In this episode of The Best Dam Podcast, Jill sits down with Olaf Stanton, the founder of Characters Unlimited, to discuss his 40-year journey as the creative force behind some of the world's most iconic animatronic figures. From his early days selling life-sized characters out of a van to trademarking the world-famous Zoltar, Olaf shares how his passion for making "dummies" evolved into an international business that turns local storefronts into major attractions.

Olaf explores the evolution of his craft, from traditional wood-carved looks to complex talking and moving figures that have become staples in restaurants, museums, and casinos worldwide. With deep roots in Boulder City and a business that survived a devastating fire, this episode highlights the resilience of a family-run enterprise and the whimsical spirit required to bring characters like pirates, cowboys, and fortune tellers to life.

DISCUSSION

1. The"House That Dummies Built": Olaf reflects on his 1986 start in a duplex garage, where he and his wife Krishun built their first characters and traveled for weeks at a time to sell them across the country.
   
   
2. The Zoltar Legacy: The story of how Olaf trademarked the "Zoltar" name in 2006—nearly 20 years after the movie Big made the character famous—securing his place as the official home of the legendary fortune teller.
   
   
3. Attraction-Based Marketing: Olaf explains why life-sized, animated characters are a vital investment for small businesses, serving as memory makers and "crowd-pullers" for locations ranging from the Southwest Diner to international gift shops.
   
   
4. The Casino Connection: A look into the expansion of the brand into the gaming world, including Zoltar-themed slot machines and scratch-off lottery tickets that bring the character's "whimsical future" to the casino floor.
   
   
5. High-Stakes Deliveries: Olaf recounts hilarious and stressful moments on the road, including being pulled over by the Border Patrol under suspicion of hauling illegal aliens and a helicopter chase involving a "hostage situation" that was actually just a bubble-wrapped mannequin.
   
   
6. Resilience After the Fire: A discussion on the 2022 shop fire that forced a total remodel and a "cleansing process" for the business, which Olaf credits as a reset that allowed his children to help take the company to the next level.
   
   
7. Immortalized in Detail: A fascinating look at the craftsmanship behind the figures, including the fact that every talking character features a mold of Olaf’s own upper teeth.
   
   

LEARN MORE

Characters Unlimited: https://www.charactersunlimited.com/ The official home of Zoltar and a premier creator of life-sized animatronic characters for over three decades.

The Home of Zoltar: Located in Boulder City, Nevada, the shop features a "swag room" with hats, t-shirts, and even Zoltar-branded wine, where the label peels off to reveal a fortune.

Products & Customization: Specialized in custom likenesses (including deceased relatives), talking fortune tellers, love testers, and classic Western and pirate-themed animatronics.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ZoltarOfficial/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/charactersunlimited/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/charactersunlimited1

KEYWORDS

Olaf Stanton, Zoltar, Characters Unlimited, Animatronics, The Best Dam Podcast, Boulder City Chamber of Commerce

#OlafStanton #Zoltar #CharactersUnlimited #Animatronics #TheBestDamPodcast #BoulderCityChamberofCommerce

Podcast Transcript

Jill: All right. We have a world famous celebrity, the father of Zoltar, Mr. Olaf Stanton with characters unlimited. I cannot wait for this interview. You happen to be somebody that in the back of my mind is so creative, so clever. I cannot wait to get into your head.

Olaf: Well, thank you. Thank, I'm glad. I'm glad to be here.

Yeah, we're glad to be a part of, of your podcast and, be stationed here in Boulder City, Nevada. It's really cool.

Jill: People don't realize that, but, you are a celebrity amongst us 'cause it truly is international and Zoltar is, and characters unlimited. I would imagine you've got characters also all over the world.

Olaf: Yeah, we sure do. we started, Well, we incorporated in 1986 and my,

Jill: Wow,

Olaf: My wife Christian and I are both from Wisconsin and, born and raised there in a tourist town called Wisconsin Dells, which is a tourist mecca of the Midwest water park capital of the world. And we both worked in the tourist industry all our life and we put ourselves through college, working in the tourist industry.

Well, I went to school for business administration when I was done, I had a marketing degree and wanted to do something on my own, and they had. We had this talent to make these, life-sized characters. And, and I wanted to try something different and my brother happened to be out here in Nevada.

In Boulder City. 'cause he stumbled through here selling some characters, like we had been taught to do from our stepfather. And the guys that were in, Boulder City were from Wisconsin and they were working on the boats on Lake Mead. 'Cause they had Coast Guard licenses, so they.

Jill: Oh, right.

Olaf: They're stationed here in the winter. Mm-hmm. So,he ended up staying here and then when I graduated, he happened to be here. So we, I flew out and we started, it started up together. For about 10 years we were together and we used to work out of the back. We rent a duplex in, in Wyoming. And, California Street and, made the characters in the backyard in the garage. And then we'd load up a van full of 20 characters and we'd hit the road.

Jill: Totally remember this

Olaf: For two weeks at a time, we'd hit the road and we would sell characters until we were done. We had two cats on the dashboard.

Jill: And I remember

Olaf: Me and my wife, and we sometimes we had to sleep between the characters and when we didn't have, enough money or couldn't find a place to stay. And then we started doing trade shows and we started making them, People asked for moving and talking and it just developed over the years, but we always have been making our customers businesses attractions.

I have a stack of testimonies from over the years that people say, this character to talk to move was $5,000 when we bought it, but, it's the best investment we ever made for our business. People remember it. They tell the friends, if you're ever in Sedona, be sure to stop at the co shop.

It has the cowboy out front, the waves, and not to mention Boulder City. the Mexican Center. You've known the Indian

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: Up there forever, and then the Southwest Diner, we changed the characters up to, for Christmas. We changed it for 4th of July, and we changed. We're gonna be turning.

The Cowboys in the Easter Bunny here, but those two cowboys out front waving are a huge attraction for her. Not to mention Grandma daisies. And, we like to get 'em in town and local when we have to, but, when we can. But yeah, we really literally sell 'em all over the world.

Jill: I think that's fascinating. So do you keep like a journal or some kind of, a spreadsheet that says where they're all at so that you know what countries they're all in?

Olaf: I had a map on my, wall of my shop that, that had the pins in it. Mm-hmm. It got to be so full that I kind of fell off.

But, we, I would say we're, 

Jill: That's called success.

Olaf: We're well over half of the countries, but the whole zoltar thing that came about in 2006 that I looked into that really, put us on the map even more.

Jill: Mm-hmm.

Olaf: But prior to that, all we sold is characters to sit in front of people's businesses that a talking cowboy, talking pirate to talking, old farmer, Right. We sell to restaurants, we sell to gift shops, we sell to museums, we sell to, people that want something fun for their home and

Jill: Yeah. We have a, an old miner that we

Olaf: Yes. You do.

Jill: To the cabin and put it in the he's

Olaf: head of in the outhouse,

Jill: huh? Yes, that's right. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Scared me to death one time.

And I'm not telling that story 'cause Barry still makes me mad that he got me. But, I love it. And so the Zoltar, the branding cap, you've got a huge strategy on this now because it's kinda taken on its own life.

Olaf: Yeah.

Jill: So hats and shirts and wine bottles. Mm-hmm.it has, really advanced. how are you keeping track of all of that and what more do you want to see that?

Do I know you probably have bigger plans.

Olaf: Fortunately, I've got some young people in the business, Karina and Gunner are with me now and after college. And, Zoltar helped put 'em through and,

Jill: Thanks Zoltar.

Olaf: And fortunately, Zoltar is doing well enough to be able to keep them.

And, they're really taking it to the next level. We, we started making fortune teller machines and the guy in the box in the late nineties, And people would, want something that they could put money in. So you put 50 cents in the old miner and he'd tell you a miner story or

Jill: Right.

Olaf: Or a pirate tell you a pirate story. And then I, then they decide, well, let's add the ticket feature. We'll make a fortune teller. Miner.

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: A fortune teller, a pirate. and then the movie Big came out in 88 and I thought, well, it'd be cool to make a zoltar, but I can't call it Zoltar 'cause that's probably trademarked.

But, so we called it Swami and we had a swami guy,

Jill: Oh, really?

Olaf: And the. It looked kind of like a zoltar. People were always calling it that. and and that became quite popular 'cause people would, compare it to the movie? Well, I just assumed that somebody had already trademarked Zoltar.

Mm-hmm. So in 2006, my mom was dating her old high school sweetheart. They got together. Oh, sweet. He happened to be a lawyer outta Madison, Wisconsin. And he said, well, why don't you look in there to trademark status as ult tar? And I said, well, it's probably taken, I can't imagine it would still be open.

After this is 2006 when we looked into it, right. And sure enough, nobody had trademarks, Zoltar.

Jill: Wow.

Olaf: So we, trademarks Zoltar, 

Jill: It was meant to be for you

Olaf: Across the board. we own all aspects of it and we're looking into all kinds of opportunities. So now we have, Zoltar games. There's a really cool replica of Zoltar put up by Nu Wave toys.

It's fully functional. It does. Everything the big one does. It sells for about $150 on eBay. It's really awesome. We got the Zoltar wine where the back of the bottle peels off to reveal your fortune. And that's, we're trying to get that in the different states. We got like four different states that we have distributors in right now.

Jill: That one is awesome. I'm loving that.

Olaf: Yeah. And then we have people in Boulder City that are handling at Southwest Diner. Cindy's nice enough to carry it there. it looks like we're gonna be going into the Supper club and, big T's cantina.

Jill: Very good.

Olaf: And in these casinos. We have zoltar slot machines too.

Jill: Really?

Olaf: Every regaming, license it. About five years ago, right before the pandemic and Zoltar slot machine hit the market, it did well, and then the pandemic came along and I stalled. But Zoltar survived through the pandemic. And, like now it's on, its like fourth generation

Jill: Wow.

Olaf: Of, of Zoltar slot machine.

And, and there's like 500 of them out around the country.

Jill: Wow.

Olaf: We probably have about 90 of them in the Vegas area and, and throughout the country the Indian casinos like 'em and mm-hmm. Other ones, But it's getting bigger all the time and know, who knows, we could be the next Buffalo or we could be the next wheel of Fortune.

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: Some of these casinos, they want to do a Zoltar slot promotion, and they'll do, they'll buy a bunch of wine and they'll give wine away or with, to the slot club

Jill: For their points.

Olaf: The railroad pass right up the street has three of our four of our Zoltar slot machines down.

Jill: How cool.

Olaf: They're doing very, very well for them. and, and the Bellagio, circa, circa is just a name, a few, but, But that's been very exciting. And we also have a license that just came out, which is a zoltar scratch off lottery ticket

Jill: Really?

Olaf: And the company that sells scratch off lottery tickets to the various states is very excited about Zoltar 'cause he's whimsical. He's all about your future and good luck.

Jill: Yeah,

Olaf: And they're testing it right now in Virginia, and, they're introducing it to other states. They have to sell each state one at a time. So we're hoping this Zoltar scratch off lottery ticket is a big success.

Jill: That is so cool. I had no idea

And you don't think about all these different places that you could creep into. Mm-hmm. You're thinking of it as a more entertainment. They walk up to it, they see it. But I never realized, I never thought about the casino side of it. And I would imagine other gaming aspects and board games and Bobblehead, Zoltar

Olaf: Bingo cards.

Olaf: Yeah, there's those zoltar board games. Those Zoltar card. Card game. there's some stuff that pops up on the internet that is totally unauthorized that we gotta kind of police and,

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: Yeah, for lack of a better term, we're trying to make zoltar great again and it's getting better all the time, so

Jill: I love it.

Olaf: Yeah.

Jill: Well,

I don't know that Zoltar ever wasn't great, so you have done a fabulous job of keeping that same place.

Olaf: Oh, you remember the Liberty Mutual commercial that was out during the pandemic result? Our. Oh, statue of Liberty and Zoltar. Yes. Pops open and rides away on a unicycle.

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: That was like a big zoltar commercial for us.

It kind of brought our version of Zoltar to the public. 'cause like, because this is,

Jill: I'm sure ai,

Olaf: The new generation of Zoltar people don't even really, our generation remember this movie kind of.

Jill: Yeah. Big.

Olaf: But now it's ours. Zoltar is kind of the, the main attraction.

Jill: That is very cool.

I think that's awesome. I would imagine that your creativity though, in the branding of it, that okay, that's running and the kids are probably really helping with that. But how do you come up with the different characters? Because I know that you are very specific and I really appreciated your note that.

You're not looking to go into the whole robotics and even Disney trying to improve all their animatronics. You're, you really like to honor the historic looking and the traditional, because those are what made you who you are, and I really love that. But how do you come up with those different characters and those different molds and faces?

Olaf: Well, we started off with cowboys and Indian and sea captains and pirates. And then the more people you deal with and the more people, I could bring 20 characters to a trade show and pack 'em into a 10 by 10 booth and end up leaving a trade show. And the only thing I sold was two characters that I didn't even have at the show.

And there people that want little something different down.

Jill: Yeah. Customized.

Olaf: They want it to look like, you know what? Well, when Mount St. Helen's blew up, this after that, they wanted, this guy named, Harry, He's the guy who survived. He didn't refuse to leave his campground and that, anyway, we did a likeness of him from photographs and

Jill: Really?

Olaf: Yeah, and then people would say, well, can you make him talk?

Can you make him, can you make the eyes move? Can you make him breathe? And well, I guess we can. And we people kind of. Force us into things,and then we bring things back. Like the man in the outhouse where you

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: Put in a dollar, you open the door and know Gabby's in there reading a mag, a series of robot catalog with those long underwear on this.

This is kind of entertainment and it's educational. Like the kids don't, they don't know what outhouse is.

Jill: Right? Right.

Olaf: And they get a big kick out of it. And outside the door it says, what do they say? Open the door for a dollar or, well for a good time, open the door. $1. Yeah. Yeah.

People get a kick outta that.

Jill: So I would imagine over the years you've had a lot of very satisfied customers. Have you ever had any aha moments? Something that, just makes it stands out in your mind as a turning point or,

Olaf: Well, funny stuff, weird stuff. when we first left college and came out here, I had sold a few characters in the town of Menominee, Wisconsin, where we were, Going to college and I'd do some trading and I would do some cash. And I sold one to a boot store. and the boot store owner after my graduation wanted to get ahold of me 'cause one of his customers wanted me to make a character for him. Oh. this guy wanted me to make one of his mother who had passed away.

Jill: Oh.

Olaf: And he wanted replica of her. He wanted to be able to put it his head in her lap and talk to her like he used to. He wanted to have it in the rocking chair in his living room where she used to sit. And,

Jill: I don't know if that's creepy

Olaf: or

Jill: Very special.

Olaf: Said, he said, I wanna be able to talk to her

and put my head in her lap and talk to her.

I think, obviously he was a little off, but, hey, who am I to judge?

Jill: Yeah. Right.

Olaf: So anyway, he ended up sending me a box with her clothes in it, her false teeth, her wedding rings, her eye glasses, all this stuff, false teeth, even had to me, built into the head. This is back in 1990 or so.

And, and recreated his mother and he, and, he is pleased as could be. So, it's not much we can't do.

Jill: Yeah. That's pretty impressive. And, for that person, he probably was so truly grateful.

Olaf: You know what, some people have a portrait of mother. He just had the whole,

Jill: Yeah,

Olaf: The whole thing. And, he,

Jill: Wow. Interesting.

Olaf: We made him happy. We, I like to say we're, do we do anything for a buck?

Jill: Yeah. That's interesting.

Olaf: For that reason. But yeah.

Jill: I, in, in asking a little bit more, of information for the show, in one of your funnier moments, you were, headed back across Texas for a show and what happened?

Olaf: Oh, we were, I was going down the middle of Texas and they heading to the Gulf Coast and then I had done the Dallas gift show and we have the characters van you might have seen around town. Full of characters and the heads sticking up through the windows and I get pulled over and, what the heck was I doing?

Speeding and all this, it was the border patrol and they had a report that I was hauling illegal aliens. So they pulled me over and, Come up through the window very serious. And I'm like, you, what? you think I'm hauling illegal? These are just a bunch of dummies back there.

he thought I was like, it was like a cover and there was probably a couple in it that were real. I had to go through the whole thing.

Jill: Oh man.

Olaf: And then

Jill: Did he just laugh after the whole thing was over?

Olaf:  Yeah. Afterwards. But he kind of wasn't seeing the humor in, but

Jill: Oh man,

Olaf:  Sure.  Afterwards he did.

And then, we, my, my kid who works with, Brandon, he was sent to California to deliver a custom character. and When we ship characters, we wrap their heads in bubble pack in their hands so they don't get damaged. So we put this one in a passenger seat and his head's wrapped in bubble pack.

Well , We're he's heading to Los Angeles and our phone is ringing o off the hook at the shop. The cops are trying to get ahold of us wondering, they wanted to, ask us these questions and they couldn't get ahold of anybody at the shop. So they knocked on my door at the house and Gunner happened to be back for lunch and they asked him these questions.

Who are, do you know? do you have a red, a gray truck? and, and, you had somebody who's heading to California and, he said, well, yeah, you got somebody heading down there delivering a character. Well, somebody had called in thought it was a hostage situation.

Jill: Oh, geez.

Olaf: And that Brandon had three state patrols follow him and a helicopter. Waiting to hear what's going on with this vehicle,

Jill: Oh my gosh.

Olaf: And then we, he said, no, it's just a character we're delivered at the to Los Angeles. It's nothing,

Jill: Poor Brandon's like you deliver your own dang little guys.

Olaf: They called out the pursuit and he didn't know what was going on until he came back,

Jill: Oh my gosh, how fun is all of this? And you don't really think about it. It's just your daily activity, you're around them all day long. But to others they're probably thinking, what the heck's going on?

Olaf: Take for granted. Sometimes. Yeah.

Jill: That is awesome. I love that. Well, so one of my favorite moments that, involves characters unlimited is many, many years ago, remember when Mr. Ray owned Boulder City, Mortuary? Mm-hmm. And we did, our October mixer we did at the mortuary, and you brought in characters and we had them.

And I have to be careful because it's a sacred place. Yes. it's a sanctuary for many.

Olaf: Yes.

Jill: And so we didn't want to make light of what happens at a mortuary. Mm-hmm. We've all used Boulder City mortuary. We understand the value and the importance, but that particular time. It was nice to allow everybody to see that, even the Ray family, all of us, that you can also have a sense of humor.

Yes. And that we can take life a little, less, tight. And we were able to kind of let loose a little bit that night. And so we had characters in there and yeah, it was the best attended mixer Oh my gosh. I ever had in my 25 years with the chamber. And that night was also homecoming. And the homecoming game.

So after the game, we had this huge influx of all of these high school kids. 'cause they had all heard about it and they'd all come over so they could participate, so they could see what was going on in the mortuary.

Olaf: Aw, it's so fun.

Jill: It really was. It was so fun.

Olaf: Well, we'd love to do stuff like that with the community and as much as we can.

And, remember the haunted house, it used to be over by the library.

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: And we used to a big part of that. We'd bring a lot of stuff in, put animatronics in there and make it even. Live, liven it up quite a bit. And that was a good time. And then they, I think they had to stop it 'cause they found mold in the building or something.

Jill: Yeah. Patty Sullivan was headed that up and she was so good about making sure those kids had a place to go.

Olaf: Mm-hmm. Yeah,

Jill: That was way fun. I mean, we've had some really cool experiences. Okay. So, when you guys were starting this business, was this your end goal? You knew this was gonna happen or did you guys have another path you were gonna go down and then.

This just kind of happened or was this always the intent to always be an entrepreneur?

Olaf: Well, it was, I've always been raised around entrepreneurs. My family was in business in Wisconsin for generations in the as tourist town. and I really, I kind of finished college as a backup in case I had.

Just get a job, like mm-hmm. Everybody else. And, I came out here first, and started doing this. And, Christian was a, my wife was a semester behind me in college, and she came out after that. And here she flies out here. I'm living in her rented duplex, trying to make a living, selling these characters.

And, and it was tough at first,  and, and how her mom would ask her why did, how my friends would ask me, what is Christian doing out there? Running around trying to sell these characters out of a van. aren't you worried about it? He says, well, I guess she really loves them.

And we did just hung in there. And as, I guess what they say, a fear of failure is a great motivator for success. Right? and I refused to fail and we just found avenues and ways to make it work. and the feedback that I kept getting from my customers of how much of an attraction these are.

and what they did for their business. at first people would see me at shows, and I've got all these characters and it's the most unusual thing you'd ever see mm-hmm. At a show. Some of this guy, young guy selling dummies,

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: People go buy, oh, who buys these? And what do you do for a living?

I sell these and who buys them and, they can't believe I'm actually making a living doing this.

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: And I, at first it wasn't much of a living, but, eventually was we were able to, build a house and, People say, well, that's a nice house. They say, well, that's the House of Dummies built.

And they look at me like that.

Jill: I love that. What a great statement.

Olaf: Yeah.

Jill: And I find it fascinating, that entrepreneurial spirit is always something that totally drives and intrigues me. But I find it even more interesting that you saw the benefit to those business owners for them to have it at their location.

So they didn't even know initially. I would imagine the Gomez has probably always had that insight, but the idea that, 'cause I was in high school when that band showed up in town, I can completely remember it. Driving around town with his dummies. I totally remember it. But I can really see the value, like you said, that.

It's an attraction item. And it's a memory maker and people, they, there's so much benefit to having that as an investment in their business.

Olaf: You know what, Jill, that, that's what kept me enthused about it, is seeing. The people and the responses and they would tell me how much had made their business more of a success.

And during the rough times in the recessions, you'd think people wouldn't buy it. But no, people were scratching up their last money at these shows to get this cowboy talking cowboy. They would sit in front of their store and Jackson o Wyoming to draw customers.

Jill: Right.

Olaf: And it worked.

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: And that would you, it don't have to be that great of a salesman if you truly believe in your product.

And it shows. and you, you radiate that to people and that's what I would do. I'd sit at these trade shows and I, we can read people's badges as they're coming down the aisle,

Jill: Right?

Olaf: So they would get to my booth and I'm standing off and I already had their name, so I'm talking on a wireless microphone.

They're looking at the cowboy and. I pop up and I go, Hey Jill, how you doing? My God, they practically jump out of their shoes,

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: And they're scared and they're excited and they're, and it's like, and they're just like, when they can see the wheels turning, he says, wow, if that got my attention like this, imagine what it could do for my business.

Jill: That's right.

Olaf: And then you swoop in and they, before you know it, they're spending $4,000 on an animated character, and it's like they're at the end of the sales, like. Well, this is the last thing I thought I was gonna buy coming to the Denver Gift Show, or coming to the LA Gift Show or Seattle.

And, but you know what? That, those people, I just have a guy today. it's called, church Brothers Family Fun Center. He bought a pirate from me 20 years ago.

Jill: Wow.

Olaf: From the pool of Spa show. Still has it. Well, he revisited, me and, needed the head motor for the pirate and ended up buying a head motor for a parrot he bought from me.

And now he's buying a pirate 20 years later to add to his collection. He's tropical and then he called next morning. He wants to add up the beach bump with bare arms and bare feet. And, the guy's he's my age, and he's been, he knew me for back when we were just starting off and he still customer, so it's pretty.

Jill: So you've really built some real relations.

Olaf: Oh yeah.

Jill: Yeah. That's very cool.

Olaf: Yeah, we deal, we know we dealt with our Richie Klein from the Imperial Palace Auto Collection, one of my first big customers. we probably sold him 30 characters to sit in the antique cars. And, we did, WC Fields and Elvis Presley for him first.

And, they had their cars there. And then, the terrible Herbs was one of our first customers. Mr. Herbs always loved our characters. He put 'em all over the balconies of the Orleans when they open. We've got, terrible herbs, character we did a likeness of. And, and they always would like to decorate their places with our characters.

Jill: That's very cool.

Olaf: You go down a searchlight right now and. And you've got terrible herbs sitting on a barrel and you walk by an a motion detector and he,

Jill: I did not know that was him.

Olaf: Then what welcomes you to the casino?

Jill: That's cool. I've seen it, but I did not realize it was after him.

That's very cool.

Olaf: Yeah,

It's named, it's terrible, the logo, but not Mr. Hertz.

Jill: Oh, I was gonna say,

Olaf: It's the character. Terrible.

Jill: Oh, got it. Okay. Gotcha.

Olaf: And we've made whiskey, Pete, we've made, Arizona, Charlie,

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: Likeness. Is this, the name? A few over the years, but

Jill: Yeah.

How fun. Fun. What was your very first job?

Olaf: My very first job was shining shoes out in front of my parents' restaurant, in Wisconsin, Dallas at 10 years out my shoe shine box and Oh, cool. Sat, sat out there when people would leave. That's people had black everywhere. Black shoes and Yeah. White socks.

And you had to be careful not to get the polish. Get the polish on the white socks, or you Wouldn't get a, a tip. But then, after that it was wa washing dishes. I would, driving, a pony cart with kids behind on ponies and drive 'em around a circle and, and then selling tickets to the boat rides the famous upper and lower Dells boat rides in Wisconsin.

Dells that was like that. 12 year job and I made really good money doing that and in college.

Jill: So do you feel like your entrepreneurial, life that has happened since, do you think that really was foundationally created by your parents?

Olaf: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, without a doubt. it, it's funny how good things come from not so good things.

My parents got divorced when I was like 14

My mom got the restaurant called the Call the Wild in Wisconsin, and she was running the restaurant by herself. this man comes through selling Indian jewelry. We had a jewelry shop and he set up a jewelry show in the dining room and gave her a percentage, it was Hank Dominic, and he, she ended up marrying him.

That fall while I was on a hunting trip with my dad in North Dakota, I came back and where's mom? she went to Vegas with Hank and got married.

Jill: Oh my gosh.

Olaf: And two months later, he's taken me out of my freshman year of high school, moving us to Arizona.

Jill: Wow.

Olaf: Hated it. Oh, no. But anyway, he knew I liked my modern, always wanted horses. He made sure, and I had horses. He got me horses down there. I helped him make the characters, Then we moved back to Wisconsin to, to mom, sold the restaurant. Then we moved to Idaho. I went to, high school in, in, Scott, Arizona.

And then we moved to Idaho. I went to Central High in Boise, and then we moved to Meridian, which is on the outskirts. I went to my junior, junior year in Meridian High School.

Jill: Yeah, I know

Olaf: Meridian. And then I ended up graduating from my high school. In Wisconsin de so I went to four different high schools.

Jill: Wow, that's a lot.

Olaf:  But anyway, during that whole time I would help him with the dummy business.

And, I would cast heads and then we would, build bodies and do that. And that's what we brought to Nevada. And I don't think I was gonna do it really till last year in my college. I was grasping for something to try.

And I thought this was, could be it. and looking back, I never would've dreamed that we'd be where we are now,

Jill: This successful.

Olaf: Yeah.

Jill: So I wonder what Chris was thinking as you were asking her to come to the desert and make dummies and sleep in the back of a van with dummies. I need to interview her 'cause I think she was already her mindset.

Olaf: Yeah. she would've, she wanted to be a lawyer. She had a psychology degree. Oh, I bet. I bet she or she could done anything she want. So we, but she came out here and I didn't have, we didn't have any insurance or anything. I was doing my own thing. She got a job as a flight attendant.

She worked for,American Trans Air.

And then she worked for, Pia Airlines, which is Pia Zorra Airlines. They had

Jill: Oh, I didn't know that.

Olaf: One, one or two planes. Pia Zorra husband.

Owned airline. and she worked for the company that drives, that flies planes to the test center.

She did that. Oh, Uhhuh. But by the time our third, child Callie came along, it was just too much. and she, and ended up, quitting being a flight attendant, but it worked. It was a perfect thing for us, for her to do that. We could,

Jill: That is awesome.

Olaf: We could work around her job and kind of eased into, being able to be a stay-at-home mom.

Jill: Yeah, she was a phenomenal stay-at-home mom and I'm very grateful that I got to, get to know her better. And

Olaf: Somehow she just believed in me and believed I could do in this. And she did her thing and I did mine. I would gone on for sometimes three weeks at a time on the road. I would go from here, I would go to Denver, I would go to.

Gatlinburg, Tennessee, Washington tour her show down to Orlando, come back. I mean,

Jill: So she was like a single parent for

Olaf: Quite some time. Yeah. Yeah. But she handled it didn't put stress on me that I said had enough that going on, Right. Well, and you guys raised such beautiful kids, so thank you so much.

Great job. And she, was such a great influence on them and we love her sister Bridget Ann Bloom. And so

Olaf: yeah, we colonized.

Jill: You did, thank you.

Olaf: Brought a lot of people out here. Okay. We love it. I kind of kid Bridget Bridge's, daughters. I say, you wouldn't be here right now if it wasn't for me,

Jill: Which is totally weird.

Olaf: I brought your mom out here and she met, we had a character at the Lonesome Dove Steakhouse, which is over the hill. I don't know if you remember that.

Jill: I remember

Olaf: Lonesome Dove. And, we made a Lonesome Dove character from a movie for them. Oh. And we knew the owners and Bridget came out and because of the relationship, she got a job there and then the cop comes in, Henderson Cop comes in, and

Jill: Those Henderson PD.

Olaf:  That Officer Tim being

Jill: Yeah, we love him too. And we're grateful for his service and I'm even more grateful that he is retired and gets to enjoy his real life now. So that's awesome. Yep. Doing great. So,what's something that people may not know about you?

Olaf: Oh gosh. what is something they don't know about me?

Jill: I was very interested to learn from this little tidbit about how you make those mannequins and the impressions that you give them. That they're your teeth.

Olaf: Oh, well, some little tidbit about the yeah.

Jill: I never knew that.

Olaf: yeah, every character that we do that has a talking feature, when the mouth opens the upper teeth are my teeth.

Jill: That is hysterical.

Olaf: Dr. Rosenbaum was my dentist at the time, and I'm saying, Hey, can I get some of this stuff that you make teeth, molds with? And so he gave me some elgin and told me how to do it. So I mixed it up and stuffed it in my mouth and made an impression of my upper teeth.

And now I can cast them out of placer. so that's one way, one way to be immortalized, That is awesome. and people, when I need body parts, I took getting back to Tim, he's buff guy works out. Yeah. I made molds on his arms. So I got real really nice bare arms and that I can make a beach bu out of or,

Jill: That is awesome.

I never knew that.

Olaf:  And not when our new babies are born into family, they come up and, I make a alginate impression of the baby foot and, send 'em away with a really cool souvenir.

Jill: That is very cool.

Olaf: All my kids. Yeah.

Jill: Yeah. You've got such a cool talent and so much creativity and, now I will never look at another one of those, mannequins different.

I will check out their mouth and I will be looking at their arms. I'm, whose body part is that?

Olaf: Definitely need to come up to the shop and see what we've done.

Jill: That's a great question. 'cause now at the new location, are you, can you offer tours? Is that too dangerous in the workshop?

Olaf:  It's not a new location.

We've been in the same location since about. Two, 2000 ish.

Jill: But you were at temporary.

Olaf:  We had a fire. we had a fire, two, two April 14th. Two years ago.

And the fire was pretty bad. Christian and I were down at La Jolla delivering a fortune teller machine, and we're just sitting on at having a cocktail overlooking the ocean in a nice restaurant.

We get a phone call from Bridget that says, Hey, we don't know what's going on, but there's, it was a Sunday afternoon, but there, there's smoke coming out of the industrial area and. We think your shot might be on fire. And sure enough, we had an employee was working on a Sunday up there, a very windy day.

He was working on the side yard cutting some metal and he left 'cause we were trying to get a rush job out for, actually the Detroit Lions. We were doing a coach Wow. For the coach of Detroit Lions in a fortune tower box and,for the NFL draft. And yeah. Steve Happy across the street

Noticed the flames and called it in and. By that time it had destroyed our side yard. The, a spark had gotten into some wood there. And he did it. and my guy didn't see, he left three hours later it turned into this roaring blaze. Wow. it was so windy. It was like blowing on a hot coal.

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: So that got into the shop area through an open door. It was minutes away from a flashover. Everything would've just gone up. But the fire department got there. They were able to subdue the fire, but by that time, the smoke and the ash and the water damage was just got on everything.

Jill: Oh, shoot.

Olaf: But it didn't get to the point where it ruined all of our molds. we had, maybe 90% of our molds were destroyed. Some were damaged, but that's the core of the business we're able to carry on. So we rented a temporary shop that down the street, which is like a quarter of the room, and we made do for 10 months, actually the next week we were sending characters out, but so we ended up with a brand new remodel shop. I, how the deal, which, every adversity carries. Opportunity.

Jill: That's right.

Olaf: So we're pretty happy with, my kids are even happier that as I was forced to throw away half the crap that I've been, collecting for 35 years,I swear that you guys started this thing on fire so I could have to throw half my stuff.

I would come back to her to clean out period and go through the big dumpster. Dad, get outta there. Yeah. You go downtown and check machines.

Jill: We're in the middle of a cleansing process.

Olaf: Oh gosh. Yeah.

Jill: Oh, that is crazy.

Olaf: Ended up being a nice reset. yeah.

Jill: And so do you offer tours?

Olaf: Yeah.

Jill: Can you do that?

Olaf:  We do. Okay. nothing really scheduled. and people knock on the door or if they do want to wanna schedule something, we will do that. And, Don't really charge for it, but it would be nice if you spent some money in our swag room.

Which you got all kinds of hats and t-shirt and zoltar merchandise and the Zoltar wine and, some neat other stuff. But, yeah, it's a very unusual business and we are the home of Zoltar and, people don't know that, it's pretty cool.

Jill: Cool. I need to come and check that out and

Olaf: Yeah, please do.

And start using that as VIP gifts and stuff that were taking around the state and call,

Olaf: We just kind of don't. Play like we're that big a deal. ButI wish I had a bigger shop where we could have like, I mean, we could really make more of a deal out of the home of Zoltar and

Jill: Yeah.

Olaf: and we are gradually doing that more and more.

Jill: We're not the home of the Hoover Dam, we're the home of Zoltar.

Olaf: Yeah. the Monster Museum and Zoltar and Yeah. There's a lot of cool stuff there.

Jill: There really is. We have, we're pretty special.

Olaf: You go around the country and like you say, you see Zoltar everywhere.

Yeah. And there's a Facebook site out right now called Zoltar is everywhere. And, it, when people buy one of our machines, they wanna put it in the most prominent spot in their business.

Jill: Right.

Olaf: On the, in front of their store in a touristy area. 'cause they're charging a dollar for a fortune,

and consequently the exposure we get with Zoltar, I just, it there's very likely there's gonna be a sequel to the movie. Big.

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: Everything else has a sequel.

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: And that's one thing that we did give back. 'cause when Fox entertainment sold. All their stuff to Disney.

Fox pretty much acknowledged that we had the trademark to Zoltar.

And they would send people to us if they wanted to do a deal. And, well, Z Character was limited, and then Fox sold to Disney and Disney's like really uptight about trademarks. And they saw that we had the Zoltar trademark.

Well, I had it for 13 years. Uncontested, my lawyer says, you're gonna, they can't do nothing. You're gonna win in court, but then they're gonna appeal. They're gonna appeal.

Jill: Keeps it.

Olaf:  And how much do you wanna fight? Disney Keeps, so we end up giving the movie right to Zoltar, part of our trademark back to Disney

Jill: So that they'll,

Olaf: yeah.

So if they do another movie, they can use Zoltar in it. we were entertaining deals with Jim Hansen company and stuff like this to do a Zoltar movie. we couldn't do another movie big. So if they do a, another sequel that does,

Jill: It'll just be more marketing.

Olaf: We're gonna be able to.

To partner with 'em on the merchandising.

Jill: Absolutely.

Olaf: So it's all good,

Jill: Yeah. it all comes back around. that would be very exciting. There's so many opportunities

Olaf: And we just sold three love tester machines. I don't if you've noticed the love testers in front of Grandma Daisy's.

Jill: Yes.

Olaf: Three Love testers, which it's actually a, your testing, your vibe of what villain in the Disney cast. Are you most likely Yeah. And is, it's funny, and they were, it's adorable. Three of 'em, they're gonna be a visit, a promotion that was sold through another vendor. But at least, yeah, we're starting to do business with them's.

Jill: Yeah, there's so much, so many different opportunities and you're so creative and such an asset to us here in Boulder City,

Olaf: Well, thank you.

Jill: So thank you so much for coming on the show. So learn a little bit more about you, about Zoltar, about characters Unlimited, because there's not just Zoltar, there are many, many characters out there and

Olaf: Yeah,

Jill: such a,

Olaf: It's a pleasure. We do things for people's homes and and, if you want something, maybe you want a deceased relative replicated, we can do that too. So.

Jill: Well that's quite a marketing ploy. Yeah. Very good. Well, thank you so much. Thank you for being here. And we are gonna come and check out the Homo Zoltar,

Olaf: Right?

I can't wait. Thank you.