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10 21 24 Frightmare Compound's Josh Holder talks about Colo's Oldest Haunted house
But there's only one feeling like knowing your banker personally, like growing up with a bank you can count on, like being sure what you've earned is safe, secure, and local. There's only one feeling like knowing you're supporting your community. You deserve more from a bank. You deserve an institution that stood strong for generations. Bank of Colorado. There's only one member FDIC. Halloween, right around the corner, so it's time to get your scare on as the Frightmare compound. Westminster is Colorado's oldest haunted house. And if you live by online reviews, it's also one of the top rated haunted houses. And joining us on the KOA Comic Spirit Health Hotline right now to talk about it, the owner of Frightmare compound is Josh Holder. Josh, good morning. I know this is a family business for you. How's it evolved over the years? Yeah. Good morning. You know, it's really evolved crazy over the years. Back in the day, you know, my dad started his place back in 1983, and it was just built on this little piece of farmland here in Westminster, Colorado, and now it's really turned into something crazy. You know, we've got over four acres will take you, you know, we tell everybody about 30 minutes to go from the front gate through the whole haunted house into the Monster Museum. Josh, tell us a little bit about what guests can expect because like you mentioned, it's not just the haunted house, there's the Monster Museum at the end, and a coffin simulator ride with no joke and no pun intended, you would never catch me dead in one of those by any means. Yeah. So we, yeah, we've kind of some things that's separated up here is the realism out here. So Frightmare, you know, we're built on this crazy piece of swampland. We've got realistic props, you know, we don't do any of the fakes of up here. Like our graveyard is all real tombstones. We built this crazy 1800s church, we've got wrecked airplanes. You go underground into a mine shaft. And then of course, we do have the crazy things like the coffin ride where it's a person coffin ride. You get to go in. It's all simulated. And if you really feel like you get buried alive and all the way to the fact that there's dirt scents to get pumped into the coffin at the end of the ride where, you know, you kind of disappear and it goes completely dark. Pretty, pretty wild. The classic public of all of you are not going to last on that one. Josh, kind of a 50,000 foot question, but has fear changed over the years? Are we more easy to scare or less so and more jaded about, about things that are supposed to frighten us? Oh, yeah. I think it changed a ton. And that's actually why the monster museum was created. So at the end of the haunted house, you go through the monster museum, you need to see in the 80s, you know, what scared people went from sheets and catch up, you know, looking like blood to nowadays, it's so realistic and so crazy that, you know, like the bodies that we use up here, the cadavers look 100% real, the tools, you know, instead of having like a real pickaxe, we use fake ones that you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between them. If you put them side by side, fear has changed just so much over the past, over the past 40 years, just with the realism, you know, you have to, you have to make everything look so realistic these days. Tell us a little bit about your staff, the people you employ, how many, and just the effort and the work that they do in order to bring the fight right mayor to life. Yeah. So we've got about 100 employees it takes to put on this show every night from the actors to security to ticket takers and the actors, you know, we all way down to having active coaches up here. We joke that we're training athletes and actors at the same time, you know, because these guys are out there for five, six hours a night and given it, they're all these guys come in, it will be dripping sweat, we make sure there's food here, we make sure there's water, everything to make sure that, you know, our team is 100% ready to go, but it's more training athletes and actors at the same time. It's wild. Josh, how long is the event and the compound open and give details about where people can go and the times and the like? We are open every night until November 2nd and I will open at 7 p.m. every night and 10 p.m. until on Sunday to Thursday and midnight on the weekends and then you can get your tickets at the Freightmarecompound.com. The owner of the Freightmare compound, Josh Holder, Josh, thank you so much for your time this morning. It sounds terrifying, which I guess means you're doing a pretty good job with all of it. Awesome. Thank you guys for having me. There's only one feeling like knowing your banker personally, like growing up with a bank you can count on, like being sure what you've earned is safe, secure, and local. There's only one feeling like knowing you're supporting your community. You deserve more from a bank, you deserve an institution that stood strong for generations. Bank of Colorado, there's only one. Number FDIC.