Five minutes with Noelle Woodland, Vortex Entertainment Wagga

Noelle Woodland was born in Taree and lived there for 25 years before she moved to Wagga after meeting her husband. They have been married for nine years and have three children. The Vortex Entertainment manager is passionate about sports and fitness and plays netball.

With previous management experience under her belt and a passion for children’s fitness, Noelle applied for the manager role at Vortex Entertainment when it opened its doors. She felt the role was a good combination of something she loved and was good at.

Before taking on the position, Noelle was part of Little Champions Gymnastics, for which she visited primary schools and taught gymnastic skills. She also worked as a store manager at The Reject Shop at South City in Glenfield Park for 10 years.

Best recent gaming experience: I don’t get to play games much at the moment. My husband is a big gamer, and sometimes we sit and play. The kids love Mario Kart. But down here we’ve got the VR so we play with the kids sometimes.

My favourite game at Vortex Entertainment is the ninja game. We’ve got an electronic button game in the ninja course. It’s like a tag game, but it’s with buttons and you verse each other. It gets quite competitive. The little kids love it and the adults get too competitive with it.

How do I start my day? I set up the centre, ensuring it is clean and inviting for guests. I like to come in and look at my emails first, then get prepared for my day. Once guests come in, the focus is on them, and there’s not much time to do anything else.

Best snack at Vortex Entertainment: The slices. We’ve got quite a few different slices and they get pretty tempting when you’re working around it all the time. And I like a good ham and cheese croissant too.

Best coffee spot in Wagga: Infuso, up at Turvey Park. It is our go-to and it’s just around the corner from my house.

Favourite coffee: I like a chai latte.

A must-try game at Vortex Entertainment: If you haven’t been here before, the roller-coaster is the best thing to try on the VR for the games. We’ve got some horror ones which can be quite frightening. And the bumper cars are a pretty big hit as well.

For the younger kids (5-6 years old), we’ve got the toddler zone and our fixed play area with all our ball pits and slides. The older kids who are big enough to climb go straight to the rock wall and spend all their sessions there. And the older kids like a bit of both – they love the ball pit and the bumper cars. We had a high school group in the ball pit the whole time.

Most popular game among visitors: The most popular is the rock wall. And one attraction in the rock hall is the pillars that go around in a spiral. They each get taller as you go around, and then you’ve got to jump from the very top one, and it can be quite intimidating when you’re at the top.

Who I admire in the Wagga business scene: I admire both our owners, Adam Drummond and Andrew McCabe. Adam has had so many businesses in the past and wore a hat for many different places. He’s an inspiration to be that busy and still keep everything together.

The biggest influence in my life: My favourite sport is netball and my favourite player is Sophie Fawns. She’s from the Riverina and plays for Sydney Swifts.

Where am I travelling to next? It will be Newcastle. My parents live there, so we visit once every three months with the kids.

Dream destination: Japan. I love the Japanese culture. I really want to go to Japan.

My challenge in managing Vortex Entertainment: The biggest challenge is coordinating guests and staff. We need to have certain ratios in certain areas. If a staff member calls in sick and leaves, a short in that area is non-negotiable. We have to reorganise the whole day to meet safety standards.

Skills required to be a great manager: Skills can be taught, but attitude matters. It won’t end well for you if you don’t have the right attitude, especially when working with kids. You must have a positive, bubbly personality and interact with the kids. On a skill level, I found multitasking to be the most important skill to have here. You can be pulled in 10 different directions on a weekend at best.

Vortex Entertainment is located at 77 Trail Street, Wagga Wagga. They’re open from 10 am until 3 pm Monday and Tuesday, 10 am until 6 pm Wednesday to Saturday, and from 10 am until 4 pm on Sundays. Keep up with them via their website, Facebook page, Instagram and TikTok.