Spirit Halloween Has the Best Business Model Going And It's Really Not Even Close

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Ah, fall. 

People that dress like Cons are keeping the economy afloat with their insatiable appetite for pumpkin spice everything. The leaves start changing in Roku City…

And Spirit Halloween stores start popping up in sad, half-empty shopping plazas across the country (if you have a moral compass and shop for Halloween costumes at Goodwill, you can just stop reading now, because this blog isn't for you).

The WSJ recently dropped an "Economics of Spirit Halloween" and it was fucking fascinating…

The company started in 1983 and JUST opened its first ever flagship store in NJ, which I hear is a lot like the Macy's flagship on 34th Street, but much more depressing. Also, I'm pretty sure it used to be The Wiz. Because how weird would it be if it didn't take over a now-defunct brick and mortar for its first permanent location?

And Spirit might have the best business model going. Although it's a private company, rumor has it that it does between $500 and $600 million in sales during the three months that it exists. That's a big chunk of the estimated $10.6 billion Americans will spend on Halloween this year. Especially when you consider Amazon, Target and Costco are its competitors.

Plus it's real estate strategy is brilliant. Buying or leasing retail space all year long in 1,500 locations is expensive as fuck. Just ask Bed Bath & Beyond. You know what isn't? Renting the space for a few months from a desperate landlord who's been trying to find a replacement for a 50,000 square foot lease after Filene's left in like 2005.

The OG Halloween-only retailer, which is often imitated, never duplicated (we see you, Party City, and your pathetic knock off, Halloween City) is about to have even more options. You see, a recession, which some say we're currently in, or, at the very least, hurdling towards, is marked by bankruptcies. Translation? Next year Spirit Halloween is going to be driving the US economy.

But it's the intangibles that have truly made Spirit an institution…

Spirit has been memed into the very fabric of American culture (or internet culture at least). It has become ubiquitous with failure or demise. As soon as something bad happens to an institution, pictures of it with a Spirit Halloween banner draped across the front start making the internet rounds. Buckingham Palace, the Mets and pretty much every retailer not called Amazon have all gotten the Spirit meme treatment, because, the internet remains undefeated.

And don't for a second think Spirit isn't aware of its place atop the food chain. The company dropped a full length movie about a group of kids that get locked inside a Spirit Halloween for a night starring Christopher Lloyd from 'Back to the Future' (not gonna lie, I kinda assumed he was dead) and Rachael Leigh Cook from 'She's All That.' I didn't actually watch it, but I can imagine it can't be worse than 'Hocus Pocus 2' (do better, Disney).

Happy Spooktober to those who celebrate.

BTW, Large and I host a twice weekly markets and money podcast called The Family Office. We talked more about Spirit on today's show.