medal. Hop on the podium, in front of the paper doves, and accept your yogurt lid medal! BTW, can we just talk about how I’m still shorter than Kevin even though I took the top spot? It was the only way to make the photo work. ?
In addition to seeing Kelly and Toby’s desks, they also set you up to play “Dunder Ball” which is the game Kelly and Toby play over their cubicle wall. Kevin won, but as I reminded him, it’s kind of hard to bend around to catch a ball one-handed at 21 weeks pregnant!
Off to the left of Toby’s desk is a spare desk, I believe it was at one point used by Gabe, with another classic The Office game on it. Do you remember “Hate Ball”? Oscar and Kevin play it with paper footballs and call it Hate Ball because of how much Angela hates it. Love those two!
Dunder Mifflin’s Break Room
Fully stocked, the break room was full of goodies for visitors.
For just a few coins, you could have yourself a KitKat, some Herr’s chips or even a Lackawanna County Volunteer Sheriff’s Deputy mug!
As we all know, nothing says classy like being a part of The Finer Things Club. Join me for a quick read and some refined finger foods at the far end of the break room.
The Office Experience Additional Photo Ops
Once you’ve gone through the office, there’s a section at the end wit iconic scenes set up separate from the rest of The Office Experience. Don’t sleep on these must-see photo ops!
First stop? Beach Day! Kevin and I both also did the coal walk. Video to come on Instagram in the near future!
Next, we visited the Michael Scott Paper Company, complete with a disco ball hanging over those filing cabinets. Never know when you’re going to have to get your cafe disco on, you know?
Who wants some chili?! Hopefully no one, because Kevin spilled it all.
Schrute Farms was a big part of the extra photo area. We snapped a pic on the front porch but there was also a roadside beat stand, a Schrute family tree and a few others.
Stanley’s famous crosswords even made a really cool appearance. They have two interactive dry erase crossword puzzles you can complete. We got all of these on our own minus one! Do you happen to know what kind of shoes Dwight keeps in his car in case of a special occasion? Show off your knowledge in the comments!
The Office Experience Warehouse
Your last stop is through the warehouse. Just don’t touch the baler!
They had tons of paper branded for Dunder Mifflin, which I thought was really cool. The attention to detail really does it for me. I wish we could have taken a ream home as a souvenir but sadly I don’t think that’s an option.
The gift shop is also designed like the warehouse since it’s the last stop before leaving. It comes complete with these tumbling shelves. A not so obvious feature, however, is the ping pong table in the back corner. We def volleyed a few times before we left!
Well, what did you think? Pretty crazy how they really nailed some of the details and set, right? What was your favorite part of The Office Experience? Curious what they are compared to mine. Let me know in the comments!
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