It’s not just the days that are getting shorter – the amount of time between glimpsing ghouls and buying roof clips for Rudolph is shrinking, too.

Home Depot sold out of its first run of 12-foot holiday skeletons in late July. Target and Walmart are already gearing up for the retail holiday season, and as Amazon prepares its second annual Prime Early Access Sale in October – a 100-million-items-sold e-commerce extravaganza last year – no one is safe from holiday “retail creep.”

The pandemic can’t quite account for the sheer volume of holiday bric-a-brac seen in retailers since the anemic consumer demand of 2020 slowly gave way to increasingly voracious holiday spending in the years since. In 2021, Walmart and Amazon began holiday sales and promotions in October and this year’s Labor Day sales saw several glimpses of snow-capped frivolity for many in-store and online vendors large and small.

“Shoppers plan to celebrate Halloween in a traditional way this year,” said Barbara Connors, VP of strategy and acceleration at 84.51°, to The Food Institute. Per its September Consumer Digest survey, Connors said 34% of consumers won’t cut back on expenses, 36% will cut back on decorations, 32% on costumes, and 27% on beverages.

Among those who celebrate the holidays, more than 20% of consumers have begun planning not only for Thanksgiving but for Christmas as well.

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