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Spookywoods - Reinventing the haunted experience

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  • Spookywoods - Reinventing the haunted experience

    Hi Haunters,

    In these days of high through put, massive attentdance I feel we have lost the interative touch that started our event in 1985. I'm always sharing ideas with my fellow haunters here on Hauntworld and I wanted to share with you my new idea.

    You may have read over the past year or so that Ghost Hunters have been doing "Research" on our farm and discovered proof of paranormal activity. Growing up on this farm this kind of activity is what prompted me to start Spookywoods at the age of 15 in 1985 in the first place. I have many stories of strange things going on, but when this team of researches started getting local news papers to publish such findings I started to think of sharing this experience with our customers of Spookywoods. Working in the logistics was key and we have come up with the solution and decided to offer it this year as a new attraction.

    I just announced this new attraction today to our fan base through our social media outlets and website. I can't give away all the secrets here or my competition will copy me! LOL

    Nevertheless, if this works out it could be a great way to add revenue to your haunted bank account! I'll be sure to let you know if it works, not everything I touch turns to gold, just look at my last Christmas event! LOL

    See this link for more information on the new Ghost Hunters Experience!

    http://spookywoods.com/spookywoods-news.htm
    Tony Wohlgemuth,
    Comes up with the fun stuff!
    Kersey Valley, Inc.
    www.KerseyValley.com

  • #2
    You May Have Made A Mistake...

    The Ravens Grin Inn has been haunted since at least 1925. Elderly people in this town warned me not to buy it because it was haunted. Numerous people that once lived in these five apartments have told me of their problems and scary experiences here over the years.
    I could not hide this from customers when they would have a supernatural sighting here and think it was a special effect.
    After a very busy supernatural year here 8 years ago which nearly ended my life I decided to begin telling as much of the house's haunted history as the customers would listen to or that my voicebox would allow me to tell. My main mission was to put the word out there, hoping someday, someone might come walking through my front door that would have some of those answers for me, as far as the "Who", "Why" and "Wherefore" of these things happening.
    By going this route too you may have left yourself open for some real nutty people to now be drawn to your place that never considered it of their intrest before.
    You also may have alienated some regular customers who do not tolerate supernatural things not endorsed by their religion.
    Of the customers that you gain, some of them will be people that you wil come to wish that you hadn't met. Many you will find are extremely fearfull of anything deemed actually "Supernatural" and they won't be around buying tickets anymore.
    Ghost hunting groups want to come here, paying us nothing , of course, as we stay up all night as they fart around, forgetting to push "Record" as we watch odd things on their cameras, Thanks for nothing!
    Some of these people are such big idiots that they think we will move out of our house/business for a night or two so they can play around and do what they want unimpeded by us, guess again!
    They talk as if they would be doing us some huge favor by proving this place is haunted?
    While they are at it, proving things and all, they might try proving the sun is hot, another obvious known fact. We know it's haunted, we live here!
    There is another page of things I don't feel totally comfortable putting on a public form concerning all of this, if you are interested send me an e-mail.
    When I am telling customers the haunted history of this house I try to add alittle attempted humor to it and I explain why I am doing this, to allow their fearfull or religiously bound-up mind a place to go, a safe, calmer, happier place , hopefully where they can tell themselves it's all made-up "Baloney", and rest happier that night putting their minds in that comfortable place.
    No consternation nor phobias found here, I hope.
    Last edited by Jim Warfield; 07-26-2009, 01:27 AM.
    hauntedravensgrin.com

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    • #3
      Ghost Hunters

      Hi Jim,

      Thanks for your reply, I knew one was coming as you don't miss a thread!

      As to this idea attracting idiots, we have been dealing with that since the articles were published in the papers from the Ghost Hunters. I just tell them all we have an exclusive agreement with the WSPS, the group that first came out and recorded the paranormal events. I too was almost impaled at a young age from a unexplained event in one of our barns. This farm is truely haunted as is your house, but that is what got Spookywoods started in the first place. These stories of hauntings do attract new customers, I hear it all the time from people in line. "Is this the house where the fiddler died?" One of the spirts that makes our haunt his home that was wrote about in the news some 20 years ago!

      As for the people not wanting to buy tickets due to thier belief system toward the paranormal, they will turn into the word of mouth advertising that gets the hype going.

      We do want to entertain the guests as well, that is a focus with this experience. I appreciate your insight to the issues you have discovered with such an attraction.

      One of the best known haunts is Eastern State with their Terror behind the Walls attraction. They are featured on Ghost Hunters and other shows all the time. It has become main stream with these type shows and into the pop culture of our target customers.

      Thanks for your input, I will be putting a humor twist to the script in places as you suggested.
      Last edited by twohlgemuth; 07-26-2009, 08:21 AM.
      Tony Wohlgemuth,
      Comes up with the fun stuff!
      Kersey Valley, Inc.
      www.KerseyValley.com

      Comment


      • #4
        Hey Tony PMed You...
        Bill Rod.
        Dark Tech Effects
        Automated DMX Lighting
        Show Control - Audio / Visual Effects

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        • #5
          I say charge people to investigate.

          Hell, give them a guided tour and point out where the supernatural has happened. Throw in the history of the place and bing bang boom you have a live 7 hour event on October 30th, a little late for the haunted house season but the free advertising should increase your sales next year.
          John Jordan
          www.TheAsylumwv.com
          www.Trans-AlleghenyLunaticAsylum.com

          Comment


          • #6
            Added to ticket price

            I have decided to add $3.00 across the board to our ticket price and include this Ghost Hunters Experience in the ticket price making general admission a $25.00 ticket. I have also decided to add more traditional haunted scares to the attraction as well to really scare them silly.

            We are going with a hybrid guided concept. The groups will be passed off from one Ghost Hunter to the next with walking alone through the woods until they reach the next Ghost Hunter. This will make this experience interactive and add value to the overall ticket in ways a free flow haunt just can't do. I will not reveal all my secrets here, but I'm excited to see this addition to our show. At a three dollar increase we stand to make a sizable revenue gain from a rather low budget investment.

            This will add about 20 minutes to our 45 minute event. At this price it will make us more revenue with the masses taken part in it rather than a separate attraction at a higher price. This will make our event over an hour haunt once in the attraction.

            I have already recieved emails from our fans excited to hear about this new attraction.

            I have 30 acres of woods that we have never used and this makes good use of that part of the farm. Just being dropped off far from the noise of the midway in the dark is scary.

            Is anyone else considering doing a simular addtion this year?
            Tony Wohlgemuth,
            Comes up with the fun stuff!
            Kersey Valley, Inc.
            www.KerseyValley.com

            Comment


            • #7
              I know a woods haunt that has strict rules saying no flip-flops or sandals because sticks on the trail caused some expensive medical bills and yet???
              It may be better to just go bare foot, toughen those feet up like a New Guinea native's and survive the path experiences much better?
              Tonight's house tour was 2 1/2 hours long, a Mother and three teenage boys.
              None of them seemed bored, one of them was scared numerous times, much to enjoyment of the rest.
              He was fun.
              hauntedravensgrin.com

              Comment


              • #8
                We had a ghost hunter in our place but we used it to drum up PR for the haunt... he said we had like 15 ghosts living in our haunted house. I have pictures of him walking through the place!

                Larry
                Larry Kirchner
                President
                www.HalloweenProductions.com
                www.BlacklightAttractions.com
                www.HauntedHouseSupplies.com
                www.HauntedHouseMagazine.com

                Comment


                • #9
                  We have our ghost tours and attraction separate.

                  A little history of the company: it started out as a year round haunted house in downtown Richmond based on the ghost stories around the area. After being asked over and over again by customers to see the sites, the next year the owners decided to add a ghost tour and actually take customers to the specific haunted locations (and were able to double the admission fee). Unfortunately, last year the lease became too high to afford a year round attraction, so they signed a per year lease with the local Edgar Allan Poe Museum (which happened to be a stop on the ghost tour anyway), added two other ghost tours (Haunted Capitol and Haunted Pub Crawl), as well as created a brand new October-only haunted house (Blood Lake) at a local water park 20 minutes out of the city.

                  Right now it's working out pretty good for us to separate the attractions - especially since we don't have a year round permanent location anymore. This way we're able to create a more family-friendly ghost tour and then have a "for mature audiences only" haunted house. Hopefully we'll be able to grow the business every year by keeping it this way.


                  - Ryan

                  Blood Lake Haunted House & Haunts of Richmond Ghost Tours
                  www.bloodlakeva.com www.hauntsofrichmond.com
                  Located in Richmond, VA

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