Fort Boyard – off-site team building for Vision Optic Group, a national optical products distributor
The goal was to unite a team working across different cities in Ukraine and give them a shared emotional experience
About the Event
CLIENT: Vision Optic Group (VOG)
INDUSTRY: optical products distribution (eyewear, lenses, equipment)
STATUS: No. 1 optical products distributor in Ukraine
LOCATION: Osokory countryside complex, Ukraine
FORMAT: offline off-site team building
DATE: summer 2024
DURATION: 1 day
NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS: around 80 people
GEOGRAPHY: employees from across Ukraine
RUSH ROLE - full cycle: concept, logistics, production, coordination
About the Client
CLIENT: Vision Optic Group (VOG)
INDUSTRY: optical products distributor (eyewear, lenses, equipment)
STATUS: No. 1 optical products distributor in Ukraine
INDUSTRY: optical products distributor (eyewear, lenses, equipment)
STATUS: No. 1 optical products distributor in Ukraine
Vision Optic Group is a national wholesale company that has been operating in Ukraine's optical industry for more than 20 years. The company distributes a wide range of optical products, including eyeglass frames, sunglasses, optical lenses, contact lenses, and accessories, supplying them to 3,000 optical stores across the country. Vision Optic Group is headquartered in Dnipro and also has representative offices in Kyiv, Odesa, Lviv, and Vinnytsia, covering sales, marketing, technical support, logistics, and warehouse operations.
The company brings together more than 80 employees working in different cities across Ukraine. Most communication happens through calls, messages, and screens, while opportunities to meet in person are rare. Although part of the team is based in Dnipro, many colleagues had never interacted beyond avatars and work chats.
For the management team, it was important to change this: to give people a chance to meet face to face, communicate as individuals, and genuinely feel part of one united team.
Challenge
The company already had experience with various corporate events and team-building formats, so typical scenarios with contests and a host were not enough. The team was under pressure from the reality of war, stress, blackouts, heavy workloads, and the lack of proper rest. There was a real risk that another ordinary corporate event would fail to create the needed effect and instead make people even more tired. The key objectives were:
Build a sense of one united team despite remote work and external challenges.
Increase trust, mutual support, and initiative between departments.
Bring sales, marketing, warehouse, and technical teams into one shared process.
Identify informal leaders and the strengths of each participant.
Create an emotional reset and a sense of pride in the shared result.
Fort Boyard Concept
The event was built around the Fort Boyard concept, a format that instantly immerses participants in a familiar world of games, adventure, and challenges. It is not just a set of tasks, but an emotional journey where people are allowed to take risks, try something new, and step beyond their usual roles. Fort Boyard creates a sense of belonging to something bigger and almost legendary, where everyone becomes part of the team and a shared story.
In a corporate setting, this approach works even more powerfully. Different departments find themselves in the same boat: some people take the lead, others handle analytical tasks, while others step into physical challenges. The format combines logic, physical activity, teamwork, and psychological tasks. Participants make decisions together, overcome fears, analyze situations, and distribute roles. Challenging conditions and vivid emotions become the glue that quickly builds trust, support, and responsibility for the shared result.
How It Was Executed
“Every unforgettable event begins long before the first guest arrives.”
CEO of RUSH Event Agency
Denys Sydora
Preparation
Preparation began with selecting a venue during the peak summer season, with the option to close the entire territory for one event. The Osokory complex was chosen because it allowed the team to reserve the full space without outside guests and ensure comfortable logistics within the city.
The Fort Boyard scenario was adapted for a corporate format, participant safety, and comfort. Over 3-4 weeks, the Rush team worked through the challenge mechanics, the balance of task difficulty, and the participant journey across the venue. The most complex part was arranging the game zones and designing unexpected routes between activities so the team would keep moving, discover new points, and never know in advance what was waiting next.
Event Day
The event began with arrival, check-in, and immersion into the atmosphere of a camp and Fort Boyard. Teams were formed randomly using symbolic keys, mixing different departments and job levels.
The game block included a wide range of tasks focused on logic, courage, teamwork, trust, and leadership. Participants went through water-based challenges, worked with props, overcame fears, and supported one another in unusual situations. The final coin-collecting challenge became the peak of the excitement: every team gave its maximum effort to collect the treasure together.
In the evening, the teams were awarded, video highlights from the day were shown, and an interactive program reinforced the feeling of lightness, humor, and unity.
After the Event
After the event, the client highlighted the high level of team engagement and the unconventional format that delivered a real reset. Vision Optic Group continues to cooperate with Rush.
The partnership has continued for more than five to six years, and VOG Fort Boyard became another confirmation of trust and shared results.
Key Highlights of VOG Fort Boyard
Full immersion into Fort Boyard: atmosphere, actors, props, branding, and scenario.
Role-based characters, symbolic keys, a treasure cage, and final coins.
Tasks for logic, strength, overcoming fears, analysis, and teamwork.
Peak emotions during water challenges, reptile encounters, and the final coin collection.
Carefully designed zones and routes that kept the team constantly moving.
An immersive experience that connects people through shared emotions, challenges, and victories.
Corporate Event Results
The event gave the team not only vivid impressions, but also concrete results noted by both participants and management.
Engagement: 80-90%. Participation in all main game and final activities throughout the day.
Team interaction: noticeably improved. According to the coordinators and hosts, participants actively helped one another, quickly distributed roles, and supported colleagues from other departments.
Event NPS: around 8-9 out of 10. Based on verbal feedback from participants and the client during and after the event.
Leadership: new informal leaders were identified. The behavior of captains and individual participants during the tasks showed who was ready to take responsibility and lead the team.
Long-term effect: continued partnership.
VOG Feedback on RUSH Event Agency
“It was important for us not just to hold another corporate event, but to truly unite the team. The Fort Boyard format by Rush gave us exactly the effect we were looking for: people got involved 100%, opened up to one another, and we saw how different departments work together. This is the kind of experience employees keep talking about long after the event.”
Hanna / COO
Vision Optic Group
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