The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
COSTUME PARTY
Retailers seek a slice of $9.1B holiday spending
While the national chains reap most of the candy profits, there is still money to be made by small businesses during Halloween.
The National Retail Federation estimates that U.S. consumers will spend $9.1 billion this Halloween; consumers last year spent $8.4 billion.
That puts Halloween spending behind only Christmas, Mother’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Easter and Father’s Day, with gifts accounting for most of the spending on those holidays. The Super Bowl also outpaces Halloween in consumer spending.
For some stores, however, Halloween is the main holiday.
“It’s our busiest time of year, without a doubt,” said John Girolametti, who owns Party Depot with his wife, Cindy. “Second is New Year’s Eve. Sales in general are picking up across the country for Halloween — everyone is getting into it.”
Girolametti said Halloween accounts for about 35 percent of his business for the year. Party Depot has four locations — Ridgefield, Danbury, Brookfield and New Milford — and sells theatrical costumes and merchandise year-round, but the stores go all-out for Halloween.
Party Depot takes advantage of the bizarre, outlandish and chilling imagery of Halloween to tempt customers with yard and home decorations, party tableware, accessories and, of course, costumes.
Party Depot has several hundred costumes in addition to hundreds of masks, from Donald Trump to gory to emojis.
“Halloween is popular because it is what it has always been,” Girolametti said, “a time when you can be someone you’re not ...”
“… and get away with it,” added JR Ruffino, store manager at Danbury, Party’s Depot’s headquarters and largest location. “It’s all about family fun. Regardless of what else is going on in the world, Halloween is fun.”
Bethel’s Tracy DeLuise and her teen son, Nicholas, browsed the costume selection last week. Nicholas sported long, wavy, brown hair and eyed a Jesus costume, while Tracy soaked in the abundance of options.
“I have three parties this year so I may need three different costumes,” Tracy said. “It’s going to be an expensive Halloween. But it’s Halloween — I love it. It ranks up there with our favorite holiday. If I could, I’d decorate the house from top to bottom, inside and out.”
Sweet sales
DeLuise saves some cash each Halloween as she lives high on a hill, a location that deters trickor-treaters. According to the National Retail Federation, consumers will spend nearly $3 billion on candy this Halloween.
Local stores such as Party Depot can compete for a piece of the $4.3 billion consumers will spend on costumes and the $2.7 billion to be spent on decorations, but the $2.8 billion candy kitty is almost exclusively gobbled up by national retailers.
“That’s just not us,” Girolametti said, adding he would have to
order truckloads of candy to compete on price with the national chains.
Walmart, in an attempt to secure a higher percentage of the candy sales, offers exclusive products, such as its new 230-piece assortment bag of Hershey’s bars, Reese’s cups and Kit Kats with glow-inthe-dark wrappers.
Other national stores capitalize on the creativity associated with Halloween by offering seasonal items, such as IHOP’s scary face pancakes and spooky doughnuts at Dunkin’ Donuts.
Competition grows
The National Retail Federation reports that 47.1 percent of consumers will do their Halloween shopping at a discount store and 22.3 percent will shop online.
The good news for shops such as Party Depot is that 37.5 percent of shoppers will visit a Halloween store. Those dollars, however, are shared with seasonal shops such as Spirit, a New Jersey-based retailer that leases vacant commercial space for a few months during the Halloween season. Spirit has more than 1,100 popup locations throughout the U.S., including several in southwestern Connecticut.
The proliferation of Spirit shops is good for landlords as they collect rent money for a few months on otherwise vacant space, but Girolametti said they present another form of competition for small businesses, which are already reeling from the surge in internet spending.
“For many, Spirit is the place to go now, but for a lot of people, supporting local businesses is huge,” Girolametti said. “People know we have unique things here and we’ll take care of them.”
Online shopping hurts small brick-and-mortal businesses overall, but Ruffino said it often adds to the last-minute rush at places like Party Depot, which has a price-match guarantee.
“A lot of people order costumes from Amazon and it doesn’t show up on time,” he said. “A Halloween costume doesn’t do you any good if it arrives a week after Halloween.”