Spirit Halloween – 99% invisible

Each fall across the United States and Canada, approximately 1,500 empty storefronts are plastered with Spirit Halloween's distinctive yellow, orange and black signs. The seasonal retailer sells Halloween masks, Halloween costumes, Halloween costumes for dogs, Halloween decorations, scary robots and more different types made of fake blood. And they do it in harmony with the times a billion dollars per year in salesaccording to some estimates. While spirit stores open every August, all physical stores close in early November.

Despite being a pop-up store, Spirit has developed a cult following. YouTube creators love posting “opening day” videos of their local Spirit locations, and there have been songs and even an independent horror film dedicated to the haunted store.

The last few years were considered A “retail apocalypse” for many companies.as many brick-and-mortar chains are closing their branches. So what does it say about the world of retail that a seasonal Halloween store takes over all those abandoned storefronts three months out of the year and makes a killing in the process?

The Early Days of the Spirit

Before becoming a retailer of all things Halloween, Joe Marver was the owner of Spirit Discount Women's Apparel, a clothing store in the Bay Area. In the early '80s, Marver watched as customers flocked to a dancewear store across the mall that grew in popularity each year during spooky season.

“They were lined up for the month of October, and it was crazy because our October stank,” Marver says.

In 1983 the dancewear store closed. And Marver decided he couldn't let those customers go somewhere else. So he put the women's clothing in the basement and bought a selection of Halloween costumes for just one month, creating the first version of Spirit Halloween. By the next year, Marver had expanded to a second location, generating a staggering $100,000 in sales. Soon he was operating six stores and soon he had franchises throughout the state that only opened seasonally.

Spirit sites were built at short notice, using materials that could be set up and dismantled quickly. “I remember the display tables were actually the cardboard boxes that the goods came in,” says Mike Olsen, a real estate agent who began working with Spirit in the 1980s and is still associated with the company . “You stacked these boxes in the middle of the sales floor, draped a black cloth over them and that was your display table.”

The hermit crab of retail

Spirit grew quickly, but as they began developing their business, Joe, Mike, and their team encountered a major hurdle. Very few landlords wanted to rent their premises to a company that would collect eight weeks' rent and then leave the premises vacant. “I called landlords and other agents,” Olsen says of the early days, “and they looked at you like you had three heads.”

Olsen says he would drive around new markets and track down abandoned big box stores, looking for corporate landlords who could take his call. Mike recalls how he got creative to woo a potential landlord with a range of available rooms by sending him a severed arm as a gag. “I stapled it to a piece of cardboard, put my business card on it, and then put the gentleman's name right there: 'Hey, lend me one.'” hand. I need your location here.'” Ultimately, the ploy worked and he got the deal.

When one of these businesses closed, landlords were stuck because these spaces were utilitarian and difficult to repurpose. It wasn't possible to fit a hospital or an apartment complex into a big old box unless a potential owner completely rehabilitated the property and sought changes to the local zoning.

Although Spirit occasionally set up shop in an old bank or once in a defunct church, their focus was always on abandoned big box stores. According to Joe Marver, the best spot for Spirit is just over 10,000 square feet, preferably across from another popular store in the parking lot. “If there was good traffic there and there was a Lowe's or Home Depot store on the corner across the street, that would be an attractive attraction,” Marver said.

The corporate era

After 16 years in business, Joe Marver sold Spirit Halloween to Spencer's Gifts, a shopping center known to most Americans for its fine selection of lava lamps and novelty T-shirts. Since 1999, corporate-owned Spirit has grown from 65 locations to approximately 1,500.

In some ways, Spirit has become a more sophisticated operation. Until recently, the company was known for carrying “copycat” costumes for popular characters a “Sidekick Bros” outfit that looked suspiciously like Super Mario and Luigi. Today the company owns the license for characters from Disney, Marvel and Nintendo.

But not everything in their business is “corporatized.” The physical locations of the mind are still temporary. Their yellow, black and orange logo is still emblazoned on a tarp in front of every store. Your display is still made of breadboards. And they still follow the same real estate strategy by filling abandoned big box stores every fall.

Mike Olsen, the real estate agent, says that in the 1990s, Spirit was able to capitalize on empty storefronts left by former brands like Comp USA, Circuit City and Borders Books. After the 2008 financial crisis, even more space was available. “I think there was once 256 empty retail boxes, large boxes, in the Phoenix metropolitan area (in 2009). Make your choice,” says Olsen.

This real estate plan has become a meme on the internet. “You've probably seen the memes out there saying whenever the government shuts down, for example Someone hang up the Spirit Halloween banner and push it super hard on the White Housesays Olsen.

This has led some critics to refer to Spirit Halloween as “the Grim Reaper of retail.” Rachel Quednau, program director at Strong Towns, wrote an essay in 2021 criticizing what Spirit has come to represent: They say their success is due in large part to the political failures of suburban development.

“If our cities are thinking about what represents long-term financial benefit to our residents, then we shouldn't be thinking about pursuing really short-term, large-scale ventures like this,” Quednau says.

“Honestly, with all the huge big box stores now sitting empty, I think the best scenario is to tear them down and bring them back to earth, especially if they are on the outskirts of the city where there is difficult access without a car .”

Quednau adds: “I don’t think there’s anything fundamentally wrong with Spirit. It’s more of a symptom of a larger problem.”

“If our cities are thinking about what represents long-term financial benefit to our residents, then we shouldn't be thinking about pursuing really short-term, large-scale ventures like this,” Quednau says.

For his part, Mike Olsen believes Spirit serves a larger role in retail with its temporary occupancies. “We cleaned more floors, replaced more light bulbs and repaired more HVAC units across the country than I would have expected from any other retailer at this point,” he says.
“When we enter a room, it has to look good. And when a retailer leaves a space, they often don’t leave it in a move-in-ready condition.”

While it's tempting to call Spirit a “grim reaper” or a “zombie,” a more apt metaphor might be a hermit crab, a creature that takes over abandoned storefronts as a temporary home because they're so readily available.

epilogue

This is the 600th episode of 99PI! And Today marks producer Chris Berube's fifth anniversary on the show. We are incredibly grateful to our listeners for listening and supporting us over the years, and to Chris for producing this very entertaining episode. Here’s to 600 more!