Each year, food brands summon up a host of novelty offerings in the festive Halloween spirit. This year’s rollouts of NPD include blood curdling ketchup, zombie breakfast cereal and alcoholic spirits imbued with the paranormal activity of the US’ most infamous haunted houses.

Kroger Co. shared insights on the US market’s favorite candies heading into the Halloween season. The supermarket chain anticipates shoppers will again reach for Hershey’s Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups to fill their baskets more than any other candy this Halloween.

“We expect our shoppers will purchase more than 11.5 million bags of fun sized candy – 7.6 million pounds of chocolate – to celebrate the season and make it a memorable experience,” comments Carlo Baldan, Kroger Co. VP of Center Store Merchandising.

The grocer revealed that Monster Bags (variety bags) account for 40% of all Halloween candy sales. The top-selling Halloween bag is made by Hershey’s and contains Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Kit Kat Bars, Heath Bars, Whoppers, Milk Duds and Rolos.

In order to imbue the bottles with legitimate spookiness, Harridan had them rested for seven nights in three of the US’ most well-known haunted houses (Credit: Harridan).Spooky beverages
The beverage category holds the highest share of new F&B launches at 63%, according to Innova Market Insights data. With the haunting season in full effect, US distiller Harridan Vodka has unveiled a Halloween-themed “Paranormal Reserve.” The limited-edition vodka is being offered in a total of just 60 bottles, making it an exceptionally rare collector’s item.

In order to imbue the bottles with legitimate spookiness, Harridan had them rested for seven nights in three of the US’ most well-known haunted houses: the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum, Farm on Round Top Road and Villisca Axe Murder House.

Pre-mixed cocktail brand Funkin launched a Spiced Rum Zombie, which landed in Sainsbury’s in early October. The 5% ABV tipple is suitable for vegans and made with pineapple juice and spiced rum for a “vibrant flavor.” It is also infused with nitrogen to achieve a “velvety texture and smooth head,” describes the brand.

Fall flavor trends are making a splash in beverages, with spirits brand Burrell’s transformed its Burrell’s Dry Gin into an “autumnal classic,” with a carefully perfected blend of spices including cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves and vanilla – essentially a “pumpkin pie without the crust.”

A limited-edition launch for Día de los Muertos, Tom Savano has given a twist on its margarita brand by infusing the packaged cocktail with artisanal mezcal for extra smokiness, and hand-infused scotch bonnet chili.

Monster Energy drink, true to its brand name, launched a Mango Loco Energy Plus variety of its beverage, in an electric blue can decorated with skeletons. A&W Root Beer, Sunkist Orange Soda and 7Up each released versions of their popular drinks in Halloween-styled packaging.

Food fright
Heinz is returning Heinz Tomato Blood Ketchup for the spooky season. The “tomato-gore-filled” limited edition bottle features the classic Heinz Ketchup. As the creepy condiment returns to tables this season, Heinz enlisted the help of Toby, a proclaimed “vegetarian vampire influencer.”

In the frozen meats aisle, Tyson is introducing Spooky Nuggets based on its original chicken nuggets recipe. The limited-edition Halloween chicken nuggets come in three shapes: pumpkins, bats and ghosts.

Other frozen treats include Iceland’s Scarily Sweet Spiders Web Strawberry Cheesecake, which is a cream cheese mousse topped with strawberry sauce in the style of a spider web, on a biscuit base.

Among confectionery launches, Hershey’s Kisses unveiled its Vampire individually milk chocolates filled with strawberry flavored cream. Meanwhile, Reese’s debuted its Peanut Butter Pumpkins – a pumpkin-shaped take on its classic peanut butter cups – alongside its White Peanut Butter Ghosts that are a peanut butter treat blanketed in white chocolate cream coating.

For vegan trick-or-treaters, Dandies is offering pumpkin-flavored plant-based marshmallows made with no artificial flavors, colors, corn syrup, gelatin or gluten. The marshmallows are also kosher and made with non-gmo ingredients.

In the cereal aisle, Kellogg’s released Frosted Flakes Chocolate Cereal with Spooky Marshmallows, which take on the form of pink, white and green ghouls and bats. Franken Berry, a berry flavored breakfast cereal with monster shapes, debuted under General Mills.

Trick or trash
With Americans projected to spend US$10.6 billion on Halloween this year alone, as cited by U.S. Packaging & Wrapping, Halloween is big business.

But the issue of Halloween waste growing to monstrous proportions is something that neither consumers nor businesses can ignore.

Beyond discarded costumes and decorations, candy wrappers present an even bigger waste problem. The majority are made with mixed materials, usually plastic and aluminum, making them unrecyclable. 

For those that are recyclable, their size makes them more complex to recycle than larger conventional plastic – only 5% of which is recycled in the US – meaning most wrappers, recyclable or not, will end up in landfill.

And with consumers predicted to spend US$3.1 billion on Halloween candy this year – the highest amount ever – and few candy companies offering sustainable packaging options, the projected impact Halloween has on the environment is pronounced.

Teaming up with digital waste and recycling solutions provider Rubicon Technologies, Mars has rolled out an initiative to minimize wrapper waste this Halloween season. The confectionery giant will offer specially designed, recyclable, trick-or-treating bags throughout October as an expansion of Rubicon’s existing Trick or Trash campaign. 

The collaboration aims to give trick-or-treaters a simple and direct way to tackle wrapper waste by providing trick-or-treat bags with a prepaid postage stamp and simple three-step instructions on how to return it for proper recycling.

once returned, each individual bag and the wrappers placed inside are fully recycled for future use.

Frightful fruit platter
Dole has unearthed its most popular Halloween recipes, serving suggestions and digital downloads from the past year, and has combined these with new-for-2022 dishes and interactive party ideas in the launch of its Healthy Halloween Recipe and Resource Page.

The Dole Healthy Halloween Recipe and Resource Page has been created for universal appeal. Highlights include two new recipes – Spooky Halloween Fruit Platter and The Witching Hour Fro-Whip, an all-purple take on the Dole Whip created in honor of Disney’s Hocus Pocus 2.

Other recipes include the Spooky Movie Viewing Party featuring the “Frightfully Fresh Fruit and Veggies Touch Game.” This comprises peeled grapes for “eyeballs,” dried apricot slices for “witches’ ears,” steamed cauliflower for “brains,” bananas sliced lengthwise for “vampire tongues” and mushrooms cut in half for “zombie noses.”