Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and there's
Speaker 1: Chuck and Jerry's here too, sitting in for Dave, of course,
Speaker 1: and that makes this short stuff.
Speaker 2: Big. Thanks to Medium, Nprstrongtowns dot Org, the list in
Speaker 2: Bloomberg for this.
Speaker 1: I'll bet, I'll bet I can guess the Strongtowns dot
Speaker 1: Org section. I want to read part of it. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: So Chuck, we're talking today about Spirit Halloween, not the
Speaker 1: spirit of Halloween, as Jerry likes to say, just spirit Halloween, right,
Speaker 1: And if you live outside of the United States, you
Speaker 1: might not know what that is. As far as I know,
Speaker 1: they're not out of North America yet, but just give
Speaker 1: it some time as Halloween spread, so too, we'll spirit Halloween.
Speaker 1: Spirit Halloween in the US is well known for being
Speaker 1: essentially a giant Halloween pop up store that sprout up
Speaker 1: like mushrooms all over the country in abandoned well old malls,
Speaker 1: old big box stores that are no longer in use,
Speaker 1: strip malls, anywhere they can set up shop with about
Speaker 1: seven to ten thousand square feet and start selling a
Speaker 1: halloweench mortgas board of stuff.
Speaker 2: That's right. They have more than I think, more than
Speaker 2: fifteen hundred. I also sell fourteen hundred, so somewhere in
Speaker 2: that range of stores, again only seasonal locations, and it
Speaker 2: has become a meme that's kind of fun around Halloween,
Speaker 2: whenever there's an abandoned thing or anything that would be
Speaker 2: funny to put a Spirit Halloween banner across. One of
Speaker 2: the most fun ones I saw was when like the
Speaker 2: US government shuts down because they can't agree on a
Speaker 2: funding bill, there will be like a Spirit Halloween banner
Speaker 2: memed over the White House, that kind of thing, because
Speaker 2: that's what they do. I looked up today just for funsies.
Speaker 2: Atlanta the Metro Atlanta area has twenty one Spirit Halloweens
Speaker 2: this year.
Speaker 1: Maybe someday we'll get to that twenty two.
Speaker 2: Maybe I mean some just within miles of one another. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but this is not the most unusual thing in the world.
Speaker 2: There's a long tradition of pop ups and seasonal pop
Speaker 2: ups here in North America, certainly around Christmas time, with
Speaker 2: Christmas tree lots, some seasonal Christmas shops opening up and
Speaker 2: popping up, carnivals, flea markets, that kind of thing. America
Speaker 2: is well known for having these kind of temporary businesses
Speaker 2: that pop up for a week or two, maybe in
Speaker 2: this case a short season, and then they shut it
Speaker 2: down and that place is now a parking lot again
Speaker 2: or an old rich way that is no longer in business.
Speaker 1: So this is the part that I'm guessing where Strongtowns
Speaker 1: dot Org comes in, because this section seems really emphatic
Speaker 1: about discussing how great pop up stores are for local communities.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Quote, I'd like to read because I think it's awesome. Yes,
Speaker 1: there's plenty to like and appreciate about a temporary shop
Speaker 1: that provides an opportunity for entrepreneurs to sell their wares
Speaker 1: and activates an empty space.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was definitely from Strong down Stuff for.
Speaker 1: So back to Spirit Halloween, because yes, there's other seasonal
Speaker 1: pop up stores, but this is the seasonal pop up
Speaker 1: store we're talking about. It was founded about forty years
Speaker 1: ago in the early eighties by a guy named Joe Marver,
Speaker 1: and he didn't start out selling halloween stuff, So he
Speaker 1: started out selling reasonably priced women's apparel.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the store was called Just Spirit Women's Discount Apparel.
Speaker 2: It was a little wordy. As the story goes, he
Speaker 2: was working in that store or you know, owning that
Speaker 2: store and working there, I guess in October, looked across
Speaker 2: the street and there was a Halloween costume shop that
Speaker 2: was killing it, and he was just like, nobody's buying
Speaker 2: in my discounted women's apparel. Everyone's buying these Halloween costumes.
Speaker 1: Look at this dress with the shoulder pads. You could
Speaker 1: turn this down.
Speaker 2: It's almost the costume in itself. And he was like,
Speaker 2: all right, I'm struggling here. They seem to be onto something.
Speaker 2: Eventually that like, that's where the seat is planned. Eventually
Speaker 2: that costume shop moves locations, and then Joe sees his
Speaker 2: opportunity and is like, nuts to these dresses. They're going
Speaker 2: in storage. October is approaching fast, and I'm gonna sell
Speaker 2: Halloween stuff. And he sells through the roof and is like,
Speaker 2: I'm onto something here.
Speaker 1: So yes, he has the best October he's ever had.
Speaker 1: Like you said, he thinks he's onto something. So the
Speaker 1: next year he does it again, but this time, rather
Speaker 1: than put all his dresses in storage, he leases a
Speaker 1: temporary space. So he's starting to see like the contours
Speaker 1: of spirit Halloween forming at the edges here. And in
Speaker 1: thirty days he sells one hundred thousand I'm assuming early eighties,
Speaker 1: one hundred thousand dollars. Yeah, it was worth of Halloween
Speaker 1: stuff in just again thirty days. And he was like,
Speaker 1: I'm definitely onto something here. I'm going to go all
Speaker 1: in on this Halloween thing. And sure, I'll sell some
Speaker 1: dresses during the rest of the year, but this Halloween
Speaker 1: thing is really a big deal to me. Now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and this is a quote that I've actually seen
Speaker 2: from Joe Marburn that I still can't make sense of.
Speaker 2: I didn't invent temporary sales, but I feel like I
Speaker 2: invented temporary Halloween.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I don't understand that, because what is permanent Halloween?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Halloween had been like a twelve month out of
Speaker 1: the year tradition until Joe Marvar came along, right.
Speaker 2: I guess. So, So that one that's just sort of
Speaker 2: a funny quote. He seems like that kind of guy.
Speaker 1: So I say, we take a break and we'll come
Speaker 1: back and talk about how the thing grew from that one,
Speaker 1: that one empty store, to say, fifteen hundred locations, twenty
Speaker 1: one of them in Atlanta alone.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Stuff, you should know, stop, you should I should know.
Speaker 2: All Right, So Joe Marber is crushing it. Over the
Speaker 2: next fifteen years, he grows to about sixty pop ups.
Speaker 2: This is roughly ninety seven ninety eight or so, and
Speaker 2: the name of the store is officially Spirit Halloween by
Speaker 2: that point. It changed along the way, and he said,
Speaker 2: you know, one of the big keys to his growth
Speaker 2: plan is presence, like billboards and stuff like that, ads,
Speaker 2: getting like you mentioned, maybe up to a ten thousand
Speaker 2: square foot storefront, hopefully close to another big anchor store
Speaker 2: like a wal Mart or a Target or something like that,
Speaker 2: or maybe a popular shopping center, and then to expand.
Speaker 2: The other key is to expand beyond just costumes, so
Speaker 2: you can get like anything Halloween in there. Decorations are
Speaker 2: a big, big part of what they sell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you want a plastic battle axe to use for
Speaker 1: your LARPing during the rest of the year, you go
Speaker 1: to Spirit Halloween here in the United States, that's right,
Speaker 1: but you.
Speaker 2: Better do it between August and November.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's crazy that they even open in early August,
Speaker 1: but I guess that's true, even though it turns out
Speaker 1: that they do most of their business the last two
Speaker 1: weeks of October, which duh, Yeah, I can't remember. There
Speaker 1: was a Simpsons episode that where somebody invested in pumpkin
Speaker 1: futures and that they paid off in like November. I
Speaker 1: can't remember who that happened to. I want to say
Speaker 1: Principal Skinner doesn't sound right.
Speaker 4: That's funny.
Speaker 1: So it turns out that Joe Marv doesn't own Spirit
Speaker 1: Halloween anymore. He founded it, but he also sold it
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety nine. He was probably worried about the
Speaker 1: Y two K bug and he's like, this is your
Speaker 1: problem now, and he sold it to Spencer's Gifts, which
Speaker 1: makes a lot of sense now that I hear it.
Speaker 1: I believe Spencer's is still around. I think it's gone
Speaker 1: more toward like a journey or a Pacific Coast kind
Speaker 1: of place, whereas before it was this weird mashup of
Speaker 1: everything sexy, bongie, grateful, deady, like the weird plasma ball
Speaker 1: that you touch and the electricity goes to your hand,
Speaker 1: but somehow it doesn't electrocute you. Like all of that
Speaker 1: stuff was in Spencer's Gifts. It was the place to
Speaker 1: go in the mall when you were ten years old
Speaker 1: in the eighties.
Speaker 2: Oh you bet, especially if you're a young Baptist kid,
Speaker 2: because you could you could be like, hey, mom, I'm
Speaker 2: going to go here to look at posters, and you
Speaker 2: know the posters were probably women in bikinis on a Lamborghini.
Speaker 2: That was also the for boating section. Remember that one
Speaker 2: that had all manner of bedroom toys.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like legit ones, not just like Gag Gift, like
Speaker 1: you know the heavy Hitters, right, there was actually one
Speaker 1: called the heavy hit probably, but.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you could if you were in the wrong part
Speaker 2: of Spencer Gifts when you were a ten or twelve
Speaker 2: year old. It was a very embarrassing thing for me,
Speaker 2: but very titillating as well at the same time. So anyway,
Speaker 2: legendary eighties store, as the legend has it, they were
Speaker 2: Joe marbur was at a trade show in Manhattan. The
Speaker 2: executive from Spencer Gift says, come with me, gets them
Speaker 2: in a limo, takes them to Spencer headquarters in New Jersey,
Speaker 2: cuts them a big check. It's an undisclosed them out.
Speaker 2: Could not find out how much, but it had to
Speaker 2: have been a lot of money because in twenty thirteen,
Speaker 2: this is eleven years ago, half Spencer Gifts yearly earnings,
Speaker 2: which was about two hundred and fifty million back then,
Speaker 2: came from Spirit Halloween. I guarantee you it's way way
Speaker 2: more than that ban now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. So just to kind of get back
Speaker 1: into the nuts and bolts, they hire about twenty five
Speaker 1: thousand temporary employees just for you know, that August to
Speaker 1: the end of October. The stores officially closed on November two.
Speaker 1: Little known fact Spirit Halloween is a twelve month a
Speaker 1: year business online. Yeah, of course, it's just as retail
Speaker 1: stores aren't open during that time. And even before they
Speaker 1: close toward Halloween, they're starting to plan for next year
Speaker 1: and they start like looking for retail spaces to take over.
Speaker 1: They start negotiating with landlords. They hire a bunch of
Speaker 1: district managers who manage about three to four stores each,
Speaker 1: and they get to go to New Jersey on a
Speaker 1: big trip for a week long training seminar, and then
Speaker 1: by the time August rolls around again, they're doing it
Speaker 1: again in for the couple of months before Halloween.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're a senior director, or at least at the time
Speaker 2: of this writing, their senior director of real estate's god
Speaker 2: named Frank Pasera. And can you imagine how hard that
Speaker 2: job is to open up fifteen hundred and negotiate those
Speaker 2: leases fifteen hundred temporary stores just on the real estate side,
Speaker 2: like forget training all those employees. There's a pretty fun
Speaker 2: article if anyone feels like reading more about Spirit Halloween
Speaker 2: on slate. I think written by an employee. He was
Speaker 2: one of those managers. And it wasn't like some horror
Speaker 2: story like oh god, it was awful. It was more
Speaker 2: just like it's a crazy experience because I'll bet everything
Speaker 2: is moving so fast and there's so much inventory, and
Speaker 2: none of these employees, like everyone is temporary, so it's
Speaker 2: just a crazy but fun environment it seems like to
Speaker 2: work in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, man, I'll bet keeping things stocked is like sacrosanct
Speaker 1: there because you got to get rid of as much
Speaker 1: as possible, although they do say about thirty to forty
Speaker 1: percent of it carries over from year to year. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sure they lost their shirts on Justin Bieber costumes
Speaker 1: one year, right, and that probably happens. But you know
Speaker 1: you're always going to make the money on Michael Meyer's stuff, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, you got a Halloween costume together for
Speaker 2: this year? Are you going to do anything?
Speaker 1: I don't know. You me usually comes up with those.
Speaker 1: I just go along with them because they're always brilliant
Speaker 1: and I can't think of anything. So I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what she's got up her sleeves this year. Probably something
Speaker 1: really good.
Speaker 2: I gotcha nice.
Speaker 1: So there's one other thing we should talk about from
Speaker 1: Spirit Halloween that you dug up is they are really
Speaker 1: into charity for children's hospitals, and it's pretty awesome what
Speaker 1: they do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they partnered. I mean essentially, what they're trying to
Speaker 2: do is bring, you know, not the spirit of Christmas
Speaker 2: to children's hospitals, but the spirit of Halloween to make
Speaker 2: hospitals less scary in an ironic twist.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. It's called Spirit of Children. You can
Speaker 1: donate online to it, you can donate in the store.
Speaker 1: You can donate as little as a dollar and they'll
Speaker 1: say thank you. But they not just Halloween. So around Halloween,
Speaker 1: these about one hundred and fifty children's hospitals get care
Speaker 1: packages with costumes and decorations and all that stuff. Because
Speaker 1: think about it, when you're a little kid, you're sick
Speaker 1: in the hospital, missing Halloween. Yeah, that sucks on top
Speaker 1: of having to be in the hospital in the first place. Course,
Speaker 1: but for the rest of the year. They support programs,
Speaker 1: they pay for equipment, like they cover these children's hospitals,
Speaker 1: and it's pretty cool. It's a really great program. I
Speaker 1: had no idea about it. But if you go to
Speaker 1: Spirit Halloween this year, maybe drop a buck in their
Speaker 1: Spirit of Children collection thing or go online and donate.
Speaker 1: But the great thing about it is one hundred percent
Speaker 1: of those donations go to this program.
Speaker 2: That's right. And we've been singing the praises of this
Speaker 2: fun store. I hope it's not exposed to some awful
Speaker 2: thing because it seems to be what it is, which
Speaker 2: is just a pretty successful fun store supporting a fun holiday.
Speaker 1: And I hope they're not advertising on the podcast right now,
Speaker 1: because if so, it's a coincidence. Everybody we weren't paid to.
Speaker 2: Do getting me they totally should. We should tell sales
Speaker 2: about this.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, then Chuck brought this on. It's okay. I
Speaker 1: don't think we have anything else about Spirit Halloween, right, Nope?
Speaker 1: All right, Well then short stuff is out.
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