Kiss Monster Mini Golf!

By April Corbin

Tuesday, June 15, 2010 | 4:25 p.m.

In a city full of themed attractions, two niches remain unfilled: monsters and Kiss.

Oh, but they're coming, at least if Christina Vitagliano has her way. The founder of Monster Mini Golf — that's monster as in "boo," with no relation to the energy drink — is looking to bring her nationwide mini-golf empire to Las Vegas. She currently is negotiating a price on a Strip location, where she plans to build a 10,000-square-foot indoor, glow-in-the-dark mini-golf park centered on monsters and iconic rock band Kiss, what else?

"We are big on family entertainment. We're freaky but fun. We're all ages," says Vitagliano. "Kiss is kind of like that, too."

To find proof this one-of-a-kind venture can work, Vitagliano says you need look no further than a Kiss concert arena. "Adults are there with their kids. It's the only time I've ever been to a concert where there are two or three generations with the shared music taste."

The venture would be the first mini-golf course for Kiss, which comes as a bit of a surprise considering the hard rockers already have their name emblazed on pinball machines, coffins and almost any other retail product you can think of.

Once the Strip location is secured, it will be about 18 months before Kiss Monster Mini Golf is finished and open. That's one long month for every hole of blacklight-lit ghoulish golfing, but Vitagliano thinks it'll be worth the wait. If completed as planned, the Vegas outpost would be the largest of the chain of 25, as well as the only Kiss-themed one.

"In Vegas you can do more," she says. "We'll be able to have a stage, do live entertainment. We'll have crazy contests, special effects. There's always all-original art sculptures. It'll be Vegas: Bigger, better, weirder."