Although Halloween lands on Oct. 31, the festivities start much before. Whether it is putting up haunted inflatables or ordering costumes, Halloween is more than just a one-night holiday. While Halloween is seen as a fun and harmless holiday, behind the scenes it is not all Snickers and Twix. It is destroying the environment one wrapper at a time.
Especially in South Florida where we do not experience the chilly fall weather that is usually associated with Halloween, inflatable decorations still cast their scary spells over the streets. According to Women’s Wear Daily, in 2024, Americans spent over four billion dollars on Halloween decorations, with the majority being inflatables. Although these decorations keep the streets spooky, large inflatables can use up to 2,000 watts of electricity. This impact grows even more because they are usually kept running 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for at least a month. That is enough electricity to power dozens of light bulbs all month long.
“My favorite part of Halloween is putting up all the fun inflatables with my family. My mom goes crazy every year with fairy lights and a six-foot skeleton,” sophomore Jazmin Martinez said.
The unintentional horrors of Halloween continue with the use of costumes. According to the National Retail Federation, over $1.4 billion will be spent on children’s Halloween costumes in 2025. The most popular costumes continue to be Spider-Man, princesses, witches, ghosts and other superheroes. According to the Public Interest Research Group, an estimated 30 million children’s costumes are thrown away each year. While children often wear full costumes purchased from big box stores or online, adults showcase their style by assembling outfits from fast fashion sites. From Edikted to Amazon, many of these items are made with low-quality synthetic materials and are often thrown away after only one wearing.
“This year I decided to use things in my closet for my Halloween costume. I was Lara Croft, which just consisted of khaki shorts and a white tube top,” freshman Isabella Mora said.
According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, approximately 92 million tons of textile waste from fast fashion ends up in landfills each year. This is the equivalent of a garbage truck full of clothes being dumped every second of every hour of every day. Instead of adding to this waste, students can reuse clothes they already have or host a costume swap with friends to make Halloween more sustainable.
Candy is another part of Halloween that has a big impact. Americans eat over 600 million pounds of candy each Halloween. This is the equivalent of 16 billion fun-sized Snickers bars or 158 trillion kernels of candy corn. In 2024, the average American spent over $31 on Halloween candy alone. Most candy wrappers are made of mixed materials, which include plastic, paper and metal, making them nearly impossible to recycle or compost. Even those that are recyclable often slip through waste sorting machines because of their small size.
“My favorite Halloween candy is Twix. I never think about how wasteful the wrappers are,” sophomore Sophie Space said.
While it might seem small, people can make a big difference by properly throwing away candy wrappers or recycling them through programs like TerraCycle. Choosing candy in cardboard boxes or bringing a reusable bag for trick-or-treating are also easy ways to make the holiday less wasteful.
“I have never thought of the effects of having candy wrappers on Halloween. I will reduce the amount of candy I eat this year,” sophomore Milo Marteau said.
For this Halloween, the scariest thing is not the creepy ghost that is haunting rooms or the horror film with the boney zombies. It is the tremendous negative environmental impact of this holiday on the planet. Even a little awareness and action can make Halloween less frightening for the Earth.
