Adults are well catered for. There’s a run club, a supper club and a wellness studio on every corner, and all of them assume you have a disposable income and a free Tuesday. If you’re 19 and just want to see your friends without a bar tab, the list gets short fast.
Yo-Chi seems to have noticed. Until 11 October, all 78 of its stores are running Fun House, a pop-up that turns the frozen yogurt shop into something closer to a house party. There’s nothing to book. You turn up, order, and find out what’s on.
The hosting falls to the Chi-E-O, a title that sounds like a joke until you realise it’s printed on an actual job description. Their job is to bring the energy, and at peak times that means running games for prizes.
The first is Chi-Pong, which is beer pong without the beer. Every Yo-Chi you buy gets you one shot at the table. Land two of your three ping pong balls in cups of the same colour and you win 50% off, 25% off or a mystery prize. It’s back after popular demand, which tells you the format works.
The second is Karao-Chi, new this year, and the deal is plain: sing for your swirl. Take the mic solo and your froyo is free. Bring a friend for a duet and you both get half off. The prize pool across the games is $2,000.
The toppings bar has been rebuilt around the same nostalgic, slightly chaotic theme. There’s fairy bread slice, which is a sentence nobody expected to write about froyo. There are SnackaChangi vinegar and salt chips, caramel popcorn, chocolate-dipped Yo-Chi Bears and Yo-Chi Bear mellows. The FUNDAY Yo-Chi Bear sweets come in yuzu, lychee and peach. It’s a lot of sweet, salty and crunchy to put on one cup, and the limited run is probably for the best.
Fun House closes with a one-night House Party on 11 October. It takes over one store in each of five cities: Tea Tree Plaza in Adelaide, Karrinyup in Perth, Carlton in Melbourne, Barangaroo in Sydney and Albert Street in Brisbane. There will be DJs, and the Chi-Pong and Karao-Chi champions each take home $1,000. Timings are yet to be announced and will go up on Yo-Chi’s social channels.
Co-owner and Chief Brand Officer Oliver Allis says the idea is for Fun House to feel like a party everyone’s invited to, and that it’s part of a longer play to make Yo-Chi stores a proper hangout for younger people. It’s a smart read of the moment. Plenty of people want somewhere to be that doesn’t revolve around alcohol, and a shop with a mic and a ping pong table is a cheap place to start.
Fun House
Where: all 78 Yo-Chi stores
When: until 11 October
Booking: not needed
Leave a Reply