Imagine throwing a party big enough to land in the Guinness World Records book? Imagine throwing a retro party big enough for artists from the 80s, and 90s to come out of retirement and back on tour. Well, Event Producer Jared Guynes did that.
Guynes was turning 30 when he decided he wanted to throw the biggest party Dallas had ever seen, while simultaneously trying to break the Guinness World Record book for the world’s largest nerf battle.
His first party featured famous artists like Vanilla Ice, Tone-Loc, Young MC, Rob Base, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and many other guests. The party of about 900 people would have broken the record, but when Guynes submitted the information to Guniess, he was denied because of insufficient evidence and improper documentation.
This only lit a fire under the party organizer. Gynes was determined to get the world record.
“It bothered me because I knew we had certainly broken the record that night, but I didn’t have a way to prove it to them. It created a chip on my shoulder which bothered me for many years until I approached the Dallas Cowboys and asked them if I could rent out their stadium for an event.” Guynes said. “It took a lot of convincing, but I finally got them to agree to let me use their stadium to host the largest nerf battle.”
Guynes then started to plan how he was going to achieve his goal and finally place his name in history.
“In March 2016, I hosted the first nerf battle that is now known as Jared’s Epic Blaster Battle one,” he said, noting that the event set a world record, and Guinness was there to present the award and sketch his name into the history books. “I became a record holder, which allowed me to redeem myself for my failure in 2014.”
The world record now sits at 2,289 people.
Guynes has held the event every year since then, but once the pandemic happened, it was a cause for concern. In 2020 as coronavirus cases were rising, Guynes was forced to call off the nerf battle that had sold out.
“Even at the time, it was like, ‘Well, I don’t know,'” Guynes says. “The mask mandates weren’t lifted, but the numbers were going down. It was sort of a gamble, but I can’t just tell the attendees that it’ll be someday, so just hold tight. They want to know when it’s going to happen.” Guynes said.
Once permitted, Guynes, hosted the 5th & 6th nerf battle back to back as a tribute to his supporters for being patient with him.
This year Guynes is taking his nerf battles on the road to three different stadiums — The Dallas Cowboys AT&T Stadium; The SoFi Stadium here in Inglewood; and The Atlanta Falcons’ Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
The Dallas event happened June 26; the L.A. event will happen this Saturday, July 2; and the Atlanta event is coming up in 2023. Tickets are available for purchase for the L.A. event at https://tinyurl.com/yu84cpa8.
