Gift Shop I need a bit of help in deciding what to sell.

[terrormasue]

I am in the process of building my gift shop. I will take any and all suggestions on items to stock. I am going to the Party Halloween Expo here in a few weeks. I would like to go with a bit more knowledge as to what to buy. Any suggestions?

Thank you in advance!

Sue

[damon carson]

Sue I would like to discuss this with you and help you with some great ideas. I sent you a p.m.
Thanks
Damon

[damon carson]

We have been talking about doing a new line of items that would be strictly sold for Haunted House giftshops. Why I sent you a p.m. Send me an email or contact me so we can talk more about it!
Thanks
Damon
www.frightmasters.weebly.com

[sean]

Logo items sold very well for us this year

[imagineer]

Someone on this forum might like to make these custom hats for selling in your haunt store. The hats have holes in it with hair strands popping out. The hair stands up as if the wearer was scared stiff. Your haunt logo can be on the front.

Also, if you can, make custom hats like these:

The cap (baseball caps) resembles the back of a cracked and aged skull.
Or, the cap can have tentacles hanging out that look like they burst out of the wearers head.
Or, the cap can have hair going around the edge and an exposed brain as the cap.

Just posting ideas for you. I hope they help.2013-01-06 13.06.14.jpg

[terrormasue]

Thank you everyone for your suggestions. I'm excited !!!

Sue

[Spikerip]

We were in a 55,000 sq ft building for two years. We used about 30,000 for our haunt which dumped everyone into a 10,000 sq ft costume store. So customers were forced to walk through the costume store on their way out of the haunt. The costume store opened at noon daily during October and stayed open until the haunt closed on weekends.

We observed the majority of our customers didn’t even look at the thousands of merchandise items we had on display. Some teens would try on wigs and hats, pose for pictures, then drop the items on the floor on their way out. We did sell some merchandise, but we had to have 3 – 5 employees working the floor with such large crowds of people exiting the haunt at the same time. We actually sold more merchandise to people who stopped in during day hours to purchase costumes. We handed out bounce-back coupons as people were exiting the costume store and some people would stop back during the day to purchase items.

We’ve since moved to a smaller space and tried just selling some of our most popular items, but even still we didn’t make enough to cover the labor needed to staff the small store. This past season we just sold a few left over costumes, hats and makeup. Our biggest sellers were our haunt t-shirts, glow necklaces and soft drinks.

We’re located within a mile of two costume stores; so it just wasn’t worth the effort for us to have a costume store. It was very surprising to us to watch people walk out of the haunt and walk directly past Halloween costumes, props and accessories without even looking at them. It seemed our customers were either running out of the exit of the haunt and out the door, laughing as they exited the haunt and talking with their friends or in a daze as they exited the building. We estimated only about 5% of our haunt customers even noticed we had merchandise for sale. Can’t explain it. Our prices were lower than what the local costume stores were selling items.

Best of luck with your decision, but I would suggest starting small and adding to it if it works in your location. It might be helpful if you don’t already have costume stores in your area. Also Wal-Mart and Party City both have very large Halloween costume displays too.

Kelly

[drfrightner]

Anything that is really CHEAP! That sells best!

Larry

[Karen]

I do custom stuff in small or large lots for the Haunt community. www.hauntedkeepsakes.com

Let me know if you have any questions.

Scaren Karen

[DeadendBrent]

Larry hit the nail on the head! anything cheap! Glow items do really well, stickers, and logo items. Our candy store also does well. You could combine the two, cheap things and bad candy! Lol just throwing things out there. Best of luck