On Monday, my fraternity, Delta Upsilon, designed and created a haunted house that we set up inside our house in order to raise money for College Mentors for Kids. It was officially declared that we would actually create a haunted house one month before it was actually set up. This, obviously, is a very short time period to begin planning a haunted house. As can be reasonably assumed, there is a lot of stuff that goes into creating a haunted house. All the materials have to be gathered, the design and layout has to be completed, and all the forms have to be completed and confirmed. This meant that we had to work fast, and we also had to still design a great house. During the first 3 1/2 weeks we got the materials, created the design, and completed all the necessary forms. The only thing we did not do was actually start building the haunted house... This meant that we had one weekend to build the entire thing before we opened it on Monday. To make matters worse, this was homecoming weekend so the house had to look great for the alumni. Because of this, we did not even start setting up the house until Sunday morning. We worked tirelessly all day. It was chaotic because everyone was in such a rush to get the thing put together. However, after much hard work, the haunted house was finally complete and was definitely ready for action the next day.
When Monday rolled around we were all very nervous. We did not know exactly how well the whole thing would actually go over. We grossly underestimated its popularity. We were supposed to work from 7-11pm, but we ended up working until the last group came through at 12:15pm; that is how busy the haunted house was. Overall, we raised $3600 and had over 720 people come. The haunted house was a great success and everyone absolutely loved it.
Haunted house.. very creative fund raising idea. So you charged each person $5 at the door right? That pretty cheap considering that the bigger haunted houses charge like $26. How did all the decorating pan out and did you have people dressed up coming out of no where grabbing people? I've actually never been to a haunted house but from what I hear, that's usually what happens. My hearts too weak to take all that jumping, grabbing and screaming. Any-who, that's a pretty good way to raise some money. I should turn my house into a haunted one and raise some money to pay for my books..lol! Well..seems like a good idea to me anyway..Well how many hours did that add up to plus all the hours you spent the next day running the things. I'm sure you racked up a good 15 if you took the whole day Sunday. Good luck getting the rest of your 30.
ReplyDeleteHi Jason!
ReplyDeleteThat’s so awesome! I planned a haunted house once in my life in high school, I am so glad however that I was just the planner and not the decorator, administrator, etc.! That sounds like so much work and for such a good cause! I know that a bunch of my sisters went to the haunted house and a bunch of my sisters are in College Mentors for Kids! They were really excited that it turned out so well! I am so glad that the haunted house was such a success! What was your role in the haunted house? Did you scare people or did you have another job? I am so sorry that I wasn’t able to go! I had meetings and an exam beforehand! Will DU be doing this every year from now on do you know? I hope so because next year I want to come—regardless if I have a heart attack during it!
Shannon
It sounds like your haunted house was a huge success as a fundraiser! $3600 from a single fundraiser especially one in one night is really impressive. That is a lot of money that your fraternity will be able to give to College Mentors for Kids and I am sure that they will really appreciate it. It is really cool that you have over seven hundred people come since it was the first year. It sounds like your fraternity should make this into an annual fundraiser. I think if you advertise it a little more you could run it on two nights and make even more money for your charity. It is really impressive that you guys were able to put together an entire haunted house in only one day. It sounds like the haunted house was a huge success despite the small amount of planning and building time you had.
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