Sullivan Hardware & Garden

Pat Sullivan · Indianapolis, IN

Pat Sullivan grew up riding a tiny train at the L.S. Ayres department store in downtown Indianapolis in the 1960s. Decades later, as owner of Sullivan Hardware and Garden, he built that same memory into a full-scale seasonal train attraction that has since become one of central Indiana's most anticipated family events.

The Sullivan Express launched in 2015 with a $200,000 investment and a single Wattman Maxi Express train. Today Sullivan operates five Maxi Express trains running two distinct seasonal experiences: the Sullivan Santa Express at the North Pole from November through December, and the Sullivan Express to PumpkinTown from September through October. Both experiences run as narrated 15 to 20 minute round trips with themed environments, animatronic characters, and a final destination stop.

“The story is not making money on the train. The story is getting people into your store to buy things. Any place where we added an hour to the train schedule, our sales in the store increased on average about 20%.”

- Pat Sullivan, Sullivan Hardware & Garden

The commercial outcome exceeded Pat's initial expectations on every metric. The North Pole experience alone generates $350,000 in annual ride revenue. In the first year, 89 tickets sold in the first hour. By the fifth year, 1,700 tickets sold in the first 14 minutes after opening, with 2,500 gone within the first hour. The experience sells out every season.

The indirect revenue effect is what makes this story unusual. The ride itself is profitable, but its bigger function is foot traffic. Sullivan does not treat the train as a standalone business. He treats it as the reason 35,000 people walk into his store every holiday season.