See full version: Ten Thirty One Productions: What Happened To $2 Million Shark Tank Deal
Melissa Carbone is the entrepreneur behind Ten Thirty One Productions. Her company is famous for producing Los Angeles’ Haunted Hayride. Every year the live Halloween-themed attraction brings tens of thousands of people into the dark woods of Griffith Park. The 17-night event generates close to $2 million. Carbone pitched her company on Shark Tank and landed a $2 million investment from Mark Cuban (he got 20 percent and sits on the board). [links]
Thanks to Cuban, Carbone has established partnerships with Ticketmaster and Live Nation. And his investment enabled Ten Thirty One Productions to take the Haunted Hayride to Manhattan (at the already scary Randall’s Island) and to San Francisco. They’ve also launched two additional attractions — Ghost Ship, a 75-minute evening boat ride of horror on the open ocean, and Great Horror Campout which is set in LA’s Elysian Park. It’s described as a 12-hour “immersive overnight experience” that offers a haunted scavenger hunt and Blood Tag. The company plans to expand the Campout idea to eight other US cities.
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Last October, haunted-attraction entrepreneur Melissa Carbone struck a $2 million deal with Mark Cuban for 20 percent of her horror entertainment company, Ten Thirty One Productions. The business creates and produces live Halloween-themed attractions, the most popular of which is the Los Angeles Haunted Hayride, which attracts 60,000 people to the pitch black woods of LA's Griffith Park every year and generated $1.8 million in revenue last October.
"The best advice he's ever given me is, 'Don't drown in opportunity,'" Carbone says. "After Shark Tank, you get bombarded by people who want to work with you or work for you, and you want to do it all, but he pulls back the reins on us a little bit in that way, which is great."
In March, as a result of partnering with Cuban, Ten Thirty One also attracted an investment from Live Nation, the largest concert company in the country. Despite these partnerships, much of the value of having Cuban as an investor comes from the breadth of knowledge he's acquired as a serial entrepreneur. [links]
Cuban saw the potential the company had for other markets and jumped at the opportunity, and recently told Business Insider that it's been one of his most profitable deals from the show, grouping it with others that are making at least half a million in profit annually. Last year Ten Thirty One hit its goal of $3 million in gross revenue.
What she hadn't planned for, however, was a wave of rain and intense wind wreaking havoc on their setup and forcing them to close for several nights, losing significant amounts of money in the process. She also found the location to be less than ideal, since isolated Randall's Island is far from a visitor-friendly locale. Due to the unexpected closings, Ten Thirty One will miss its goal of $5 million in revenue this year. more
There are many horror attraction franchises in different parts of the country, but Carbone is attempting to create a national presence. It will certainly not be easy, but Cuban is confident in Carbone and her team, and will help keep her on track to her dream of being the dominant horror attraction company in the United States.
That doesn’t mean that the other sharks were completely confident on the valuation. Robert agreed that everything would have to go right for Carbone’s next-year projections to come true. Without pushing her to offer more equity, he dropped out due to the risk. Lori brought up the time to recoup her investment, a point no one had raised yet. Equity investors tend to make real money when their businesses are bought by a larger corporate entity. Carbone did have offers from some large players in the live entertainment space, but it’s possible that Lori doubted these claims. For this reason, she dropped out. here
Melissa Carbone, a former Clear Channel Communications executive, is the owner of Ten Thirty One Productions. Since 2009, Ten Thirty One has been a major Halloween-themed live entertainment company in the Los Angeles area. Carbone went into business with the goal of staging the best haunted hay rides possible. Almost immediately, she made a local name for herself. For seventeen nights per year each fall, Ten Thirty One led Haunted Hay Rides for thirty dollars per ticket. For a premium, visitors could also rent a private wagon for up to thirty guests, enter a maze attraction, and feel true dread at a “Purgatory Side Show area.” Next, Carbone wanted to expand. She had a solid business model that she could see taking root in New York. Eventually, she hoped for Ten Thirty One to be the world’s largest Halloween-based entertainment company. This would, of course, depend on the sharks.
They wouldn’t have a chance to respond yet, of course. As Carbone described the company’s ownership and production of live attractions in the horror space, a stationary scarecrow from the presentation came to life. “Just when you think the terror is over…think again,” she uttered. An evil shaman and an executioner with a chainsaw stormed in from the wings. As the monsters converged upon the sharks, only Kevin O’Leary was unphased, chuckling at Robert and Daymond, who were clearly shaken. Mark threatened the attackers, warning the actor with the chainsaw that he would kick his “tush back to Texas.”
Since the previous year, the company has undergone a transformation. Before, it was known almost exclusively for the Haunted Hay Ride, and the Great Horror Campout was only in its infancy. Now, the Great Horror Campout is on tour across the nation. The overnight attraction forces patrons to face demons and chupacabras. When it comes to the scavenger hunt, the queasy should beware. Competitors may have to rummage through cadavers for clues and items to complete the challenge.
Ten Thirty One’s update conveniently aired almost exactly a year after the initial segment, both just before Halloween. The timing was perfect, with the “Shark Tank Effect” bringing the Haunted Hay Ride and the company’s other ventures plenty of press during its most profitable season. The update finds Carbone interviewing actors for her growing cast on both the east and west coasts. The actors writhe and crawl, hiss and shriek. Between zombies, vampires, clowns, and other spooky characters, Ten Thirty One does not disappoint. Sales didn’t disappoint either. Since Carbone’s partnership with Mark, the business made two million dollars in revenue, with projections of growth to between three and four million in the next year.
Cover of Los Angeles Times Business Section TODAY!here
Although Christmas is winding down right now, things were hauntingly creepy on ABC's Shark Tank when Ten Thirty One Productions first appeared on episode 509 of the show in October of 2013. The timing worked perfectly given that the company produces Haunted Hayrides in Los Angeles -- as well as a Horror Camp Out and a Ghost Ship ride.
Melissa Carbone founded Ten Thirty One Productions in 2009, and by the time the show initially aired, the company had provided thrills and chills for more than 100,000 people. On Shark Tank, Carbone's initial goal was $2 million for 10 percent of the business. Initially, the "sharks" weren't so convinced about Carbone's valuation of her company, but they took notice when she revealed the hayrides brought in $1.8 million in a mere 17 nights. Of that amount, $600,000 was pure profit. Not shabby for slightly more than half a month's worth of work.
Unfortunately, earlier in 2018, the New York Post reported that the company was sued over damages that Shannon Morris sustained in NYC's Randall's Island, when a fog machine landed on her head. According to an Inc report from October of this year, Thirteenth Floor Entertainment Group purchased Carbone's company. Both Carbone and her ex-spouse, Alyson Richards, stayed on with the new owner. They would continue working on providing a perfectly frightful experience for visitors.
Since the deal, the Shark Tank Blog reported that the company did $2 million in sales in 2014 -- with projections of $4 million in sales in 2015. Ten Thirty One Productions expanded to New York, along with offering Ghost Ship experiences on the West Coast in addition to summertime Horror Campouts. Business Insider reported that the deal was Cuban's best on the show.