2011 Haunt Season - Final Results - Looking Forward 2012

[Mike Goff]

This thread has me reflecting on past seasons and looking at the books. I have always thought that the elections screw up the short term economy, and they may, but the numbers don’t support this theory as it applies to my haunts attendance. While it is true that an election year can be stressful, they make media buying a pain, and they get the locals all wound up, the numbers don’t lie.
If you remember, the majority of the stimulus money is scheduled to be spent this year. While I hate the idea of the whole stimulus thing, I believe that we will see a very short term improvement in the economy. I also believe that the majority of the mainstream media will do all that they can to support the current administration, and will not be talking down the economy over the summer. Whether the public believes it or not, is another story, and is yet to be seen.
The wild card is Iran, and ultimately Russia. Typically the American people rally around a war time president, this could mean war with Iran in Sept. or October. If we don’t go to war with Iran by then, I think that it is a safe bet that we will go to war with them before the end of the year.
Other possibilities are an economic collapse or a “terrorist attack”. I think that we should plan for business as usual, but do not take huge financial risk. I think that the whole model of business as it relates to haunting has changed, and those who understand this will probably see growth, those who don’t will not. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that as a whole, this will be the best season yet for haunting. That is the up side; the downside is what 2013 will look like.

[Mad Wax Sculptor]

You didn't even touch on a wet la Nina. This yr it is predicted to be very wet for the mid west in OCT with possible hurricanes and sever thunder storms. TX saw a warm dry Oct in 2011 so Im expecting rain!!! Thank god im indoors this yr

[krazedklownkilla]

Well Horror Fields in sawmills nc Had a GREAT year. This was our First year open in this location. In a small town of a pop of 4,931 people in the whole town, We had around 2700-2800 guest. I have never done so much advertising in my life as I did this year. We hit all areas of the board. I think 2012 will be just as good or better. We got LOTS of good feedback and was told by Most we were the best haunt around (But there isnt any haunts around us lol) and the best ticket price around. We flooded the market area with 15,000 $3off coupons. so 2011 we were just trying to get people to our door So that they could see our haunt and know were we were at. 2012 Should be a Great year too.

[storm]

Not bad in New England

First off, definately understand the pain with the world series. In New England we really feel the pinch with Red Sox getting in the playoffs. With a couple world series wins the hit has been a little less drastic on game nights over the past years, but if the Yankees and Red Sox square off in the ALCS we expect low numbers on game nights.

The upside is that it shows sports fans are a big part of your market, and lets you focus advertising dollars that way. While it's tough to get partnership with major leauge teams even if you are a huge haunt, there are always oppertunities to tap into sports with minor leauge teams, highschool sports, and even amature leuages like the afterwork softball, kickball, and roller derby.

Trails To Terror faired well this season. Weather was a complication at each end of the season. The tropical storm that came through caused some real issues, especially to the haunts in the area that are dependent on corn mazes. The high winds at the end of September limited the size of corn fields and one haunt was even unable to open because the crop got hit. The Rain / snow event at the end of the month cost most outdoor haunts a couple nights, and posed big challenges to make sure the paths were safe enough to open at all. All in all at Trails we feature outdoor attractions and weather impacted attendence, but not too significantly. We were still close to the record numbers of last year with about a 15% increase from our average attendence. Parking issues on our busiest nights will be the challenge again next year.