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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 7d

🎃👻 Spooktober: Data After Dark - October 7

Today's plot shows inflation adjusted U.S. Halloween spending across 4 categories from 2005 to 2025 (2025 anticipated).

#Spooktober #DataViz #R #ggplot2 #RStats #Tidyverse #Retail #Halloween

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 8d

Read more here: rpubs.com/colebaril/sp...

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 8d

To get this data, I scraped all store locations off their website and used {stringdist} and {tidygeocoder} to geo-tag each location to allow them to be mapped. Full scraping and cleaning script can be found here: github.com/colebaril/da...

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 8d

Spirit Halloween’s reach spans across North America, with the highest density of stores in the eastern U.S. and major metropolitan regions. Its presence thins in rural and northern areas, reflecting population distribution and retail availability.

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 8d

🎃👻 Spooktober: Data After Dark - October 6

Spirit Halloween stores seem to pop up almost everywhere out of nowhere. I wanted to see just how ubiquitous these temporary shops are across North America.

#Spooktober #DataViz #R #ggplot2 #RStats #Tidyverse #SpiritHalloween #Retail #Halloween

A map of North America showing the distribution of Spirit Halloween stores using purple circles sized by store count. The highest concentrations appear along the eastern United States, particularly around the Great Lakes, the Northeast, and the southeastern states. Dense clusters also appear around major U.S. cities such as Los Angeles, Dallas, and Chicago, while western Canada has smaller clusters near Vancouver, Calgary, and Edmonton. Northern Canada, the northern U.S. plains, and remote regions show few or no stores. The map highlights how Spirit Halloween stores are most common in densely populated urban and suburban areas.

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 8d

Yes, it is my package. It is only used for plot themes and captions w/ html customization to make my life easier, so not necessary at all.

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 9d

get it girl

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 9d

Chocolatey, nutty, caramely bars reign supreme (Reese's, Twix, Kit Kat, Snickers, etc). Although fruity assortments of candy (e.g., Skittles, Starburst) also are popular on their own.

Read more here: rpubs.com/colebaril/sp...

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 9d

🎃👻 Spooktober: Data After Dark - October 5

Want to know which Halloween candy is most popular? Look no further. This Halloween candy constellation plot shows which candy traits are the most popular together.

#Spooktober #DataViz #R #ggplot2 #RStats #Tidyverse #HalloweenCandy #Candy #TrickOrTreat

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 9d

This breaks my heart. I had to say goodbye to the dog I grew up with recently. I framed it to myself as we experience sadness so they don’t have to and can rest and be pain free. You gave her the best life and she was lucky to have you. 🫂

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 9d

The code for each plot can be viewed here : rpubs.com/colebaril/13...

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 10d

This makes me wonder if all the other states started producing pumpkins after the drastic decrease in production by Illinois in 2014 🤔

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 10d

Interestingly, the drastic drop in pumpkin production in 2014 was attributed to abnormally wet conditions that year: archive.attn.com/stories/3884...

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 10d

To make the gif, I used a combination of {gganimate} and {gifski}. Due to how html is rendered, I had to sacrifice some of the usual elements I add to plots.

I also discovered {ggnewscale} which supports different scales for the same type (e.g., size).

Read more here: rpubs.com/colebaril/13...

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 10d

I'm not entirely sure why several states (e.g., PNW, TX) only appear in around 2015 - it is unclear as to whether data collection only started for those states then, or they did not grow pumpkins to that point.

Line chart showing U.S. pumpkin production by state from 2000 to 2024. Illinois is highlighted in orange and consistently leads all other states, producing between ~150M and 320M kilograms annually, with fluctuations and notable spikes around 2014 and 2017. Other top states include California, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania andproduce substantially less, mostly between 20M and 100M kilograms. Decorative pumpkin icons appear near the chart title.

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 10d

🎃👻 Spooktober: Data After Dark - October 4

Today, I looked into U.S. pumpkin production. Illinois dominates in the U.S. due to its ideal soil type and favourable conditions for pumpkin growing.

#Spooktober #DataViz #RStats #Tidyverse #Pumpkins #Pumpkin

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 11d

Almost non-stop lightning—in October.

#mbwx #mbstorm

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 12d

Read more here: rpubs.com/colebaril/sp...

Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 12d

Interestingly, when I graphed the number of haunted places per capita, the graph completely reversed: there are more haunted places per capita in the least populous states.

Bubble scatter plot of U.S. states showing state population (x-axis) versus haunted places per capita (y-axis). Bubble size represents the total number of haunted places. Smaller-population states like Wyoming, Vermont, South Dakota, and North Dakota have the highest per-capita haunted sites, while large states like California and Texas have many haunted places overall but low per-capita density. Title includes a cartoon haunted house with a ghost.

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Cole 🐛 @colebaril.ca · 12d

Sure enough, there is a clear pattern. The more people in a state, the more haunted places. Perhaps this is due to more people to report haunted places, or more entities to do the haunting...

Scatter plot of U.S. states showing the relationship between state population (x-axis) and the number of haunted places (y-axis). Larger-population states generally have more haunted locations. California and Texas stand out with the most hauntings, while Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, and Michigan are also high. Smaller states like Kentucky, Indiana, and Massachusetts are highlighted as well. Title includes a cartoon pumpkin with bats.