Peter Schorsch
Boys and girls of every age, wouldn’t you like to see something strange? Come with us and you will see this, our town of lobbying.
Our apologies to Danny Elfman, but the title track from a movie about two worlds colliding is the perfect fit for our annual rundown of how the men and women working in The Process are helping you enjoy one of the best holidays of the year: Halloween.
According to the Florida Retail Federation, Halloween 2024 has already been a massive boon to retailers.
A survey conducted by its partner organization, the National Retail Federation, found nearly two in five consumers planning to celebrate Halloween started shopping for the holiday back in September.
NRF says 72% of Americans will celebrate in some way and they’ll spend about $103 a pop on average. That adds up to a $11.6 billion rake for retailers, which is a smidge below last year’s record-setting spend but well above pre-pandemic numbers.
If you want a preview of who will be knocking on your door Monday night, the same survey asked shoppers what costumes they’re picking up for the kiddos and, just like the last year … and the year before that, and the year before that … Spiderman took the No. 1 spot. Batman and Superman were the only other trademarks that registered, with Halloween staples such as witches, ghosts and pirates filling out the rest of the Top 10.
Adults are mostly sticking to the tried-and-true costumes, but Beetlejuice — fresh off a decently reviewed sequel — did weasel his way into the Top 10. (With the kids hyper-focused on Spider-man, you’d think more parents would’ve opted to dress as a different Michael Keaton antagonist … just saying.)
Since retailers will be busy counting their Halloween windfall, they’ve handed off their advocacy needs to a team of lobbyists that includes FRF president Scott Shalley as well as in-house lobbyists Angela Bonds, Marnie George, Lorena Holley and Jessica Kraynak. The squad of contract lobbyists includes French Brown of Jones Walker and Jon Johnson, Travis Blanton and Darrick McGhee of Johnson & Blanton.
Halloween, of course, is about more than shopping.
The holiday sprang from Samhain — and by that we mean the Gaelic festival, not second lowest point of Glenn Danzig’s career, right behind ghost writing songs for Roy Orbison. All that aside, Samhain marked the beginning of winter, or the “dark half” of the year, when days are shorter and people are more likely to hear something go bump in the night.
When the Irish, Manx and Scottish peoples ditched Celtic paganism for Christianity, Samhain went through several mergers, acquisitions and rebrands … we’ll spare you the minutiae on Dziady, Calan Gaeaf, Hop-tu-Naa and the rest of the also-rans. What matters is that the world eventually agreed to call it Halloween and to appoint tooth decay as the official mascot.
This was a gut punch for dentists, who learned a valuable lesson: It’s never a bad idea to have a lobbyist on retainer.
The Florida Dental Association, which represents the interests of DDSes and DMDs across the state, relies on in-house advocates Andrew Eason and Joe Anne Hart as well as Team J&B for its lobbying needs.
But, as people with a full set of teeth know, hygienists are also important contributors to oral health — if you disagree, remember that they have a tray of sharp objects and even though they would never purposefully harm you … well, it’s your word against theirs.
Dental hygienists are represented by the aptly named Florida Dental Hygienists’ Association, which looks to James Daughton, Doug Bell, Leslie Dughi, Anna Lewis, Allison Liby-Schoonover, Aimee Diaz Lyon, Andrew Palmer and Karl Rasmussen of Metz Husband & Daughton when it needs a hand in the Legislature.
Dental professionals have since worked through the stages of grief and learned to accept that sugar is an essential part of a happy Halloween — just brush your teeth before bed and floss occasionally, OK?
One thing that sets Florida apart from the rest of the world is that anyone within our border who looks at a mirror and says “Candyman” three times (or is it five?) will receive a burlap sack full of sugar instead of meeting their demise at the hands of a Clive Barker creation.
That’s because sugar is a big industry in Florida, and U.S. Sugar is the biggest name in the business.
The company and its affiliate farmers are hard at work in the Glades producing the core component of decent candy and, perhaps by design, the Sugar Express does not stop in Tallahassee. It’s no matter, because they have a massive team representing them in the Capitol.
Just as sugar is far from the company’s only export, the following is far from an exhaustive list of their lobbyists: Brian Ballard, Bradley Burleson and Adrian Lukis of Ballard Partners; Gregory Black of Waypoint Strategies; Charlie Dudley of Floridian Partners; David Browning, Mercer Fearington, Seth McKeel, Sydney Ridley and Clark Smith of The Southern Group; Richard Heffley and Kelly Horton of Heffley & Associates; Frank Mayernick and Tracy Mayernick of The Mayernick Group; Kirk Pepper of GrayRobinson; Christopher Smith of Tripp Scott PA; and Screven Watson of Screven Watson & Associates.
Florida Crystals is the other big name in the Sunshine State sugar industry. Their team is smaller, but it’s certainly mighty. It includes Davis Bean, Melissa Braude, Cody McCloud and Earl Jones Jr. of The Fiorentino Group; Jeffrey Johnston, Amanda Stewart and Anita Berry of Johnston & Stewart Government Strategies; and Michael Cantens of Flagler Strategies.
Handing out candy isn’t the only way to celebrate Halloween. If you’re feeling particularly festive, Universal Studios hosts the holiday’s premiere festival: Halloween Horror Nights.
For the unfamiliar, the after-dark event draws in tens of thousands of people who want to get spooked by actors who cannot legally hurt them but are trained to give them the strong impression that they might.
This year’s edition features 10 haunted houses that offer several flavors of fright. If you want the nitty gritty, Florida Politics has you covered — our very own Gabrielle Russon checked out this year’s HHN and you can read her thoughts on it.
Even outside of Halloween season, Universal Studios is one of the top destinations in Florida, and it has lobbyists from some of the top firms on retainer. Their team includes Brett Bacot, Mike Grissomand Kimberly McGlynn of Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney; Will McKinley, Angela Dempsey, Fred Dickinson, Erik Kirk and Sophie Smith of PooleMcKinley; Margaret Timmins of Timmins Consulting; and in-housers Melanie Becker and Ilia Torres.
If a trip to Orlando sounds like too much work, Halloween is the best day of the year to sit back and stream your favorite horror movies — at the very least, they’re a festive way to kill time between door knocks.
Sunshine State cinema savants can pocket this piece of trivia: Creature from the Black Lagoon was shot in Florida — more specifically, Silver Springs, Wakulla Springs and Jax.
The definitive “deep ones” film went on to be considered a classic, but there’s been few other “Fresh from Florida films” to be so honored in the 65 years since it bowed. Sorry, Bradford County, as much as you try to scare campers with the mask and chainsaw routine, the real Camp Crystal Lake is in New Jersey.
However, if Film Florida gets its way, that could change. The trade association has been fighting for years to lure film productions back to Florida. It hasn’t cleared the Legislature yet, but it gains enough traction each year to warrant a sequel.
The renewed interest is thanks in part to the team at The Advocacy Group, including Slater Bayliss, Steve Shale, Stephen Shiver, Sarah Busk Suskey and Chris Chaney — no relation to Lon, as best we know, though if he is we bet his Halloween parties are killer.
Of course, not everyone is into creature features. For those that want a little Sci-Fi mixed in, all-time greats such as It Came from Outer Space, or The Thing are always good picks. Speaking of which, John Carpenteris a criminally underrated horror director — in addition to The Thing, he was behind Halloween, In the Mouth of Madness, The Fog and the film adaptation of Stephen King’s Christine.
Christine was a 1958 Plymouth Fury. The two-ton slab of steel got about 10 miles per gallon in the city, meaning that over the summer it would have been less expensive to be carted around by an Uber driver than the soul of a crushed assembly line worker.
A Plymouth badge hasn’t been slapped on a new car in 20-plus years, but if you’re in the market for some American muscle there are options.
Fred Motor Company is the largest U.S. auto manufacturer and, at least for now, still make new ‘Stangs with V8s. The industry juggernaut is represented by Hayden Dempsey of Greenberg Traurig.
Another option is General Motors, which is still rolling Camaros and Corvettes off the line. Fun fact for the trivia nerds out there: The original GM brand was actually Buick, not Chevrolet or any of the bajillion other brands that have been under the GM umbrella over the years. Bonus fact: Dunbar Buick rolled out the first mass produced car a decade before Henry Ford. But he died without a nickel to his name, and American history classes would rather brush Ford’s … let’s call them, um, “personal views” for now … under the rug than talk about that. Moving on, when it comes to lobbying, Chevy’s put the keys in MHD’s hands.
No matter how you plan to celebrate Halloween, remember that it’s the one day of the year when you should reject the “be yourself” message from The Nightmare Before Christmas. Seriously — no costume, no entry.
