Having visited industry trade shows where Halloween decorations go for tens of thousands of dollars, Halloween enthusiast Randy Goddard didn't see why he couldn't make the same props in his own backyard.
"We sort of said, ‘You know, all that's in there is some wood and some PVC and some electronics and stuff like that,'" the Novi resident says. "'How come we can't do that somewhat the same way, but cheaper?'"
Last year Goddard formed the DIY Halloween prop-makers group
PoorMan Props with his friend, Romulus resident Steve Tobey. The club, which has grown to include almost 60 members, meets several times year-round to build a variety of Halloween decorations and props. It's a natural outgrowth of what has become a massive business in the U.S., with Americans spending an estimated
$7 billion on Halloween annually. About one-third of that goes towards
decorations, giving rise to annual trade shows like St. Louis'
TransWorld.
Goddard and Tobey, respectively the president and vice president of PoorMan, have been visiting those shows for years, and creating haunt material for themselves and others for even longer. Goddard traces his fascination with the holiday back to 1977, when his dad –a preacher in the Church of Christ– bought him a copy of Kiss'
Alive II.
"I'm sitting there looking at the makeup, and I'm looking at the theatrics, and I'm looking at everything those guys did at the time," Goddard says. "It's kind of funny–from then it spawned into where I had to make sure I had the best Halloween costume every year. And then it spawned into I had to have the best yard every year."
Goddard got seriously into prop-making in 1990, when some former coworkers in Tennessee asked him to create something spooky for people to walk through at a fall get-together. "Something spooky" turned into a 10-room haunted house inspired by the
A Nightmare On Elm Street movies.
"I even played Freddy Krueger myself," Goddard says. "I spent a whole month training my voice to sound just like his. I wanted the realism. And from there it just sprouted."
Since he moved to Michigan 18 years ago, Goddard has mostly focused on decorating his own lawn, although he has also acted as a consultant to the professional fright-masters at the
Erebus and
Dark Legacy haunted houses. While the details of Goddard's story may be particularly entertaining, his obsession certainly isn't unique among the PoorMan gang. When
Metromode stopped by Tobey's home for a mid-September club meeting, the house was already filled with Halloween décor;
Corpse Bride was even playing on a TV in the den. Ask any PoorMan member and you'll hear a different pledge of allegiance to their beloved holiday.
"You get people that like Christmas," Tobey says. "All they do is make Christmas stuff all year long, but people kind of think it's weird if you tell them, 'Oh, I make Halloween stuff all year long.' I think it's gotten a little bit better in the last few years, because there's so many [trade] shows. People are starting to look at the industry a little differently."
When we stopped by the September get-together, Tobey's backyard was bustling with about 25 club members on an unseasonably warm day. On the patio members were creating large prop candles, using PVC pipe and spliced electrical cords to create a flickering effect. On the other end of the yard, some members were using heat guns to melt milk jugs over store-bought plastic skulls to create their own replicas. The group is notably diverse, including men and women (and, in some cases, their children) of varying ages. Their professional backgrounds are diverse as well, ranging from computer-aided design to hairdressing to heating and air conditioning.
"One thing that we really like about our club is not only are we making things, we're teaching people how to use a lot of this stuff too," Goddard says. "A lot of these people have never used glue guns or electricity or heat guns, pneumatics, electronics, a lot of that stuff."
While painting wooden Halloween signs with friends Lisa Tobey and Paula Doyle, Ypsilanti resident Missy Phillips noted that while some of the club's projects are advanced, experienced members are happy to take beginners under their wings.
"We do have a few people that come where someone might not be comfortable just using a saw," Phillips says. "There's always someone here to help or give you advice or help you try to make something."
Many PoorMan members compare the group to the
Motor City Haunt Club, which also serves metro-area Halloween enthusiasts but doesn't focus as much on "make-and-take" opportunities. PoorMan posts instructions for many of its projects on the
club's website.
"There was an area definitely lacking in the other Halloween-related clubs," says Doyle, a Port Huron resident. "There wasn't always the opportunity to actually build and create things. This really filled that void."
The approach certainly seems to be a success. Little more than a year after it was founded, the club has drawn members from as far away as Ohio, Canada and the Eaton Rapids area. Doyle says that's thanks to PoorMan members putting a supportive and social atmosphere first–perhaps even before their holiday of preference.
"We're all just in it to help each other out and encourage each other," Doyle says. "I think that's just the beauty of it. It's not cliquey. It's just all of us getting together and having fun and hanging out."
Patrick Dunn is an Ann Arbor-based freelance writer and a senior writer at Metromode and Concentrate.
All Photos by David Lewinski Photography