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Trick or Treat Bags

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2.9K views 25 replies 19 participants last post by  colmmoo  
#1 ·
Does anyone fill little TOT bags instead of giving out candy? What do you put in them? How much, etc?
 
#3 ·
I give out a WIIIIIDE variety of toys and treats. The TOTs draw numbers and can get anything from a 6' stuffed carnival snake to a little treat bag. I stuff the treat bags with small toys from Oriental Trading, matchbox sized cars, decks of kid-themed cards, and small factory wrapped candy.

Naturally, there are many more little treat bags than six foot snakes and FM radios, so to make it more exciting, I put a $20 bill in one of the tiny treat bags and tell the kids to 'choose carefully.' They reach into a big basket to pick one...hoping for the $20. For two years in a row, nobody picked that- the littlest bag. :)

boo
 
#8 ·
we make treat bag for the kids here. We put an assortment of candy and a spider ring or something similar for the older kids, we make up different treat bags for the smaller trick or treaters and they usually get cookies and candy and a small toy one year rubber ducks from oriental trading, last year a juice box and some stickers was the extra item for them this year it will be a small frisbee. We made up 300 bags last year and was out in 1 hour there is no way we could give out candy by the handful, The kids were lined clear up the drive way, one line coming up one going down,
 
#11 ·
I found these cute bags at Target in the dollar section. It was 20 bags for $1, so I got 3 kinds and am going to fill them up with candy and these Halloween erasers and possibly a small bag of chips (they have those giant bags with the little ones in the Halloween section in front of Target). I'm also going to have extra candy for the teenagers that don't dress up they just get a little fun size candy.
 
#13 ·
Id freaking love to do the treat bags but for right now, The kids get a glow stick( i like to keep them vivisble!!) and the little mini bags of microwave popcorn. The first year i did it, my sisters said that for sure my house was going to get egged for not giving out candy.. i came back from taking my son tot-ing, and a little girl about 4 came up to the house, I gave her her popcorn and glow stick, and she runs from the house screaming "MOMMY!!MOMMY!! I got POPCORN!!!" I turned and gave my sisters the biggest grin. Eggs my ass! lol
 
#14 ·
I started doing ToT bags last year and will do it again. I just put in about four different kinds of candy…chocolate eyeball, gummy fangs, gummy body parts, etc., along with a stylish card I design and print out from the computer which says, "Happy Halloween from The Haunt at Havercroft."

It's a good way of keeping count of how many trick-or-treaters I get, since I know how many candy bags I've made. I made 50 last year and then had a box of 24 full sized candy bars as backup. It was easy to calculate that I had a total of 64 trick-or-treaters last year. I would have had more but there were some who came all the way down my 75' driveway, stood in front of my Haunt for a minute, only to turn around and walk away. Too scared to come in.

I'm thinking of making up 60 candy bags this year, maybe more, and also having the candy bar backup. My biggest Halloween fear is running out of candy.
 
#15 ·
I used to make bags for the kids in the neighbourhood at our old house. We lived in BFe, so we only got 10-15 TOT's tops. So it was super easy to spoil the crap outta them, lol.

Now, we live in a nicer closer to town neighbourhood, so I don't know yet.

I always make bags for my daughter's class at school. I put a plasitc cup and straw in them, playdough (she's 7 BTW, lol), some stickers spider rings, pencil, and a ton of candy. Each school bag runs about $5 each.

For the kids in the 'hood though, I will probably give out bags to the kids she always plays with, but have handfuls for extra for the kids we don't know, or the ones that drive to the "good parts of town" for candy.
 
#16 ·
I started doing the bags years ago, but I stopped when I was doing over 300 and still would run out of candy! It would take a week, on and off just to fill them.

Now I just get "good" candy (ask kids, they'll tell you what to hand out!). Last Halloween we gave out over 400 pieces. That's 7% of the total population of our small town! I expect to give out more this year.
 
#17 ·
I'm going sort of off the deep end with the treat bags this year. Each bag this year will contain the following:

  • 1 Glow bracelet
  • 1 Skull whistle
  • 1 Glow-in-the-dark super ball
  • 1 Set of plastic vampire teeth
  • 1 Chocolate Jack O' Lantern coin
  • 1 Plastic bat ring

Add to that a piece (or two) of candy and I think I've assembled a pretty kick ass little bag o' goodies. Thank God for places like Oriental Trading Co. and eBay where you can get most of that stuff at reasonable prices.

I just hope the gross of bags I've got assembled is enough for this year. Usually, we get about 40 - 50 TOTs, but this year I was in the town newspaper, so I have a feeling I'll need more, hence the gross.
 
#19 ·
Just a note. If you find that you often have a lot of treat bags left over like I do, attach the candy- if any- to the outside of the bag...or simply go with a candy-free package. Some treat bags of mine have made it through FIVE years now. Since I give out treat bags, large and small toys, carnival plushed animals, as well as candy and chips, the leftover toys and treat bags can easily go into storage each year. Kinda nice since Oriental Trading has raised it's prices this year.

boo
 
#20 ·
well i am pretty much doing what ZOmbie-F said, though i am hardly worried about runing out (3 TOTS last year) and with the goodies that are non perishable I don't have to worry about packing them up for next year, I like that rather than either eating a bunch of left overs or schleping it to work for the "starving" masses
 
#21 ·
Wow, it sounds like there is a lot of you that don't get too many TOT's. The lowest # I ever had was 243 between 6-8pm the "designated" TOT hours in my town. I think it's great that even if you only get a few TOT's that you are still making Halloween special. Those kids will remember you their whole lives! And hopefully pass on the tradition and keep it alive. I truly salute all you dedicated haunters out there! Thank you.
 
#23 ·
Wow, I don't know what's more heartwarming - the generosity of our haunters here, or that in so may places there's more than 200+ TOTs!! And everyone gives out such cool stuff...(ducks to avoid the body parts being thrown her way...)

We'll be lucky if we get 30 TOTs here - guess I'm just going to have to step it up to get the kids to tell their friends!

PS Love the idea of the mini popcorn bags, GhostGirl - stupid Q: do you hand them out already popped?
 
#25 ·
I wanted to let you all know that Wendy's has coupon books for free small frostys. They are $1 each and you get 10 coupons. Granted, the frostys are very tiny, but what do you want for .10?! Also, I've read/heard the McDonald's has TOT books as well but they are hard to come by around here I know.

I'm going to include one in each treat bag for my 5 yo twin's class.

The bags will contain the following:

1 Frosty coupon
1 Glowstick bracelet
Halloween Pencil
Mechanical pencil
Spider ring
Stickers
Cookie
Candy

I'm definitely going to load up on clearance items this year after Halloween. Target is great when they go like 75% off.