History of Looney Labs
Brief History
Looney Labs was started in November 1996 by Kristin Looney and her husband, Andy, with the goal of publishing a card game he’d invented, called Fluxx. By 1999, both Looneys were able to quit their day jobs (they met while working at NASA) to pursue their dreams together. They have now sold over 4 million copies of Fluxx!
Over the last 27 years, Kristin and Andy and their team have published numerous innovative and award-winning games, most notably dozens of versions of their flagship game, Fluxx. They are also well known for the colorful pyramid-shaped gaming pieces called Looney Pyramids, which are an abstract board game system you can play hundreds of different games with. Their other hits include a time travel game called Chrononauts, a high-speed matching game called Loonacy, a party game based on Mad Libs, and for dessert, a card game about dessert called Just Desserts.
Looney Labs games are for sale in game stores everywhere, including all around the world — Fluxx is so popular that it’s been translated into eleven different languages!
Detailed History
- The Icehouse Years: 1986-1996
- The ICE Years: 1996-2000
- The Pop-Tart Cafe Years: 2000-2003
- The Experimental Years: 2003-2005
- The Janet's Attic Years: 2005-2008
- The Pepperland Years: 2008-2013
- The Sterling Building Years: 2013-2019
- The Pandemic Years: 2020-2023
- The Future: 2024-Now
The beginning of Looney Labs was the day in 1986 when Andy met his new NASA co-worker Kristin, and in the summer of 1987, when he wrote a short story featuring a fictional game played with imaginary pyramid-shaped game pieces. He made a prototype gameset using lead fishing weights, but struggled in his first attempts at game design. Fortunately, his friend John Cooper was inspired by Andy's vision, and in 1988 he unveiled working rules for Andy's pretend game. Icehouse was so fascinating that Kristin, one of the first to try playing it, immediately wanted to start a company to publish it.
Icehouse Games, Inc sold an initial print run of 100 hand-made game sets in late 1989. The spare-time company never had any paid employees, and only published a few hundred game sets of various formats in their 8 year history; even so, the experience was crucial towards giving Kristin & Andy the training they needed to start Looney Labs. Another effort during this time that helped hone their production skills was the tradition of producing short-runs of cool creations for the holidays under the imprint of Geronimo! Industries. This tradition lives on in Looney Labs’ efforts to provide some small gift back to our fans as a “Holiday Gift”.
Everything changed on July 24, 1996, when (at Kristin's request) Andy invented Fluxx. Instead of trying to publish a complicated game with pieces that were difficult & expensive to manufacture, they had an easy-to-learn easy-to-publish card game which, best of all, was endless fun to play. So they shut down Icehouse Games and Geronimo! Industries and started a new company for the purpose of publishing the card game Fluxx.
When they first started Looney Labs, Kristin had a full time job managing the IT department of an aerospace company and Andy was doing contract programming work. Their vision was to become a design studio, by publishing short runs of new games, selling and promoting them until a larger publisher showed interest, then licensing the rights to someone better suited to fully distribute the game.
Fluxx was such an immediate hit that they had several publishers interested within just a few months; they turned down two other offers to make a deal with Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE). Their edition was published in 1998 and sold through several printings until January 2000.
While ICE was the publisher of Fluxx, Looney Labs focused on developing new games, including Aquarius, Proton, and Q-Turn. Best of all, they were finally able to produce injection-molded Icehouse pyramids, which they sold in a new plastic box edition bundled with the rules to 4 of the earliest pyramid games. In late 1999 Kristin walked away from her lucrative career in the aerospace industry and the Looneys pushed their credit limits to the edge, to focus all their energy on building Looney Labs.
Then ICE filed for bankruptcy, and the rights to publish Fluxx reverted to Looney Labs. The Looneys were no longer content with the vision of developing ideas and licensing them to others. They were ready to truly become publishers themselves. As Andy observed on his blog at the time, "after letting them drive for the past 2 years, we've come to realize that we'd rather be the ones behind the wheel, after all."
The Pop-Tart Cafe Years: 2000-2003
The next person to join the team was Alison Frane, who moved in with the Looneys in 1999 and soon became part of the company. Various other friends worked for Looney Labs during the early years, for shorter or longer phases, but no one else was as crucial in helping build the company in the early years as Alison.
In those days, the company was operating entirely out of their basement, with a unit in a nearby storage facility serving as their warehouse. But in the summer of 2001, they forged a partnership with a warehousing and distribution company called ACMS, later renamed Print Mail Communications (PMC).
Looney Labs republished Fluxx in 2000, making just a few changes to the ICE version and calling it version 2.1. Also that year they published Chrononauts, their first Time Travel card game. In 2001 they published Cosmic Coasters, Fluxx Blanxx, and Lost Identities. In 2002, they published Nanofictionary and Are You a Werewolf? and they made a bunch of changes to Fluxx, relaunching it as Fluxx version 3.0.
The Icehouse system continued to evolve. First they relaunched the pyramid game system as tubes of individual colors, along with a book featuring rules to 12 games, called Playing with Pyramids. The next year, they created a pair of single-game boxed editions, Zendo and IceTowers.
Lastly, during these years Looney Labs occasionally hosted hospitality suites called Pop-Tart Cafes at selected science-fiction conventions. Although they had a lot of fun doing these, it became something they decided they had to stop doing to focus on bigger issues of company growth.
The Experimental Years: 2003-2005
As the company struggled to grow, they looked for new ways to expand. Since Fluxx continued to be their biggest hit, they focused on that. The first themed edition of Fluxx was actually Stoner Fluxx, which was initially conceived of as a fund-raiser for the Drug Peace movement. The first edition was published in 2003.
Also in 2003 they made a licensing deal with a large German game company, Amigo Spiele, to publish a German edition. Later, in 2005, a Japanese version was published by HobbyJapan. In 2004 they tried bundling a Fluxx deck with a set of six plush Happy Flowers for a product called Flowers & Fluxx. They also published Early American Chrononauts that year. In 2005 the company published EcoFluxx and Family Fluxx, followed later by their own foreign language edition, Fluxx Espanol, and the religious-themed expansion packets, Christian Fluxx & Jewish Fluxx. In 2005, the company published a short run of an early beta-test version of a new card game called Just Desserts. (Andy spent the next six years rethinking the design of this game.)
During these years, the company struggled with space limitations, and contemplated moving to another city, or even a faraway land. In the end, they just expanded into other houses in the neighborhood.
The Janet's Attic Years: 2005-2008
In early 2005 the company moved into Janet's Attic, this being an attic apartment rented out by their friend Janet, in a house several blocks from the home office. The Looney Labs office operated there for over 3 years. Watch the video: a tour of the Looney Labs office in Janet’s Attic!
In 2006, the pyramid system was revamped again, this time in a highly simplified version called Treehouse, which was available in two color schemes, Rainbow and Xeno. This completely changed the way players are introduced to the system. Later that year they also published Martian Coasters.
In 2007, Zombies changed everything yet again. After years of urging, Andy took up the challenge of creating a Zombie themed version of Fluxx. This required the invention of a new card type, the Creeper, which in turn revolutionized Fluxx game design. Zombie Fluxx also marked the first time Looney Labs worked with artist Derek Ring, who would go on to become one of the company's primary illustrators.
The Pepperland Years: 2008-2013
In 2008 Alison bought a house right nearby the Looney's house, which had long ago been given the whimsical nickname Wunderland (spelled with a "U" in honor of Kristin's maiden name, Wunderlich, and also why Andy's blog is called Wunderland.com). In this grand tradition, Alison named her house Pepperland (after the psychedelic land the Beatles visit in Yellow Submarine). Pepperland featured a large basement apartment perfectly suited to becoming the new Looney Labs office. The company immediately moved over from Janet's Attic and began setting up shop. Watch the video: a tour of the Looney Labs office in the Pepperland Basement
This was the beginning of a phase in which they re-worked everything in their product line to use a standard-sized, two part box, packed in another standard-size display, designed to hold 6 units. Prior to this, Looney Labs games each came in a tuckbox designed to be exactly the size needed for the number of cards in the game. This resulted in a series of differently-sized products which were difficult to store both on retail shelves and in consumer collections. The new uniform-style packaging gave all the products a consistent look.
In 2009, Looney Labs released a new card game called Are You the Traitor?, a new version of Fluxx called Martian Fluxx, new editions of Aquarius and Chrononauts in the new packaging style, and some small expansion products like the Castle pack for Monty Python Fluxx and the Gore Years for Chrononauts. This was also when they pioneered the promo card attached to a postcard as a marketing tool.
Also in 2009, after years of letting Stoner Fluxx stay out of print, the company created a special imprint called Fully Baked Ideas as a way to bring the game back while keeping it apart from main company offerings.
In 2010, Looney Labs reissued EcoFluxx and Family Fluxx in the new standard format, as well as publishing Back to the Future: The Card Game. Just before the end of the year they launched a new fan club web site.
In 2011, Looney Labs published Pirate Fluxx and Star Fluxx. They also finally relaunched the pyramid game system using standard-sized boxes for the basic pyramids and a pyramid-shaped zippered bag for the new headliner game, IceDice.
In 2017, the company hired Sarah Wilber as a Project Assistant. She was with Looney Labs for over 2 years and helped with many things including event support and the launch of a merch store to sell Looney Labs T-shirts.
New products in 2018 included Get the MacGuffin, Anatomy Fluxx, the first 2 Star Trek Fluxxes, a bunch of expansion packs, and Fairy Tale Fluxx, featuring the artwork of Mary Engelbreit, whose art was also the star of a Mary Engelbreit version of Loonacy. Also in 2018, Meredith moved on and Morgan Nakroshis became our in-house graphics person. We also hired Tom Ryan, who helped us in the sales department for about a year and a half, plus our money guy Gary Guttman handed over the reigns to Kelly Jennings for a couple of years, since he needed to give one of his other clients full-time attention for awhile. Kelly was a capable stand-in, but we were glad when Gary came back.
Late in 2018, Looney Labs partnered with Cardinal to jointly publish a series of Fluxx games featuring popular licenses. This led to the release of Marvel Fluxx and Jumanji Fluxx in 2019, and SpongeBob SquarePants Fluxx in 2020. Unfortunately, due to Reasons, the partnership was short-lived.
Other new releases in 2019 included Time Breaker, two more Star Trek games (DS9 Fluxx and ChronoTrek), Are You a Robot?, and more expansions including adding the 13th Doctor to Doctor Who Fluxx. Also this year, we started offering Custom Loonacy decks through our on-demand printing partners at the Game Crafter.
During this time, Playdek re-released Fluxx for smartphones, also adding an implementation of Zombie Fluxx to their offerings.
Near the end of 2019, Andy & Kristin got to visit Moscow as Guests of Honor at Igrokon, Russia’s biggest gaming convention. By this time, Fluxx had been translated into 11 other languages, with several versions published in Russian including the infamous Star Wars version (available only there). But although Fluxx does well for them, our biggest hit in Russia is actually Loonacy, and since it features that cartoon of A&K as one of the game icons, the Looneys have become instantly recognizable to many Russian gamers. It was one of the last trips we’d take for awhile…
Obviously, 2020 was a difficult year for everyone. When the lockdown began, we tightened our belts, applied for all the government assistance we qualified for, and got used to staying home.
But it wasn't without its beneifts. We all set up work-from-home spaces and began using video-conferencing software to stay connected. After we got used to working that way, we decided to just keep doing that. When our lease was up at the Sterling Building, we decided to vacate half of our office space and let most of the team just keep working from home.
Not being on the road gave us more time to focus on internal work. By mid-2021, we finally finished the long process of building and moving into a new Shopify-based webstore, in addition to other internal streamlining, most notably moving our fulfillment & warehousing operations from Excel in Virginia to AIDC in Vermont.
To honor the challenges of 2020, we made a promo card called Emergency Toilet Paper. As for new games, in 2020 Looney Labs released Astronomy Fluxx, Star Trek: Voyager Fluxx, and the Pyramid Quartet series of games (Nomids, Ice Duo, Martian Chess, and Homeworlds).
Interest in tabletop gaming increased with everyone cooped up together during lockdowns. The pandemic also caused a surge of interest in digital implementation of tabletop games, with sites like Board Game Arena allowing friends to keep playing board games together even when they couldn’t do so in person. Therefore we were delighted to help their affiliated programmers create online versions of our games, starting with Just Desserts and Fluxx, with Get the MacGuffin, Star Fluxx, and Homeworlds being added in the following couple of years.
In late 2020, Rebecca Anderson started helping us part-time in the sales department. She arrived with years of experience at SET Enterprises and telecommutes from Michigan.
In 2021, Looney Labs released Fantasy Fluxx and re-published 3 out-of-print titles (Oz Fluxx, Martian Fluxx, and Seven Dragons). Later in the year, they also released Wonderland Fluxx and 2 new expansions (Archer & Porthos) for the Star Trek Fluxx series.
2021 marked the 25th anniversary of the start of Looney Labs, and the company celebrated this milestone in several ways:
• Silver Jubilee Gifts: The Looneys created a greeting card for the occasion, with a copy of Tiny Fluxx inside, and during the course of the year they gave away several thousand copies with out-going orders from the webstore. Each card included a copy for the recipient to give to a friend!
• Jubilee Events: Since conventions couldn’t happen, the company created a digital convention. Using video conferencing software, they held over 100 events, including gaming events, discussion groups, panels, workshops, and more. Everyone enjoyed being able to play games with fans from all over the world, using digital implementations or simply by pointing a web camera down at a tabletop.
• Rare Items Raffles: Each quarter, Looney Labs gave fans an assortment of interesting old items pulled from the Looney’s attic & basement. Winners of these vintage treasures are determined via a bucket-style raffle, with fans earning tickets for the raffle via various interactive activities.
In early 2022, after nine years, our Operations manager Kristine Greere moved on to another company. Prior to the pandemic, we would have thought this position could only be filled by someone local; however, once we became a telecommuting company, we realized our ops person could work from anywhere, so we hired Laura Martin, who lives in Illinois! She quickly proved to be an excellent addition to our team.
Our releases for 2022 included Fluxx Remixx and two Greek Mythology themed games, illustrated by Echo Chernik: Olympus Fluxx and Olympus Loonacy. Later in the year, we released a trio of Fluxx expansion packs, each containing 10 new cards that could go into any version of Fluxx: More Actions, More Rules, and More Surprises. Lastly, we released Missing Artifacts, an expansion for either version of Chrononauts.
While we were making all of those other expansion packs, we also made the Peanut Butter & Jelly Fun pack. We had planned on making it the holiday gift for ’22, but then Andy invented Solo Fluxx so we switched to a digital gift for that year and saved the PB&Js for the next year. (This was nice — for once we had our Christmas shopping done really really early!)
Also in 2022, we ventured out to a few conventions again, including GenCon, where we celebrated our new booth-sharing partnership with Zombie Orpheous Entertainment by making a promo card called the Zombie Portal.
In early 2023, we started getting part-time help with our social media efforts from Jess Cassady. She's been making a big difference!
Our major releases for 2023 were a couple of travel-themed versions of Fluxx, called Across America Fluxx and Around the World Fluxx. The former inspired Andy to take an epic road trip, visiting every landmark featured in the game (and returning with an abandoned kitten). 2023 also saw the re-release of Fluxx: The Board Game, now in a compact box that fits with the rest of our line (and with pegboards that actually work properly).
Our much beloved and long-time part-time CFO, Gary Guttman, decided to retire in 2023. Fortunately, he gave us plenty of notice and help in training his hand-picked replacement, Scott Emge. Farewell Gary, and welcome Scott!
Lastly, the Pandemic Years were also marked by an extended health crisis for our president, Kristin, which required two major surgeries. The first was in December 2021, and the second was almost a year later. In early ’23 she also finally caught Covid. Fortunately, at this point, she has fully recovered from all of those ills.
We have big hopes for 2024 and the future beyond. In February we will release Camping Fluxx, with Winnie-the-Pooh Fluxx joining the fun later in the year. We also have a new pyramid game in the works, called Jinxx, plus a little something folks have been requesting for Chrononauts since 2009. And we've been working on a couple of really new and different things to release in the future that we're even more excited about. Follow us on social media and sign up for our newsletter to keep informed about our latest releases and upcoming events!