The growing popularity of Halloween
in the UK and worldwide
 
It's that time of year again in the United States for Halloween and kids Halloween costumes. There it is a multi-billion dollar industry, but do other countries celebrate this holiday like it is in the United States? Sure they do, just some don't celebrate it the same way or time as they do.
There are other western countries that celebrate or embrace various versions of this frightful holiday. These countries include the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, Sweden, Puerto Rico, Japan, and some parts of Australia.
Halloween in the United Kingdom
The celebration of Halloween in Ireland and Scotland isn't much of a surprise since Ireland celebrated has Halloween for centuries.
It all started with the practice of carving and lighting of Jack-o'-Lanterns made out of turnips or potatoes to scare away an evil spirit by the name of "Stingy Jack." Stingy Jack while alive had played too many tricks on the devil. So when he died, heaven didn't want him and neither did the devil so he was doomed to wander the Earth for all eternity. But he didn't want to do it in the dark so the devil gave him a coal from hell and Jack put that coal in a turnip he had carved out, to light his way. Soon people made their own Jack-o-lanterns to scare away Jack's ghost.
But it wasn't until the Irish and Scots came to the United States bringing Halloween with them that the United States started to celebrate Halloween. But being in the United States, where pumpkins are plentiful and much bigger than turnips, that it made carving Jack-o-Lanterns much easier so that is how the carving of pumpkins came to being.
In recent times cities in Ireland like Derry in Northern Ireland or Dublin that the industries are really starting to grow as they decorate more and more, light fireworks outdoors and having parades.
The Scots on the other hand were the ones that started the trick or treat tradition believing that youngsters can put pranks that night and not be punished for because the pranks could be blamed on spirits being mischievous. From there it spread to the United States and from there to Canada.
Canada's customs mimics the United States from the costumes and trick or treating to carving out of Jack-o-Lanterns.
The Halloween market is growing exponentially in the UK and exceeded sales of £160m in 2007. The UK market has been growing at an average rate of over 50% since 2003 and is now the third most lucrative trading period for retailers after Christmas and Easter. The Halloween market is now bigger than both Bonfire Night and Valentine's Day. But the Halloween industry is still the greatest in the United States, where it is second only to Christmas in sales. The Halloween industry generates more than 6 billion dollars in sales and only one third of that is sweets.
With the availability of the internet as a Halloween shopping spot, Halloween is gaining popularity throughout the world. In the United States alone it is estimated about six percent of people alone will do majority of their Halloween shopping online.
This is an original news article © The Kids Window
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