Happied

Moral of the story, we make sh*t happen. That’s why we believe in the human approach to team retreat planning. We figure stuff out and are on the ground with our clients making their team offsite visions a reality. #HappiedMakesitHappen #UnitedAirlines

And, now we can add getting a giant, custom piñata through Mexico customs to our resume! 🙌🙌

TLDR for the rest of this story: We made it to the resort and our local vendor met us to bring the fillings. We hung up that big ol’ piñata. Our clients were v impressed, and everyone had an absolute gosh darn ball.

Anyways, we made it through. On to the hotel!!

Customs taxed us - BUT NOT ON THE PIÑATA 🤯. PSA if your bags get checked at customs and you have not one, but TWO devices (we had a laptop and an iPad), you WILL get taxed. But, worry not, 4ft piñatas are not a problem 😂.

Checking it was (surprisingly) easier than we thought it would be. We even caught a glimpse of it going up to the baggage compartment. The agent seems v confused 😭, but truly shout-out to @united for how delicately they handled it 🥹.

Once we landed at CUN airport, we knew to expect a bit of drama going through customs. And, we were right. All of our bags were held and were the last to come out of the carousel. Then we had to head to oversize to grab the piñata.

Alright, to the airport we go!

We thought we’d be able to find a Cancun vendor to make the piñata, but no luck. They were either very expensive or not able to customize in the logo shape we needed. So, we decided to look local.

The two piñatas:

Plan B: We contacted @united airlines to figure out the best way to get the bigger piñata across the border. The agents were truly PHENOMENAL at walking us through the logistics. We’d simply wrap the piñata and check it in oversized luggage. Easy right?

Plan A: We ordered a second back-up piñata in a smaller size so that we could pop it in a checked bag.

Ok, so we were definitely NOT going to cut the pinata lol. We got to work and ended up going with both Plan A and Plan B.

How would we pack it? How would we get it through customs?

We’re based in Washington, DC and thankfully found a local vendor who was just as excited as we were to build this beauty. But, the piñata was HUGE (our fault for not giving specs 🙈).

We’re always up to the challenge though! Let’s just say it was wilder than we expected.

First, let’s talk about how we got here. Our company, Happied, plans retreats and offsites for companies around the world. Our clients love us because we go above and beyond for them. But this was a new one even for us.

Story time. Our client requested a custom piñata for their Cancun team offsite. Yes, we got stopped at customs, but hell yes we pulled this thing off! A thread with vid of said incident 🧵.

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