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Haunted House Vendors / Small Business Must Act Now
Wed, April 01, 2020

Hauntworld community it's time for a reality check.  

Haunted House Vendors:  There is only one solution at this point get loans.  The government is offering you 8 weeks of payroll money if you keep your staff employed.  Why wouldn't you?  Build some product, create the stuff you know sells and skip the rest.  Build up some inventory and be ready when haunted house owners start buying.  Vendors you might also consider an SBA loan which would save your business, and maybe help grow it.  The reality is however that haunts aren't going to be buying much this year.  No virtual tradeshow, discounts, or late MHC show is going to change anything.  Haunt owners have the luxury right now of sitting this buying season out.  This virus hit our industry at a time that benefits the haunted house owner.  Had the virus breakout happened 14 days later haunted house owners would have given vendors orders some with cash, checks and the situation would be flipped.  But now haunt owners are the ones who benefit as most Renovation projects typically start after Transworld not before.  I personally think sometime in April all this is going to calm down, people will go back to work, but even if the media switches topics from virus the new topic will be more bad news (unemployment).   The unemployment is going to be a record high, some business on the brink prior to this situation will close forever. Millions are going to lose their jobs and the media will talk about that on top of an election and virus.   Everyday this summer will bring more bad news scaring off haunt owners from buying anything. 

Furthermore you have a Presidential election coming up this year.  There will be no PR for haunted houses this year zero!  All the media will focus on is virus, economy and election.   So what should vendors do?  Should vendors expect any orders?  Great questions!  I'll answer the order question first, yes I think you will get some orders but they will trickle in here and there, and some orders might surprise you!  With that being said to take those orders and complete them you will need cash, apply for government grants or loans.  Keep in mind there are two things going on right now grants and loans.  The grants are forgivable if you retain your workforce.   The government will give you the money to pay your workers so take advantage of that and make some product be ready to ship when orders do come.  Also consider a zero interest rate loan from the Government I mean what in the hell do you have to lose?  
 

Vendors there is only ONE solution right now GET LOANS GET GRANTS!  Thinking there will be some miracle life raft sometime this summer is the wrong move.  

I commend Transworld for trying to find a new show date for MHC, but at the end of July its too little too late.  I doubt most vendors have anything to bring and sell as they'll be hand to mouth between now and then, meaning get an order make it ship it... not many will have inventory to sell at a show.  I hope the show helps as many vendors as possible but you can't wait around to see what anything in the future brings you need to act now!   In fact if I was in your shoes I'd be looking at every possible way to save money, hunker down into your shop make product, take government assistance and sell as orders come in.  If you take governement loans or assistance maybe you could built up some inventory, and if you havne't already sold it all by the new MHC grab a table and sell, sell and sell!  You have to make this work for your company and your staff.   You must find a way to grind this out and hope the haunted houses have decent seasons. 

We need all the vendors BACK in St Louis at Transworld 2021.  We need ALL OF YOU TO RETURN this how we save your business and the industry at the same time.  We can't take steps backwards, we need the Transworld show 2021 to be the biggest one ever!  We need to save Transworld as well who've invested into this industry like no other company before or after.  We can all achieve this by stopping everything you're currently doing and apply for government loans and grants. 

To my fellow haunted house owners... you really need to get a copy of my new DVD "How to Get Rich" because this DVD focuses on things you need to do to increase your business revenue.  Oddly enough I made this DVD prior to this situation but now more than ever, everything discussed in the DVD needs to be applied and applied fast!  Instead of expensive renovations you need to work on making your haunt easier to operate.  You need to build more scarezones where one actor can double or triple up rooms.  You need to figure out ways to go from 100 actors to 60 actors like it was 10 years ago.  Haunt owners needs to figure out ways to cut expenses, marketing, and operation costs.  Haunt owners you need to skip room renovations and instead built new revenue sources to take advantage of the customers who do come.  Do you need a new scene or a 5 minute escape room?  Do you need another bloody prop or a zombie paintball arena?  You need to figure out every way to increase revenue this haunted house season this will save your business in the event attendance is down by a lot.  

Haunt owners should prepare for the worst but hope for the best.  Haunt owners PR will not exist in 2020 due to the virus, economy and elections. It's time for you to get clever and once this virus passes jump on your social media and start promoting HIRING PEOPLE, talk about everything you're doing to make this Halloween more fun than ever before.  You must be socially active.  Lastly help your vendors when and how you can, don't be afraid to spend something, anything!  We're all in this together, we need to be smart but we need to do our best to keep everyone in the game. 

Below find links to government programs which can SAVE YOUR BUSINESS and a link to our new How to DVD.  


STEP BY STEP CHECK LIST:  CLICK HERE 
LOAN FACT SHEET:  CLICK HERE 
CARES ACT INFO CLICK HERE   

CLICK ON DVD IMAGE TO BUY 

 

  Posted by Larry 9.55 PM Read Comments ()