Halloween's Chocolate Slump: Higher Prices, Fewer Buyers

Oct 31

Halloween chocolate sales fell $33.1 million, the steepest drop in at least three years, as candy prices ran 15.3% above last year and gas topped $4.

Published October 31, 2026. Facts current as of October 31, 2026.

Tonight, somebody's porch light stays off. Across the country, people who used to buy the big bag of full-size bars are standing in the candy aisle doing math. A 100-piece bag now averages $16.96, up 71 percent since 2021, according to FinanceBuzz. One Utah woman told reporters she thought about turning off the light and ignoring the doorbell. Down here, it costs $4 a gallon to drive to the store to buy that bag. The chocolate makers noticed. Hershey's chief executive, Kirk Tanner, said the company needed shoppers to "show up" in the last days before Halloween. Many did not. They bought the small bag, or the gummies, or nothing. And a growing number of them now take a weekly shot that makes a candy bar a lot less tempting.

The Ledger

Row	Entry	Source	Label
SAID	"When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on day one." Donald Trump, Bedminster, N.J., August 15, 2024, standing beside a table of groceries.	Scripps/ABC Action News	Documented, Tier 1
DID	Imposed emergency tariffs in 2025 (struck down 6-3 by the Supreme Court on Feb. 20, 2026); replaced them with a 10% global tariff (Feb. 24 to July 24) and then 10% to 12.5% Section 301 tariffs on 60 economies (July 24 to now). Exempted cocoa from tariffs in late 2025. Launched strikes on Iran on Feb. 28, 2026; the Strait of Hormuz has been largely shut since.	Morgan Lewis; Honigman; States Newsroom	Documented, Tier 2
RESULT	Halloween candy up 15.3% year over year (NielsenIQ prices, week ending Oct. 3). Grocery prices up 3.4% from January 2025 through August 2026. Gas at $4.29 nationally (Oct. 25), the highest ever for autumn; Florida $4.11, up $1.19 from a year ago. Consumer sentiment at 46.3 in early October, near the all-time low of 44.8 set in May.	Supermarket News; CNN; AAA; Trading Economics	Documented (prices, gas, sentiment); Reported (candy analysis)
RESULT (sales)	Halloween chocolate sales down $33.1 million in the nine weeks ending Oct. 17, all of it milk chocolate. Hershey's price added about 11 points to quarterly sales while volume fell about 10 points.	Reuters via Idaho Business Review; Hershey 8-K	Reported; Documented (Hershey filing)
GAP	Promised lower prices on day one; 21 months later candy is up 15.3% in a year, groceries are up 3.4% and gas is above $4.		Facts Documented; how much is tariffs vs. cocoa vs. war is Disputed

What you need to know

Almost all cocoa comes from West Africa, and bad harvests drove cocoa to a record near $12,000 a metric ton in 2024. It has since fallen below $3,000. Candy makers locked in their cocoa costs months ahead, so today's bars were often made with expensive beans. Tariffs hit other inputs, like packaging and sugar-based ingredients. The Supreme Court ruled in February that the president's emergency tariffs were illegal, and companies have started getting refunds.

The Bag Got Smaller

NIQ data analyzed by Reuters shows small-pack Halloween candy sales rose 24 percent in dollars this season. Every larger size declined. That is a household budget at work. The University of Michigan's current-conditions index fell to 44.7 in early October, the lowest reading on record, and buying conditions for big purchases also hit a record low. Year-ahead inflation expectations stood at 4.7 percent in the final October survey. Halloween is the first holiday of the spending season. If people are trading down on candy, retailers are watching what that says about Christmas.

The Price That Didn't Come Down

Cocoa has dropped by roughly three-quarters from its peak. Shelf prices have not. The Groundwork Collaborative and The Century Foundation found Mondelez's gummy variety pack up 39 percent in a year, Hershey's seasonal peanut butter cups up 23 percent and Ferrero's chocolate packs up nearly 19 percent. Hershey's own filing shows how the math worked: in North America confectionery, price added about 13 points while volume fell about 11. Segment income still rose 66 percent, to $949.7 million. The company also lowered its 2026 organic sales growth target to about 3 percent and booked tariff refunds that added roughly 22 cents a share to its earnings outlook. Wells Fargo's David Branch expects consumer price increases to slow significantly early next year.

The Gas Tank and the Candy Bowl

Gas is the other bill everyone sees. The national average was $4.29 on October 25, and AAA called autumn prices the highest on record. Before the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, Brent crude sat just above $70. Within days it passed $100, and it was nearing $100 again in mid-October. Florida drivers paid $4.11 a gallon on October 18, $1.19 more than a year earlier. Every extra dollar at the pump is a dollar not spent at Publix, and candy is the easiest thing to drop from the cart.

The Shot That Changed the Snack Aisle

GLP-1 drugs like Wegovy and Zepbound cut appetite, and cravings for sweets go with it. About 1 in 9 American adults reported using one in 2025, according to RAND. The Trump administration made them cheaper: a November 2025 deal with Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk set TrumpRx cash prices starting around $350 a month and opened Medicare coverage in mid-2026 with a $50 copay for qualifying patients. Reuters names GLP-1 drugs and the administration's "Make America Healthy Again" push as forces driving healthier Halloween choices. Hershey says gum and mint sales have actually risen with GLP-1 use. Its Ice Breakers brand grew 8 percent in the first quarter. Mondelez is buying Undercover Snacks, a chocolate-coated quinoa crisp. The big companies are betting on smaller, "better-for-you" treats. In plain terms, the same White House that promised cheaper candy also made the drug that makes people want less of it cheaper.

Their side

The administration exempted cocoa from tariffs and points to the GLP-1 price deal as a cost-of-living win; Trump has said grocery prices "have come way down." Industry voices argue cocoa, not policy, drove most of the chocolate price spike, and that most bars on shelves this fall were made from beans bought near the peak. Economists also note that gas prices follow global crude, which the Iran war, not a domestic decision alone, pushed past $100. Defenders of the tariffs say they bring factories home. FMNN did not send a right-of-reply request to the White House, Hershey or Mondelez before publication; this is on the hold list.

The dispute

How much of the candy price rise comes from tariffs versus cocoa costs is argued. Groundwork Collaborative says prices stayed high after the cocoa exemption and that margins rose. Hershey says commodity and tariff costs drove earlier price increases. FMNN's answer: the cocoa price fell by about three-quarters and shelf prices did not, so the record does not support "it's all cocoa."

Voices of Resistance

The quiet protest this year is the porch light. Shoppers searching for "cheap Halloween candy bulk" rose more than 5,000 percent, FinanceBuzz reports. Families are handing out fewer pieces, choosing smaller bags or skipping the night entirely. It costs them a tradition.

Reading the Pattern

The official story. The president says grocery prices "have come way down"; federal price data show they rose 3.4 percent on his watch.
Too late, too little. Cocoa got a tariff exemption and companies got tariff refunds, but shoppers have not seen candy prices come back down.

Who Carried the Story

Reuters, owned by Thomson Reuters, broke the NIQ sales numbers; it ran in regional business papers such as the Idaho Business Review. The 15.3 percent price figure came from two progressive policy groups, Groundwork Collaborative and The Century Foundation, and was carried by Supermarket News and Scripps. CNN, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, ran the grocery-price fact check. Most coverage treated candy as a seasonal shopping story. Few outlets tied it to gas, tariffs and the weight-loss drug deal in the same piece. (Owner facts: Reported.)

Closing

Tonight the kids will still come. Some will get one fun-size bar instead of two. Some will get pretzels. And some porches will stay dark, not because nobody's home, but because the math didn't work. Day one was supposed to fix that.

Disclosure: FMNN's publisher owns Eat This Dessert First, a Tampa Bay dessert maker.

Notes and sources

Corrections log

None as of October 31, 2026.

EconomyTariffsGLP-1

Joseph Jackson