This is 99% invisible. I'm Roman Mars.

There's a storefront at a major intersection in downtown Toronto at Spadina and King Street.

The space is about 11,000 square feet and it used to house a

massive liquor store right in the middle of Canada's biggest city.

For years I work down the street and let me tell you that liquor store was bumping.

That's producer Crisperubei. I remember lines out the door before holidays and setting aside a whole

lunch hour just to get a bottle of wine.

But in 2019 the liquor store moved to a new bigger location closed by and

the shop at Spadina and King closed. Since then all 11,000 square feet have been empty.

For a long time I wondered, okay, what is going to move in there? I mean, this is a big time space right downtown, but in 2019,

it sat empty.

2020? Still empty.

2021. Empty. 2022., okay you get the point. But it's only empty for about nine months out of the year.

Because every fall, just like clockwork, the space has been possessed by a spirit. By spirit, Halloween.

If you have probably seen the orange, yellow and black spirit Halloween signs.

They go up sometime in August and 1500 empty storefronts and by early November all of them disappear

Spirit Halloween has become something of an institution. If you aren't familiar, I mean, it's pretty simple. It's a pop-up store full of

Halloween stuff. They sell Halloween masks, Halloween costumes, Halloween costumes for dogs, Halloween decorations, creepy robots, and several different kinds of fake blood.

And it's successful. Spirit reportedly sells about a billion dollars worth of merchandise every year.

For a long time I resisted going to Spirit because I don't know it just seemed like a lot of

loud noises and crowds and children running around. And I got to say when I finally took the plunge last fall it was pretty much that

Okay I'm passing through a crypt

...