Temporary Retail:: Halloween Stores Make Yearly Visit

An interview I did the other day with the Nashua Telegraph on the business of temporary holiday stores… bf

Halloween stores make ghostly visits each year

By ASHLEY SMITH

Staff Writer

Nashua Telegraph

They may seem like fly-by-night operations, but temporary Halloween stores have a well-defined business model.

Some start looking for space as early as January, seeking vacant spots in shopping plazas with major retailers and high traffic counts.

“A plaza with a grocery store is ideal, say a Market Basket,” said Bill Faulkner, a Portsmouth-based commercial real estate specialist with the Bean Group.

“They probably wouldn’t want to go to a plaza that has a chiropractic office, a spa and a hair salon.”

Faulkner said the stores usually negotiate a simple cash deal for retail space that includes two months of rent and the utilities. Other times, they offer the property owner a percentage of sales.

The idea is to fly in and out of town as simply as possible, capitalizing on the growing interest in Halloween merchandise, now a $5.8 billion business nationwide.

“It’s classic entrepreneurship – see a need, fill it, make a buck, move on to the next opportunity,” Faulkner said. “It’s kind of like the carnival coming to town.”

Some Halloween stores are independently run by local entrepreneurs who have a relationship with costume distributors, Faulkner said.

Others, like Spirit Halloween, are national chains. Spirit operates some 870 stores nationwide, including a handful in New Hampshire.

After 20 years operating solely as a seasonal business, the company was sold to novelty store Spencer Gifts in 2003.

Now, Spencer Gifts is testing the model on the Christmas season with the launch of temporary toy stores, said Sushma Dwivedi, a spokeswoman for the company.

Faulkner said lease prices for temporary Halloween stores vary widely depending on the size of the operation and how badly property owners want buildings occupied.

With the commercial real estate market in a slump and plenty of vacant retail space, the Halloween stores have the negotiating power now.