Akron resident Kal Matar was on the hunt for one of this year’s hottest Halloween costumes — Big Bird.
The 23-year-old University of Akron student found a Big Bird-style get-up — not at one of the seasonal, “pop-up” Halloween stores, but at the year-round, 32-year-old Akron Design & Costume.
“You can’t compare a place like this to one of those,” Matar said, clutching the feathery costume he plans to rent for $95.
The outfit, complete with an over-the-head mask, is one of many costumes the store’s owner, Debbie Meredith, has made over the years.
Big Bird is enjoying a surge in popularity this year, after the first presidential debate in which Republican candidate Mitt Romney threatened to cut off government funding for PBS, where the character stars on the Sesame Street show.
Akron Design & Costume, at 3425 Manchester Road, is a survivor, having batted away a frightening mix of the seasonal stores, online competitors and economic downturns.
“I’ll do anything to set myself apart from those 30-day stores,” Meredith said. “We make stuff and find things that others don’t have.”
She motioned to several red capes she had made that morning.
“They’ll be for devils, red riding hoods, phantoms, whatever,” she said, explaining that they’ll go out on the sales floor, along with the numerous commercially made costumes.
Since 2000, Akron Design & Costume has been in a former bowling alley that is actually in Coventry Township.
Shortly after moving in, Meredith decorated the shop’s front with a giant black spider, made with plywood and chicken wire, that stays up all year.
Also year round, customers enter through a dimly lit hallway lined with spider webs and ghoulish mannequins. There are recorded screams.
Inside the store, the slightly claustrophobic feel continues. Walls and floor space are jam-packed with an estimated 5,000 commercially made costumes.
There are also the capes and other items Meredith has made, along with hats, wigs, feather boas, masks (including handmade leather ones), and Halloween decorations and “accessories.” Accessories run the gamut from fake noses and body limbs to faux giraffe tails and bunny ears.
Assistant manger Rob Lehr said a zombie craze has boosted makeup and fake blood sales. The store offers much of each, including Lehr notes, one type of faux blood that runs and another that is more gooey.
Lehr said popular costumes include Batman, along with characters from the Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises. The stripper movie Magic Mike and singer Nicki Minaj, known for her colorful outfits, also are inspiring customers this year.
Tucked in the back of the store are thousands of costumes Meredith and helpers have made for high school, college and church productions, including medieval, Renaissance, and Victorian styles galore.
They’re available for rent for Halloween, along with many of the big-headed mascot outfits Meredith has made. There are dogs, pigs and other animal mascots, along with a pizza slice made for pizza shops, a sun for tanning salons and a molar for dentists. Meredith is known locally for creating the Akron Aeros and Akron Racers mascots.
One day last week, Akron Design & Costume was bustling with shoppers. Still, Meredith figures only about 20 percent of her sales are related to Halloween.
The bulk of Meredith’s business is costume rental for theater productions, with orders coming in online from across the country. Wizard of Oz and Beauty and the Beast costumes are among the more frequently ordered.
“We would not exist without the Internet,” she said. “That’s kind of what saved us.” She has 10 full- and part-time workers.
Still, Meredith aims to scare up what Halloween revenues she can, hiring additional part-timers and keeping the store open longer hours.
Halloween sales have been steady the last few years. Meredith said “that’s fabulous” in these days of the pop-ups and chain stores with aisles of Halloween paraphernalia.
Shoppers nationwide are expected to spend $8 billion on Halloween this year, with a record seven in 10 people celebrating the holiday, according to the National Retail Federation.
Individual consumers will spend an average of nearly $80 on costumes, decorations and candy. That’s up from $72.31 last year, the retail federation said.
Taking big slices of the market are the national pop-up store chains, such as Spirit and Halloween City, that temporarily move into vacant retail space.
This year, Spirit, owned by novelty chain Spencer’s of New Jersey, opened about 1,000 stores in the United States and Canada. Spirit spokeswoman Lisa Barr said that’s up from last year. The Halloween City chain, also headquartered in New Jersey, has more than 400 locations this season, according to spokesman Donny Rose.
Halloween City is a sister of the Party City chain, also based in New Jersey.
Another locally owned costume shop, Mr. Fun’s Costumes & Magic Emporium of Cuyahoga Falls, also competes with the chains.
Meredith’s costume career goes back to the late 1970s, when she made some grapes for her own Fruit of the Loom fruit costume.
A friend asked if she could borrow the grapes. Meredith, thinking she had put time and money into the grapes, suggested the friend rent the grapes and the friend obliged. She founded the business as Uncostly Costumes in her home in 1980. The current site is her second location since moving from her basement.
Katie Byard can be reached at 330-996-3781 or kbyard@thebeaconjournal.com.