How It All Began
It started, as the best stories often do, with a dare from a friend.
Halloween 1999. Louise and I had been running an online paranormal magazine called Mysterymag for a number of years and, through it, we’d built up a small but passionate community of people who were fascinated by the same things we were, the unexplained, the historic, the things that go bump in the night. People kept asking us, “Can we actually come on an investigation with you?” And honestly? We’d never really considered it.
Then a friend suggested we organise something at Kirby Muxloe Castle, that beautiful, unfinished ruin in Leicestershire, surrounded by its moat, left incomplete since Lord Hastings was dragged off to his execution in 1483. We thought, why not? We’ll see if anyone turns up.
They turned up. And they loved it.
That one Halloween night changed our lives completely. What was supposed to be a one-off turned into a second event, then a third, and before we knew it, we were building something that had never existed before, a company dedicated to taking ordinary people on extraordinary ghost hunting experiences at Britain’s most haunted locations.
Fright Nights
From that first nervous evening at Kirby Muxloe, Fright Nights grew into something neither of us could have imagined. We became the world’s first commercial ghost hunting company, and over the years we’ve had the privilege of taking more than 400,000 people through the doors of over 300 haunted venues across the United Kingdom.
We’ve hosted ghost hunts in medieval castles and crumbling abbeys, in grand stately homes and notorious old jails. We’ve spent countless nights in places where the air feels different, where the temperature drops for no reason, where footsteps echo in empty corridors. Every location has its own story, its own atmosphere, its own secrets, and sharing those with our guests has been the greatest joy of our lives.
Along the way, we organised not one but two World’s Biggest Ghost Hunts: the first in 2003, televised on Living TV to over four million viewers, and the second in 2008. Both were organised to raise money for the cancer charities close to our hearts, and across our events, Fright Nights has raised over £1 million for charity. That’s something we’ll always be incredibly proud of.
We brought ghost hunting to some of Britain’s most iconic cities through our Ghost Weeks and Ghost Festivals, week-long celebrations of the paranormal in Edinburgh, York, London and Portsmouth. These weren’t just events; they were gatherings of kindred spirits (pun very much intended), bringing together thousands of people who shared a curiosity about what might lie beyond.
If you’d told us back in 1999 that we’d end up appearing on over a hundred television shows and documentaries, we’d have laughed you out of the room. But the phone kept ringing, and we kept saying yes.
We’ve consulted for and appeared on Most Haunted, Ghost Hunters International, Ghost Adventures, Scream Team, World’s Scariest Places, The Ghost Detectives, London’s Scariest Mysteries — and yes, even Ghost Hunting with the Dingles. (We’ve learned never to say never in this business.) From serious paranormal documentaries to prime-time entertainment, we’ve always brought the same thing to every show: a genuine passion for the subject and a respect for the locations and their histories.
Why We Do What We Do
People sometimes ask us whether we’re believers. The honest answer is that after more than two decades of standing in dark rooms at three in the morning, we’ve experienced things we simply can’t explain. But that’s not really why we do this.
We do it because of the look on someone’s face when they experience something they can’t rationalise. We do it because a mum and daughter have a night out together they’ll talk about for years. We do it because a group of workmates discover that standing in a haunted cellar together is the best team-building exercise money can buy. We do it because Britain’s haunted heritage is extraordinary, and someone needs to keep those stories alive.
Over the years, our guests have become our community. We’ve had people come back dozens of times. We’ve had couples who met on a Fright Nights event. We’ve had three generations of the same family join us. That means more to us than any television appearance ever could.
A New Chapter
In 2017, after eighteen incredible years, we stepped back from the day-to-day running of Fright Nights and handed the reins over to new owners. We were proud of what we’d built, and we wanted to see it continue to thrive.
The years that followed weren’t easy for anyone in the events world. COVID brought the entire industry to its knees, and ghost hunting, built on gathering people together in enclosed, atmospheric spaces, was hit particularly hard. Through it all, the Fright Nights name endured, which is a testament to the strength of what this community has always been about.
By the end of 2024, circumstances brought things full circle, and the opportunity to do something new landed right back in our laps.
Over the years, the name “Fright Nights” has become more associated with theme park scare attractions than with what we originally created: real ghost hunting, in genuinely haunted locations, led by people who actually know what they’re doing. So rather than look backwards, we decided it was time to look forward. To honour what we started, but to give it the name it always deserved.
Welcome to The Original Ghost Hunting Co.
Because that’s exactly what this is. We were the first. We took the very idea of public ghost hunting and turned it into an industry. And now, with over twenty-six years of experience, hundreds of locations under our belts, and a passion for Britain’s haunted heritage that has only grown stronger, we’re bringing everything we’ve learned into what comes next.
Same passion. Same people. A whole new adventure. If you joined us back in the early days, welcome back — we’ve missed you. If you’re discovering us for the first time, you’re in good hands. We’ve been doing this longer than anyone.