Brewing up insights: Turning Halloween buzz into actionable data

Every October, some brands go all-in on Halloween, rolling out limited-edition products and playful campaigns that fill social feeds with spooky cheer. But while much of the focus goes into creating the buzz, fewer brands stop to ask: What can we learn from it?

Behind every viral costume or pumpkin-flavored craze lies a cauldron filled to the brim with consumer insights. The way people talk about Halloween and the products they reach for all reveal powerful clues about what drives purchase intent and emotional connections.

So how can brands turn that short-lived surge of attention into lasting strategic value?

The answer lies in treating Halloween not just as a marketing moment but as an opportunity to learn more about your consumers’ behavior. By analyzing the right data, brands can uncover insights that extend far beyond spooky season, fueling smarter creative and product decisions all year long.

In this article, I’ll get into the power of seasonal moments and tips to turn these moments into long-term learnings, as well as some examples of brands who use insights to win at Halloween and beyond.

Seasonal moments like Halloween offer a rare opportunity to see consumers’ emotional drivers in action. 

It’s one of the few times of year when shoppers behave less rationally — spending on fun, nostalgia or impulse. That makes it an ideal testing ground for understanding what motivates purchase behavior and brand affinity.

Take Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte phenomenon. While it started as a seasonal product, Starbucks used the data generated from early launches, such as social chatter, sales spikes and even geographic engagement, to refine its limited-time strategy. Now, each year’s return of the PSL isn’t just a product launch, it’s a brand ritual.

Or consider Reese’s Halloween campaigns. By tracking which limited-edition shapes (bats, pumpkins, ghosts, etc) drive the most engagement and sales, the brand learns what kind of novelty actually excites fans. Those learnings inform broader innovation plans, guiding flavor extensions and year-round product designs.

We’ll get more into the examples later on, but in short, while the buzz is fun, it’s the data underneath that’s gold. So what should you keep in mind to get the most out of your Halloween initiatives? 

The challenge is that Halloween buzz can be messy. Social mentions spike and short-term sales blur into the holiday season. To turn that chaos into clarity, brands need a plan to categorize and connect data across sources.

Here’s four quick tips on how to brew insights that last even longer than candy corn:

1. Listen early and often

Social listening can identify emerging trends before they hit shelves, like rising chatter around nostalgic costumes or non-traditional treats. Spotting these shifts early gives brands a head start on next year’s creative or product strategy.

2. Test ideas while sentiment is hot

Tools for rapid creative or concept testing let brands validate new campaign ideas inspired by what’s trending in real time. Ideally, you’d start testing with consumers from the start, but if your Halloween ad unexpectedly takes off, test variations to understand why. Was it the humor, the characters, the timing, the theme?

3. Connect short-term buzz to long-term behavior

Pair campaign engagement metrics with brand tracking data to see if seasonal participation actually lifts brand affinity or consideration. For example, if your Halloween campaign drove a 15% spike in brand awareness, did that carry into November?

4. Feed learnings back into planning

The best brands treat Halloween like a live experiment. They use what they learn, from creative themes that resonate to audience segments that engage, to shape year-round strategies. By connecting your insights into learnings over time, you gain a greater understanding of what your consumer likes, wants or needs — which only sets you up for success for your campaigns to come. 

Let’s take a deeper look into some brands who connect insights to get the most out of Halloween:

Heinz Ketchup

A few years ago, Heinz released a limited-edition product called “Tomato Blood” ketchup, complete with a Halloween-themed label and a quirky campaign involving a fictional vegetarian vampire named Toby.

The campaign turned seasonal novelty into an ongoing brand asset, generating ~457 million earned impressions and a 12.5% increase in ketchup sales. By tracking engagement and testing consumer sentiment, Heinz discovered that playful horror resonates with its younger audiences. Now “Tomato Blood” returns each year with new twists. 

🎃 Insight takeaway: Heinz used the seasonal moment as a testing ground, learning that fun packaging + cultural tie-ins led to measurable lift. They treated Halloween as a data opportunity, not just creative flash.

Spirit Halloween

We can’t talk about Halloween without mentioning Spirit! Spirit Halloween thrives on understanding consumer sentiment. Its marketing team closely monitors search trends and social buzz to decide which costume themes and decor items to highlight each year. 

For instance, in 2024, Spirit capitalized on Barbiecore and nostalgic horror themes after noticing early spikes in search data. Beyond inventory planning, the brand uses insights to localize store layouts and digital ads — ensuring each region sees the costumes and decor most relevant to its shoppers’ tastes. It’s a perfect example of how insights can make even a pop-up retailer feel hyper-personalized.

🎃  Insight takeaway: Spirit Halloween shows how using consumer data can turn a seasonal retail pop-up into a hyper-personalized experience, boosting both relevance and sales during a brief but crucial period for the brand.

M&Ms

M&M’s is a master of using pop culture insights to fuel its seasonal campaigns. In 2023, the brand launched limited-edition Halloween packs featuring popular characters and memes inspired by online fan chatter. 

The brand’s insights team uses consumer insights and social listening tools to identify rising Halloween themes — from nostalgic 2000s references to spooky humor — and translates them into creative packaging and influencer collaborations. This also includes experiential activations such as M&M’s “Halloween Rescue Squad” where the brand offers free candy delivery to households that run out of candy on Halloween night.

The result is campaigns that feel perfectly “of the moment,” keeping the brand top-of-mind (and top-of-basket) during the biggest candy seasons of the year.

🎃  Insight takeaway: M&M’s doesn’t just ride the seasonal wave, they use the moment to test product innovations, generate high-impact activations and embed consumer insights (like the fear of running out of candy) into campaign designs.

Target

Target uses real-time insights to test and refine Halloween product assortments every year. By analyzing purchase patterns, social engagement, and more, Target identifies which costumes, decor and candies will perform best regionally. 

In 2024, for instance, early in-store insights and website analytics highlighted a growing demand for retro 90s costumes, allowing Target to adjust shipments and marketing messaging quickly.

🎃 Insight takeaway: Target demonstrates how combining real-world sales data with consumer behavior allows retailers to make timely merchandising decisions, turning seasonal experimentation into predictive insights that inform future planning.

Each of these brands treats Halloween not as a one-off moment, but as an informative,  data-driven playground for understanding evolving tastes and cultural cues.

Halloween might come once a year, but the learnings it offers can last all year long. Whether you’re testing creative or refining your product mix, the key is to look beyond the moment and translate seasonal reactions into strategic insights.

When you mix the right ingredients, you can turn Halloween buzz into a year-round advantage. After all, great marketing isn’t about chasing trends. It’s about understanding why they catch fire and using those insights to shape what comes next.