Halloween takes over thrift stores

Ezekiel La Mantia
Social Media Editor

Working in retail, means working the Halloween rush. Starting early August and running all the way through the end of October, no cashier is spared from spider webs and fake blood. 

Abandoned buildings getting turned into Halloween super stores is a common occurrence leading up to the spooky holiday. Old mattress store and sports merch stores are cleaned and decorated to the nines and used for the short amount of time that Halloween shopping occurs. Once Nov. 1, hits the stores are cleaned out and what didn’t sell is packaged and sits awaiting to be used the next year. 

“Halloween at Savers is our main event of the year. We take all year long prepping for it, ordering costumes, making sure they’re the latest and updated costumes. We have the largest display of any department store world wide,” community donation center manager Belinda Butler said.

Savers Thrift Store is a global chain that sells second hand clothes and goods. It’s also known as Value Village, but in St. Louis, Savers is the name used. Every August Savers undergoes a makeover of spooky decor in preparations for the momentus holiday. 

Not only does Savers have Halloween decor, but it has new and used costumes out. The team members completely flip their store and become dedicated to selling Halloween items and helping customers find the perfect costumes. Savers management even turn some of its employees into strictly costume consultants/ Halloween workers in charge of organizing and maintaining the new products for the scary upcoming event. 

“It’s kinda weird. Normally we just have thrift stuff, but now we actually have Savers brand costumes from corporate here,” Savers employee Danny Chura said.

Savers takes so much time and energy preparing and building up excitement in patrons that anyone who’s ever been to savers knows of its sale and holiday prep.

“I’ve been going to Savers for a couple years now, and I’ve never really seen adds outside of signs or you know just around, but lately I’ve been hearing on my Spotify Savers ads advertising for Halloween, and so I think it’s a seasonal thing here,” customer Amy Griesedieck said.

Zeke La Mantia – Social Media Editor This is Zeke La Mantia’s first year on with Echo publications.  He has earned multiple awards for his photographic contributions.