Mildly Infuriating

put a sign on your door next year, and report back on how well it works lol.

I see you did it this year, but doing it again next year should also increase the amount of visitors. We do a little science.

I put a bowl out once. The first kid that came emptied the whole lot into his bag and I had nothing left. So now I keep it inside and if they don't knock it's their loss and I get treats.

Most of our neighborhood sits outside with the candy and to hang out and see everyone's costumes. They make it very obvious they're handing out candy so when it's knock houses, we're less likely to go

My front door faces the courtyard, so you’d have to come through the gate, walk between the house and fence, and then around to the back to knock on the door. My house is one of the older ones in the neighborhood, with big trees and bushes and no porch light or anything. I’ve never had a trick-or-treater knock on my door. Maybe I should get a massive, highly coveted bag of candy just in case someone does - and then just give them the whole thing.

They go for the unattended bowls so they can just take it all for themselves. I dressed up as a decoration scarecrow one or two years after I was too old to trick or treat myself and held a bowl of candy in my lap out on the porch. Every kid that attempted to take the entire bowl, got a scare as I stood up and shouted scary things like "TAKE THE BOWL, I TAKE YOUR SOUL!"

I went out with my kids and we went to a few houses actually that had lights on outside and inside, told my kids to go to the door and knock, waited a minute or so, and nothing. This was maybe half-a-dozen houses, so it’s not always a given that just knocking on the door will get results. The new “normal” is that people are either waiting outside to hand out candy or they’re leaving bowls out for kids to help themselves. Knocking on the door for trick or treating is a crapshoot and it’d be understandable why most kids will skip that. Compared to other houses, it’s more effort for potentially no reward, or, even if there is a reward, it’s the same as every other house.

You are if course right and they are wrong. But it's possible they learned this by being yelled at by some curmudgeon who sits at home with their lights on, watching TV on Halloween but screaming at anyone who dares ask for candy. And at all the houses with kids, who welcome them, the parent is out chaperoning their little tribe. Ergo bowl. I say parent because of course they're all divorced by the time the kids are walking.

How to teach them right? Put a sign on your gatepost, not at the door, easily seen from the street. Remember, if they're under 3rd grade they're still learning to read, so keep it simple:

RING BELL FOR CANDY! 🎃🍫🍭🍬👻

Once they do that, you can remind them to say Trick or Treat, and/or admire their costumes.

Baby steps.

My guess is, the kids aren't supposed to knock and interact with strangers anymore cause their parents are scared.
Some places, trick or treating has been replaced with a group of parents driving to a parking lot and their kids going from truck to truck.

We hand it out - one chocolate and 2 non-chocolate. I do most of it because my husband lets them put their disgusting paws in the bowl and take handfuls.

ETA: you could put out a bowl with a little candy and reload it after each kid/group.

Not my experience. When I've had no decorations, my house was mostly skipped. When I put a few out with lights on, I got plenty of knocks and rings from both little kids with parents and young teens. And when I was cooking dinner one time, a teen could smell it and asked if they could have some, LOL. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Leave a bowl out with a sign that says "if the bowl is empty, please knock." You don't even have to fill the bowl with anything.

Give out the best candy possible to the few who come by. The rumor of the amazing trove will spread. But then "run out" early so that some of them will miss out and learn the lesson for next year

At my house we get north of 200 kids every year it's decent outside. Sometimes over 250. We're talking about a kid every minute for the 3.5 hours we do it.

I just set up a table outside, invite a few friends over, drink some beers and give kids candy as they show up. Fuck having to answer the door every minute for 3.5 hours.

My older neighbors complained that the kids don't have to come up to the front door and are skipping their house because I sit outside. I felt a little guilty, but honestly sitting outside (it it's cold I get a fire pit going, not tonight tho) is much nicer. One older couple followed my lead this year and agreed. So I'm over it now. Welcome to the new world.

The last time I left a bowl on my porch, literally the first group that came took all the candy and threw the bowl into my lawn. It disincentivized from doing so again.

That's just how economy works. Anyway I always hated to interact with strangers and still do.

Put a bowl out but in the bowl just have a sign that says "please knock"

It’s a holdover from Covid. It isn’t some glaring indictment of “kids these days”. The social contract changed with Covid and will take time to go back or maybe never does.

Ah yes, let's skip the social part and get right to the obligatory consumption.

I don't really care for Halloween, but I don't actively hate it either. I like seeing kids and parents in cute costumes walking around. To me, the whole point has always been one of social activity, of walking around the neighbourhood and showing off your cool costume and such. You know, the whole "reinforcing horizontal social ties" deal we've done since forever.

I think you're looking at it wrong. It's likely not that kids are too lazy to knock but that your neighbors are too lazy to answer the door. The kids see everyone on the street leaving bowls out and assume that if someone on the street doesn't have a bowl, then they're not doing Halloween like everyone else is.

That’s sad. We only leave the bowl out during the time we are out trick or treating ourselves. All trick or treating is under fire, it seems. Have you heard of trunk-or-treat? Gah. And even people who live in safe areas will like their kids into a car and go drive to some affluent neighborhood where the decorations are fancier and full size bars are being given out. I greatly value the experience of knocking on my neighbors’ doors and it’s sad to see people discount this community building experience.

We sit on the porch and pass it out.

This year we offered candy or pickle. We went through a gallon jar of pickles!

LOL put a ginormous bowl on your porch with a sign in it that says RING BELL FOR CANDY

I sit on the porch with the bowl, it's nice to see them walking around. It's easier for both parties, and I can dress up too.

I think it's because fewer houses are doing it, mostly. But I don't understand skipping very decorated houses, and honestly wouldn't leave out a bowl of candy here.

The sitting on the porch thing is traditional here now (my mom sat inside but I'm over 50 now and since being old enough to be on the treating side have always sat out with the candy and that's more usual as far as I can tell) Though my kids always did go up and try if a light was on outside.

Maybe they are also a little more sensible too, lol - a princess last night looked in the bowl and said, nah there's nothing I like, happy Halloween. My kids would have taken some anyway and traded it around, but it is always too much by the time they are done.

Overall I agree, they should yell TRICK OR TREAT but am glad nobody is, like egging your house if you don't have a treat for them.

The last time I was handing out candy at my old neighborhood, kids would ring the doorbell but then they'd just stand there and stare at me until I handed them candy. You're supposed to say "trick or treat"!

Now I live in an apartment, so I don't get trick-or-treaters. (I have candy just in case, but nobody ever knocks.) My roommate went to hang out with his sister and hand out candy at her place, and apparently their neighborhood has decreed that trick-or-treating ends at 7 sharp now so that nobody is out after dark? I don't get it. I thought staying out late (and, for teens, potentially unsupervised) was part of the fun!

I didn't get a single knock last night.

Spooky decorations, LED candles, WLED providing backup lighting, 12 XL Hershey bars with frozen Snickers as backup.

Not. One. Knock.

Fuck em -- we'll be eating smores all winter. 🤷

Is it only me who is surprised that they have a scout to optimise the process?

Me and some friends of mine went out “reverse trick or treating” tonight, we carried around a door knocking at houses and giving them candy, and doing the same for any trick or treaters, that kind of thing. We were really disappointed by how few people we saw, and a majority of the houses in the area just had bowls. It made us feel quite sad actually.

I think we were just in an older neighborhood, full of mostly empty nesters with a few younger couples. I hope anyways. There’s a part of me that’s worried that Halloween is like a dying holiday I guess, but maybe that’s just because I’ve gotten older and have a different perspective. Who knows.

Its probably a covid relic or something. Kids knock on my house when I'm not even there cause I have my own kids (and yes, I leave a bowl outside and they still knock)