Hundreds of people stuffed into the Halloween Spirit at 8th & Market St on the day before Halloween at 5:45pm to buy their costumes for the next day. Every minute dozens shuffled in and surprisingly, every minute dozens shuffled out.
Halloween Spirit on October 30th is the closest thing America has left to peak “Black Friday” energy, the only difference was how kind and patient all the shoppers were. Products strewn about the store, piles of costumes line the aisles as a line of 75+ customers snake throughout the store.
Sophie from North Philly expected the line to be wrapped around outside and was surprised that it only went to the back of the store. When asked what her costume was, she responded “we finna be karma. I got my outfit, then if I come back tomorrow and they still have a little scepter, I’ll buy that tomorrow.”
Olivia, originally from upstate New York, was at Halloween Spirit on her birthday – naturally she’s a big Halloween fan. “I’ve always rolled my birthday into Halloween, and I work at a haunted house, so I’ve been in the Halloween spirit for about a month now!” The line was much busier than she expected as she purchased a Puritan style corset and an axe to complete her Lizzie Borden costume.
“I just saw the Evening of horrors at the Philadelphia Ballet, it’s two ballets back to back. The first one is a ballet of Lizzie Borden’s story. Lizzie Borden was a murderer who killed her parents with an ax in the early 1800s. So I was inspired by that, so I’m going to be Lizzie Borden this year.”
D-Money from South Philly was last minute Halloween shopping because she wants to “turn up with my friends and it’s very last minute because they come outside, very late.” She was buying Freddy Krueger hands for her sister. She spent 20 minutes total in the hectic retail environment and 15 of those minutes were in line, “it’s going pretty fast!’ she said, surprised.
Philadelphia is in the Halloween spirit and in Halloween Spirit. The store was filled with poorly made, overpriced nonsense, yet it was packed with smiling and exciting customers. Traditional Halloween costumes cost between $30 and $75 depending on how much intellectual property is involved. The newest hottest trends are $60 or more, but a Fred Flintstone costume costs $30.
“Halloween’s a great holiday,” started Olivia. ”I really love that people embrace the spooky aspect here in Philly. We have a lot of great haunted houses in and around Philly, and I think Philly should be more known for that. I’m going to plug Lincoln Mills Haunted house because they’re my favorite, but Eastern State Penitentiary, Field of Horrors, there’s a ton of really good ones around here. All very, very talented actors and producers and artists that work there. So it’s a very spooky city additionally. There’s a lot of ghosts that haunt this city, so it’s a really good place to be in the Halloween spirit.”
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