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Marketing Your Illinois Business

Five Frightful and Fun Halloween Promotion Ideas

October 13, 2020

It’s finally Halloween time – the spookiest time of the year! Halloween also happens to be one of our favorite times of the year because there are a number of fun and easy promotions for bars and restaurants to host at their locations! Check out some of our favorite ideas below.

 

Halloween Horror Movie Night

Everyone likes a good scare once in a while! Bring in some foot traffic to your location by hosting a Halloween Horror Movie Night. Queue up some horror classics on your location’s digital monitors and break out the popcorn. This event is easy to plan for and adapt to any social distancing measures you have in place at your location. By limiting attendance, you can spread designated seating areas away from each other. Just make sure to get the word out about your movie night well ahead of time!

 

Host a Pumpkin Carving Contest

This one might get a little messy – be warned! Encourage your customers to sign up ahead of time and reserve their pumpkin carving stations. Then just be sure to provide the pumpkins and any carving tools. This is a great promotion because customers can be encouraged to order food and drinks while they carve their pumpkins. Also, when they take a picture of their end results (and they will) encourage them to tag your location in any social media posts they make.

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Host a Costume Contest

This is very similar to the pumpkin carving contest, but much less hands-on. Encourage customers to wear their Halloween costumes at your location on Halloween and then host a contest for the best dressed! Encouraging customers to participate can be easy; just offer a free appetizer or a discount on their meals. Be sure to post often about it on social media – both before and after the event! Customers love to see photos of other customers having fun at locations.

 

Spooky Specials and Specialty Cocktails

Add some spooky spice and flair to your regular menu. Whether you just give your regular menu a spooky touch by renaming your items — spaghetti become “fresh worms” or chicken wings become “crispy bat wings” — or add brand new items to your menu, it’s a nice touch to help celebrate the season! Want some inspiration for adding Halloween specialty cocktails to your menu? Check out our list of spook-tacular cocktails here!

 

Howl-a-ween

Did you know that over 30 million people dress up their pets for Halloween – or howl-a-ween? Try boosting your social media presence by encouraging customers to post a picture of their furry friends in costume and tagging your location in the post! Then you can have customers vote on the best costume or you can choose a random winner – make the prize something simple like a gift card or a night of free appetizers! Not sure where to post? Check out our article on which social media channel is best for you and your business!

 

We want to know how you typically celebrate Halloween at your location. Let us know what you plan on doing this year in the comment section below.

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