Fiendish Friday Interviews :: Scott Michael and buying a Haunted House on eBay for $1

How long have you been in the business?

I've been a professional haunter for 11 years. I have been operating my own commercial haunts for five years.

How did you start?
I started out like most of us. Building haunts in the basement & garage. It eventually expanded into my High School where I produced "The Haunted House" in the drama room. I went on to do non profit events like "THE HAUNTED BUNKER" at the Illwaco Wa. coast guard station. I later advanced into selling self built Haunt props on e bay. Now I'm a full fledge Hauntoholic,.. I mean professional haunter.

What’s the scariest Haunted House you ever attended?
To tell you the truth, I have never been scared in any of the 100's of operating commercial haunts I have been into. I've been immune to them since childhood.

On the other hand, I have been scared shitless by the real ghost who inhabit our haunts in the off season or after hours. Those are real scary!

Do you still find time to attend Haunted Houses?
Without fail I will attend all of the haunts in our area to see what the competition is up to. I also like to make a Halloween date with Knott's whenever possible.

What inspires you to create?
I get inspired by many things, but my biggest inspiration is Walt Disney and has been since I hung out at his Magic Kingdom as a kid. I still take regular trips to see Uncle Walt & his creations both at Disneyland & Disney World. Visiting the ever changing parks and attractions gets my creative juices flowing.

Do you ever get scared anymore?
I don't get scared of commercial Haunted House gags and props. I do get startled on occasion by my actors who challenge each other to scare me, but as I tell them " Startles are not true fright, just a natural human defense reaction."

What does scare you?
The scariest thing I face each and every year is the ridiculous amount of ever changing rules and regulations that govern the operation of Halloween events across the country. Every year it gets tougher to operate because of non voter approved laws that are made up on a whim by those who regulate haunted houses & operations.

Who’s your average customer?
Our clients usually consist of a wide variety of people, in all ages, all backgrounds. I think it's because of the way we set up multiple style attractions on one lot, in the city format. It seems to appeal to freaks of all ages.

So why are you selling your Haunted Attraction on eBay?
Plain and simple, Las Vegas Compliance Laws.

Our trailer attractions are among the safest in the industry and would do well in most parts of the country as far as compliance goes, but somewhere along the line, whoever first built a trailer haunt in Las Vegas had it permitted as a building structure rather than a portable amusement attraction. Since then our 8 ft. X 45 ft. trailer haunts have had to do everything thing that a sky scraper would have to do to be compliant as a permanent structure.

This year they came up with their own set of rules that they call “Haunted House” regulations. Basically it says that all of our existing haunts would have to be approved by a structural engineer. Well, structural engineers have never heard of approving a semi trailer and none will even talk to us about it, not even the ones they suggest. Las Vegas has a history of changing laws on a drop of the hat to avoid taking responsibility for what they do not understand about our trailer haunts.

Every year for the past five years we have had to restructure the way we operate to make the officials happy. We have the option to operate out trailer attractions in Las Vegas for the 2007 season as they are, but want to get a jump on the officials. As far as selling the HOTEL for a buck goes, I have made my money over & over again with the hotel. It has been an icon in Las Vegas for the past 5 years and has had right around 30,000 victims through it since it’s birth. Although it is still like new and ready for the season, I feel it is time for it to be relieved of it’s Las Vegas duties.....