Thread: Haunt Question

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Anyone do their own haunt for the public. A few of us are looking into it and besides finding the location and insurance we were wondering what else we may be missing. Just looking for someone that we can kinda use as a mentor.

The best way I would suggest you do it is hook up with a local non-profit organization and let them do the legal work, while you get to do the design work.

That's virtually what I've been doing for the last few years. First started with a historical railroad, then moved to a county parks and rec haunted trail, and now do a haunted house for a community theatre.

They got lucky. The insurance that they already have to carry to run the theatre covered the haunted house as well. Not sure how much it costs.

First of all, is your area large enough to support a haunt. There is a lot of difference between a pro haunt and a volunteer type haunt. Rule of thumb - your audience is only 10% of the population of your area. That has to be divided between all the other haunts in the area, pro or not. I believe that is three things to look at before you can search for a location or shop insurance. The list goes on. How many of you have to earn a salary from this endeavor. If just one then it is simple but if multiple then how much is the minimum your crew will need to make your time worthwhile? A $100,000 profit makes one person a very nice yearly salary. $100,000 split 20 ways becomes a very meager living for co owners. And the list goes on. Good luck. Make sure you research everything before you rush into this. There is a big difference between making some props for your backyard haunt and having to make a living out of a six or eight week season that your haunt will most likely be open. Incidentally the three things I gave reference to were,
A.) how far you can draw your audience from?
B.) how many people live in the target area?
C.) how many other haunts occupy the same target area?

There is a really good book on the subject, it's called
So You Want To Be A Haunt Entrepreneur by Kelly Allen.

-Writing an effective Business Plan
-Developing a haunt theme and storyline
-Establishing your business organization’s team members and roles
-Safety, fire codes and security
-Advertising and marketing
-Insurance requirements for your haunt
-Recruiting Fright Team Members
-A comprehensive resource guide
-And much, much more!

This 172 page book is beneficial to the first time haunted attraction owner and to someone who has been in the business for years. “So You Want to be a Haunt Entrepreneur” is a great book for getting your haunted attraction business on track, and for keeping it there.

http://www.hauntbook.com/entrepreneur.html