If you're looking into becoming a murder mystery licensee, the first question is usually the most practical one: what do you actually get for your money, and what are you expected to supply yourself? This isn't a franchise where someone builds the business for you. It's a licence to run games that already work, using a brand and booking system that already exist, in your own area with your own venue and audience.
Here's the honest split of who provides what.
What does a murder mystery licensee get from the company?
You get the finished games. Every script, character sheet, clue, prop list, and host's running order is written and tested. You're not developing content from scratch or guessing whether a mystery holds together over three hours with real guests in the room.
You get training on how to run the games as a host, including pacing, how to manage a room of guests who've never played before, and how to handle the moments that always come up — someone arriving late, a guest who wants to dominate the plot, a table that's gone quiet.
You get the brand. Guests searching for a murder mystery night recognise the name and know roughly what they're booking. You're not starting from zero on trust.
You get the booking system, which handles ticket sales, payment, and the admin around private bookings and public events. This is the part most new licensees underestimate — the software behind a smooth booking experience takes far longer to build than the games themselves.
What do you have to bring as a licensee?
You bring the venue relationships. The company doesn't own restaurants, function rooms, or hotels in your city — you find them, or you already have them. Private events happen at a customer's own venue, so part of your job is being the person a local restaurant or events manager calls when they want to fill a Tuesday night.
You bring the audience, at least at first. Public ticketed events need people buying seats, and building that local following is on you — through your own marketing, local listings, social media, and word of mouth once the first few events have happened.
You bring the people who run the games on the night. This might be you, staff you hire, or a mix, but someone local has to actually deliver the game in the room. The company can train hosts; it can't be in your city on a Friday night.
You bring the day-to-day running of your patch — scheduling, communicating with venues, handling the practical side of a booking from enquiry to event night.
How much of the ticket price does a licensee keep?
Licensees keep the large majority of every ticket sold. The exact structure is covered in detail when you apply, but the model is built so that the person doing the local work — finding venues, selling tickets, running the room — is the one who benefits most from a busy night, not the company that supplied the script.
Is this the same as dinner theatre or hiring actors?
No, and this trips people up. A murder mystery licensee isn't buying into dinner theatre. There's no stage, no script performed at guests, no cast putting on a show while people watch and eat. It's a game — guests play characters, follow clues, question each other, and work out who did it. The host runs the game rather than performs it. That distinction matters for how you market it locally: you're selling an experience people take part in, not a performance they watch.
Do you need event or hospitality experience to apply?
It helps, but it's not the deciding factor. What matters more is whether you can find and hold venue relationships in your area, and whether you're comfortable being the person who runs the event end to end — bookings, communication, and being present or having someone present on the night. If you've run any kind of local event, sold tickets to the public, or managed a venue relationship before, that experience transfers directly.
Can you run both private events and public ticketed nights as a licensee?
Yes, and most licensees do both. Private events are typically booked directly by a customer at their own venue — a birthday, a corporate night, a fundraiser. Public events are ticketed nights you organise yourself, usually at a restaurant or venue you've built a relationship with, where individual guests buy seats rather than one customer booking the whole night. You can see how public events are currently run city by city on the public events page, which gives a good sense of the format before you commit to running your own.
What does a typical first few months look like?
Most new licensees spend the early weeks on training and on lining up the first handful of venues. The first events tend to be smaller and slower to fill, because the local audience doesn't know the brand yet. Momentum usually comes from the first two or three public events going well enough that a venue asks to make it a regular booking, and from private event enquiries starting to come in once the licensee's name is attached to the brand locally.
What it comes down to
The company supplies the product, the training, the brand, and the system that takes a payment and turns it into a confirmed booking. You supply the local presence — venues, guests, and someone who can run the room. Neither half works without the other, which is really the whole point of a licence rather than doing it entirely alone or entirely for someone else.
If you want to see what a night actually costs and how availability is structured for private bookings, the pricing and availability page is a useful reference point, and general questions about how events run are covered on the FAQ page.
If the split of responsibilities above sounds like something you could do in your own area, the next step is to look at what running as a murder mystery licensee involves in more detail on the licensee program page, and if it fits, apply directly through the licensee application.