For years now, I’ve been watching most of the trick-or-treaters go to the house on one side of me, take one look at my house and walk right past it, and then go to the house on the other side.
I had no clue why. Maybe they were scared of my house or thought I’d give cheap candy (my house is a bit of a fixer-upper)? I completed my “curb appeal” projects; didn’t help.
Maybe they thought nobody was home? I not only have the porch light on, but also have the living room TV on, clearly visible through the (open!) front window, and it makes no difference.
Maybe they think I’m not participating (despite the clear signal of the porch light and jack-o’-lantern)? I put up a bunch of Halloween decorations this year, and it still didn’t help!
Well, I finally found out the reason, after hearing one kid scouting ahead yelling to tell his friends to skip my house: “there’s no bowl on the porch!”
…You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
Yep, unlike my neighbors, who had apparently just left unattended bowls of candy on their porches, I was actually sitting there inside the house, with the bowl of candy, waiting for kids to knock or ring the doorbell before I opened the door and handed it out. You know, like how trick-or-treating is supposed to work.
This is ridiculous. Kids these days are skipping viable houses with candy because they can’t be bothered to actually knock on the damn door and say “trick or treat” to the person who answers? Residents are expected to be too lazy to answer the door, and just put out the candy without even receiving the traditional threat first? With no actual interaction with the neighbors for the kids to show off their costumes, what’s even the point‽
I finally stuck a sign on the door saying “yes, you have to knock or ring for candy!” and that helped, but even then, some kids are still skipping my house because they apparently can’t be bothered to read the sign.
Do you live in a sketchy area? That hasn’t been my experience at all. We had 90 kids in total knock on our door yesterday for trick or treat!
Leave a bowl out with a sign that says “if the bowl is empty, please knock.” You don’t even have to fill the bowl with anything.
Classic “bait and switch” tactic. Guess OP isn’t an used car’s seller.
hey look buddy I’ve got some amazing advice for OP over here but I had another OP call me 10 minutes ago asking for the exact same advice so I’m gonna need you to make a decision right away.
ONE bag of sprite per child
It’s a holdover from Covid. It isn’t some glaring indictment of “kids these days”. The social contract changed with Covid and will take time to go back or maybe never does.
Yeah, in my area trunk or treat is the main reason for no trick or treaters these days. It’s a very urban area, so getting a lot of candy on foot would be easy, but walking around a parking lot is way quicker. It seems to be what most parents prefer also, so I think it’s here to stay.
I loathe trunk or treat. It’s not the same as trick or treating, it’s cheating. When I was young the only way I got a bunch of candy was to run all over the neighborhood, and then run to the other neighborhoods to squeeze in more. I was out and about, acting the fool, where chicanery abounds. I’d end up at home, exhausted at the end of the night.
Today’s kids walk around a parking lot. It’s just not the same.
When we were kids halloween was the best. As an adult, there was nothing more I looked forward to than handing out candy, seeing costumes, scaring some kids with all my decorations. But now it’s all sanitized and boiled down into the something as ludicrous as walking around a parking lot asking for handouts from cars. What, are they just prepping the nations children for a life of panhandling? Joking aside, it’s just not as fun for anyone involved. I don’t want to drive somewhere and decorate the fucking trunk of my car (especially when I decorated my house already?), and the kids don’t want to walk around a parking lot!
Trunk or treat is the worst solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.
We went to one of the several trunk or treats in our town. I chose one of the less busy ones so my kid could understand what the massive downtown one would be like if she wanted to do that. We waited in line from trunk to trunk for a whole hour, got meh candy, got to get inside emergency vehicles (that was cool), got to see a lot of other people’s costumes (also really fun), but mostly it was waiting. Standing mostly still. And then the advertised time came for it to be over, even as people were still waiting in line, tables and cars all broke down and started leaving us in a sad, barren lot. We went trick or treating for the main event after all, and got excellent candy, saw all kinds of cool houses as we actively walked with a friend for as long as we wanted.
The last time I left a bowl on my porch, literally the first group that came took all the candy and threw the bowl into my lawn. It disincentivized from doing so again.
I did this and they stole the bowl too.
Same, bowl was stolen :( at least they didn’t take the table it was on
I used to live in a townhouse and no one would bother going along the row. Finally we got together with other residents and set up a table in the parking lot next to the street. That was a lot of fun hanging out with the neighbors all evening, handing out candy
Pre-COViD we used to take out the screen in our storm door (and after put in glass for winter). It really freaked some people out when we reached through to hand out candy! Even better when someone didn’t keep a good hold on the dog and he leaped through! Of course today I have a pit bull instead of mini poodle so that wouldn’t go over as well
That’s so weird. When I used to trick-or-treat (not murican so it was different ofc, and also we went to apartment doors instead of houses) I always assumed that if someone had a candy bowl it was just because they weren’t home that night, and I think I preferred it when they answered the door and gave us the candy themselves. It was nice to show off my costume and perhaps even get a compliment from an adult pretending to be scared.
Most of our neighborhood sits outside with the candy and to hang out and see everyone’s costumes. They make it very obvious they’re handing out candy so when it’s knock houses, we’re less likely to go
I sit on the porch with the bowl, it’s nice to see them walking around. It’s easier for both parties, and I can dress up too.
I think it’s because fewer houses are doing it, mostly. But I don’t understand skipping very decorated houses, and honestly wouldn’t leave out a bowl of candy here.
The sitting on the porch thing is traditional here now (my mom sat inside but I’m over 50 now and since being old enough to be on the treating side have always sat out with the candy and that’s more usual as far as I can tell) Though my kids always did go up and try if a light was on outside.
Maybe they are also a little more sensible too, lol - a princess last night looked in the bowl and said, nah there’s nothing I like, happy Halloween. My kids would have taken some anyway and traded it around, but it is always too much by the time they are done.
Overall I agree, they should yell TRICK OR TREAT but am glad nobody is, like egging your house if you don’t have a treat for them.
Everyone in my area stays outside, no matter the weather. No kids knock on any doors. Also, no one leaves out a bowl, that shit would be gone in minutes. But people are outside with portable fire rings, music, some have cocktails for the adults. It’s the only night of the year all of the neighbors are outside and socializing. Honestly it’s great.
I didn’t get a single knock last night.
Spooky decorations, LED candles, WLED providing backup lighting, 12 XL Hershey bars with frozen Snickers as backup.
Not. One. Knock.
Fuck em – we’ll be eating smores all winter. 🤷
I got a knock last night. I had to apologize and say there’s no candy - I don’t live in the US. We have our own similar traditions on St. Martin’s day and St. Catherine’s day. The article for the latter even describes it: Wiki, though for either day you can click on the Estonian Wikipedia article to get a more complete description.
I suppose in the coming years I’ll have to start stocking candy for Halloween too because I don’t really want to disappoint a bunch of kids. Though to be fair, I don’t think they did much trick or treating anyway, they mostly just opened their bag and asked for candy - so it felt kinda lazy. When I was a kid, I remember groups of kids would come knock on our door for either Mardipäev or Kadripäev and they’d usually have something like a song or dance prepared, or at least told us riddles.
In the US all you are supposed to do is Knock and say “Trick or Treat”.
If I were you, just turn the porch light off. Its the universal sign for “Not home/No candy”
I moved to this place 2 years ago starting a lease on November 1st. Got here a day early, so third Halloween. Bought candy both of the first 2 years, and never got a knock on the door. Figured they just don’t do it in this area, all going to local Halloween events or such. So I didn’t buy candy this year, and poof sudden knocks on the door and I felt like absolute poop telling the kids sorry. Waited till they got down the drive and turned off the entry light so no one knocked after. I’m guessing since it rained all night (including when they came) some of the Halloween events may have been canceled, which made the kids finally come trick or treating… leaving me tricked and the kids without treats.
That’s funny, in my subdivision I had to put a sign up on my door that said “no candy” and I still got multiple knocks!
(I’m a Halloween Scrooge don’t judge me)
I went out with my kids and we went to a few houses actually that had lights on outside and inside, told my kids to go to the door and knock, waited a minute or so, and nothing. This was maybe half-a-dozen houses, so it’s not always a given that just knocking on the door will get results. The new “normal” is that people are either waiting outside to hand out candy or they’re leaving bowls out for kids to help themselves. Knocking on the door for trick or treating is a crapshoot and it’d be understandable why most kids will skip that. Compared to other houses, it’s more effort for potentially no reward, or, even if there is a reward, it’s the same as every other house.
I would be mad if some kids would come begging for my candy. MY CANDY! yes I’m fat.
I never liked bowels. More fun to hand fist fulls of candy.
Might want to edit that to bowls lol
150 chocolate bars gone! And they had to ring the bell. Its a good neighbourhood for this.
If it came to skipping my house because no bowl, I’d skip Halloween altogether.
The houses that do leave bowls are my favorite, the kids trick or treat as normal but when there’s a bowl-house I take one extra for dad lol
I leave a bowl out, and this year I had a trash can out in case anyone needed it. At the end of the night, the only thing in it was an empty hard cider bottle. Had a laugh
