Haunted Attractions www.parkworld-online.com


THE FRIGHT IS RIGHT! Behind the scenes of a half-billion-dollar industry


ceiling of $15 (€12.50) admission. People were not willing to pay more regardless of size. Stumbling into Halloween in 1973, Knott's Berry


Farm in California discovered the popularity of haunted houses and started cashing in on people's love of being frightened. For an amusement park, a Halloween event drive patrons to the property during a month that historically had low attendance and it introduces new people to the park’s amenities; promoting return visits in the summer. However, Knott's did not have a large single area available for their haunted house and instead created multiple attractions around the park. A bumper car building, a large queue line area, or an arcade with the games removed became separate “mazes” filled with creepy sets and ghoulish characters. This multi-element approach worked, smashing through the $15 ticket barrier, and was quickly adopted by other Halloween events. Today, prices for independent haunted attractions range from an average of $8 (€6.70) for a small single element attraction to $40 (€33.50) for a full blown multi-element event while theme park Halloween events range from $40 to as much as $70 (€58.50) for general admission.


Terenzi Horror Nights at Europa-Park


In just 40 years, the American haunted


attraction industry has developed from a single church tour into a half-a- billion-dollar industry.


Here Leonard Pickel of DOA Haunt and Design Consulting traces the


development of the sector, highlighting some of the key attractions that have shaped the industry and exploring the methods


used to illicit screams of terror and delight from


intrepid guests. Then turn the page as the creators


of two attractions outside the US share their experiences


limits of good taste while trying to create as terrifying an experience as possible within building and fire codes, insurance restrictions and common sense safety of patrons and staff. The first seasonal October haunted attractions


A


appeared in the United States in the early 1970s as fundraisers for church groups and charitable events. Visitors paid a donation of $3 to $4 to walk through an old house, church meeting room or school classroom decorated with frightening scenes and staffed with volunteers dressed in black robes and white makeup. Some of these events became very popular and it was not long before entrepreneurs realised the profitability of these two to nine-day events. At first the for-profit haunted attractions donated


partial proceeds to charities, but even this gesture quickly died out. Unable to compete with the advertising dollars a for-profit event can pump into a market, the non-profit haunted house has all but disappeared from most cities. Always looking to increase profits, attraction owners started raising their prices and the attraction size. Haunted houses grew to massive become 40-50,000 square feet standalone attractions, but there seemed to be a


30


s sensibilities and what society deems as acceptable changes, attraction designers are forced to weave a daunting path through the


Thousands of Screams Today there are between 2,000 and 3,000 independent haunted events in the United States every October, a lot of them based on farms. Many start up haunted events fail before their third year, but with every failure is a new first time event opening to take its place. Haunting is a business like any other and the failure rate in the first five years exceeds the overall business average of 60%. Even with this high failure rate, some haunted attractions have been able to gain a foothold in their market and some have been rewarded with attendances reaching in excess of 50,000 people (the industry average today is below 15,000 attendees per season). Throughout its history, there have been haunted attractions that raised the bar in attendance, creativity, detailed realism or pure fright-factor. In the early 1980s Joe Jensen operated Hades Haunted House in Chicago, Illinois. In its prime, the event hosted 50,000 people in just 10 days of operation and due to noise restrictions had to close at 10pm, a record for independent attendance versus hours of operation that stands to this date. Rocky Point Haunted house in Salt Lake City,


Utah, was a massive attraction that not only had movie quality sets, costumes and makeup, but was filled with sets, props and costumes from major motion pictures. Owned by Cydney Neil, this attraction was spotlessly clean and the volunteer acting troupe was second to none.


JUNE 2010


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