Hello, my name is Jay Harris, and I’m driven by a fascination of how people interact with their surroundings and inner voice. This journey began during my A-levels while studying Psychology, deepened through my Psychology degree, and has informed every step of my career since.
I strive to be innovative and this passion led me to founding Modern Fables Escape Rooms. Alongside creating the visitor attraction itself, I assembled a team, developed an inclusive team culture and brought the company’s visual identity into being.
I am highly organised and have over a decade of experience managing creative projects, operations, and customer-focused business models. I have extensive experience in marketing, product development, financial management, and stakeholder management, balancing creativity with data-driven decision-making.
I see the bigger picture while not ignoring attention to detail, delivering exciting customer experiences.
I’m very excited about starting a new career journey and am eager to apply my skills to new challenges.
My Career Journey
I started my career in a Government Authority. Here, I honed my understanding of diverse experiences and learned the importance of listening to enable mutual understanding.
After this I was a freelancer. I worked collaboratively alongside various creative directors, designing and building immersive audio environments for children’s theatre and museums. Clients included the National Trust and the Clink Prison Museum. During this period I really got to exercise my creative muscle alongside working to very specific briefs.
A fateful city-break to Berlin introduced me to escape rooms, sparking the realisation I had a unique creative vision to offer London’s escape room scene. In 2017, with minimal resources and fanatical determination, I launched “The Escapist,” Modern Fables’ first escape room. Its success, punctuated by a 5-star review from Time Out London, was a turning point, proving the market’s appetite for my vision of what an escape room should be. See my case study to find out what this vision was.
After moving to a larger venue in the lead up to the pandemic, I overhauled the Modern Fables visual identity and tone of voice. We then accomplished an average quarterly sales increase of 50%.
I managed all aspects of the business, from marketing to creative direction and project management to daily operations and team organisation, being highly regarded by team members.
The pandemic caused me to pivot my work so I took my passion and expertise into creating games for others. During this time, I collaborated with the charity Ministry of Stories and worked with YouTuber MrWhoseTheBoss.
Highlighted Skills
- Product Management & Strategy: Created, launched and developed experiential products and branding in line with overall strategy.
- Financial Accountability: Experienced in budget forecasting and management to meet ambitious financial goals.
- Analytical Insight: Leveraging data for market insights, optimising product offerings to increase growth.
- Stakeholder & Relationship Management: Expertise in collaborating with creative and production teams, as well as external IP holders and senior management.
- Creative Direction & Marketing: Created compelling products and campaigns that increased revenue by 50% per quarter, achieving a 4.9* Google Review rating and a Recommended by Time Out award.
- Administration: Highly organised, running all aspects of a small business.
- Problem Solving: Solution focussed, inspiring teams to achieve in difficult circumstances.
- Written and verbal communication: Empathetic, active listener with an audience-focused approach.
- Adaptability: Comfortable dealing with the unknown quickly and efficiently.
Other skills: I learned to make decent cafetière and moka pot coffee from my brother. It powered our fully-booked days at Modern Fables.
Moving Forward
As I explore new horizons, I carry a wealth of experiences and creative ideas. From project management to creative direction, I have worked as a part of multi-organisation teams as well as leading my own by example. I’m very excited to apply the lessons I’ve learned and contribute to even more exciting projects. I’m eager to see where my passions will lead next!
Alongside my professional life I also work on other creative projects that take my interest. These include a new set of immersive storytelling works as well as musical and visual interests.
