How Spirit Halloween Became a Pop-Up Retail Icon

Around early September, you may notice that a Spirit Halloween store seems to pop up in every empty building or abandoned retail store. In a world where physical businesses seem to crash and burn after a few months, how is Spirit consistently successful? How does the company run a model that allows them to come back year after year? They give us what we need for Halloween, and then move on to the next year. In this article, we’re going to look at how the company started, how it expanded and how it’s now an extremely successful pop-up Halloween retailer. 

As moms, we all know the day before Halloween panic. When the kids don’t have the perfect-fitting, softest material or the right color for the costume. Despite your best efforts, there always seems to be a hang-up, and most of us have run right to stores like Spirit to find a wider selection of costumes and special effects. We might pay more than we would at a store like Walmart or Target, but the relief is often worth it.

Or say you’re in charge of the elementary school’s Halloween party, and a volunteer cancels at the last minute. It’s a relief to run to a store designed specifically for the holiday, knowing you’ll find all the products you need in one area. Most moms have felt the relief that comes from shopping at a store like Spirit, but what makes it successful?

Starting Small, Growing Exponentially

Spirit is the brainchild of Joe Marver who opened a temporary setup in Castro Valley, California, at the Castro Valley Mall in 1983. While his landlords laughed at him and expected the concept to fail, he sold over $100,000 of goods in just 30 days, despite being stuck in a corner behind a restaurant. 

After 16 years at Marver’s hands, the company was purchased by Spencer Gifts in 1999 and now has no permanent location. It operates strictly as a pop-up store but has more than 1,500 locations and corners a unique area of the retail market with candy, props and costumes. 

Spirit’s success could be attributed to a long list of things. A great vision, analysts who understand what consumers want and embrace the joy of the Halloween season. When you begin in a mall as a start-up with doubters in every corner, you’ve got to believe in what you’re doing to succeed, and that’s exactly what Spirit executives did. 

Bringing Spirit Halloween to Communities Big and Small

The National Retail Federation lists the Halloween industry as worth more than $10 billion, and Spirit finds ways to tap into that as effectively as possible. As a transient store, consumers may be surprised to see them come back year after year, but Spirit somehow managed to make themselves a permanent fixture with a transient nature and it still going strong after 40 years. 

Every year, the company’s analysts look at available real estate and strive to bring the Halloween spirit to as many locations as possible. The company looks for spaces that are 5,000-50,0000 square feet of sales floor space. One major key to their success is their visibility. 

For every 35,000 within a 3-5 mile radius, Spirit strives to put in a store. The company doesn’t narrow its prospects to anything too big or too small — it works with what they have and keeps its formula for how to find locations a secret from curious competitors and consumers.

The stores begin preparing in the middle of summer, so you may see signs long before the store is set up. And while approaching 40,000 empty square feet of space can seem daunting, maybe its longevity can be attributed to the fact that this isn’t considered an insurmountable task, but rather something that can be taken day by day until the job is done.

Along with the more than 1,500 physical locations, Spirit offers a year-round online store for Halloween enthusiasts who like to dress up year-round or plan early.

Animatronics, Costumes and Decor as an Avenue to Give Back

Spirit takes Halloween seriously and gives back through its philanthropic arm, Spirit of Children. The company partners with over 150 hospitals in Canada and the United States to use the imagination and excitement of Halloween to make a child’s hospital journey a bit easier to endure. The program began in 2006 and supports Child Life Services to the tune of $127 million raised so far. This is all money raised through vendor partners, customers, and the company itself.

At every store and on Spirit’s website, customers have the option to donate as little as a dollar. Not only do these donations provide support for critical child staff, sensory equipment, patient-focused resources, sibling and family support services, crafts, toys, art supplies, and therapy programming, but they also provide basic joy and excitement. Hospitals receive packages full of costumes, coloring books, accessories, tote bags, and crayons to make the hospital stay a little less scary and a bit more joyful. Spirit takes a unique spin on the “scary” part of Halloween and turns it into joy for those in scary situations.

A Variety of Products That Represent What Customers Want 

While some Halloween products are mainstays like pumpkins, ghosts, and skeletons, others change each year, and Spirit has to stay on top of research to ensure that each store has the products people want.

Costumes like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Disney princesses, Marvel superheroes, and Nintendo characters have staying power and draw a large crowd every year as new generations discover them. Other favorites come and go. For example, ten years ago, Dora the Explorer and friends were popular Halloween costumes, and in today’s world, kids are looking for Bluey and family. To stay relevant, Spirit has to update its inventory every year in accordance with what consumers are buying. These trends vary from state to state and location to location, so every year an extraordinary effort is put into choosing products. 

Spirit’s top trending costumes for last year included Barbie, Bluey, Chucky, Wednesday Addams, and characters from Five Nights at Freddy’s. Classics like the Flinstones, Scooby-Doo!, Spongebob Square Pants, and South Park were also extremely popular last year. Who knows what this year will bring?

The store doesn’t limit itself to costumes. Customers can also choose from a huge selection (online and in-store) of decorations, accessories, tees, and animatronics. 

Embracing the Model and Remaining Relevant

There aren’t a lot of stories like Spirit’s, and very few stores come back each year with enough inventory to fill a 50,000-square-foot store space. Some holiday products show up in pop-up shops in malls, but they typically have products throughout the year and then include a focus on holiday items. Spirit embraces the entirety of Halloween and doesn’t back off. That fearlessness present in founder Joe Marver carries on every year into stores that continue to be successful and favorites of consumers. 

With a long list of products, costumes for every age group, and unique items you can’t find everywhere, Spirit stays relevant, but don’t be fooled by the spooky, fun nature of the store. Behind its success lies sharp business minds, intense research, and constant scrutiny of locations. Perhaps the way Spirit has managed to stay successful for more than four decades is the correct balance of holiday joy and business acumen. For parents, the magic is often found in the simplicity and variety Spirit presents for an affordable price.

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The image featured at the top of this post is ©Mike Mozart from Funny YouTube, USA, CC BY 2.0.