Retro Halloween Commercials

Halloween advertising has existed in print for well over 100 years. It was then natural that with the rise of television there would be Halloween commercials. I am not sure how far Halloween commercials go back in the history of the television, but I know it is at least the Sixties and I have to suspect there were even Halloween commercials in the Fifties. Below are five old Halloween commercials I gathered from YouTube. The quality of many of them is poor, but then I suspect that they were probably digitalized from old video tapes that had seen better days.

First up is a commercial for Shasta Orange Soda. It is from the Seventies, but I have no idea what year. I believe the store clerk is none other than John Fiedler, now best known as the voice of Piglet in Disney's "Winnie the Pooh" cartoons and Juror No. 2 in 12 Angry Men (1957).


One can tell this next commercial is old simply from the fact that it is for Woolworth's and Woolco. Woolworth's closed its department stores in 1997. This particular commercial is from 1978. Notice the Star Wars costumes, not to mention the other old Ben Cooper costumes.


This Wrigley's Gum commercial is from 1979.



And here is a Hershey's commercial from 1981.




Finally, here is a Toys "R" Us ad from 1985. You'll notice the kids are still wearing costumes of the type manufactured by Ben Cooper. Ben Cooper didn't have too many years left. It would close its doors in 1991. As to Toys "R" Us, they closed down just a few years ago, in 2018.