Halloween is the greatest holiday ever, but not for the reasons most people think. Like all holidays, Halloween is commercialized, and it should be the biggest profiting holiday in the USA.
Sadly, the lesser holiday of Christmas is encroaching on every holiday with big profit potential. Halloween has the biggest potential for profit but loses a lot of attention because of old religious superstitions.
Costumes alone cost hundreds of dollars now, they have become elaborate endeavors to try to out freak everyone else. Sadly the marketing for these has failed to increase the customer base, losing billions on a product that actually requires a yearly investment.
Candy is a product with a huge profit, nearly two hundred percent profit is gained from candy sales, which is why they try to integrate it into other holidays. But Halloween is all about the candy, the treats which kids are encouraged to collect under the guise of a "trick."
Because of the season Halloween falls on, many of the products considered to be Christmas based are more suited to Halloween. Pumpkin is a given, which is easy to milk through Thanksgiving, and it has a huge profit potential due to our synthetic versions being identical to the "all natural" flavor.
But the biggest crime against the economy is that businesses invest more in the holidays that encourage reclusivity. Family gatherings are not social, and most people actually don't enjoy them, but Halloween is all about socializing, visiting your neighbors.
In major cities, this is a gold mine of customers, instead I see people just renting movies, sitting at home alone, eating popcorn. Starbucks is bare of customers, other than us regulars, when they could attract many more with a simple and inexpensive dress up party promotion.
The streets of downtown Seattle, where thousands of people live, are bare as the cars roll by rushing home to take their kids out in large groups. But the kids are not brought to downtown, there are no parties here, no celebrations, in the densest commercial center of the city there are no customers.
It has been this way for several weeks, and I see many places already applying Christmas decorations. So instead of encouraging the current gold mine, they prepare for a single holiday which actually does not increase sales.
Most people shop at the last minute, that means they have already spent all their money for the previous months on necessities. So businesses waste a lot of money on advertising for a holiday which is already planned, or limited to one paycheck anyway.
Now here is what makes Halloween perfect, almost all cultures celebrate a holiday of spooky stories, treats, and even giving of gifts during the Halloween season. Less than half the planet celebrates Christmas, making Halloween more popular than Christmas based on cultural relevance.
Dia de los Muertos, the day of the dead for Mexico, kicks off the month with gifts to the dead, pageantry, and skulls made of sugar to sacrifice to their ancestors, a potential gold mine of profit. Even before that, in August we have Ghost Month, a Chinese holiday much like day of the dead, where food is offered to the spirits and people dress up.
October is not so cold as to herd people indoors, but you can see that time drawing close, which encourages people to socialize as much as they can before the cold winter nights force them to isolate more. Giving them reasons to gather will always increase socializing, and profits, and improve our society as a whole.
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