Deirdre Cross discusses the partners and purpose behind her new company, The Office of Tiffany Birdsong

Deirdre, you’ve just announced – all in one go – the nature of your new venture, the people on the team… And its name: The Office of Tiffany Birdsong. Before we get to that extraordinary name, what IS The Office of Tiffany Birdsong?
The Office of Tiffany Birdsong is something my partners and I have been building for a long time… A creative studio focused on tabletop board games. That’s the short answer – but it’s very special to us and very exciting for me…  We have our first games coming out later this year; we’ll be able to talk about those closer to Gen Con.

Perfect! And what are you hoping to achieve with The Office of Tiffany Birdsong? What are your aims?
We’re developing a range of new tabletop and party games, the first wave of which we’re publishing under the imprint Hall Party Games. That product is very much focused on the creator space and discovery culture. We’re creating products that are specifically developed to push into the TikTok channel – so they’re really visual; very gettable.

And you’re saying “we” – let’s talk about the team. Who’s on board?
My co-founder in this operation is my former business partner, Jessica Aceti. Joining us in the launch is Andrew Perlmutter, who is an investor and our strategic advisor on building this business. You well know Andrew, of course; he was the CEO of Funko. Jessica and I had the great pleasure of working with Andrew for many years – but our relationship with him goes back before then as well… It’s fantastic to work with him again in this way. And then Matt Christianson is joining us as Director of Product Development. Matt was a Senior Game Developer and Category Lead on our incredible creative team at Funko Games.

That’s quite a line up!
It’s so exciting! The legacy of the people on this team is in such a broad range of consumer products: Funko Games, Forrest-Pruzan Creative, and Prospero Hall. Add to that the last couple of years creating product for Moose Games, Goliath and Asmodee… There’s a deep wealth of knowledge helping us build out this business in a lot of interesting directions. We’ve also reached out to a few outside game-inventors with whom we’ve worked before – but we’re not open to all outside inventors just yet.

So you’re not opening the floodgates to external inventors – noted. In terms, then, of the games coming from this first imprint – Hall Party Games – what can we expect?
As you might tell from the name, Hall Party Games focuses very specifically on super-accessible party games… The way we describe them is games that we can pitch in five seconds. We say: “These are games so fun, your friends will forgive you for making them play!”

Oh, I love that! Even working in the industry, I think there are still times at which one feels trepidation or resentment after someone pulls out a game…
Isn’t it true?! You go to your friend’s and they’re like, ‘Oh, Deej is here. We’ve got to play a game…’ But do you really want to play? Or are you going along with it? And secretly hoping that you don’t hate it?!

Ha! Personally, I almost always feel the latter… Which I feel bad confessing!
Well, I don’t think you’re alone! And as we’re developing and playtesting these new party games, one of the standard questions we take note of is: how many drinks has each of these people had before they play the game? Because we know how it is to have had a few glasses of wine and find yourself playing a game… We want to make sure it’s still easy to understand late in the party!

Yes… No one wants to look foolish or make a mistake. No one wants to sit there bamboozled by rules or wondering what the aim is! And I think having a whole bunch of things you really don’t like about certain games gives you a tree stump against which to kick…
A tree stump against which to kick?

Yes! If you don’t like complicated rules, then that’s a stump to kick… You must have simple rules. If you don’t like long complex concepts, that’s a stump: your games will be instant gets…
Got it! Because most people probably don’t even want to play a game… So when we’re talking about creating ideas for Hall Party Games, we’re specifically thinking about that TikTok mentality first. We’re thinking about how extraordinary a moment must be if it’s strong enough to stop you scrolling on that platform and think, ‘That looks like so much fun, I have to get it!’

Which is something we’ve discussed before, I think, because it’s directly comparable to shopping at retail, isn’t it?
Yes – it’s very much the same when you think about product you’re developing for the game aisle. Over the years, consumer research has shown something fascinating about mass-market game sales… When asked about their decisions when buying a game, more than 50% of purchasers didn’t go to the game aisle intending to buy a game. Rather, they were going by with their cart and somehow ended up purchasing a game.

50% is bonkers! So there must be a moment at which an awful lot of consumers are saying, ‘Oh, I’ll give that a go!’
And what was that moment? What made them buy something they didn’t go to the store to purchase? What is the power of a game that jumps off the shelf to do that? Or reaches through the screen? We all know some games that do it…

So, we’re constantly thinking about that, because we have to engineer that moment. We’re continually asking ourselves a lot of questions around that because we’re building The Office of Tiffany Birdsong from the ground up… And we’re building it based on a lot of experience around what’s worked – and what’s not worked.

Perfect. And why is now the right time for this team to start The Office of Tiffany Birdsong?
Well, to extend your tree analogy: if the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, the next best time to plant one is today. I mean, what are we going to do? Wait two more years. Three? For what are we waiting? When else is the right time? And I mean, I’ve been heartened by the support of my family and my friends to start this now… For the last seven years of my career, I’ve been at Funko Games and Moose – really tremendous toy companies; I’m so proud of the work that I did at those places… But to be an entrepreneur again with The Office of Tiffany Birdsong does feel like coming home.

Terrific. And if Hall Party Games is the imprint for party games, presumably there are other imprints for other game types?
Our studio is going in three directions at once. Right away, we’re publishing our own titles as Hall Party Games. Then we’re also working on partnerships with other brands, founders and creators. There’s something of a question as regards where those sit… Do those come out under their name? Ours? Something completely new? All that’s to be decided. That’s the second of our pillars. Then, our third pillar is to hire ourselves out as what we call “idea incubators.” In other words, The Office of Tiffany Birdsong can be a phantom muse on retainer.

Amazing! Now, I’m almost sorry to bring this up because it’s such an obvious question and I think you’re going to get it a LOT! Why is it called The Office of Tiffany Birdsong?
Ha! There’s no need to be sorry! The team actually talked about this quite a bit. Many years ago, Jessica and I shared an office. In our studio, there weren’t any numbers on the doors of the rooms… Instead, there were just names. And Jessica and I named our room The Office of Tiffany Birdsong. At some point, Matt and I also shared that office. Eventually I had the office all to myself – and still kept calling it The Office of Tiffany Birdsong.

And this is a name you just made up for fun? Picked at random?
Yes. So far as I know, there is no real Tiffany Birdsong… It was just Jess and I riffing. In one way, it could serve a practical purpose because when I was running a large studio, it felt less intimidating to tell someone, “Just stop by the office of Tiffany Birdsong…” It was so random – but why not? Then I think it stuck for eight years because the confusion was part of the delight… Sometimes people would call me Tiffany! Ha! I even received an email one time saying, “Thanks for your interest, Tiffany.” Ha!

Ha! Oh, my gosh! So funny! So now… Before we wrap things up, is there anything I should’ve asked you about today that I didn’t, Deirdre?
You could’ve asked me about licensed product – there’s no reason you should necessarily, except that this team has such a strong background in creating licensed games. Now, our first wave of product is non-licensed, but we’ll certainly be working with licenses in the future.

And you’re taking meetings, are you not, at Licensing Expo?
That’s right. And despite the fact that you and I talked quite a bit about Hall Party Games being very focused on a very specific style of game, it might be that the tightness of the brand creates opportunities. You know, if you put us in a tight box, we’ll create our way out of it! But that’s not to say that anything The Office of Tiffany Birdsong produces would be limited to those specific parameters because the creative flexibility and the breadth of the opportunity is above that.

On that then, Deirdre… When you’re looking for licenses – generally speaking – how do you know a license is right for you?
I wouldn’t say there’s any certain formula because you can put your heart into every product and launch them all with high hopes. Some licensed ideas might be a creative success but perhaps not a commercial success! But we’ve all seen unusual licenses break out in surprising ways… Sometimes you pick something unusual and it really sings. Back in 2017, for example, we made a Bob Ross game before anybody was making products for Bob Ross.

Bob Ross being the cult American presenter and artist. That game was for Forrest-Pruzan Creative, was it not?
Yes. And we did that because Jessica was leading what we called our Trendscaping at that time… So Jess saw that Bob Ross was trending on Twitch; people were watching and talking about Bob Ross and how chill it was. Jess strongly felt it was going to be a thing. We pitched it to one of our publishing partners and they thought it was so crazy that it just might work! At that same time in parallel, Andrew Perlmutter and the team at Funko were getting ready to license Bob Ross for Funko Pop! So sometimes there’s something unusual about a license that you can’t put your finger on: it just works; it really takes off.

An insightful answer! Thank you, Deirdre. I’ll sign things off with a link to your website, which people can find embedded in the word here. Thanks again for joining me!

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