Can you guess Colorado’s favorite Halloween candy?
The oft-reviled — yet also beloved — Candy Corn made Instacart’s top 10 list in October 2020, and it was a Colorado favorite that year. Photo by Emily Kemme.
By Emily Kemme
If you’ve ever found yourself pawing through your kid’s bag of Halloween candy in search of that soft, chewy mini-Milky Way bar, it might assuage your guilt if you knew that all you’re doing is answering ancestral urges to feed your inner caveman.
In fact, fattening up with sugar for the lean winter months when food sources were scarce is hard-wired into our genetics. Sugar has also long been used as a preservative because as a curing agent it prevents food from spoiling and hosting food-borne bacteria.
Humans crave sugar and fat because our collective ancestry reminds us we might not be able to find any once the snow begins to fall.
The Industrial Revolution and grocery stores aside, the fact that there’s no snow in Florida on the last night of October doesn’t matter to the candy industry. It just latched onto a good idea when it saw one.
But don’t blame Nestlé for starting it all.
Festivals have been traditionally held in autumn and around harvest time to celebrate the changing seasons and (hopefully) a bounty of food to tide communities over until spring planting.
Halloween’s roots are most closely tied to the 2,000 year old Celtic festival Samhain, a celebratory time of harvest in what is today’s United Kingdom and northern France.
Halloween candy-buying is projected to exceed $3.1 billion in 2022. Which is your favorite? Photo by Emily Kemme)
November 1 (or thereabouts) straddled the autumn equinox and winter solstice seasons and was considered a mystical time between the living and the dead. Celebrants honored ancestors by leaving food called soul cakes outside homes for the dead to spirit away. They lit protective bonfires to ward off harmful ghosts and dressed in costumes constructed from animal hides and heads to disguise themselves in case the ghosts became angry.
Christianity grew in popularity, and by the 7th century Samhain had evolved into celebrations of saints and the dead. Over the millennium, the holiday wore different names, including All Saints’ Day, All Souls’ Day and the evening before that was All Hallows’ Eve.
People went “souling,” leaving small sweetly spiced cakes for the poor in exchange for prayers for the dead, and often dressed up in costumes. Saints, angels and devils were trending themes.
The holiday eventually migrated to America. It also became more secular over time, and trick-or-treating (the former soul cakes) became neighborhood traditions: the treats were handed out to children to prevent the little devils from pranking (or tricking) people.
Candy companies had been trying to entice Americans to pad festivals year-round with sweets, and they hit the jackpot when candy aligned with trick-or-treating.
Families with hard-working parents appreciated the ready-made miniature packages that were easier to hand out at the door than baking labor intensive spice cakes.
Halloween in the United States is a monstrous industry
Candy-buying hovered in the $2 billion dollar range from 2011-2020. After a disruption during the first year of the pandemic, candy spending rocketed up to $3 billion in 2021 and is projected to exceed $3.1 billion this year. According to the National Retail Federation, all spending on Halloween — including costumes for humans and their pets, candy and decorations — is projected to be over $10.6 billion.
It might not surprise you that Americans eat a lot of sweets — and 172 million of us celebrate Halloween. But what you may find astounding are the popular sweets by state.
The NRF report found the top ten candies for Halloween are Reese’s Cups, Skittles, M&M’s, Starburst, Hot Tamales, SourPatch Kids, Hershey Kisses, Snickers, Tootsie Pops and coming in at number ten: candy corn.
Yes, even the oft-reviled syrupy sweet nubbins made the NFR list.
Chocoholic Colorado’s most popular treat hand-outs are Hershey Kisses, M&M’s and Skittles, in that order.
But if you believe Instacart’s October 2020 survey, Colorado’s favorite Halloween treat was candy corn. The grocery delivery app’s top ten ranked candy corn nationally at number 8, and included HARIBO Goldbears at number 10.
If you’re concerned that trick-or-treaters at your doorstep will scowl in disapproval at your candy choices, before you go foraging for sweets this season, play it safe and review CandyStore.com's Worst and Best list for 2022.
It’s true: the candy that most appeals to you is subjective. But keep in mind that when our ancestors were facing down a woolly mammoth, they were armed with their best spear.
Before you stash the haul away until the big night, go ahead and grab a sweet goodie. You can even grab two. You might say eating sugar this time of year is in your bones. After all, winter is coming.