Sure, Ebola containment suits are apparently a popular Halloween costume this year. We get it: the costume is easy to put together, timely, and some people find it amusing. Yet when they take off their fake hazmat suits (or their incredibly fake sexy hazmat suits) will any of the people wearing this costume think about the health care workers in western Africa whose lives depend on the real versions of these suits? [More]
halloween
Live The Dream: Hand Out Candy Canes To Trick-Or-Treaters
By 10.30.14
Most people have bought their Halloween candy, which leaves lots of empty retail space. What’s a smart store manager to do? Fill that space up with merchandise for the next holiday. This makes retail sense, but results in horrified Consumerist readers when they see a huge display of candy canes two days before Halloween. [More]
Halloween Eats: Free Bacon At Arby’s, $3 Burritos At Chipotle
By 10.29.14
While we’re still reeling from the revelation that Arby’s may be shorting customers on their fountain drinks, the fast food chain is doing one thing right this week — offering to give away free bacon to customers on Halloween. [More]
Krispy Kreme Handing Out Free Doughnuts On Halloween To Anyone In A Costume
By 10.29.14
Want a tasty treat but don’t want to spend any money? Dust off that witch hat/set of cat ears/football jersey/train conductor outfit and head to Krispy Kreme on Halloween for a free doughnut of your choice. You’ve gotta be in costume in the store, and it’s gotta be Oct. 31 only. Though feel free to wear a costume any day of the year that you like. [via Krispy Kreme on Facebook] [More]
Florida Town Worried Roving Wild Boars Will Put A Damper On Trick-Or-Treating Fun This Year
By 10.28.14
There’s the homemade costume that didn’t turn out like you dreamed, the candy bag that springs a hole unnoticed until the trick-or-treating is done, and the sudden flash of bad, stormy weather raining all over your carefully madeup skeleton face. All are big bummers on Halloween… and then there are huge wild boars roaming around, ruining trick-or-treating night in an entirely different way. [More]
Walmart Finally Removes “Fat Girl Costumes” Section Of Website
By 10.27.14
Almost a week after it was first called out for having a section on its website dedicated to “Fat Girl Costumes,” Walmart has finally removed the category and replaced it with “Women’s Plus Size Halloween Costumes.” [More]
Costume Shops Have To Guess What You’ll Rush In To Buy On October 30th
By 10.23.14
It’s October 23rd: do you know what you’re going to be for Halloween? How about your kids? If your answer is “no,” don’t worry. Most people don’t really plan ahead for this holiday, but do you know who does? Costume shop owners. They have to not only plan for Halloween, but try to figure out what people will be rushing to stores to buy at the last minute. [More]
Still Looking For A Halloween Costume? Here’s One For Just $1.6M
By 10.23.14
Some people might rummage through their closet or head to the local Halloween pop-up store for a clever, or sultry costume to prowl the streets in. But apparently someone might just go a different route, shelling out more money for a costume than many consumers would pay for a house – or two, three, four, five, or more houses. [More]
Company Touts “Ebola Containment Suit” As Literally The Most “Viral” Costume This Halloween
By 10.14.14
Sometimes I like to think that just once there will be a tragic situation that won’t lead to someone trying to make a buck off a serious situation. But hey, it’s Halloween, when sensitivity to world events apparently goes out the window. So why not charge people $79.99 to dress up in an “Ebola Containment Suit”? [More]
Subway: Watch It, Ladies, You Can’t Get Fat Before You Put On That Skimpy Halloween Costume
By 10.3.14
Looking at the array of costumes available to adult women these days, one might think that every profession requires a display of cleavage and enough visible skin to make one fervently hope for a 75-degree night in October in places where it is not 75 degrees in October. The funny thing is, not every gal wants to dress up like a sexy/sassy/foxy mechanic/dentist/ornithologist. Some of us just want to be ornithologists, okay? Seems someone forgot to tell Subway that before it made its new boneheaded Halloween ad. [More]
Hey Kids, Let’s Not Trick-Or-Treat In This Completely Black Bodysuit
By 9.30.14
If there’s one problem with kids, it’s that cars can easily see them and avoid hitting them, especially at night. Wait. That’s wrong. Kids are small and easily overlooked when crossing streets, and never more so than when cloaked completely in black on a dark Halloween night. [More]
Another Beautiful Nightmare Before Christmas Display At Target
By 9.26.14
Every retailer has its own specialty when it comes to holiday mashup decorations. At Hobby Lobby, it’s beautifully decorated evergreen trees with a fall theme. Target has settled on a holiday specialty, and that is “Nightmare Before Christmas” displays that combine elements of the two holidays. We’re pretty sure that it’s accidental, but maybe it’s not. We have to admit, though, when you see these displays in the wild at Target, they sort of work. [More]
Busch Gardens Guests Find Severed Head Halloween Displays A Little Too Timely
By 9.18.14
The terrorist group ISIS (or ISIL) is in the headlines on a daily basis, and the group uses films and displays of their captives’ and opponents’ heads and bodies as a potent weapon. How potent? Complaints from guests led the theme park Busch Gardens to change a Halloween display that features (fake, rubber) severed heads. [More]
I Don’t Want To Dress My 11-Year Old As Sexy Oscar The Grouch For Halloween
By 9.15.14
Last year, we brought the world’s attention to a “Naughty Leopard” costume for toddler girls at Walmart, and the product was eventually pulled from shelves. (To be honest, we were more concerned that it didn’t look like a leopard at all than the costume sexualizing young girls.) Reader Corrie has an 11-year-old daughter who wants to dress up as Oscar the Grouch, though, and she disapproves of the ready-made options. [More]
Back-To-School Halloween Candy Keeps Kids Healthy And Happy
By 8.25.14
Okay, we get that it’s difficult to swap out seasonal sections in retail stores, and that items sell out when we think it might be too “early” for the next holiday to come along. However, Michael spotted an odd combination of one retail “holiday,” back to school season, and the following holiday, Halloween. [More]
Start Decorating For Halloween In Early August Thanks To Dollar Tree
By 8.5.14
It’s the beginning of August, but maybe you like to plan ahead. You’ve already started to stock up on pumpkin spice snacks, and you even picked out your kid’s costume at Costco back in July. The logical next step? It’s time to start shopping for orange decorative lights, streamers, and pumpkin-shaped flashlights for trick-or-treating. At least, that’s what Dollar Tree thinks. [More]
Walmart’s Nightmare Before Christmas: Cereal Edition
By 11.14.13
In practical terms, there isn’t much of a difference between one sugar-coated breakfast grain product and another. There’s even less of a difference between Cap’n Crunch products for different holidays. Somehow, though, we still find this combined cereal display spotted at Walmart just as amusing as an honest-to-Santa Halloween tree. [More]
Inside The Chinese Labor Camp That Made Halloween Decorations Sold At Kmart
By 11.7.13
Last year, reports surfaced of a woman in Oregon who bought Halloween decorations from at Kmart, pulled the unopened package out of storage a year later, and found a letter inside from the factory worker in China who packaged them. This was no lighthearted note. It was a desperate cry for help secretly written at night inside a Chinese labor camp. [More]
