INVER GROVE HEIGHTS, Minn. — There's good reason to be scared inside Nowhere Haunted House.
'Nowhere' began as Galen McKay and Nicole Ross' home, where they would decorate to the nines in anticipation for Halloween.
"We just started going crazy at our house to the point where we decorated so much we'd have limos go by; we'd have 1,200 trick-or-treaters, and it took five people to hand out candy," said McKay.
Their passion connected McKay and Ross to like-minded masters of fright, Ian Knutson and Mike Reimer. "We got together with these guys, and we just brainstormed how we could have a haunted entertainment center that could be open year-round," McKay recalled.
Now, everything inside this haunt is hand-crafted, hand-selected, and hand-painted by a group of home haunters.
The group helped transform an old pawn shop into this one-of-a-kind entertainment complex in Inver Grove Heights.
"We started building in March of 2022," said Knutson. "That took us pretty much a whole year before our last Halloween to be open. Mini golf and [the] arcade didn't even start until this Spring. We basically lived in there all year."
When the group started, the space was a blank canvas.
"We created every single thing here; we built by hand using auctions, [Facebook] Marketplace, Craig's List and Menards. We just built everything, and Nicole was our painter. We painted all of the sets," said McKay, who also said they were working full-time jobs. "We just did it as a passion."
Nicole Ross was on board, but it took a little convincing. "I'm not into horror stuff or scary stuff, but then I got into the process of it, and it's really cool because it's theater. I mean, there's so much creativity here."
That includes the team of actors who spend a lot of time on character work and development, even figuring out ways to play with their voices in healthy ways.
'Nowhere's' resident physician, Dr. Jaundice, is certified in malpractice. Behind the makeup, Rachel Tracy is a storyteller who embraces the creative freedom Jaundice brings.
"Listen, I work in retail. Let me tell you, it is the best thing ever going from being really, really nice to people to not being that nice to people. It's like anti-customer service here; It's beautiful," said Tracy.
It's the same for Matt Hicks, who is one of the floating actors. His ghoulish character moves around the haunt.
"You get to use your imagination. Yeah, it makes you feel like a kid," Hicks said.
Working at the haunted house is very different from his day job, building floats for seaplanes. "It's a pretty calm environment, so coming here is nice to let loose and get wild," he said.
Nick Thompson, the ghostly pirate, spends his days working construction. Now, Thompson gets to relive some of his favorite memories and amplify them.
"As a kid, I loved Halloween. There was a haunted house down the road from our house, and we'd go every year and check it out," Thompson said. "I've always enjoyed watching and being a part of it, and the last few years, I jumped into it."
When she's not a killer clown at Nowhere Haunted House, Emily Ludewig is a seasonal entertainment worker at ValleyFair, but on the technical side. 'Nowhere' allows her to be in the spotlight and away from her daily routine.
"It allows me to step away from the stress of my life, and the chaos that I have going on, and just be like, 'Alright, well Clacky is this unhinged goblin clown, so I just get to do that, and it's a very nice stress relieving type of moment," said Ludewig. "I don’t super enjoy being scared, which is kind of ironic."
Like Ludewig, not everyone enjoys those adrenaline-pumping moments of terror. That is why Nowhere Haunted House offers four different scare levels including Low Scare Saturdays and No Scare Behind the Scenes Tours on Sundays.
"If we can't scare somebody, we're going to entertain them. We're going to make this fun as well as scary," Ross said.
Ian Knutson agreed saying this of his actors: "a lot of them are good at it; they know that it's a little bit of comedy mixed with the scare."
Although Nowhere Haunted House is a year-round business, the actual haunt only runs through October and for seasonal experiences. The main haunted house turns into elaborate escape rooms with details in every nook and cranny. The indoor mini-golf course and arcade are also open all year.
For the future, there are plans to expand Nowhere Haunted House to include zombie axe-throwing and laser tag. Eventually, the owners would like to make their own animatronics, apparel and masks.
There's even potential for 'Haunt Camps' during the summer.
"You teach them how to do makeup, how to make costumes, how to be a haunt actor, how to build sets, how animatronics work, and at the end of the week, they put on the haunt for their parents; they're the actors," McKay said.
Expert Matt Reimer said there's a method to the madness when it comes to who gets scared in the haunted house.
"Actors are trained to aim more towards the middle or towards the back. The tough guy is in front, so I’m going here [in the back of the line], and then [the actors] are going to scare me; I’m going to scream," Reimer said. So you have to determine what's worse for you - the 'front scare' or the 'back scare.'
WATCH MORE ON KARE 11+
Download the free KARE 11+ app for Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV and other smart TV platforms to watch more from KARE 11 anytime! The KARE 11+ app includes live streams of all of KARE 11's newscasts. You'll also find on-demand replays of newscasts; the latest from KARE 11 Investigates, Breaking the News and the Land of 10,000 Stories; exclusive programs like Verify and HeartThreads; and Minnesota sports talk from our partners at Locked On Minnesota.
- Add KARE 11+ on Roku here or by searching for KARE 11 in the Roku Channel Store.
- Add KARE 11+ on Fire TV here or by searching for KARE 11 in the Amazon App Store.
- Learn more about the KARE 11+ app for Apple TV in the Apple App Store.
- Learn more about KARE 11+ here.
Watch more local news:
Watch the latest local news from the Twin Cities and across Minnesota in our YouTube playlist: