5 Eco-Friendly Halloween Tips: Sustainable Costumes, Candy, Decorations, and More in Chicago

It’s no secret that Halloween has a scarier undertone than just vampires, ghouls, zombies and ghosts: it’s also shrouded in plastic-covered candies, decorations, and synthetic costumes that make their way to the garbage after only a single use!

Beyond a shadow of a doubt, Chicagoans love Halloween. From the Arts in the Dark parade to the Night of 1,000 Jack-o’-Lanterns at the Chicago Botanic Garden, to the dozens of decked-out bars and restaurants throwing ghoulish parties throughout October, Halloween makes its yearly mark on Chi-town in the form of non-stop festivities and community gatherings.

But just as Halloween has a special place in Chicago, so does sustainability. Innovative environmental initiatives are a key focus of Chicago’s policies, and residents of Cook County are more worried about climate change and their environmental impact than the U.S. national average.

So with Halloween being one of the most wasteful holidays of the year, what can be done to bridge the gap between the well-meaning fun of a global tradition, and reducing plastic and food waste to mitigate the environmental damage?

This guide will hit on the main tricks (and treats!) you can take advantage of to enjoy Halloween more sustainably this year.

#1 Be Intentional With Plastic-Covered Candies

There’s no avoiding it: in most cases it’s nearly impossible to find plastic-free treats to give out to trick-or-treaters on Halloween. Even the non-sugar alternatives - bat-shaped pretzels, granola bars, toys, etc. - will come in their own orange and purple plastic bags. So unless you’re planning to paint cute jack-o’-lantern faces on enough oranges to feed the neighborhood kids, the plastic problem on Halloween is just plain unavoidable.

The plastic wraps on candies are normally not considered recyclable, either; they are created with mixed materials that vary in terms of recyclability, and are contaminated with food products, anyway. So during the Halloween season, over 600 million pounds of candy will be purchased in the U.S., and the wrappers will make their way to landfills.

Luckily, there are still ways to reduce the amount of candy-related plastic you’re taking on for the Halloween season. Plenty of sweet tooth-driven brands have recognized the need for more eco-friendly candies, too, and offer treats with sustainable packaging that anyone can enjoy.

Go for the candies in paper/foil wrappers and paper boxes! Like:

Dum Dum Lollipops
Nerds
Junior Mints
Hershey Kisses
Tootsie Rolls

Find the eco-friendly brands, like:

Alter Eco, which is currently having a 15% off sale of their truffles through October 27!
UNREAL chocolates, which opt for more sustainably sourced ingredients and packaging.
YumEarth for some more non-chocolate variety, who use recycled packaging and allergen-friendly ingredients in their candy.

#2 An Easy One: Use Reusable Trick-or-Treat Bags

Skip the cute plastic buckets this year, if you haven’t already -- a pillowcase or cloth bag is all you need to collect candy this Halloween. It could also double as a fun way to get creative with the kids this season -- give them some markers and have them customize their bags any way they want, be it an extension of their costume, a holiday-themed favorite, or anything else!

#3 Source Sustainable Halloween Costumes

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About 40% of all Halloween costumes are thrown away after single-use. This is especially true of kids costumes, which many children grow out of by the next Halloween, and the cycle repeats. An instant fix is to do the obvious: rent, thrift, or DIY your costumes this Halloween!

Village Discount Outlet - find one of these stores throughout the Chicagoland area for vintage and retro clothing to bring the 80s and 90s back in 2024!
The Brown Elephant - with locations in Oak Park, Northhalsted, and Andersonville, find whole rooms dedicated to Halloween costumes, where proceeds go to support LGBTQ+ healthcare.
Goodwill - Goodwill also tends to have clothing/costume sections dedicated to Halloween this time of season.
Crossroad Trading Co. - these stores in Wicker Park and Lincoln Park have trendy clothing items that could work great for a thrifted, but upscale version of classic Halloween costumes! Their Instagram even offers ideas on how to make these styles a reality.

In Chicago you can also find costume swap events throughout the month of October. Reuse-a-Palooza is a yearly costume swap happening on October 27 this year at The Plant.

Organizations like Conscious Costume and Chicago Green Theatre Alliance also host yearly costume swaps!

#4 Opt for Eco-Friendly Decorations

Synthetic cobwebs, 10-foot tall plastic skeletons, ghost-covered tablecloths, or peel-and-stick plastic bats - just like over 80% of Halloween costumes - are common Halloween decorations that are completely non-recyclable. Even if you plan to reuse the decorations for next year, take into account how quickly the low quality of the product can turn it into a single-use item. And not to mention, the same cheap decorations every year would get boring real fast.

But luckily, plastic decorations aren’t the only ones out there. Natural, harvest-y, old-time spirit-of-Halloween decorations are the kind of inexpensive, earthly adornments needed to switch things up this Halloween, like with pumpkins, gourds, corn husks and thrifted quilts. Craft makeshift cobwebs with rope, yarn, or twine, paint mason jars with eco-friendly paint and place candles inside, or even make bats out of paper to place around the house.

For larger yard decorations, get crafty with pillowcases, bedsheets, old t-shirts, wires and inflatable balls to hang ghosts or witches on the front porch. Stuff old flannel long sleeves and jeans with newspaper and dried leaves to make a charmingly primitive scarecrow, or make door hangings out of twigs, twine, pinecones and berries.

Using decorations from previous years works just fine, too. But in the decoration department, there’s always plenty of neat, thrifty ways to reduce plastic during the Halloween season.

#5 Properly Dispose of Your Pumpkins

Last year, we dedicated an entire blog to properly preserving and disposing of pumpkins, because with Illinois being the largest producer of pumpkins in the U.S., it also sees an exorbitant amount of pumpkin waste, especially around the Halloween season!

To mitigate the problem, the City of Chicago hosts Pumpkin Smash events all around the Chicago metropolitan area to gather pumpkin compost all in one place, and create a fun community atmosphere to do it in. For 2024, the annual Pumpkin Smash will happen on November 9 from 10am - 2pm.

If the Pumpkin Smash doesn’t work out, you can also compost pumpkins yourself in your own backyard, bake them into fall recipes, or donate them to local farms for animal feed!

So, this Halloween season, pick an idea or two from this list to try out. Any effort, big or small to keep a little less plastic and food waste out of landfills is an effort worth making.

Halloween is one of the best times of the year for a lot of people, and it can still be fun, magical, and even glamorous, without worrying about how it could potentially affect the environment!