Halloween trick or treat for shops

Zombies are in this Halloween, along with zombie princesses, zombie pop-stars and the 1980s.
But high unemployment and an economy that’s yet to fully rise from the grave have area retailers who rely on costume and candy sales worried that spending money this Halloween could also go out of fashion.
“If we can match last year’s sales, that would be wonderful,” said Paul DeRoche, executive director of the Rhode Island Retail Federation, about 2011 Halloween sales. “With the economy the way it is and more than 10 percent [of available workers] in Rhode Island out of work, I don’t think the consumer has a lot of confidence. I think when you break it down on Halloween, you have to proceed with caution.”
In the last few decades, Halloween has increasingly become the territory of large national chains, such as CVS, Wal-Mart and the temporary pop-up stores that materialize every fall and then disappear.
And more recently, Halloween costume sales have begun following purchases of other consumer products onto the Internet.
But there are still some locally owned and operated stores around that count on Halloween.
One is Rhode Island Costume, which has been selling costumes year-round in the Warwick Mall since 1985, the year owner Laurie Garabedian said the business of Halloween really started “taking off.”
For Rhode Island Costume, outfitting Halloween partygoers in the latest costume each year is a make-or-break proposition.
“We are basically open for Halloween year-round,” Garabedian said. “If it weren’t for Halloween, we wouldn’t be here.”
Until two years ago, Rhode Island costume used to open its own pop-up stores to complement sales in the Warwick flagship.
But Garabedian said the impersonal nature of the pop-up stores didn’t match the kind of custom service she was interested in providing.
Now Garabedian finds herself competing with pop-up stores that have benefitted from low rents caused by the sluggish commercial real estate market and the bankruptcies of other large retailers. After Boaters World went bankrupt and closed its Warwick store on Bald Hill Road, a temporary Spirit Halloween store moved in.
A Spirit store also moved into recently closed Borders bookstores in Mansfield. Spirit now has 11 stores in Rhode Island and Bristol County, Mass., according to the company’s website.
In many ways, Garabedian said she is frustrated more by people trying something on in her dressing room and then using their smartphone to find it online elsewhere than temporary stores or Wal-Mart.
“We put a sign up in the dressing room that says: ‘If you try it on and want it, why not buy it today,’ ” Garabedian said.
Perhaps even more than costumes, Halloween candy has become the domain of chain retailers.
At Betty’s Candy in Cranston, manager Kevin DeTroia said his business is more focused on gourmet chocolate and gifts than bulk Halloween products.
“If we needed bulk candy like that we would probably go there too,” DeTroia said.
There is at least one group that thinks the public will be spending more on Halloween this year: consumers themselves.
A survey conducted for the National Retail Federation found that adults on average expect to spend $72.31 per person this year, the highest total in the survey’s nine-year history and around $6 more than last year.
A spokeswoman for the federation said the group does not track actual sales to see how accurate the survey ends up being.
In addition to total sales, the Retail Federation survey also tracks trends in costume buying. This year’s results reflect the observations seen at Rhode Island Costume and at Savers, a national chain that targets Halloween and has a store in Providence. Witches, pirates, vampires, zombies and Batman characters are the top five costumes this year, according to the survey.
Savers reports princesses, pirates and superheroes are all top sellers, but notes a surprise in the popularity of animal and insect costumes.
At Parks Plaza, a women’s clothing, shoe and accessory store in downtown Providence, costume sales used to provide an annual boost heading into the Christmas season, but have not been as robust in recent years.
“I remember last year the first couple of weeks were very slow and I was regretting getting costumes, but then it picked up right at the end,” said Daniel Park, whose father owns the store. “We usually get a rush right at the end from students. So far we have not sold many. We’ll see in a week how it does.”
At Rhode Island Costume, Garabedian said zombie costumes have surged in popularity, not just in their generic form, but as zombified versions of other favorites.
“Girls are shying away from the traditional, pretty costumes and doing zombie prom queen or zombie princess,” Garabedian said. “Where before you would dress up as Madonna or Lady Gaga, now you go as zombie Gaga.”
She added that costumes based on people or fashions popular in the 1980s have also taken off, leading to a run on zebra-print and day-glow accessories.
DeRoche, of the Rhode Island Retail Federation, said this Halloween is likely to revolve around discounts and Wal-Mart would probably end up the biggest beneficiary.
“Wal-Mart is a great promoter of Halloween,” DeRoche said.
Whatever happens in the costume and candy aisles this October, DeRoche said most retailers will be looking to see what it says about the larger shopping holiday approaching on the calendar.
“I am more concerned about Christmas,” DeRoche said. “What happens in the economy in the next eight weeks will be critical.” •