Spirit Halloween, the seasonal retail operation that is part of Spencer Gifts, will be testing ten Spirit Christmas stores later this year and if you think it’s such a good idea it’s maybe because you’ve seen it before.
As much as just about everybody in the business press – not to mention the New York Times, the New York Post and Fast Company — treated this as a first-time-ever thing, the fact is that this is at least the second or third time Spencer has tested a Christmas holiday pop-up operation, going back to its original owners as well as under its current ownership and management. (And kudos to analyst Neil Saunders for getting it right.)
Besides showing forgetful (or worse, lazy) reporting on the part of most journalists covering the retail sector, the Spirit news is a great example of a good retailer continuing to find ways to expand their business. One has to think the company is still evaluating whether this concept works as it is nearly 20 years since the last time they tried it, back in 2006.
Spencer does an amazing job with its Halloween business, opening up more than 1,500 locations a year: leasing spaces, hiring workers, bringing in merchandise and then running them non-stop for about two months before packing up what’s left, handing back the keys to the landlord and going back to its core business for the rest of the year.
That core business is of course the 670 or so Spencer-branded stores that are open all year round, selling a crazy mix of novelties (for kids and adults), t-shirts, key chains, posters and other assorted merchandise some of which defies description. Privately owned, Spencer doesn’t release any financial details but is understood to be successful and profitable according to informed sources.
Spirit Halloween’s founder and original owner tested Christmas stores in 1990, according to upstate New York radio station WRRV, extending its seasonal leases into November and December. It quotes founder Joseph Marver saying, “The Christmas stores were just something I had to try since it wasn’t difficult to add another two month to our three month lease. It seemed like a no brainer.”
The radio station says the Christmas Spirit stores were discontinued “at some point,” but when Spencer bought the Spirit business in 1999 it decided to resurrect the idea and tested the concept in 2005 and 2006. It is believed it has not tried the format since.
This time around it is testing ten locations, near its southern New Jersey corporate offices as well as in upstate New York and Pennsylvania. Let’s make sure we keep all of this in the proper context. Christmas is very different than Halloween and the competition is much more intense. This is just ten stores we’re talking about too, so it’s not going to move the needle in a big way one direction or another. Whatever the outcome, credit to Spencer for trying this. Too many retailing businesses are afraid to take any risks and do something different. Playing it safe is just playing around.
Spencer itself likes this whole idea . “Spirit Christmas is a new concept for us, and we’re hopeful it will resonate with our customers,” Kym Sarkos, Spirit’s executive vice president, said in a statement quoted in the Times. Customers, she said, will be able to wander through a “life-sized gingerbread village, where you can mail your letter to Santa at the North Pole and find out whether you’ve been naughty or nice.”
With this new test, it will also be Spencer deciding if this retail concept is naughty or nice.
WarrensReport 