Best Beach Team Building Activities for Your Corporate Group Event
The sun is shining, the temperatures are rising, and sunscreen bottles are fully stocked. That’s right, summertime is here! It’s so easy to become lethargic or distracted working in an office during the summer months while so many people are on summer vacation with families and friends. That’s why now is the best time to really #PlayOutsideTheCubicle to avoid losing motivation and feeling cooped up. While most people consider hosting a regular team building event for their corporate group event, we encourage you to “heat” things up a bit and gift your team with a little vacation of their own – team building on the beach!
Beach Team Building Activities
Our beach team building events go much further than beach volleyball or a sandcastle building contest. These beach team building activities are designed to foster teamwork, improve communication skills, and practice creative thinking, all while soaking in the summer sun and feeling the soft sand between your toes at any of your favorite beautiful beaches!
Florida has some of the best beaches in the continental U.S. making it a top choice for group meetings. Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa Bay, and Fort Lauderdale are great destinations for team building games at the beach.
Beach Dash
Imagine yourself on the sandy shores of the beach, your corporate team adorned in leis, ready to participate in some friendly competition with the sound of steel drums and summertime music in the background. This dream can be a reality during Beach Dash, our beach team building activity where teams compete in various beach-themed challenges and fun activities! After a successful team bonding beach day, award medals are given out to those who successfully completed the challenges, and the team with the most points, wins!
Beach Bar Battle
Let’s say your group is more focused on working together and relaxing instead of competing in a relay race or beach games – take a sip and relax because it’s 5 o’clock somewhere during our Beach Bar Battle team building event! Using tropical decorations and building materials such as bamboo poles and thatch panels, teams build their own custom beach bar and decorate it in a fun way to stand out from the rest of the teams. After impressing the VIP judges with a commercial advertising the beach bars, the winning team is announced, and all teammates come forward to receive award medals to remind them of the day they created a tropical paradise that was the envy of all their colleagues.
Beach Buggy Battle
If you’re looking for more fast-paced team building beach activities for your corporate team, Beach Buggy Battle might be just the thing for you. Teams are encouraged to use their imaginations to design a “beach buggy” out of cardboard, duct tape, and a variety of decorating materials. Then, teams race to the finish line, sending two participants to drive through sandy obstacle courses that include two “pit stops,” where each team member can participate in the challenges. Whichever team holds the fastest time over any opposing team will be the champions of the beach that day!
The Games
If you’re looking for an active event on a beach, Olympic-style challenges are a fun way for a corporate group to interact. The Games, which are inspired by the Olympics,” is a high-energy competition for athletes and non-athletes alike that has each team competing for the gold! The different challenges during this event include the classic game of baton relay races, a gymnastics “obstacle course,” shot put, soccer, and a few more fun-filled games that will help lift team spirit! Once points are added up, the event ends with a closing ceremony that sees the top team invited to the podium to receive their prize.
Sustainable Team Building Activities
A massive benefit of having team building events on the beach is that there are no extra resources required, making your event more sustainable! Sustainable Team Building is when there is little need for extra resources or what you do need is reusable in some way, resulting in little to no waste produced by your event. Thankfully on the beach, you only need what Mother Nature provides to you! While the events listed above do require extra materials, there are ways to use what you already have available to get outside and enjoy some fun beach games. If your group is conscious about your global imprint, there is one way to take it a step further and help clean up the beach…
Conservation Quest
There’s nothing that can ruin a beach day more than seeing napkins flowing in the breeze or a plastic empty container by your feet. A great way to enjoy the beach and some team bonding at the same time is to come together and help rid a beach of litter with Conservation Quest! While learning about conservation and how to preserve ocean life in the beach environment during this app-based game, teams stand together as they collect trash and microplastics, earning points in the app along the way. Weighing each team’s trash bag at the end of the event will earn bonus points to help determine a winner and the entire group can enjoy their beach events for the rest of the conference or meeting knowing that they made a difference!
Beach Scavenger Hunts
For the explorers who don’t make it to the beach as often and are wanting to soak it in, we suggest a beach scavenger hunt to really make the most of their time! Our scavenger hunts can easily be customized to work on the beach where teams will access a GPS-enabled app to find hotspots around the beach that they must travel to. Once physically at these hotspots, each team will complete a variety of tasks and challenges that could include trivia about the ocean, puzzles and clues that improve problem solving skills, possible photo and video challenges of your best beach yoga pose, and much more!
Outdoor Resort Team Building Exercises
We get it… sometimes reserving the beach can be logistically challenging, expensive, a liability, or simply too hot! Don’t worry, you can still gift your team with the same beachy feeling by incorporating other outdoor venues at a resort. If your corporate group is spending the night at a resort or hotel with access to outdoor space, a pool, or even a beach view, we’ve got you covered with other events that will make you want to put your flip-flops on and grab your beach chairs!
Float Your Boat
For this refreshing outdoor team building activity, “whatever floats your boat” will work – literally! Each team is tasked with building a boat made out of cardboard and tape that is capable of holding two of their teammates in a race against all other teams. The ocean may be a tad rough and risky for these fragile boats, but a resort pool is the perfect watery racecourse for this event! As teams take to the water in heats, each two-man crew receives paddles and lifejackets and the racing begins. The first team to successfully float their boat and cross the finish line will claim victory as the other teams dip their toes in the water while watching the final regatta to determine the overall winner.
The Amazing Chase
The Amazing Chase is another fantastic team building event that promotes teamwork as groups will be able to explore a resort and beach by visiting challenge stations set up around the area. Inspired by the Amazing Race, teams chase down each challenge station and complete the activities as best they can to rack up the most points. In this chase, the first person does not get the most points and the last person is not necessarily the loser… it depends solely on how well each team performs at the challenge stations where physical, creative, and mental prowess will be put to the test.
SurStrivor
Playing beach games can be strangely familiar to some who have seen Survivor. That’s why our SurStrivor team building event is perfect for outdoor venues at resorts or beaches! Guests are welcomed to the island with their “tribe” and receive their “tree mail” which details what physical and mental challenges they will face around the event area. Take this opportunity to spread the challenges out around the resort and include some by the beach, if available, to really get in theme! After the many trials, tribulations, and a few head-to-head relay races, it’s time for tribal council where teams may vote for an opposing team to receive less points. However, that team may be safe if they have found a hidden immunity necklace hidden somewhere within the event area. The team with last remaining torch is the ultimate SurStrivor!
Client Considerations For A Successful Team Building Event on the Beach
Now that we’ve offered plenty of options for beach events and beach activities, there are a number of things to consider during the planning process to make the day go as smoothly as possible. Some considerations may seem trivial and common sense, but it’s surprising how little these are thought about when it comes to team building on the beach!
What if it Rains?
First things first – have a rain backup! While rain may not be an issue at some beaches around the nation, most corporate groups, if they’re wanting to meet at a tropical location, will pick Florida for their destination where it rains almost daily at the beaches. The Florida afternoon storm is no stranger to the locals, so it’s imperative to have an indoor backup plan at the ready in case it decides to downpour on your outdoor team building activity. Having this plan in place before the event day will save loads of time and stress for all involved.
Another helpful tip, if you are utilizing the beach for your event, is to try and run the event in the morning. If you are meeting in a tropical destination, rain is likely to strike in the afternoon hours and it’s best to have completed your outdoor activity before then. Plus, it gets hot at the beach! To avoid your participants suffering from the blinding sun and heat in the afternoon, meet outside during mid-morning or even around sunset when it’s cool and breezy.
Permits, Sound and Power
Although the beach is one of the coolest event spaces, there are some logistical items that need to be accounted for if you want your beach event to be a success! Make sure the area of the beach you are looking to reserve is available and that you have the right permits and permissions to use it. You don’t want to be kicked off by a lifeguard or hotel staff by not having permission. Something else to consider is how you’ll provide power and sound for your event. Unless you have a small group, most events will require a DJ and a microphone for the event host. Beaches don’t come with outlets, so make sure you have the proper speakers, generators, extensions cords, and any other equipment necessary! There’s nothing worse than a large group of people that can’t hear what’s happening…
Keeping Employees Safe
Most importantly, keep the safety of your employees and participants in mind when planning a team building beach day! Consider the following during the planning process:
Shade
As mentioned before, the beach gets HOT! There is no natural coverage from the sun on the beach and exposing a group of people to the sun for a couple hours can have massive consequences. Consider putting up tents for participants to take a break under, or at least a close designated, shaded building to find relief in. Your DJs and emcees will also require shade, so that neither the employees or their equipment overheat.
Water
Be sure to provide enough water for everybody! Keeping your participants hydrated while they engage in competitions or vigorous activities on the beach should be the most important thing. Without enough water, you run the risk of heat stroke and a variety of other liabilities during the event. You can never have enough water!
Sunscreen
Providing sunscreen is another wonderful thing to consider for your group before they head out underneath the sun. If the beach event is at the start of a conference or retreat, you don’t want your participants sunburnt and feeling unwell for the rest of the trip. Make sure everyone is well protected and prepared for some fun action in the sun!
Wildly Different
