Update on Halloween Merchandise
As of tonight, August 31, Michael’s has only a small amount of Halloween merchandise out, including maybe half of the Lemax Spookytown 2021 line. At Home is also far behind in stocking for Halloween, with maybe a third as much Halloween merchandise on shelves as usual. Spirit is doing a better job, but they are also planning to put out more merchandise throughout September. Some Spirit stores have more than others, but none have their full line of animatronics, or movie related merchandise. Spirit has a lot of Sam Trick r Treat items this year, with more coming in through September. I will stopping by Home Depot and Lowes tomorrow, so I will post another update.
Update 9/2. Home Depot has just begun to put out Halloween merchandise. Lowes has put out most of what they have, which is about a fourth of their normal Halloween merchandise.
Update 9/3 According to employees at Michael’s, Spirit, and At Home, the reason stores are so far behind in stocking Halloween merchandise is the massive supply chain problem in California. Most of all Halloween items are made in China, and reach the US through California ports. Those ports have huge backlogs of container ships waiting to be unloaded. It’s possible that more merchandise will reach stores before Halloween. It’s also possible that what is in stores now will be all we get this year.
If you’re wondering, Party City, Target, and grocery stores don’t have much Halloween out until mid September, in a normal year.
The merchandise delays this year are being caused by slowed production and shipping in the Pacific Rim, due to Covid. Production runs many months ahead of the holidays, so most of the 2020 merchandise had been made by the time Covid hit. That’s why 2020 was a fairly normal year for Halloween shopping. The production delays caused by Covid have begun hitting us this year.
