Board Games By The Bay (BGBTB) is the name for a series of epic board gaming events that have been running in New Zealand since 2011. It was originally started by the folks behind online game store SeriouslyBoard.co.nz.
The first event in Auckland (which was ‘by the bay’, in case you were wondering), was followed with another in Tauranga the same year. Hamilton was added in 2012, and then Palmerston North in 2013. In 2014, record numbers attended two weekends in Auckland, and one in Hamilton.
When SeriouslyBoard changed hands in 2014, the new owners committed to keeping BGBTB running. For 2014 to 2018, BGBTB continued this pattern with three events every year (two in Auckland, one in Hamilton), and the number of gamers attending each one continued to grow.
With SeriouslyBoard changing hands again in 2018, it was decided to let BGBTB out into the world on its own! It is now run by Hamilton gamers Jason and Juliet, with the help of many amazing volunteers. All the people involved with running BGBTB love playing these games, and want more people to discover the joys of modern board games!
In 2019, we expanded to 5 events over the year - two for Auckland, two for Hamilton, and our first ever South Island event in Christchurch!
The arrival of COVID-19 in 2020 brought with it a lot of challenges for our events, but we did still manage to run four events in 2020 and four in 2021, including our first ever event in Dunedin.
We took a bit of a break in 2022, but were super excited to be part of the Cancer Society Games Fair, with a special event on in Auckland that brought together not just board games, but role-playing, collectible card card games, and wargaming!
