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Haunted House Discussion

Lex DeVille

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I've had an unscratched itch for a while and thought someone might have experience. Whether you've run a haunted house or just want to chat about it, let's open up discussion.

Here are some questions for anyone who has done it:

1. What was the startup investment like?
2. What do you wish you knew going into it?
3. How did you advertise and what worked?
4. Was it worth your time and were you profitable (within 3 years?)
5. What else?

If you haven't run a haunted house but are curious, what are your thoughts? Would you do it? How would you approach it? How would you stay top-of-mind throughout the year? How would you make it profitable in the off-season?
 
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Dan_Cardone

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No direct experience but I do know that a group of college guys rents a section of corn field from a famer every year and sets up a "haunted and zombie maze" that everyone seems to love. They do it on Friday and Saturday only, charge $35 per person, and always have long lines. They advertise on social media.

I also know that around here every year old ran down building get rented out and turned into haunted houses. They all seem to make good money.
 

Lex DeVille

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Just bought this book on how to start a haunted house. Strangely...it is written by someone in my hometown, which...strangely...I am moving back to in about a month. Perhaps the stars are aligning.

Apparently my mom's boss runs a haunted house too. Hmm. Guess I'll have to start networking.
 
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I don't know the specifics but right at 20 years ago in Omaha a guy put up his house ($200,000 loan) because he wanted to have a haunted house. His wife told him that if he lost their house, she was leaving him. So he had himself a haunted house and charged $12 to get in. He said by October 14th he had enough profit to pay back the loan. I think it was the next year he raised the price to $15. He had the haunted house about 5 years and then never did it again.

My thought on a haunted house is.... is there any way to make it where you have a virtual tour guide? Make it so there is a ghost leading the way. Maybe I am ahead of the game.

I think after Halloween, they should go in to Christmas and make it a North Pole with a work shop, stores that sell Christmas stuff (It IS Christmas ya know) and 1 line that leads in to a room. This room is divided in to 3 and has a Santa in each room. That way the line doesn't get so long for the kids waiting on Santa and they don't realize there are 3 instead of just the 1 REAL Santa ;) . Sleigh rides (instead of hay rides). Christmas light maze, just an over all fun atmosphere with multiple things to do.

@Primeperiwinkle Events And Adventures would be a good one to hook up with for what you are talking about.

When we were in St Augustine, Florida last Christmas we went on a ghost tour. They have like 10 tours a night and the buses are filled. AND, there is more than 1 company that does it so I have no clue how many people take a ghost tour in just that 1 town EVERY day. They are open year around.
 

broswoodwork

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I've had an unscratched itch for a while and thought someone might have experience. Whether you've run a haunted house or just want to chat about it, let's open up discussion.

Here are some questions for anyone who has done it:

1. What was the startup investment like?
2. What do you wish you knew going into it?
3. How did you advertise and what worked?
4. Was it worth your time and were you profitable (within 3 years?)
5. What else?

If you haven't run a haunted house but are curious, what are your thoughts? Would you do it? How would you approach it? How would you stay top-of-mind throughout the year? How would you make it profitable in the off-season?
We had Spooky World around here, at the old Patriots stadium, for a long time. It was like the Disney world of haunted houses. I met the guy who played Jason one year as a kid... :D

I'm not sure what happened to it, but I recall a radio interview with the owner where he said it cost about $1mill/ year to put on.

Edit: looks like they moved up to awesome tax free NH Spooky World | #1 Halloween NH, Haunted House New Hampshire, Haunted Hayride MA| #1 Halloween NH, Haunted House New Hampshire,Spooky World

Gotta do that myself.
 
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Fox

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No direct experience but I do know that a group of college guys rents a section of corn field from a famer every year and sets up a "haunted and zombie maze" that everyone seems to love. They do it on Friday and Saturday only, charge $35 per person, and always have long lines. They advertise on social media.

I also know that around here every year old ran down building get rented out and turned into haunted houses. They all seem to make good money.

I’ve been to one of these in Canada and they were making crazy money. Seemed like quite a similar operation.

They were upselling a lot of stuff also - food, drinks, toys, masks, merch.

As for what the maze contained it was standard enough - a decent maze layout, some hints and clues, and some lockout points through the maze.
 

JSM

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I have always thought it would be cool to own one.

The haunted corn maze idea would be good if you wanted to start cheap and try it out. Pay the farmer $1000-2000/acre and there’s no way they say no. Google says the average corn maze size is 4-20 acres. I think the lower end of that spectrum would be plenty of space. Parking might be the biggest issue with doing the corn maze.

That size field is pretty small and something of that size can probably easily be found on the outskirts of suburbs and still be close to the city.
 

ChrisV

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remake the resident evil mansion.. dogs and all
 

Dan_Cardone

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So to flesh this out a bit more.

Lets say your overall story is "You just got kidnapped by a psycho and now you must escape!"

The first week of the month would be "Chapter One." The would go through a series of escape rooms and deal with whatever scary stuff you come up with.

Throughout this some guide takes them through this scary story and journey.

By the time they escape there should be some sort of cliff hanger. Now they are encouraged to come back to participate in Chapter Two which is always held the second weekend of every month. Then chapter three and four on the third and fourth weekends.

The grand ending would be your halloween event.

I guess I'm saying to design a big horror story and allow people to be the real life characters. Nothing like that (as far as I know) exist but I would do it over and over again!
 

Primeperiwinkle

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:rofl: Maybe? I really don't know.

What do parents take their little kids outside to do all year?

Amusement parks, parks, swimming pool, paintball, corn maze, pumpkin patch, frisbee golf, bumper cars, an old school arcade (do those still exist?) ...

Yeaaa they all exist but now parents are so frazzled we walk like zombies to air conditioned indoor places like buildings where the children can run around Iike hooligans and we end up paying $250 for F*cking tokens so they can buy large pikachus and feel content in their little materialistic souls.

I’m not bitter, I told my kids if they want that freaking charzar they better get a job.
 

RazorCut

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I would have thought the biggest obstacle would be getting ghosts willing to man it. Now there’s an opportunity “rent a ghost”.

Seriously though I take it it’s run on the lines of these locked room experiences? I have no idea or experience of either (only real ghosts).
 

Lex DeVille

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We had Spooky World around here, at the old Patriots stadium, for a long time. It was like the Disney world of haunted houses. I met the guy who played Jason one year as a kid... :D

I'm not sure what happened to it, but I recall a radio interview with the owner where he said it cost about $1mill/ year to put on.

We went to Thrillvania a few years ago. It's run like a theme park with multiple attractions, vendors, street shows. All kinds of cool stuff. Massive crowd and amazing pyrotechnics. Had to cost a lot, and I know it was built over time. They moved the main mansion between multiple locations.

79850105-new_image18.jpg


Anyway, they have the following price points:

- General Admission: $32.99
- Speedpass: $52.99
- General Admission Combo: $59.99 (Two House Events)
- Speedpass Combo: $84.99
- Group Rates: $28.04 (15 tickets or more)
- Speedpass Group Rates: $45.04 (15 tickets or more)
 
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broswoodwork

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We went to Thrillvania a few years ago. It's run like a theme park with multiple attractions, vendors, street shows. All kinds of cool stuff. Massive crowd and amazing pyrotechnics. Had to cost a lot, and I know it was built over time. They moved the main mansion between multiple locations.

Anyway, they have the following price points:

- General Admission: $32.99
- Speedpass: $52.99
- General Admission Combo: $59.99 (Two House Events)
- Speedpass Combo: $84.99
- Group Rates: $28.04 (15 tickets or more)
- Speedpass Group Rates: $45.04 (15 tickets or more)
It definitely seems to scale, for a pop up style attraction. The people who worked at our local place were so enthused to be there too (pumpkin tattoos and such) that it felt like an instant productocracy experience-wise.
 

Dan_Cardone

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$35 seems kind of steep for a haunted corn maze. Do they offer other stuff after entry? Like vendors or games or anything like that? Most of the haunts around here are between $10 and $20. I can see paying higher prices for things like:

- VIP Head of Line Pass
- Multiple Attractions

Not sure what else. Beyond those I imagine money after entry coming from upsells like t-shirts, concessions and other merch.
Nope. The guys putting it on seem to know nothing about business. Ive offered to consult them and improve how much money they make but was told to F Off.

People pay the price and generally seem to love it though.
 

Fox

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What's the location like? Do they run it somewhere without much else going on or is it near a city?

Nah it was way out. Like at least 20-30kms. But it had been run successfully for a few years so it had great word of mouth. I’ll try find a link if I can.
 

broswoodwork

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Just found this after thinking I came up with a clever and funny word (I reinvented the wheel as usual).
 
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Lex DeVille

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I have always thought it would be cool to own one.

The haunted corn maze idea would be good if you wanted to start cheap and try it out. Pay the farmer $1000-2000/acre and there’s no way they say no. Google says the average corn maze size is 4-20 acres. I think the lower end of that spectrum would be plenty of space. Parking might be the biggest issue with doing the corn maze.

That size field is pretty small and something of that size can probably easily be found on the outskirts of suburbs and still be close to the city.

There was a corn maze by my house in Missouri. They had the maze in one field and a parking area across the street in another field. Cool thing about fields is they tend to be by more fields haha.

The outdoor spaces make sense for keeping costs down. No need for a building. They often stack the maze with hay as a sort of guide or makeshift walls.

There's one in my hometown that's not maze but it's in the woods. They have a trail and different sets along the path. They also have a concession stand at the entry. One thing I always liked about it was you had to drive about half a mile down a dark gravel road. So there's an element of anticipation while also beginning to escape the "real" as you enter the experience. And that's before you park!

One advantage of the maze is it's a constricted space with a lot of places to hide. In the forest there's more open area. I like smaller spaces for several reasons. Not much time to react if something jumps out, and much easier to control responses. If monster jumps out from the left, then customer jumps to the right. And if a second monster is on the right, then customer jumps right into them for a better scare.
 

ChrisV

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So i just did a little Googling and came up with some cool articles

doesn't say much about the business aspects, but what I would do is google things like "how to build a haunted house," find people on YouTube or wherever that have done it, then reach out to them about the business aspects. I'm sure they'd be willing to share what they've learned.

Edit: @Lex DeVille found this

 
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Dan_Cardone

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The tricky part is looking at this as a seasonal attraction in the first place. It seems like people think about haunts and get stuck on the haunt AS the business.

I look at the haunt as more of a culminating event. The business is not the haunt, but the haunt is a big income opportunity.

So the question for me becomes what business could I build that is related to the haunt, and can also sustain itself during ALL seasons and then turn a huge profit in October?

Random thoughts based on the question above:
- The business shouldn't be tied to Halloween
- The business should operate with minimal staff except during haunt season
- The business should generate buzz for the year's haunt throughout the year
- The business should offer non-haunt products online and offline
- The business should probably be involved in the local community

Other random thoughts:
I wonder if the haunted house could be an upsell opportunity? Could I apply guru funnels to this model? Would some people buy a $100 or $1000 ticket to a scarier event after they exit a $20 haunt they enjoyed? Theme parks sell photos and t-shirts after roller coaster rides. Maybe a photo from inside the haunt would be a better upsell.

The first thing that comes to mind is to have a series of mystery events with each one building on top of the other and have the ending take place at the giant haunted event.

The challenge:

A) Tie them together to such a way where these is a cohesive story that would be understood by anyone to attended every event

B) Make them stand alone enough so that just a "casual" would have plenty of fun and understand it enough to enjoy it.

I'm thinking you have a total of four "chapters" that goes throughout the year, one each week, with the first one starting all over again after the fourth week. Wanting to be involved in the next chapter of the bigger story would make people want to keep coming back.

I can see this in my mind but am finding it exceptionally hard to explain.
 

Primeperiwinkle

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So to flesh this out a bit more.

Lets say your overall story is "You just got kidnapped by a psycho and now you must escape!"

The first week of the month would be "Chapter One." The would go through a series of escape rooms and deal with whatever scary stuff you come up with.

Throughout this some guide takes them through this scary story and journey.

By the time they escape there should be some sort of cliff hanger. Now they are encouraged to come back to participate in Chapter Two which is always held the second weekend of every month. Then chapter three and four on the third and fourth weekends.

The grand ending would be your halloween event.

I guess I'm saying to design a big horror story and allow people to be the real life characters. Nothing like that (as far as I know) exist but I would do it over and over again!

This idea is fantastic but for a completely different concept I’ve been tossing around.

Group Dating. See, all the cool chicks I know don’t want to just go out and feel awkward on a stupid bumble hookup date and the cool guys I know are all worried about coming across as creepy so they don’t even use dating apps. Both groups would prefer to have something fun to do AS A GROUP.... if you could tap into the local dating pool and make this a fun monthly event that would be awesome. (At least for ppl who like scary stuff which I do not so feel free to make tons of money off of this idea, lol.)
 

Sheens

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:rofl: Now I am hoping there is a haunted house near us this year!

For a year-round option, what about something like a minigolf/putt-putt area that could be designed and changed to fit the different themes?
 

Lex DeVille

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Saw this on the news last night. Thought it was a neat idea with a Fastlane twist. If you already owned a car wash, then this would be a novel idea to pick up a nice payday at the end of the year. Much lower investment than going all in with a $50k - $100k+ haunt.

 

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Hey @Lex DeVille,

Back in college, a club I was a part of volunteered at a haunted house for an evening and it was a ton of fun!

This is how it worked, the company got college students that were a part of some type of club. The company would then donated (I believe it was $200-$300) to the charity we represented as a club. We had around 15-20 people show up for about 4-5 hours worth of volunteering/work. We got in, they gave us the instructions, then prepped us with makeup and costumes, and then given our lines and stations. Then as people came through the haunted house, we'd just do as instructed.

The makeup artists and other staff (which was way smaller than our volunteer group) were the only ones getting paid actual wages. The volunteers were paid minimally for the number of hours spent. But overall, I felt that it was a win for everyone. We had a cool volunteer event to recruit new members, we supported our charity, and we all had a ton of fun doing it!

Overall, I remember someone mentioned they had talked to the owner and the haunted house brought in ~$1mil in revenue for a 3-month window.

I just wanted to pass the volunteer experience along, as I thought it was a pretty sweet system the owner had going on.
 

Lex DeVille

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Damn, it's that time of the year again. Was driving down the road and saw local haunt signs. Naturally, my imagination spun into overdrive. Then I remembered buying that book on haunt businesses and starting this thread.

In 2019, I was in the middle of buying a house and making an interstate move, so I forgot about the discussion. I do recall thinking about how bad things would be for the industry with the pandemic. At the time, I thought, "whew! Dodged a bullet with that investment!"

This year things are ramping up. There are several local haunts. I still think it would be badass to open a scalable fastlane haunt attraction, especially once I can name it "Dr. DeVille's House of Demons" or whatever.

I looked up our local haunts to see if I could get contact info. I'd like to volunteer for one next year. Maybe they'll find value in my background.

Unfortunately, the local haunts are epic failures in the internet marketing department. Only one or two have their own website, and those websites suck.

I honestly can't believe none of them collect emails or have any way to sell merch through their website.

MADNESS!!!!!!

If I created a haunt, a website, and an email funnel would be the first things I set up. VIP waitlist. Online tickets. Online merch. Online EVERYTHING! My god, how much cash are they leaving on the table without these?!
 

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I have always thought it would be cool to own one.

The haunted corn maze idea would be good if you wanted to start cheap and try it out. Pay the farmer $1000-2000/acre and there’s no way they say no. Google says the average corn maze size is 4-20 acres. I think the lower end of that spectrum would be plenty of space. Parking might be the biggest issue with doing the corn maze.

That size field is pretty small and something of that size can probably easily be found on the outskirts of suburbs and still be close to the city.
With corn prices where they are currently, you probably would need to up your per acre payment
 
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Lex DeVille

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No direct experience but I do know that a group of college guys rents a section of corn field from a famer every year and sets up a "haunted and zombie maze" that everyone seems to love. They do it on Friday and Saturday only, charge $35 per person, and always have long lines. They advertise on social media.

I also know that around here every year old ran down building get rented out and turned into haunted houses. They all seem to make good money.

$35 seems kind of steep for a haunted corn maze. Do they offer other stuff after entry? Like vendors or games or anything like that? Most of the haunts around here are between $10 and $20. I can see paying higher prices for things like:

- VIP Head of Line Pass
- Multiple Attractions

Not sure what else. Beyond those I imagine money after entry coming from upsells like t-shirts, concessions and other merch.
 

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I think it's an interesting idea, and of course it could work. If you put the right time into setting it up and getting people to come, then word of mouth should spread quickly if you have a productocracy.

My only caveat here is timing. We're already October 7th, so you have ~3 weeks to get set up before Halloween. All of the best Haunted Houses have a fair amount of design, so making a great product in that short of a time could be a push
 

Lex DeVille

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I think it's an interesting idea, and of course it could work. If you put the right time into setting it up and getting people to come, then word of mouth should spread quickly if you have a productocracy.

My only caveat here is timing. We're already October 7th, so you have ~3 weeks to get set up before Halloween. All of the best Haunted Houses have a fair amount of design, so making a great product in that short of a time could be a push

Well, I'd say this really isn't possible as a last minute thing. It needs to be started probably at least a year in advance. There's a ton of factors to account for:

- Location
- Parking
- City Codes & Ordinances
- Security / EMT
- Insurance
- Prop Acquisition (or building)
- Actors
- Make Up Artists
- Cashiers
- Licenses

TBH There's probably a million other things that I have no idea about that go into this. The Netflix special seems to hint that others start their yearly preparations around 3 months in advance (but they've already been operating for years).
 
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There was a corn maze by my house in Missouri. They had the maze in one field and a parking area across the street in another field. Cool thing about fields is they tend to be by more fields haha.

The outdoor spaces make sense for keeping costs down. No need for a building. They often stack the maze with hay as a sort of guide or makeshift walls.

There's one in my hometown that's not maze but it's in the woods. They have a trail and different sets along the path. They also have a concession stand at the entry. One thing I always liked about it was you had to drive about half a mile down a dark gravel road. So there's an element of anticipation while also beginning to escape the "real" as you enter the experience. And that's before you park!

One advantage of the maze is it's a constricted space with a lot of places to hide. In the forest there's more open area. I like smaller spaces for several reasons. Not much time to react if something jumps out, and much easier to control responses. If monster jumps out from the left, then customer jumps to the right. And if a second monster is on the right, then customer jumps right into them for a better scare.
Right I also like the maze idea. For parking I was just speaking in terms of if someone were to rent from a farmer. A farmer won't be making money off of an empty field unless it is in hay. Parking in another corn or soybean field would be dependent on being able to harvest before you open the maze. Also, corn stalks and soybean stubble are terrible on tires. Owning the land and working with a local farmer somehow would probably be the ideal situation.
 

Lex DeVille

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Apparently some haunt owners are opening Escape Rooms to account for the rest of the year while continuing the fun. This could probably work pretty well if you own a building since you probably re-use a lot of your non-horror props like makeshift walls and things.
 
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