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FRANKENSTORES

The recession hasn't been so scary for Halloween stores. In fact, they're finding better haunts in the graveyards of failed retailers.

The recession hasn't been so scary for Halloween stores. In fact, they're finding better haunts in the graveyards of failed retailers.

The seasonal sellers are taking advantage of the spate of retail bankruptcies and closings to open more - and larger - temporary stores this year in better locations. It adds up to an aggressive bid to capture cautious consumers' dollars in an industry that has grown rapidly over the last decade.

Spirit Halloween has raised 83 former Circuit City stores from the dead, part of the 100 stores it has added to the 625 it had last year.

Other smaller competitors are also taking bigger bites this year: Halloween Express, based in Owenton, Ky., and Halloween Adventure, based in Garnet Valley, Delaware County, have each added about 10 new stores this year.

Because Halloween falls on a Saturday - the best day, according to those in the industry, since more adults throw parties - retailers are hoping for brisk business.

Despite the recession, market research firm IBISWorld Inc. expects 2009 sales for costumes and decor to rise 3 percent, to $3.8 billion, this year compared with a year ago.

Halloween Adventure chief executive officer Joe Purifico confirmed sales were "trending up" as the company headed into this week before Halloween.

But the seasonal retailers - which make about 70 percent of their sales in September and October - face tough competition for market share from lower-priced retailers such as Target Corp. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., so visibility is key.

"The bigger the storefront, the bigger impression you have on the consumer, and that's the big plus," said Spirit Halloween vice president of operations Tony Detzi.

The stores say they are not really spending more on rent - just similar amounts to get better locations.

The Spirit Halloween store on Manhattan's Upper West Side was bustling on a recent afternoon. Children alternately marveled and screamed at the decor on the first floor - including a life-size Michael Myers from Halloween - while shoppers browsed costumes ranging from knights in armor to sexy nurses, most for about $30, on the second floor.

Lucy Mateo, 40, an executive assistant in New York who works nearby, was surprised at the speed with which the vacant Circuit City morphed into Spirit Halloween: "I didn't even know it was under construction."

Empty retail space from the closing of Circuit City and Linens 'n Things, among others, have given the temporary stores plenty to work with.

Suzanne Mulvee, senior economist at Property & Portfolio Research Inc., estimates there is 269 million more square feet in vacant retail space - the equivalent of more than 5,000 full-size Best Buy stores - across the country compared with a year ago. That gives retailers bargaining power, she said.

"A year ago they were in the corner of the mall, where no one went to," she said. "Now, there are all these choices."

Moving into shuttered big-box stores ultimately translates into more dollars for seasonal retailers.

"It helps to make the store more shoppable, there's more floor space to put out all the product that you want and still have enough elbow room for customers," said Halloween Adventure's Purifico.

The average square footage for Halloween Adventure's stores grew from 8,000 to 10,000 this year.

If you try to cram too much into a smaller store, Purifico said, "the store becomes a maze."