Spirit Halloween set to open in Fort Eddy plaza

Like a Black Friday sale or the first heart-shaped boxes of chocolate lining grocery store shelves, every holiday season has an unofficial kick-off. For many, spooky season officially starts when a Spirit Halloween store suddenly appears in an empty storefront nearby. 

Concord has long hosted the seasonal pop-up emporium, a go-to for both those scrambling at the last minute for a costume party ensemble and those constructing an elaborate, eerie display to frighten trick-or-treaters. This year it’ll be in a new home at the Fort Eddy Plaza.

Spirit is known for its model of cropping up for a month or two ahead of Halloween inside vacant retail fronts and then, in the first few days of November, vanishing. It’s taken up that model in Concord for years at a variety of locations — from the Steeplegate Mall to the TJMaxx plaza across from the Everett Arena — and this year is moving closer to downtown via the 16,000 square-foot space that held a Rite-Aid until this past winter. 

Rite-Aid closed around the end of 2023 as part of a national bankruptcy for the pharmacy and was part of a slew of change-ups at the Fort Eddy Plaza: The outdoor gear store Eastern Mountain Sports also left, and the Paper Store, which was right next to Rite-Aid, slid over to the larger EMS’s vacant spot. The outdoor retailer said it had plans to open elsewhere in Concord, but that hasn’t happened yet. 

The Concord Spirit Halloween hasn’t announced an opening date yet, but stores in Tilton, Manchester, Goffstown and Keene have their doors open already. 

Catherine McLaughlin can be reached at cmclaughlin@cmonitor.com