Every community has a legendary "candy house." This year, it's mine.
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The Mother Lode
Every neighborhood has one legendary house that doles out full-sized candy on Halloween. This year, it’s gonna be me.
In What It’s Like, people tell us, well, what it’s like to have experiences many of us have not even imagined. In this entry, we spoke to Johner Riehl, a public relations professional from San Diego who has been the proud proprietor of a full-sized candy bar house on Halloween since 2020. It has made him a legend among the children in his neighborhood, and his reputation seems to grow with each passing year. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
We used to live on a much busier street in San Diego, where we got a ton of trick-or-treaters. There were flat sidewalks and lots of houses—prime real estate for Halloween night. It was one of those areas where kids who didn’t live in the neighborhood would travel to, just to take advantage of the incredible trick-or-treating opportunities. In those days, my wife and I would buy the standard payload of
mini Milky Ways,
mini Kit Kats,
mini Butterfingers, and so on, and hand them out by the fistful. But when we moved to a slightly less dense part of town, with less foot traffic, we decided to make a change. Since 2020, we’ve been one of the rare full-sized candy bar households, and we’re never going back.
Each Halloween, we buy about four boxes of full-sized candy. We’re talking Reese’s, Twix, Sour Patch Kids, and Skittles. You get about 24 items per box, which gives you around 100 treats total. I’d say we burn through about two-thirds of that per Halloween, so we definitely overbuy our stock. But financially, it’s about the same investment we made previously with our trick-or-treating hoard at our old place, when we were taking home those big bags of mini candy. In total, I think we spent like $100 every season, which is a worthy investment as far as I’m concerned.
The first year we handed out those full-sized bars was 2020, so right in the middle of the pandemic. We actually built a “candy chute” for social distancing—a contraption where we could slide the treats down from our door to the kids. There was so much shock and disbelief with the trick or treaters that first year. The kids couldn’t believe that they were getting a grocery-store-checkout-aisle bag of Skittles. I heard a lot of, “Wow, I can’t believe this is happening!”
Our reputation has grown since then. More kids seem to come by every year as word spreads. Sometimes, kids only come into our neighborhood to hit our house and a few others, which is cool, because we’re a little off the beaten track. Our own children are proud of our full-sized status. They brag about it to their friends, and they love to answer the door to see if they see any trick-or-treaters they know. We keep our decorations pretty simple. Some lights in the bushes, and disembodied body parts in the yard, with a few nods to El Día de Los Muertos to honor our own lost loved ones. At this point we pretty much know all the kids who come by. I like that sense of community, but I sort of miss when we were on busier streets. It was nice to think that kids from less privileged neighborhoods could make the trip to our neck of the woods and score some awesome candy.
We occasionally run into some trick-or-treaters that double-dip. Trick-or-treaters might come back with a larger group and get another giant candy bar. I never deny them. At most I might give them a knowing look. Because seriously,
who cares? It’s Halloween! Halloween is about kids having fun, and trying to get a bonus Reese’s Cup isn’t a crime. However, I don’t allow any triple-dipping. Once you sneak a second treat, you’re done for the night.
I will say, if anyone wants to become a full-sized candy household, you need to set the right parameters. Don’t walk out there with a bunch of treats on a tray, or leave them on the doorstep. They’ll be gone in minutes. Sometimes we present our guests with a clear choice: “Choose one of these three candy bars,” which reins in the chaos. If you pull it off, you’ll endear yourself to your neighbors. There’s some stuff online about how being a full-sized candy house on Halloween can breed some resentment with other families on the block, but for us, it’s been the opposite effect. The vibes have been great. Once you give a neighbor’s kid a giant chocolate bar, they realize that the new people in town aren’t so bad, after all.
I expect to be running a full-sized candy house for the rest of my life. It’s only enhanced what I already love about Halloween. Kids don’t have a lot of control over their lives, especially the ones who are the age of trick-or-treaters. I mean, I remember what it was like when I was a kid, and how awesome it was to get something truly special from a house on the big night. Anything we can do to make their dreams come true, even for a night, is totally worth it.
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