France Turning Its Back on 'Le Halloween'
Earl Evleth
time and money on, but not really French. One seller
said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
its popularity would pass.
Celtic music goes over better since Bretagne is
Celtic and the language is still spoken there.
Earl
****
France Turning Its Back on 'Le Halloween'
Fri Oct 31, 1:43 AM ET
Add Business - AP to My Yahoo!
By LAURENCE FROST, AP Business Writer
PARIS - Five years after it took France by storm in a whirlwind marketing
drive launched by a lone French entrepreneur, "Le Halloween" looks set to
perform its very own disappearing act.
Parties, pumpkins and Halloween bar promotions are still on offer Friday
night, but almost everyone agrees there's something missing this year.
The only people really spooked are retailers.
Arriving almost two decades after "trick-or-treat" entered popular
vocabulary in neighboring Britain, Halloween swiftly became a cash cow that
few French marketing directors could afford to miss.
But Richard Roizen, the businessman credited with importing the festival to
France, died earlier this year. Paris trend-watchers are predicting that
Halloween will be buried with him.
As chairman and chief executive of Cesar ‹ once a brand of masks worn to
19th century balls ‹ Roizen transformed the firm into the world's largest
costume maker with annual revenue of euro122 million ($142 million).
Attending Chicago's Halloween trade show, the annual gathering par
excellence for makers of creepy masks and rubber spiders, he quickly grasped
the potential for his home market.
"He struggled for years to bring Halloween to France," says Franck Matthais,
head of advertising for French toy store chain La Grande Recre.
Things took off in the autumn of 1998.
"We were in a euphoric mood because France had just won the soccer World
Cup," Matthais recalled. "Halloween worked very well indeed."
By 2000-2001, when it peaked, Coca Cola and mobile phone operator Orange had
jumped on the bandwagon ‹ even though their products have no obvious
connection to Halloween. Bakery windows were crammed with marzipan pumpkins
and spidery confections.
Since then, however, Halloween has had "less impact each year," Matthais
said in an interview. Last year, he spent euro150,000 ($175,000) on spooky
decorations for the toy chain's 86 outlets, as well as in-store face
painting for kids. And this year's budget?
"Zero," he said. "There are virtually no Halloween products in the shops."
The same goes for the Bakery Julien, near Paris's fashionable Champs
Elysees, where there is not a single pumpkin in sight.
Instead, its window is adorned with figurines of saints. All Saints' Day on
Saturday, and Sunday's Festival of the Dead, are major dates in the French
religious calendar.
"We're doing anti-Halloween," bakery owner Gontran Julien quipped.
Julien is not alone. Radio advertisements for Flunch, a fast food chain,
urge diners to "escape Halloween" by seeking refuge in their restaurants,
where they will instead be confronted with special menus celebrating the
"Ancient Gauls' New Year".
The chain is offering mead, a medieval alcoholic drink made from honey, for
diners to wash down large slabs of meat and other foods deemed authentically
Gaulish.
Flunch marketing director Sophie Gilleron said she felt the tide turn
against Halloween last year. "Besides, there are only so many things you can
do with pumpkin," she said.
Elsewhere the culture clash is more serious. French Catholic youth groups
plan to demonstrate for the second year running against what they see as
Halloween's trivialization of death.
Despite the omens, costume company Cesar insists Halloween, the source of 15
percent of its annual sales, will long outlive its late chairman ‹ mainly as
an event for children.
"The French market has moved away from the gory side, it's now more about
being 'scary but cute'," said marketing director Isabelle Geniez. "It's a
good compromise."
Nevertheless, the CREDOC ‹ a Paris-based sociological research institute ‹
says the writing is on the wall for Halloween.
Not only does Halloween seem to undermine the solemnity of Sunday's Festival
of the Dead, when some 9 million French people will visit relatives' graves,
it has also "failed to create any of its own traditions," CREDOC director
Robert Rochefort said.
"It was a fashion that worked very well," he said. "But it's become a victim
of its own commercialism."
Jeremy
Evleth" <evl...@wanadoo.fr> wrote:
> Basically, it was cute, sort of something to waste one`s
> time and money on, but not really French. One seller
> said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
> its popularity would pass.
>
> Celtic music goes over better since Bretagne is
> Celtic and the language is still spoken there.
>
> Earl
>
> ****
We had quite a few kids round, and they also visited local shops where they
were well received. The kids were imaginatively outfitted and polite.
Obviously not Muslims.
J.
Mxsmanic
> Basically, it was cute, sort of something to waste one`s
> time and money on, but not really French. One seller
> said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
> its popularity would pass.
>
> Celtic music goes over better since Bretagne is
> Celtic and the language is still spoken there.
This article is interesting--I was thinking this very evening that
Halloween doesn't seem to be nearly as popular as it was a year or two
ago. One year I recall seeing kids all over the place in costume, and
even some adults. The ones I saw today I could count on one hand.
Additionally, the stores are already rushing to put up Christmas
decorations. I guess Christmas is more of a sure thing than Halloween.
I understand some clubs are having "Halloween dances," though, something
that I don't ever recall encountering in the U.S.
--
Transpose hotmail and mxsmanic in my e-mail address to reach me directly.
Elaine
"Earl Evleth" <evl...@wanadoo.fr> wrote in message
news:BBC86427.19118%evl...@wanadoo.fr...
> Basically, it was cute, sort of something to waste one`s
> time and money on, but not really French. One seller
> said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
> its popularity would pass.
We were very surprised at the amount of halloween stuff on sale in the shops
whilst we were in Lyon last October. It seemed even bigger there than it is
here in the UK.
Maybe the UK will follow France's lead and it will eventually die out here
too, or is that just wishful thinking?
Elaine
Icono Clast
> France Turning Its Back on 'Le Halloween'
How sad. Too bad.
Hallwe'en is, and has always been, San Francisco's biggest party.
Tuesday's high temperature was a record-setting 93°F (I think) and I
said "I sure hope it's warm Friday evening". Well, not only was it not
warm this evening, it was very cold. Right now it's 47°F. I doubt if
it was much warmer at Midnight when we left Castro Street.
Tonight in Eureka Valley there must've been close to 200,000 people of
whom about 90% were made up, decorated, and/or costumed in some
manner. Although we visited none, I know that there were thousands
more on other neighborhood commercial streets in addition to Eureka
Valley's main drag, the Four- and Five-hundred blocks of Castro
Street. Polk Gulch and Broadway/Columbus (North Beach) usually have
great crowds as does Mission Street in several neighborhoods, Potrero
Avenue, San Bruno Avenue, Clement Street, Irving Street in at least
two neighborhoods, Taraval Street, Fillmore Street, Noriega Street,
Haight Street, Cole Street, Union Street (Cow Hollow), and perhaps a
few others. I doubt if there's a bar in town that didn't have a
"Hallowe'en Party". I have deliberately not named the beautiful
two-block long part of a street in which virtually all of the houses
get decorated and several have spectacular, magical, "shows" as one
passes. It's all designed for children but is a treat for "children of
all ages" as the RingMaster says.
I'm certain the low temperature, and bit of rain around 19:30 was the
reason the Castro Street show lacked the usual tits, dicks, twats, and
asses. There were miles of cleavage, though, and many legs exposed by
garments cut very high.
As always, some of the costumes were wonderful works showing great
thought, creativity, and craftsmanship. There were a few gorgeous
queens in drag but most of the drag was whimsical or comic. There was
a couple, a giant penis and vagina, that we found delightful but at
least one young woman thought "disgusting". There was also a Fallopian
Swim Team.
We were there for about five hours, getting to see the children and
dogs in the early evening before the big crowds arrived around ten.
I've been spending Hallowe'ens on Castro Street since I was in the
Third Grade. The first time I went out in drag, in the '50s, was on
Castro Street. In those days, the gay neighborhoods were Polk Gulch
and North Beach although we had a gay couple for neighbors who are
probably dead now but had been together, then, for many years and
eventually celebrated being together for longer than 50 years.
If you have only one day to spend in San Francisco, Hallowe'en is the
day to do so.
____________________________________________________________
A San Franciscan in (where else?) San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net
Thomas Peel
Elaine schrieb:
This American commercial fad has also been imported into Germany with
mixed success in recent years. We had one group of kids yesterday ring
on the door for a "trick or treat".
November 1st has always been a public holiday here so that people can
pursue the original religous purpose of Halloween, and tend the graves
of their departed loved ones.
T.
Mxsmanic
> Hallwe'en is, and has always been, San Francisco's biggest party.
Isn't every day a party day in San Francisco?
> If you have only one day to spend in San Francisco, Hallowe'en is the
> day to do so.
Isn't every day Halloween in San Francisco?
One of the reasons I'd avoid San Francisco is that I _don't like_
massive public demonstrations with people behaving strangely in strange
costumes. I don't like special events at all, as a general rule,
especially those that produce crowds.
David Horne
> Halloween in Northern Ireland is a heady mix of high explosives and more high
> explosives. Oddly enough they are illegal to buy without a permit. However
> nobody has ever been prosecuted for buying the darn things. I expect the
> hospitals will be full of the wounded tomorrow.
Would that the fireworks only came out on October 31 and November 5.
It's almost non-stop for October and November in much of urban Britain.
Kids throw firecrackers at buses, trains, each other, and apparently
through the windows of the elderly (thinking of one quite horrible
recent case.)
Everyone says it's unfair to ban them, based on the bad behaviour of the
few, but in fact, I think they're fast becoming a public nuisance. The
current laws obviously have no effect. Of course, politicians don't tend
to live among the masses, so they have little real idea of what people
have to put up with.
David
--
David Horne- www.davidhorne.co.uk
davidhorne (at) davidhorne (dot) co (dot) uk
Marie Lewis
<elli...@clysbarton.freeserve.co.uk> writes
>
>We were very surprised at the amount of halloween stuff on sale in the shops
>whilst we were in Lyon last October. It seemed even bigger there than it is
>here in the UK.
>
>Maybe the UK will follow France's lead and it will eventually die out here
>too, or is that just wishful thinking?
>
>Elaine
>
>
or treating and I saw no-one in fancy dress.
--
Marie Lewis
nospam...@dcs.ed.ac.uk
celebrated for hundreds of years - to Nice, I was surprised to see a
lot MORE Halloween decoration up in shops all over Nice than I'm ever
used to seeing at home in Edinburgh. Rather startling.
Anyway, by the time Halloween is near, shops here are well into their
Christmas celebrations! My local supermarket has already dragged out
its dreaded robot carol singing machine and set it up at the front
entrance, where it'll ponderously try to look cute (it fails utterly)
and sing loudly in nasty American accents until the end of the year.
--
-- Chris.
Reid
>Would that the fireworks only came out on October 31 and November 5.
>It's almost non-stop for October and November in much of urban Britain.
>Kids throw firecrackers at buses, trains, each other, and apparently
>through the windows of the elderly (thinking of one quite horrible
>recent case.)
The latest bit of fun is putting the new huge fireworks in a
phone box.
>Everyone says it's unfair to ban them, based on the bad behaviour of the
>few, but in fact, I think they're fast becoming a public nuisance. The
>current laws obviously have no effect. Of course, politicians don't tend
>to live among the masses, so they have little real idea of what people
>have to put up with.
I back onto parkland and we get about a month of nightime
explosions. It seems to me we have reached the point where
fireworks should be in displays and people should have a bonfire
with a guy to burn and cook jacket potatoes etc, probably best
done on the local green communally anyway, an excuse for people
to <shock> talk to their neighbours.
--
Mike Reid
"Art is the lie that reveals the truth" P.Picasso
UK walking & photos "http://www.fellwalk.co.uk" <-- you can email us@ this site
Spain,cuisines and walking "http://www.fell-walker.co.uk" <-- dontuse@ all, it's a spamtrap
Reid
>Maybe the UK will follow France's lead and it will eventually die out here
>too, or is that just wishful thinking?
Probably wishful thinking, but BBC London were taking a line on
celebrating Guy Fawkes rather than "trick and treat" or extortion
as I call it. Our doorbell only rang twice this year, so perhaps
its dying down. I feel sorry for old people terrorised by young
thugs armed with fireworks.
When did you last see "a penny for the guy"?
Lene Hellgren
America by Europeans and commercialized there.
Catholics in Europe still call it All Saints Day.
Lene
> Basically, it was cute, sort of something to waste one`s
> time and money on, but not really French. One seller
> said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
> its popularity would pass.
>
> Celtic music goes over better since Bretagne is
> Celtic and the language is still spoken there.
>
> Earl
>
> ****
>
>
> France Turning Its Back on 'Le Halloween'
>
> Fri Oct 31, 1:43 AM ET
>
> Add Business - AP to My Yahoo!
>
> By LAURENCE FROST, AP Business Writer
>
> PARIS - Five years after it took France by storm in a whirlwind marketing
> drive launched by a lone French entrepreneur, "Le Halloween" looks set to
> perform its very own disappearing act.
>
>
> Parties, pumpkins and Halloween bar promotions are still on offer Friday
> night, but almost everyone agrees there's something missing this year.
>
> The only people really spooked are retailers.
>
> Arriving almost two decades after "trick-or-treat" entered popular
> vocabulary in neighboring Britain, Halloween swiftly became a cash cow that
> few French marketing directors could afford to miss.
>
> But Richard Roizen, the businessman credited with importing the festival to
> France, died earlier this year. Paris trend-watchers are predicting that
> Halloween will be buried with him.
>
> As chairman and chief executive of Cesar ? once a brand of masks worn to
> 19th century balls ? Roizen transformed the firm into the world's largest
> costume maker with annual revenue of euro122 million ($142 million).
>
> Attending Chicago's Halloween trade show, the annual gathering par
> excellence for makers of creepy masks and rubber spiders, he quickly grasped
> the potential for his home market.
>
> "He struggled for years to bring Halloween to France," says Franck Matthais,
> head of advertising for French toy store chain La Grande Recre.
>
> Things took off in the autumn of 1998.
>
> "We were in a euphoric mood because France had just won the soccer World
> Cup," Matthais recalled. "Halloween worked very well indeed."
>
> By 2000-2001, when it peaked, Coca Cola and mobile phone operator Orange had
> jumped on the bandwagon ? even though their products have no obvious
> percent of its annual sales, will long outlive its late chairman ? mainly as
> an event for children.
>
> "The French market has moved away from the gory side, it's now more about
> being 'scary but cute'," said marketing director Isabelle Geniez. "It's a
> good compromise."
>
> Nevertheless, the CREDOC ? a Paris-based sociological research institute ?
Reid
>It's actually an old European tadition, brought to
>America by Europeans and commercialized there.
>
>Catholics in Europe still call it All Saints Day.
Halloween yes, strong in Scotland, but what about "trick or
treat"? The very name sounds american. It didn't exist in UK
until it appeared in US TV imports a few years ago.
Rudolph Hucker
> Following up to Elaine
>
> >Maybe the UK will follow France's lead and it will eventually die out here
> >too, or is that just wishful thinking?
>
> Probably wishful thinking, but BBC London were taking a line on
> celebrating Guy Fawkes rather than "trick and treat" or extortion
> as I call it. Our doorbell only rang twice this year, so perhaps
> its dying down. I feel sorry for old people terrorised by young
> thugs armed with fireworks.
> When did you last see "a penny for the guy"?
> --
> Mike Reid
Penny for the guy - just imagine the abuse you'd get if you actually did give anyone a penny!!
Quite amusing these days to see the "trick or treaters" give our place a wide berth. Perhaps
because it's my daughter's birthday and she hosts a party with a host of hefty guests that
would do any misguided little thug a serious amount of damage.
RH
--
He who laughs last thinks slowest.
The views and expressions contained in this message do not necessarily
coincide with those of my employer.
Mxsmanic
> Halloween yes, strong in Scotland, but what about "trick or
> treat"? The very name sounds american.
It's not just a name in the United States: it's official foreign and
domestic policy.
Reid
>> Halloween yes, strong in Scotland, but what about "trick or
>> treat"? The very name sounds american.
>
>It's not just a name in the United States: it's official foreign and
>domestic policy.
Excellent.
me
> It's actually an old European tadition, brought to
> America by Europeans and commercialized there.
>
> Catholics in Europe still call it All Saints Day.
God I hope not. That's November 1st. All Hallowed's Eve
is October 31st. It is supposedly a night of all sorts
of metaphysical possibilities.
But all of that was way lost in the commercialization of
the event. Now, it's mostly just a national costume party.
me
[snip]
>
> One of the reasons I'd avoid San Francisco is that I _don't like_
> massive public demonstrations with people behaving strangely in strange
> costumes. I don't like special events at all, as a general rule,
> especially those that produce crowds.
I think you might have San Fran confused with New Orleans. Halloween
produces fairly large celebrations in communties with large gay
populations (Key West has "Fantasy Fest"). But the remainder of the year,
I'm not sure what would lead you to describe SF this way any more than
any other large American City.
Sarah Banick
When I was in Catholic school in the '70s, (in the US), we always got All
Saints Day off as a holy day of obligation. At the time, most of us thought
the holiday was an opportunity for us to count our candy!
devil
> It's actually an old European tadition, brought to
> America by Europeans and commercialized there.
>
> Catholics in Europe still call it All Saints Day.
However, my guess wold be that this is just like Chrismas, an older
tradition of Germanic origin, that antecedes Christianity.
And which the Catholic church incorporated at some point when they clearly
saw it fit to incorporate anything within their own realm.
So, just like the winter solstice celebration that Christmas had been is
reinvented as "the birth of Christ," the celebration of all the ghosts
becomes the celebration of all past dead people.
Incidentally, this is what Oct. 30 is in the Catholic word. The
celebration *of the dead.* All Saints Day is the next day, Nov. 1.
The ghosts are mereley the unlucky ones who didn't make it to sainthood I
guess.
Hatunen
Hellgren) wrote:
>It's actually an old European tadition, brought to
>America by Europeans and commercialized there.
>
>Catholics in Europe still call it All Saints Day.
Uh, no. They call 1 November All Saints Day. Halloween is 31
october.
************* DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@cox.net) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *
Mxsmanic
> The ghosts are mereley the unlucky ones who didn't make it
> to sainthood I guess.
They didn't have the right PR. Nowadays media favorites can jump onto a
fast track to sainthood after death.
Lene Hellgren
All Saints Day (1.nov).
Lene
meurgues
> time and money on, but not really French. One seller
> said it had the "mode" attacked to it, meaning that
> its popularity would pass.
>
> Celtic music goes over better since Bretagne is
> Celtic and the language is still spoken there.
>
> Earl
>
> ****
>
>
> France Turning Its Back on 'Le Halloween'
"LE Halloween" ???
I've never seen the article "Le" used before this word in french
language. If you say that, french people will/could laugh... I'm even
wondering if that's not incorrect. I'm always amused to see in some
english speaking moovies where French places are reconstructed, signs
on the front shops like "La boulangerie", "La boucherie", full point !
In France you will never see that but simply "Boulangerie-patisserie",
"Boucherie du raincy" or "Bar des amis", for ex.
The articles "le, la les, au, aux" are only used, like sometimes in
english, when the place name is characterised more precisely like in
"At the rising sun", "Au soleil levant", "The globe", "The black
unicorn" (bar), "La licorne", "Le bar des amis", "Le boeuf sur le
toit" , "Le pied de cochon", "La tour d'argent" (3 restaurants),
etc... You can say "La boulangerie du canal" but "Boulangerie du
canal" will be more common.
The only company in France wich uses an article in his name at
singular which I can remember is the post office "La poste" and it
sounds rather strange to a french hear because it is abnormal to call
a company like that at singular. Before it was simply called
"Poste(s)" in the name PTT. They just wanted to be different probably
for advertising reasons. It is only normal at plural : "Les comptoirs
réunis", but rare.
Only towns uses normally the article in some cases : La Clusaz, Le
havre, Le Blanc, etc... because it allows them to be ditinguished from
the common nouns they use : Clusaz (cluse in savoyard : a closed
little valley), havre (harbour), blanc (white), etc... But these towns
names are rare too and, for the masculine names, become : au Blanc, au
Havre, when used in a sentence.
Even when plural is used like for the islands or for countries wich
are at plural in their own name, they appear without the article on
maps : Bahamas, Seychelles, Maldives, Iles Vierges (iles is added
because vierge/virgin is also a common noun), Etats Unis, etc... The
article "Les" at plural is only used in a sentence : "Les (iles)
Marquises sont lointaines".
So it's always an amasement to the french to hear at the Eurovision
song contest the french translation of the points count by the english
speaking people this way : "Le Portugal dix points, L'Italie neuf
points, L'Allemagne cinq points", etc... even when they have just
heard before, the french vote say quite distinctly "Portugal huit
points, Italie sept points, Allemagne deux points", etc..., without
the article, which is the only correct form in modern french. At least
they don't dare to say "L'Israel seven points, Le Malte five
points..." :=) !!!
didier Meurgues
> Fri Oct 31, 1:43 AM ET
>
> Add Business - AP to My Yahoo!
>
> By LAURENCE FROST, AP Business Writer
>
> PARIS - Five years after it took France by storm in a whirlwind marketing
> drive launched by a lone French entrepreneur, "Le Halloween" looks set to
> perform its very own disappearing act.
>
>
> Parties, pumpkins and Halloween bar promotions are still on offer Friday
> night, but almost everyone agrees there's something missing this year.
>
> The only people really spooked are retailers.
>
> Arriving almost two decades after "trick-or-treat" entered popular
> vocabulary in neighboring Britain, Halloween swiftly became a cash cow that
> few French marketing directors could afford to miss.
>
> But Richard Roizen, the businessman credited with importing the festival to
> France, died earlier this year. Paris trend-watchers are predicting that
> Halloween will be buried with him.
>
> As chairman and chief executive of Cesar ? once a brand of masks worn to
> 19th century balls ? Roizen transformed the firm into the world's largest
> costume maker with annual revenue of euro122 million ($142 million).
>
> Attending Chicago's Halloween trade show, the annual gathering par
> excellence for makers of creepy masks and rubber spiders, he quickly grasped
> the potential for his home market.
>
> "He struggled for years to bring Halloween to France," says Franck Matthais,
> head of advertising for French toy store chain La Grande Recre.
>
> Things took off in the autumn of 1998.
>
> "We were in a euphoric mood because France had just won the soccer World
> Cup," Matthais recalled. "Halloween worked very well indeed."
>
> By 2000-2001, when it peaked, Coca Cola and mobile phone operator Orange had
> jumped on the bandwagon ? even though their products have no obvious
> percent of its annual sales, will long outlive its late chairman ? mainly as
> an event for children.
>
> "The French market has moved away from the gory side, it's now more about
> being 'scary but cute'," said marketing director Isabelle Geniez. "It's a
> good compromise."
>
> Nevertheless, the CREDOC ? a Paris-based sociological research institute ?
David Horne
> Following up to Elaine
>
> >Maybe the UK will follow France's lead and it will eventually die out here
> >too, or is that just wishful thinking?
>
> Probably wishful thinking, but BBC London were taking a line on
> celebrating Guy Fawkes rather than "trick and treat" or extortion
> as I call it. Our doorbell only rang twice this year, so perhaps
> its dying down. I feel sorry for old people terrorised by young
> thugs armed with fireworks.
> When did you last see "a penny for the guy"?
When I was a kid in Scotland, Halloween was great fun. It wasn't just
enough to turn up and demand sweets- you had to perform- sing, tell a
joke or a short story etc.
This year, I didn't answer the door.
David
--
David Horne- website under re-construction