Halloween is one of the spendiest holidays of the year next to Christmas! According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), in 2010, consumers are planning on spending over $5.7 billion on Costumes, Candy, Decorations and Greeting Cards. That breaks down to approximate spending of $66.28 per person nationally. According to the Halloween_2010 NRF Survey, consumer spending will be approximately $23.32 per person for costumes, $20.29 for candy, and $18.66 for decorations, and more adults than ever (40%) plan to dress up this year for Halloween.

So, $66.28 per person… for my family, a family of 4, that would add up to $265.12. This year, neither I nor my husband are going to be dressing up… So, to be fair, we’ll omit 2 people worth of costumes from the total bringing our family total to $218.48. I’m going to show you how you can do Halloween for $100 just by going to Walmart.

First we have our girls’ Halloween costumes. Beauty and the Beast was just released on Blu-Ray, so Belle is very popular with the younger girls. One of my girls chose to be Belle this year, and we found her costume at Walmart for $19 add in a set of leggings for $2.98. My other daughter saw the wall of petticoat skirts, wings and accessories and wanted to dress up as a Pumpkin Fairy. We got her skirt for $5, Wings for $5, Accessory bundle including a tiara, jewelry & wand for $5, Black and Orange Leggings for $2.50 and found a cute orange T-Shirt with a Jack-o’lantern face on it for $4.98. Total in costumes for two: $44.46.

Decorations… Well, that’s where we got a little spendy, but not too bad. I bought a gravestone set where one of them lights up for $15, a noisy animated Grim Reaper for $10, a light up ghost for the window for $5, spider webs were $2 per bag. I grabbed 3. I bought a pack of plastic spider rings to go on the spider webs for $2. There’s 100 rings in the pack, so plenty to go around. I also bought a couple of the light sticks and necklaces for my girls for $1 a piece- $4, and a pumpkin carving set.. the biggest set they had geared towards pumpkin carving parties for only $6. I figured with 4 of us carving pumpkins, we needed enough tools to go around. Total in Decorations: $48

I bought candy at $2 per bag, and got 6 bags of candy! This isn’t the no name candy either! I got Starburst, AirHeads, LifeSaver Gummies and DumDum Lollipops–  so, $12 TOTAL in candy!

Total spending for a family of four this year $104.46 … That’s WAY under the $218.48 estimated by the NRF! Not bad!

I think I might have waited too long to shop this year though, because the decorations seemed like they were pretty bought up. I hate it when I procrastinate! I’m going to run to my other Walmart this weekend to see if there’s anything else I can get there to add to the decor! I’ll update you next week on that!

I am a participant in the Walmart Moms program. Join me and my fellow Walmart Moms  as we try to have the best Halloween for less at Walmart. Walmart has provided me with compensation to blog about Halloween Savings at Walmart.  Participation in this program is voluntary. As always, all opinions are my own.