Ghouls for Good scares up free costumes for children and their families
CRANBERRY TWP — Prices for Halloween costumes at department stores these days can make any parent want to scream.
But frightening finery abounded from 3 to 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Cranberry Municipal Building gymnasium, where children and teenagers could transform for free into superheroes, princesses, boogeymen or any freaky combination costume. Young ghosts and goblins also can find costumes from 4 to 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 17, and Tuesday, Oct. 18 at Butler Cubs Hall.
“I think that they like coming in and just picking out their costumes, and a lot of them seem to get creative with it,” said Kristen Kane, who founded the program.
Organizers said one child found a cat mask and a cape to create Puss in Boots.
“I think being able to pick what they want from all of the different costumes and try things on if they want,” said program leader Audrianna Bly, who chairs the Butler County Young Professionals group. “They don’t have to worry about their parents paying for it or it being out of their parents’ budget. They get to just be a kid and pick what they want.”
Bly said it’s also rewarding when parents ask how much the costumes their children pick out cost. When they learn they don’t need to pay anything for them, the sense of relief they feel becomes clear.
Butler County Young Professionals, a networking group that helps younger adults get their foot in the door with businesses in region, is hosting the Ghouls for Good initiative.
“Costumes are just so expensive,” Kane said. “I mean at Spirit, some of them are like $50, $60. If you have multiple children, that’s a big bank account.”
Parent Allison Petrozza said it was a blessing and a pleasant surprise to learn about Ghouls for Good this year.
“Seriously, I only have one kid, but it’s enough,” she said. “And he’s 14, and he’s still serious about Halloween. He’s like, ‘I’m always going to go out.’ And I’m like, ‘Hey. More power to you.”
Petrozza said her son’s movie-inspired costume, which will include a wig of long female hair, will make up a broader theme involving all his friends. She said she doesn’t really know where this idea is going, but told her son she would look for whatever she can find. She laughed.
Kane said the program has grown each year since it began seven years ago.
“It kind of started on a whim,” Kane said. “I just called Stan at the chamber and was like, ‘I have this idea.’”
Kane was referring to Stan Kosciuszko, who served as president of the Butler County Chamber of Commerce from 2002 to 2022.
“And I gave him the whole presentation,” she said. “And there was a prolonged silence, and if you know Stan, that can be either really good or really bad. So I was really nervous. And then he says, ‘I love it.’”
That year, her team just placed bins outside of local businesses for people to donate new and gently used costumes, before handing these over to Butler County Children & Youth Services Program.
Though her team has continued to bring donated items from local businesses to families and children, the more recent sponsorship of companies such as Armstrong Credit Union channeled funds directly into the program. Ghouls for Good now uses these to buy costumes brand new.
Greeted upon entry by a “Ghostbusters” recording, a boy in a skeleton costume toddled into the gymnasium with his mother to find a costume of his own.
He was following his mom out of the gymnasium with the collection of discoveries the two of them had picked out together. But he turned around when one of the Ghouls for Good volunteers raised a neon grab bag adorned by a witch.
“Would you like some candy too?” she asked him.
He returned for the treats before going on his way.
