While traveling to cities around the country with his teenage son’s competitive soccer team, Brad Little of Norman got a firsthand view of various family entertainment center concepts.

When the team was in different cities, the teenage soccer players and accompanying family members would visit the family entertainment venues during down times. Little said he realized a need for a similar venue in the Norman-Moore area.

“We would see places like Dave and Buster’s and Main Event Entertainment in Texas,” he said. “We wanted something clean for families here.”

So Little, an attorney, started developing a concept for a family entertainment center for the Norman-Moore area. In September 2007 after two years of planning and finding a couple of partners, Trey and Tracy Bates, HeyDay opened at the Indian Hills Road exit of Interstate 35 between Moore and Norman featuring laser tag, mini-golf, a game arcade and DoubleDave’s Pizzaworks.

HeyDay will be celebrating its second anniversary in September and has attracted patrons and events extending well beyond kid birthday parties and teenagers – many of the customers are adults and HeyDay offers a team-building program that has been used by some of the area’s largest companies.

“When Brad and I were discussing the concept, we talked about how to attract the college crowd, the younger crowd and the grandmas and the grandpas,” said Trey Bates, a real estate developer.

Little already was developing the concept for a family entertainment center when he met Trey and Tracy Bates through a mutual friend.

Trey Bates, a native of Norman and a University of Oklahoma graduate, worked in the Dallas area in real estate development for 14 years before returning to Norman. Along the way, he met and married Tracy, a native of Austin, Texas, and a Texas A&M University graduate, and they started a family. Their four children are ages 7-14.

While in Texas, Trey and Tracy often ate at DoubleDave’s Pizzaworks, a Texas-based chain featuring hand-tossed pizza dough started in College Station in 1984.

Little was planning the laser tag and mini-golf, while the Bates were considering a DoubleDave’s franchise for Oklahoma.

“Brad already had laser tag and mini-golf and he had the best designer and manufacturer for both,” Tracy Bates said.

So Little and Trey and Tracy married their concepts and the result is HeyDay with the only DoubleDave’s outside Texas.

“The restaurant is as much an attraction as the laser tag,” Trey Bates said.

Last fall when the University of Texas football team played Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, a lot of the Texas fans stopped at HeyDay for the pizza when they saw the familiar-to-Texans DoubleDave’s sign, Little said.

Many of the visitors to HeyDay are impressed with the quality of the food at the restaurant featuring hand-tossed pizza, Tracy Bates said.

“People have an expectation of concession-stand quality food,” she said. “We have been working on marketing the restaurant.”

Restaurant services have expanded.

“We now offer catering and delivery,” Little said

HeyDay offers 7,000 square feet for laser tag on two floors that can accommodate up to 42 players at a time.

“With laser tag, we are on a march to 1 million players,” Little said. “We are at 700,000 now.”

Laser tag also has been popular with adult customers.

“More adults play laser tag than kids,” he said.

Mini-golf and laser tag have both been popular with families.

“Mini-golf is a great activity for grandparents to do with their grandchildren,” Tracy Bates said.

Weekends are popular for events.

“Saturday is birthday party city here,” Little said.

HeyDay’s special event uses extend beyond the usual birthdays, kids’ parties and school and church groups. Other groups have come to HeyDay for wedding rehearsal dinners, bachelor and bachelorette parties, family reunions and sporting event watch parties.

Other services offered by HeyDay include group lock-ins and team-building sessions for companies and other groups. Customers for the team-building sessions include Dell, Chesapeake Energy and a high school softball team.

HeyDay has 35 part-time employees, a restaurant manager and an entertainment manager. The restaurant and entertainment managers report to Little, who is the general manager although he still practices law.

Tracy Bates handles sales and marketing. Trey Bates also helps out, and he and Little even clean tables in the restaurant.

“I always try to talk with customers,” Trey Bates said.

Talking with customers is part of a plan to keep HeyDay’s concept fresh.

“We are committed to reinvesting money here,” Trey Bates said. “Our goal is that when you come back here there is something new that you did not see the last time.”

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