A family walks out of a Spirit Halloween store converted from Best Buy.
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Some Spirited Halloween locations will be busier than usual this year.
Spirit Hawaii will operate 10 stores throughout the holiday season,”Spiritual Christmas,” a spokesperson confirmed to CNBC.
The company’s usual strategy is to lease abandoned storefronts only long enough to house Halloween-specific retailers, and 10 stores in the Northeast will open by the end of the year. The company’s flagship store in Mays Landing, New Jersey, will open on October 18, and nine other stores will open in early November, a spokesman said. Not all stores will be converted from existing Spirit Halloween locations.
“Spirit Christmas is a new concept for us and we hope it resonates with our customers,” a spokesperson for Spirit Halloween told CNBC. “Our goal is to create a festive retail experience that captures the spirit of the season, just like we do for Halloween.”
Every store will have holiday inflatables and decorations, but they won’t all be the same experience. Not only will the new store replace fake skulls and costumes with wrapping paper and stockings, but it will also host activities such as photos with a real-life Santa Claus and letters to the North Pole.
The first 10 locations will serve as a test to see if customers will stay invested throughout the holiday season.
Holiday sales are a lucrative area, but not a sure bet for the company. According to the National Retail Federation, spending will increase 3.8% annually in 2023 to $964.4 billion.
Deloitte estimates that holiday retail sales will grow 2.3% to 3.3% in 2024, but e-commerce is expected to grow 7% to 9%, and Spirit Christmas test stores will not be able to support this growth. Amazon is already gearing up for the holidays, with plans to hire 250,000 workers this season, the same number as last year.
Holiday spending could also be affected by November’s tense presidential election and a historically volatile hurricane season.
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