Hershey warns Americans squeezed by gas prices are buying less candy - and Halloween’s final days are ‘really critical’

Spooky costumes and decorations aren’t the only frightening things this Halloween. For America’s biggest chocolate maker, the scarier sight may be the shoppers who aren’t showing up.

On Hershey’s third-quarter earnings call Thursday, executives said candy sales at convenience stores fell 5% in September across the category, and that the slump has continued into October as high gas prices and stubborn inflation squeeze household budgets.

Hershey CFO Dave Hulays said consumers are “more cautious on inflation,” pointing to gas prices and interest rates as sources of household strain. “They are making more deliberate choices across channels,” he said, with shoppers shifting more of their spending to mass retailers, e-commerce, and warehouse clubs.

Outside of convenience stores, Hulays said, the candy category grew 3.7% in the third quarter, and he framed the weakness as “more of a channel and trip problem, not as much a category issue.”

Hershey’s results show the squeeze. The company’s third-quarter net sales rose 3% to about $3.28 billion, but that growth came from roughly 11 percentage points of higher prices, while volume fell about 10 points, according to its earnings release . Hershey also narrowed its full-year organic net sales growth outlook to about 3%, the low end of its previous range of 3% to 3.5%.

The pullback extends beyond Hershey. Halloween candy sales fell 6.7% in the month ending Oct. 17 compared with the same period last year, according to NielsenIQ data reported by the Associated Press last week. Small bags were the only size still growing, AP reported, while the average price of regular gasoline had climbed to $4.29 a gallon, up nearly 40% from a year earlier.

That doesn’t mean Americans are skipping the holiday. The National Retail Federation projects a record $13.5 billion in Halloween spending this year, up from last year’s $13.1 billion. That includes $4.1 billion on candy, which 96% of celebrants plan to buy. But the NRF also noted that shoppers are approaching the season with affordability in mind.

Cocoa, the ingredient behind years of chocolate inflation , has come well off its highs. Global cocoa prices hit a record of about $10,710 per metric ton in January 2025, then fell to $3,241 by March, before rising again this spring as the Iran war disrupted fertilizer supplies to Africa and forecasters warned of El Niño, AP reported.