[Tannasgach]

I usually give out a big size Goldfish snack bag (from Sam's) to any toddlers 2 and under and for the tots a full size KitKat bar. I can't afford the full size candy this year so I bought Mars chocolate assortment, Skitlles and Rice Krispy Halloween minis. I've never given out the small bars before and am wondering how much should I give. I don't want to appear cheap, being thee Halloween house and all but I don't want a bunch of candy left over either. I was thinking a Skittle, two Rice Krispy (they're tiny) and two fun size (not the minis) chocolates per tot. Does this sound about right?

How much candy do you give out?

 

[Frankie's Girl]

You're fine. Anything over 2 pieces is good.


We usually do give out 2 fun sized chocolate, 2-4 wonka mix, and a variety of toys depending on what we had left from last year and what I found this year. This year, I forgot the crazy amount of toys I had left over and bought way too much, so there are jewel spider rings, glow in the dark skull or spider rings, tattoos, whistle lips, rubber bats and something else I can't remember right this minute - oh yeah... glow bracelets.

We give a BIG handful (and toys) for really creative home made costumes.

 

[Madame Leota]

I made treat bags that each contain 1 fun size chocolate, 1 blow pop, and 3 misc. pieces such as airheads, laffy taffy, bubble gum, etc.
I think that is plenty. I have yet to get a trick played on me so I must be doing something right.

 

[yeloowtang]

with my all out set up, I felt bad a few years back just giving the bite size chocolate I get over 500 mkids..
so now I prepare 500 treat bags with 5 pieces in ea, chocolate,skittles,gum,rockets, lolly posp, fiz, bracelts, lolly rings etc etc..
ea bag has 5 candy.. I usually chase up specials over the two months they show up in stores LOL
then I get extras and a box of chips just in case.. this year, I have a zombie game, so I still need to get prizes for that in case some actually succeed at it hehehe

 

[Maniac Marshall]

We also pre-make bags, 5 pieces each: 2 mini chocolate bars (whatever mix i get a good special on), 1 lollipop, and 2 pieces of "filler" (rockets, starburst, etc.)
I also like to get 50 bags of chips as back-up if I run out. costs me about 100$ a year

 

[cleanfreak]

1500 TOT's x 2 pieces each = 3000 Pieces of candy. Expensive!

 

[Kwll2112]

We get the assorted bags of candy from Costco. I don't recall exactly what they are, but it's name brand stuff. Fun size pieces (though smaller never really seemed fun to me ). The first year we had people walk through the house, we were allowing them to take 3 pieces each. As the numbers of ToTers grew, we cut this down to 2 pieces. As it is, I think we're planning on having somewhere between 1200 - 1600 pieces of candy, based on we had over 800 people come through last year. Of course, not everyone takes candy, like the adults, but some kids grab more, etc.

 

[BarryJ]

With between 800 and 1000 ToTs, it's two pieces a kid (with allowances for special costumes).

I figure they can get a memorable display or they can get candy, but not both.

 

[RCIAG]

I get less than 10 ToTers so I go for treat bags with the full sized bars, some type of gum, a Pixie Stick, a Tootsie Pop, a Halloween rubber ducky, & whatever toys are leftover from last year.

 

[Tannasgach]

OMG guys, you are blowing my mind over here! 800, 1000, 1500 tots!! I'm planning on 40 - 50 lol but I have enough for 70. And 500 bags - when do you find the time to make them? I can barely get decorated in time. You guys are amazing!

 

[Cali Specter]

We're dialing it down this year. Last year we went dark due to travel reasons. The year before that we had 5000+Tots. We spent way too much. One piece per kid no matter how cute the costume. This year I'm limiting it to 3k pieces. Trust me, it gets expensive!

 

[Raydium]

I give out 2 to 3 pieces of candy -- cute or scary costumes get an extra piece, I usually make a comment as I put an extra piece of candy in their bag. However, I guess my haunt can be too scary for the little kids and I sometimes get more candy that I handout! LOL (OK JK -- not really)

 

[sookie]

I give out treat bags, m&ms, Snickers, Reeces, lollipops, dollar tree Halloween candy, Kit kats, Milky Way, and toys. 2-3 pieces of chocolate, some dollar tree candy amd 2-3 toys per bag. For the toys i get bouncey Halloween balls, puzzles, mazes, pencils, pens, notepads, bubbles, Halloween stencils, Halloween stickers, slinkys and Halloween plushes

 

[Mapleton Manor]

We usually get a little over 100 kids. The wife decided last year to give out full size candy bars. Which is great. We also have hot chocolate for all the TOTers set up for any that want some.

 

[kuroneko]

OMG guys, you are blowing my mind over here! 800, 1000, 1500 tots!! I'm planning on 40 - 50 lol but I have enough for 70. And 500 bags - when do you find the time to make them? I can barely get decorated in time. You guys are amazing!

I'm right there with you! I get about 40-50 ToTs that actually try to collect candy. We made the decision two years ago to start giving out full sized bars since we just don't get that many and it is a bit of a trip to get to my house for a lot of them. I live in an isolated section on the very edge of my town. It isn't exactly worth crossing the footbridge or walking the underpass to get to my house. Not to mention they still have to go all the way across my neighborhood to the edge of town and I'm not sure how many of my neighbors actually give out candy. Honestly I've seen kids skip the surrounding houses and just come straight to mine while saying "THIS is the house I told you about!" Afterwards they just run off into the night...

Of course I say that now and this year the whole of Big Weston will cross the bridge into Little Weston and I'll get like 200 ToTs...

 

[RebelDead]

We started buying candy a while ago. Unfortunately I wish I could give out more but we get over 2000 kids. So it is 1 a piece. Oh and I actually run out before the night is done. Each year we buy more and more but we always tend to run out. Ok well maybe if we weren't snacking ourselves the whole time it might stretch a little bit more LOL

 

[Kwll2112]

Well, I don't think we would get the numbers we do if it wasn't for the open house we have. Without that draw, it would probably be around 200, maybe 300. Our neighborhood gets a lot of people coming in from other areas, so it's not just the neighborhood kids.

OMG guys, you are blowing my mind over here! 800, 1000, 1500 tots!! I'm planning on 40 - 50 lol but I have enough for 70. And 500 bags - when do you find the time to make them? I can barely get decorated in time. You guys are amazing!

 

[Wolfman]

We let TOTs choose, full sized candy bars or a bag of chips/Doritos. We're prepared for 400 and, yeah, it gets expen$ive...

 

[RedSonja]

We make treat bags, it's the only way to keep the candy from running out too soon! I usually put 3 candies and a small toy. I make about 100 of these and keep some left over candy in a bowl. At the end of the night it's always gone!

 

[HauntedWyo]

Usually we would only get about a dozen or so TOTs. But last year after putting out my witches we ended up with closer to a 100 TOTs. I had bought extra candy as I knew we would get more kids and my husband still had to make a mad dash to the store for more. So this year I bought plenty more candy. I made up 195 treat bags and still have a bag of 240 pieces of candy I didn't open. I put 4 pieces of the mini sized or 2 of the fun sized in each bag which equals up to close to a regular sized candy bar. This is the first year I did the bags, I just bought the cheap snack sized ziploc like bags. I did so because I wanted to get a better idea of TOT headcount so I have a good idea of how much candy to buy for next year. Before the bags I would hand out 2-4 pieces of candy to each kid depending on candy size, kid size and what their costumes looked like. Now that they are in bags everyone will get the same amount no matter what.