Imagine walking into a business, picking up a bat, smashing everything in sight, and then instead of being arrested and escorted out, you get a wave and a smile to "Please come again!" That's basically how it works at The Anger Room in Dallas. Founder Donna Alexander never would have guessed that the crazy idea she had at the age of 16 would take off, turning a dream into a—pun intended—smash success.

The Backstory

Donna grew up seeing her fair share of people end up in trouble when they couldn't find a safe place to blow off steam. That's when the idea for the Anger Room first came to her: "[When I was 16], I thought the idea was too good and somebody else was gonna come out with it . . . but in 2008 the idea came back again and I did a little research to see if anybody came out with it, and nobody did, so I started to do it in my garage."

It started out with just friends and coworkers paying $5 a head to smash things while Donna supervised.

"One day, a stranger came to my door and he was like, 'Is this the place to break stuff?'" she recalls. "And when that happened, I think that's when the lightbulb went off!"

"Every person that I was telling the idea to, from real estate [agents] to landlords, they thought I was crazy."

– Donna Alexander, owner

Three years later, she opened her first storefront. She might have had one sooner, but as she puts it, "Every person that I was telling the idea to, from real estate [agents] to landlords, they thought I was crazy or that it was a joke or that I would just attract crazy people." Finally, one person stepped up and told her to just go for it. By the time she opened, Donna was able to announce that she already had a waiting list that was four months long.

How It Works

Once customers book an appointment online, they'll choose their weapon. "For the general weapons, the go-to is usually like golf clubs and baseball bats," Donna says. But there's one item in the arsenal that stands above the rest: Lucille. One of the Anger Room's special partners not only made a stunning replica of the Lucille bat from The Walking Dead, he made the original for the show, too. If you're feeling inspired, you can even bring in a weapon from home–assuming it meets Anger Room requirements, that is (for starters, nothing sharp and nothing with ammunitions).

Then, it's time to get suited up in the provided safety gear and get to smashing, letting out all your pent up frustration.

If you want something really special, you can request a custom room. Donna and her team will set up just about any kind of space you like from kitchens to office spaces and once, at the request of GQ, a re-creation of the Oval Office. That's not even the strangest room they've ever done: "We had someone request us to do [a room with] almost 180 balloons, and they needed to be specifically in small, medium, and large sizes. And we had to have stacks and stacks of newspapers and like 70 or more plates and bowls."

Heading to the Anger Room doesn't have to be solely about venting frustration, though. "It's a fun thing to do, it's exciting!" says Donna, and her business's success has inspired imitators all over the country, such as The Break Room in Atlanta and Destroy a Room in St. Charles, Missouri. So-called "rage rooms" or "break rooms" might just be the next big thing...