Masquerading as Kids : Pricey Costumes and All-Out Parties Make Halloween a Big Treat for Adults
As they run from door to door this Halloween, many trick-or-treaters are likely to find fewer adults around to answer their pleas for candy. Instead of waiting at home for the little ghosts and goblins, more grown-ups are getting into the celebration themselves.
“I have seen a substantial increase in adults wanting to get costumes,” said Theresa Saidy, owner of Adele’s of Hollywood. “They’re coming in to get something for themselves first, then the kids.”
Not only are they donning costumes, more adults are decorating their homes and hosting parties, helping to turn Halloween into big business. Sales of items from soft drinks to streamers increase during the season, and retailers say Halloween is edging closer to Christmas as a major sales holiday.
According to the National Retail Federation, Halloween is a $2.5-billion industry. That includes sales of candy and chocolate, home decorations and theatrical products.
Halloween is the biggest holiday for candy and chocolate manufacturers, who expect $850 million in sales in September and October, according to the National Confectioners Assn. and the Chocolate Manufacturers Assn. Christmas and Easter sales, by comparison, aren’t quite as sweet, trailing at $841 million and $800 million.
Hallmark Cards, which conducts extensive surveys on holiday spending patterns, says parents’ eagerness to have fun with their kids is just part of the explanation for the increase in Halloween’s popularity. Grown-ups also seem to need to do a little primal screaming.
“Right now things are spinning faster, there is too much change--politics we can’t understand, world crisis, layoffs,” said Hallmark spokeswoman Rachel Bolton.
“[At Halloween] you can put on a mask and a costume and just really escape. It can be a release valve on the pressure cooker. Maybe people need that once a year.”
Retailers are catching on to the possibilities.
“When the holiday came out of the realm of children, a whole new market opened up,” said National Retail Federation spokeswoman Pamela Rucker. “Retailers of all types are taking advantage of it and finding new ways to capitalize on it.”
Take the Halloween Club, a 17,000-square-foot costume and prop house in Santa Fe Springs, probably the largest of dozens of temporary stores that open just for a couple of months to cash in.
About 10,000 customers flock to the store each weekend during Halloween season, district manager Babloo Sawhney said. It’s hard for drivers on the Santa Ana Freeway to ignore the inflatable witch that towers over the warehouse.
Inside, there are 600 different costumes and 500 masks to choose from, including the judicial robes of Judge Lance Ito and football uniforms emblazoned with O.J. Simpson’s number, 32.
Sabrina Contreras, owner of Stray Cat Costume Store in Fullerton, said that some parents spend $20 on costumes for their kids, then shell out hundreds of dollars on eye-catching get-ups for themselves. Some are spending as much as $450 on original Phantom of the Opera costumes and 1920s zoot suits.
“The adults have been just like the kids the last couple of years,” said Victor Pahl, manager of Ragztop-Vintage, a costume and vintage clothing retailer in Fullerton. “It’s been tremendous for building business.”
Business at Ragztop-Vintage is up 50% from Halloween season last year. Authentic Batman and Robin costumes run $400 for adults, he said.
In the $40-$50 range, the best sellers are Ito masks and robes, U.S. postal worker uniforms--complete with guns and holsters--and 1970’s disco attire.
More adults are dressing up their homes too.
Halloween is now second only to Christmas as a popular time to put up special holiday displays, according to research by Hallmark. They expect 65% of families to decorate their homes and spend $60 million to $70 million on supplies this year.
Sawhney, of the Halloween Club, said some adults are steadily building up their collection of props to decorate their homes. The store sells fog machines, strobe lights and wallpaper that makes a home look like a castle.
“Some of the props are kind of expensive . . . now people collect one every year,” he said.
Retailers and representatives of the candy and beverage industries don’t see an end in sight to the growth of Halloween’s popularity.
“The challenge,” said Rucker, of the National Retail Federation, “will always be to do it bigger and better.”
