I keep a short list of what to grab from Dollar General before Halloween, and these seven spooky treats for kids made the cut — nothing here costs more than five dollars.
1. SOUR PATCH KIDS and SWEDISH FISH Mini Holiday Candy Variety Pack, 22 Snack Packs – $3.75
Twenty-two individually wrapped mini snack packs — a mix of Sour Patch Kids and Swedish Fish — come in one $3.75 bag you can drop straight into treat bags without portioning anything yourself. That’s two major candy brands, pre-sorted, for well under four dollars.
Parting Thoughts: At about seventeen cents a pack, this is the rare treat-bag candy that doubles as snack-time backup all season.
2. Brach’s Classic Candy Corn, 11 oz – $3.00
The Halloween staple — 11 ounces of tri-color candy corn for three dollars that portions effortlessly into small scoops or cellophane bags. It reads immediately to every kid who reaches into the bag.
Parting Thoughts: The only candy here that actually looks festive in the bag before the kid opens it.
3. Fun Sweets Halloween Cotton Candy, Assorted – $1.00
A festive spooky tub of fluffy cotton candy for a dollar — something that feels completely different from every other item in the bag. It stops kids cold when they pull it out.
Parting Thoughts: Nothing else in this list is cotton candy, and that one-dollar surprise factor is exactly what makes it worth including.
4. REESE’S Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups, Candy Pack, 1.5 oz – $1.50
Reese’s Cups are the treat everyone actually wants, and at $1.50 for a two-cup pack, this is the most recognizable name-brand drop you can make at this price. Every adult trick-or-treating with their kid will silently root for you.
Parting Thoughts: Kids will remember which house handed these out — Reese’s at $1.50 is a genuine win.
5. Tootsie Roll Pops Minis, 13.5 oz – $4.50
This $4.50 bag holds up to 75 individually wrapped mini lollipops with a chewy Tootsie Roll center — do the math and you’re at roughly six cents each. Two or three fit in a bag without crowding, which makes high-volume stuffing completely painless.
Parting Thoughts: Peanut-free, gluten-free, and six cents a pop — the bulk buy that makes sense every single Halloween.
6. Smarties Mega Candies, 2.25 oz – $1.00
Decades-old, instantly recognizable, and still a dollar — Smarties Mega delivers 2.25 ounces of the classic tart candy tablet that has been landing in treat bags for generations. Parents know it, kids know it, and it is essentially free per bag.
Parting Thoughts: Three generations of trick-or-treaters can’t be wrong; Smarties Mega hold up as one of the few genuinely universal Halloween picks.
7. Mother’s Limited Batch Eerie Critters, Shortbread Cookies, Halloween Snacks – $3.75
Parents quietly scan treat bags for the non-candy item, and for $3.75, these spooky-shaped shortbread critters are the one they will actually appreciate. Shelf-stable and ready to drop in alongside the candy, they break up the all-candy monotony without complicating the assembly line.
Parting Thoughts: Worth adding for anyone building bags where variety — not just candy count — is the goal.
