Thread: Commercial Haunts...Thumbs Up or Down?

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We've taken our two little girls, 4 and 9 years-old, to a couple of commercial haunts over the past few evenings. One was a "Haunted Train", raising money for charity, the other was a full-blown, empty-your-pockets kind of thing. A 45 minute wait, and a 10 minute walk-thru. The train was a bit of a joke, but the big haunt had some great set-ups, cool props, fine make-up on the actors. Was it worth $44.oo? That's a tough one. I wouldn't overindulge on these things, but, hey, it's Hallowe'en!!
Are you fellow Haunters into these sort of things?

The Philadelphia area has some great commercial haunts, but the cost does often seem excessive. I keep it to about one per year so I don't have to take out a loan. In their defense, they only have a small window of time to make their money. "Agri-tainment", haunted hay-rides and corn mazes, don't make anything if they have a rainy October. So, I try not to complain. I see it as research for my own commercial haunt that my wife and I will open when we retire.

I went to a haunt at a semi local mini golf course the second year it was open. I had never been to a haunted attraction before and since. It was $20 I believe. This got you into 3 attractions that took up all of about a half hour. We were at place maybe fourty minutes. There were no lines and nothing else to do but the attractions. There was no need to have entertainment at the lines because there were none. No effort was put into getting people to spend more money.

That same place had a Halloween magic show put on by a magician friend of mine that I was a part of.

Tickets were $18 and got you the 1 hour seated show, and two other options. The choices were mini golf, go karts, arcade credits, roller skating, dinner (pizza, drink and an ice cream) and I believe batting cages. This was a fantastic value. This was the first year they had their new facility open.

A great idea would have been a $30 or so ticket, which included the show, attractions and the two choices. That would keep the people there at least two hours, more if there are lines.

I live about 40 minutes from the #1 rated attraction in the us, but have yet to go. You need to make reservations for it. I hear that it is absolutely fantastic! It is called the Headless Horseman.

Oh yes! I'm totally into commercial haunts - one of the pluses of my house was that it was a stone's throw to one of the best in the state! (rated #1 in Texas, #7 in the US)

I have a friend that used to work for the place and he got us (my hubby and myself) in for free, so we saved about $100 to see 6 houses.

I still would have paid for them if we hadn't gotten a hookup. They change them up so they aren't the same scares and props, and opened two new ones this year.

It isn't Halloween unless I go get professionally scared.