British shoppers splashed out an estimated £491 million in preparation for this year’s Halloween, giving retailers a boost both on the high street and on the web.

This represents a 2.1 per cent annual increase in expenditure around this holiday, with the figures provided by GlobalData and reported by Internet Retailing.

Perhaps unsurprisingly there was especially strong growth in the volumes of costumes being purchased by people planning to attend Halloween parties, with a 3.4 per cent uptick in fancy dress spending noted in 2018.

Experts claim that part of the reason that this market is continuing to grow is down to the fact that social media encourages people to share their creations, check out what influencers are wearing and attempt to emulate them.

In addition to seeing a spike in the number of costumes sold via safe shopping online and from bricks and mortar outlet, there was also growth in the health and beauty market, with people buying makeup to transform themselves into spooky characters.

Study spokesperson Zoe Mills said that retailers are making more of an effort to appeal to consumers who are enraptured by the idea of Halloween, developing season-specific products and promotions while also bundling together relevant items to try and shift more of them before the big day.

Tie-ins with major media providers, including Netflix, have even helped some retailers to diversify their offerings, encourage customers to make Halloween purchases and further push the event as a social significant one in the UK.

Halloween decorations were another big seller, in many ways mirroring the popularity of baubles and other trinkets during the Christmas break. If this trend continues then in future years Halloween will be an even bigger event for retailer to leverage, as British habits more closely mirror those of North America.