Halloween by the Numbers

With All Hallows Eve fast approaching, there are pumpkins to carve, ghosts and skeletons to post on the front lawn, and costumes and trick-or-treat candy to buy. Americans love to make Halloween spooktacular, but the ever-rising costs are almost frightening.

Total Halloween spending for 2007 is expected reach $5.07 billion, second only to the Christmas holiday. Here is a peek at what goes into to making Halloween a ghoul-o-time.

Statistics and figures are from the National Retail Federation, National Confectioners Associations, U.S. Census and NASS.

Trick or treat?

This year, more than 36 million Americans of all ages plan to trick-or-treat, about the same number as 2006.

Pumpkins, pumpkins everywhere

Finding the perfect pumpkin should be no problem, with an estimated autumn harvest of 1 billion pounds of pumpkins, down from 1.1 billion last year.

Why the drop? Poor weather conditions, especially in Illinois, which leads the nation in pumpkin production with 492 million pounds.

BOOgie down

Just because you're too old to trick-or-treat doesn't mean you can't dress up and have a little fun.

One-third of adults say they plan on wearing a costume or throwing or attending a Halloween party.

Most popular costume choice for women: witch,same as last year. Most popular for men: pirate, the perrenial favorite.

Most popular costumes for girls

The princess costume is once again the most coveted for Halloween. Witch and fairy costumes are also showing brisk sales, retailers say.

But also expect to see a lot of girls dressed as Hannah Montana, The Disney Channel's popular television character who is an average girl by day in middle school but secretly a big pop star.

Most popular costumes for boys

Inner superheroes come out and play on Halloween. Spiderman is the top costume choice for boys this year, beating out the always-popular pirate get-up, according to the National Retail Federation.

A new addition to the group's list of top costumes is the bespectacled wizard himself, Harry Potter.

Life is ruff on Halloween

Kids and adults won't be the only ones dressing up.

About 7.4 million households plan on gussying up their pets. Retailers report a boom in sales of pet costumes, from devils to pumpkins to angels. Just be careful not to mistake a pet costume for an infant costume, because they can be very similar in size and price.

Recognize my disguise?

Americans are expected to spend an average of $23.33 per costume in 2007, up from $21.57 last year.

There are now 2,232 costume shops across the nation to accessorize people for Halloween and other occasions, the NRF says.

Give me something good to eat

The average household plans to spend almost $20 this year on candy -- up slightly from last year.

Trick-or-treaters say chocolate is the most sought-after goodie, while fruit is the least desired. Surprise, Surprise.

Extreme Halloween home makeover

One out of two households will decorate, spending almost $1.5 billion in the process. Halloween is second only to Christmas in spending on decorations.

Smashing pumpkins

More than 20,000 people gather each year near Bridgeville, Del., to watch orbs of orange fruit (yes, pumpkins are botanically classified as fruit) being flung across an open field. At the World Championship Punkin' Chunkin' contest, 72 teams of innovators compete to hurl pumpkins the farthest distance.

This year's contest will take place November 2-4, after Halloween is over.