{"id":2409,"date":"2022-04-22T17:00:29","date_gmt":"2022-04-22T15:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/murder-mystery-tabletop-game-company-hunt-a-killer-sees-large-layoffs\/"},"modified":"2022-04-22T17:00:29","modified_gmt":"2022-04-22T15:00:29","slug":"murder-mystery-tabletop-game-company-hunt-a-killer-sees-large-layoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/murder-mystery-tabletop-game-company-hunt-a-killer-sees-large-layoffs\/","title":{"rendered":"Murder mystery tabletop game company Hunt A Killer sees large layoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"source-title\">Murder mystery tabletop game company Hunt A Killer sees large layoffs<\/div>\n<div class=\"source-text\">\n<div>\n<p >Murder mystery tabletop game company Hunt A Killer, which grabbed headlines and saw record-setting financial success during the pandemic, laid off a significant portion of its staff in late March, former employees told Polygon. Ryan Hogan, Hunt A Killer\u2019s co-founder and chief executive, confirmed the layoffs in an emailed statement, but declined to share the exact number of workers let go. Multiple former employees told Polygon the dismissals accounted for at least 40% of the staff.<\/p>\n<p >Hunt a Killer was estimated to have had 80 to 100 employees before the March layoffs. Some product teams have been almost completely wiped out, former workers said, with priorities now shifting between projects. <\/p>\n<p >\u201cWe are currently shifting our efforts to the most growth-oriented aspects of our business,\u201d Hogan told Polygon. \u201cPart of that process is, unfortunately, a temporary reduction in force to allow focus on our thriving retail distribution and soon-to-launch live event business.\u201d<\/p>\n<p >He continued: \u201cIn the near future, we will be announcing new content partnerships and new retail partnerships as we continue to grow and evolve our business.\u201d<\/p>\n<p >Layoffs of this size aren\u2019t new for Hunt A Killer; former employees told Polygon there have been at least three rounds of large-scale layoffs since 2020. Two workers told Polygon they received a few days\u2019 worth of severance pay.<\/p>\n<p >Hunt A Killer\u2019s subscription-based murder mystery games took off during the pandemic. The games unravel over multiple boxes, which cost $30 per month, as players compile clues and put together the story. Boxes contain items like newspaper clippings, notes, little trinkets, and police reports, all curated to tell a story. In 2020, Hunt A Killer boasted $50 million in revenue \u2014 \u201cnearly doubling\u201d revenue from the previous year, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.prnewswire.com\/news-releases\/immersive-entertainment-company-hunt-a-killer-appoints-industry-leading-directors-to-its-board-301262482.html\">the company said in a 2021 news release<\/a>. Earning the No. 6 spot on <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.inc.com\/magazine\/202009\/kevin-j-ryan\/hunt-killer-murder-mystery-subscription-box-game-2020-inc5000.html\">Inc.\u2019s 2020 top 5000 list<\/a>, Hunt A Killer reported a revenue growth of 20,484.9% in three years.<\/p>\n<p >Attempting to build on that success, Hunt A Killer pushed its staff to continuously release new material and games. Some workers told Polygon this led to extensive crunch for the company, often focused on the creative teams. <\/p>\n<p >Though former workers said they enjoyed their work and teams, they said the pace at which it was conducted was often untenable. Some workers told Polygon that Hunt A Killer was not selling as many games as it expected in 2022, which led to the company\u2019s massive layoffs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"source-image\">https:\/\/cdn.vox-cdn.com\/thumbor\/-VXtI2ifyV7YfEIJxPtCfRYGF-E=\/0x198:2760&#215;1643\/fit-in\/1200&#215;630\/cdn.vox-cdn.com\/uploads\/chorus_asset\/file\/23408952\/539568195.jpg<\/div>\n<div class=\"source-link\">https:\/\/www.polygon.com\/23037110\/hunt-a-killer-murder-mystery-board-game-subscription-layoffs<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Murder mystery tabletop game company Hunt A Killer sees large layoffs Murder mystery tabletop game company Hunt A Killer, which grabbed headlines and saw record-setting financial success during the pandemic, laid off a significant portion of its staff in late March, former employees told Polygon. Ryan Hogan, Hunt A Killer\u2019s co-founder and chief executive, confirmed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2410,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2409"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pr.gagadget.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}