Pittsburgh Company's Fun Promotion Sends Residents Scrambling For Cash

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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- If you were in Downtown Pittsburgh on Wednesday night and saw people looking through bushes, under benches and behind planters, there's a good reason: They were trying to find hidden treasure.

A company called Breakout Games, which runs escape rooms in the North Hills and South Hills, came up with a treasure hunt as an unusual promotion.

They hid twenty, $100 dollars bills in envelopes and then revealed GPS coordinates for the prizes on a website.

People showed up at locations but still had to search to find exactly where the envelopes were hidden.

"We as a team picked the spots," said Joe Nelis from Breakout Games. "We spent some time mapping it all out, making sure it was as cohesive as possible, that things weren't too far apart."

One of the first spots was near the David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Alex Scott from Cranberry found a $100 envelope in an electrical outlet box.

And what will he do with the winnings?

"I got to pay for a date now, that was the deal," he said with a smile.

The next stop was Mellon Green off Grant Street, and many more people showed up searching in various spots.

Finally, Amy Smith from Mount Lebanon came laughing and cheering as she hugged a friend after finding one of the $100 envelopes wedged in a tree trunk.

"So fun! So fun!" said Smith. "We love doing any kind of hunt, so what a great way to do it and end up with a hundred dollars!"