By Larry Kirchner

Haunted Houses are at a point now where you can't really raise prices anymore otherwise you could run the risk of losing customers. I believe most haunted houses do not offer enough value for the dollar already much less should charge more per ticket. On the other side of the coin your rent doesn't get cheaper, your insurance keeps rising, cost of marketing and labor keeps climbing. So what do you do if not raise your ticket prices?

There is really only one option; Haunted houses need to find new revenue streams that fit into their Halloween theme. We all know many of the staples such as glow products, hot dogs and soda. However none of those commonly used answers bring in much revenue compared with the costs associated with selling them. In addition I do not believe most haunted house customers care much for buying a soda from a haunted house.

On the other hand if you're operating an amusement park style haunted event I would say just the opposite about hot dogs and soda. But most haunted houses are not amusement parks so let's explore a few ideas, which might help your business this year.

• 1) Staples: Glow products can rake in some extra dough; however they take motivated sellers so you should have the sellers wage based on incentive. Offer wages based on how many products they sell and you'll experience more sales. Selling food is very hard for most haunted houses and I don't necessary recommend that you devote the energy. Remember even if you make a few bucks you're still spending your time to manage everything. In addition concession stands always run out of something and the customers create a big mess with the leftovers. One of my ideas that recently popped into my head was to buy used soda machines and line them up through your queue lines as they do in amusement parks. You can buy really nice looking soda machines for only a few hundred dollars and they require little to no labor to manage.

• 2) Additional Attractions: A few years ago we rebuilt our attraction from scratch. With our added experience of maze design from when we first had built the Darkness many years ago, we can now have a longer experience with less space. If you design your mazes tighter, adding more twists and turns and some areas of the maze in complete darkness you can use less overall space for your main show. This will free up a couple thousand square feet for a new but smaller second attraction. I've found that a 3D attraction best sell for me, however there are other options such as a 'pitch black' maze to a mirror maze. Whatever you decide your additional attraction should be a complete opposite from your main show. We've found that anywhere from 50 to 60% of your customers will pay an additional $3 to $4 dollars for the up-charged attraction. You must keep the costs of the up-charged attraction low so your customers will figure it's only a couple extra bucks so what the heck.

• 3) Speed Tickets: This seems to be the new craze across the amusement industry and especially at haunted houses. I've discovered having a digital audio repeated message blasting scare music, rules, and other information helps create more knowledgeable customers when they finally make it to your ticket window. For example you could explain in great detail about the additional attractions and so forth while they're waiting in line for a ticket. Heck, why not they're a captive audience. So we suggest that you not only place signs throughout your ticket line but also make announcements letting everyone know of speed passes. We had a speed pass window, which allowed customers who wanted to plunk down an extra $5.00 to walk right up, buy their ticket and go inside the house. Speed tickets if properly marketing can increase revenue. In addition we sold speed tickets on the internet through our website. Give it a try!

• 4) Screams for Pay: A few years ago while working at Madison Scare Garden, I noticed they had a VIP scare. The VIP scare was for special guests to stand behind a two way mirror and hold onto the rope which they could lower a spider on customers heads. On water rides inside theme parks they've all seemed to install these water blasters, where customers pay a fee and can shoot other customers with water. Why not figure out ways for you to have screams for pay? Ghost Ride for example sells a video game monitor that has a camera inside the haunted house. You see the customers walking by and when you're ready a customer can push a button, which could fire off an air blast, drop spider, or whatever. Sounds fun, interactive and might add some bucks to your pocket book.

• 5) Themed Games: A few years ago (didn't I just use that line?), anyway I was at Spookyworld and they had this game called "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes". Basically a guy was dressed up in some paint ball type padding with helmet and people paid $1.00 per tomato to have the opportunity to throw them at the guy. The guy tried to dodge the incoming tomatoes however they allowed more than one person to throw them at a time. The guy was blasted with tomatoes constantly. From what I understand your stuntman can be hurt from time to time so it was required to have two at all times on busy nights. If cleaning up tomatoes isn't your bag, I've also seen the same thing done with paint ball guns. Try making a toxic waste background, buy some paint ball guns and allow people to shoot 10 balls at the stuntman for say $3.00. Those guys made a killing!!! Who wouldn't want to take aim at a 'sitting duck'?

No matter what you attempt this year make sure it's fun and themed around your event. I've found that most customers of haunted houses come for one thing and one thing only: screams and creepy fun. If what you're trying to sell isn't creating some additional screams more than likely it isn't worth it and it's not adding to the overall experience.

Until next time Happy Hauntings
Larry Kirchner
www.halloweenproductions.com