How to attract visitors' attention, bring a shopping destination to life and offer family entertainment without requiring dedicated event staff?
On Saturday 31st October 2026, the Cap Saran shopping centre, near Orléans, hosted WHERIZ® Wall for a special Halloween day. Result: between 400 and 600 estimated participants and 354 games completed in just 10 hours!
The shopping centre, much more than a shopping place
Today, shopping centres are also places of life, leisure and meeting. To attract visitors, enrich their experience and energise their galleries, shopping centre management teams multiply events throughout the year.
Halloween, Christmas, school holidays or retail promotions are all opportunities to offer original activities that entice families to come to the shopping centre, spend time there and enjoy its shops.
In Saran, in the Loiret, the Cap Saran shopping centre, managed by Carmila, regularly offers entertainment to its visitors.
For Halloween 2026, between makeup workshops and monster hunts, the gallery also hosted an interactive experience for the whole family: WHERIZ® Wall.
A seek-and-find game at the heart of the gallery
Situated opposite the entrance of the Carrefour hypermarket, in a strategic location in a high-footfall location, WHERIZ® Wall invited young and old to discover Mystery Manor.
This scenario immerses participants in a mysterious manor, between a haunted house atmosphere and a Cluedo-style investigation. A theme perfectly suited for Halloween!
The principle is simple: visitors scan a QR code with their smartphone, access the game directly from their browser, and explore a large illustration to find hidden items based on clues.
For the occasion, we had set up the application in competition mode.
After entering their first name, surname, and email address, participants could start a five-minute game and try to achieve the highest score.
At stake: a €50 gift card, valid in the shops of the shopping gallery, for the winner of the day.
A challenge accessible to all, with no prior registration on site, no reservation, and no app to download!
WHERIZ attracts, brings together, and makes you want to play again
While many activities in shopping centres are primarily aimed at children, WHERIZ® has the unique feature of bringing together all generations around the same activity.
Throughout the day, we observed different ways of playing :
Some visitors participated individually, each with their smartphone.
Others played two or three on the same phone : one person led the game while the others helped find the answers on the illustration.
Entire families exchanged ideas and helped each other to meet the challenge.
One game could thus engage several people simultaneously, making WHERIZ® a shared gaming experience.
Another interesting observation : the short format of the games naturally encouraged replayability.
Some participants played multiple games for nearly 30 minutes to try to improve their score. Others returned to play after finishing their shopping in the gallery, before leaving!
A concrete illustration of the game's ability to keep visitors engaged, without imposing a path or schedule on visitors.
Between 400 and 600 estimated participants in one day !
The figures recorded at Cap Saran testify to the enthusiasm generated by the activity.
In just 10 hours :
400 to 600 estimated participants, taking into account the collective game around smartphones ;
207 registrations recorded for the competition ;
354 games completed, averaging more than 35 games per hour ;
10 to 15 people playing simultaneously observed continuously throughout the day.
The 207 registrations correspond to the phones registered to participate in the competition, and not to the total number of people who played. Many visitors indeed participated in groups around the same screen, which allows for estimating a significantly higher collective participation.
Beyond the volume of participants, it is mainly their spontaneous engagement that impressed us: visitors would stop, get involved in the game, interact, and sometimes return to try their luck again.
An activity that does not just attract attention: it makes you want to participate and to do it again!
30 minutes of setup, no animation to manage
For shopping centre managers, the simplicity of implementation represents a key issue.
At Cap Saran, one person and 30 minutes were enough to install WHERIZ® Wall, position the panel with its QR code, and set up a poster announcing the competition and the prize to be won.
To optimise the capacity, we also chose to install the same illustration on both sides of the wall.
Visitors could thus play simultaneously from each side of the structure, on the same scenario, without requiring additional equipment.
But the main advantage lies in the autonomy of the participants.
Once installed, WHERIZ® offers self-service entertainment, without a dedicated host.
Visitors can start a game at any time from their smartphone, play for a few minutes, and then continue their visit.
This flexibility worked particularly well at Cap Saran, where the game was installed near the makeup workshop.
Families could thus enjoy WHERIZ® while waiting their turn, transforming waiting time into a moment of entertainment.
The animation naturally integrated into the Halloween programme, without disrupting other activities and no dedicated staff required to accompany each game.
WHERIZ energises shopping centres all year round.
The experience conducted at Cap Saran illustrates several advantages of WHERIZ® for shopping centres:
Attracting the attention of visitors through a visual and interactive structure, installed in the thoroughfares.
Offering an intergenerational activity, accessible to both children and adults.
Encouraging engagement and replayability through short games, scores, and competitions.
Animating the gallery continuously, with autonomous players and without a dedicated host.
Completing other animations, particularly by pleasantly occupying waiting times.
Adapting content to key commercial moments, thanks to different scenarios and the possibility of creating customised games.
Halloween is just one example among others.
Christmas, school holidays, sporting events, shopping centre anniversaries, or promotional operations can also become opportunities to turn high-traffic areas into play spaces.
The same structure can host different scenarios throughout the year, allowing for the renewal of experiences offered to visitors.
What if your shopping centre also became a playground?
With its various formats of interactive games, WHERIZ® supports professionals in events and leisure in creating playful experiences accessible to all..
Do you want to offer a WHERIZ® activity in your shopping gallery?
Find on www.wheriz.co our map of equipped event service providers, capable of intervening directly in your centre.
We can also explore the creation of custom scenarios, in the colours of your shopping centre or tailored to a specific operation.
And from spring 2027, a new format of treasure hunt will enrich the possibilities for activities, particularly to imagine experiences throughout an entire shopping gallery.