Snarls, spats, and ire: It must be Halloween!

Competition among businesses in Salem sometimes gets nasty

Visitors to Salem walk among the headstones at the Old Burying Ground. (Mark Wilson/Globe Staff)

For retailers on Essex Street, who will greet as many as 100,000 Halloween revelers expected tomorrow night, October means big business.

"Everyone's struggling to get the money out of the same pool, and there's only so much to go around," said Mollie Stewart, who runs Spellbound Tours, a ghost-hunting company. "We're the Halloween capital of the world, so it's a big pot right now, but after Oct. 31 it's going to be a ghost town, literally."

Every year, about 1 million tourists visit Salem - with more than 300,000 visitors arriving in October. The visitors, according to Salem Main Streets, a nonprofit that works to boost the city's economy, spend $124 million annually in the city - with the bulk going to downtown merchants.

But with the economy struggling and recession becoming a daily topic, the fight for tourist bucks among retailers has never been more competitive.

When tourists arrive in Salem, they're often greeted by smiling merchants on the brick and cobblestone streets. What tourists don't see is the backbiting and intense competition: One walking-tour company owner says at least one competitor has tried to block her tour while in progress; workers for the two opposing trolley companies have publicly bad-mouthed one another; and last year, a woman who had worked as a psychic was arrested after police say she placed raccoon entrails on the doorways of competing psychic businesses.

Mayor Kim Driscoll said she was unaware of the squabbles among retailers but linked tension to the faltering economy. "When there's an economic downturn I guess every dollar matters a little bit more; every sale matters a little bit more," said Driscoll.

Kate Fox, executive director of Destination Salem - the city's Office of Tourism and Cultural Affairs - said wherever there's tourism you'll find competition among merchants. "I think it's typical of any business community. And it depends on the personalities you have. I think that we'd certainly be a happier destination without it but I can't fault people for being protective of their ideas," said Fox.

But among some retailers, gaining the upper edge and staying profitable in a city where most of the money is made in October is critical.

"It is very cutthroat," said Leah Schmidt, who has owned the Salem Trolley and the Haunted Footsteps Ghost Tour since 1997.

Schmidt alleges that at least one competitor has smeared animal feces on her door, and scratched her car. "There's been pushing and verbal assaults upon myself, attempting to trip my tour guides. We've had water balloons tossed at us by other tour operators; ripped-up brochures," she said.

Schmidt also accuses CityView Trolley Tours of trying to steal her business. In a letter to the city's licensing board last year, she wrote that CityView tried to deceive the public by also calling the company Salem Trolley Tours, and setting up a website, salemtrolleytours.com, similar to her company's salemtrolley.com.

Tim Maguire, head manager for CityView Trolley, who also runs Remember Salem ghost tours, said his companies have acted fairly and not engaged in wrongdoing. "If it's cutthroat, it's on their side," he said.

Witches have also feuded publicly, with two of the city's most prominent witches, Christian Day and Laurie Stathopoulos, taking different sides on a city ordinance that passed last year. The ordinance increased the number of fortune-tellers in the city. It was in the midst of the debate that parts of a dead raccoon were left on the doorsteps of psychic businesses that opposed the ordinance.

Most witches now agree that the ordinance has actually increased business for their shops, but Day - who runs a psychic fair each October and proposed the ordinance - said there's always tension among witch-owned businesses.

"We often come to blows because you're dealing with a nascent spiritual path; you're dealing with people who are trying to define not only their commerce and their business but their spirituality," said Day, who owns Hex, a witch shop. "So when you're dealing with spirituality and money all in the same breath there's going to be problems and disagreements."

The competition is not limited to ghost tours, trolleys, and witch stores. Karen Caccavaro, who has owned Coons Card & Gift Shop for seven years, said she can't compete with merchants who pay the city $200 a day for a temporary license to sell clothing from pushcarts.

"They bring these people in and it cuts down on what I'm trying to sell. There's one selling silkscreen T-shirts for $5. I sell them for $10 and $14 - I can't compete with $5 T-shirts," she said.

Driscoll said regulations are in place to protect year-round merchants during October. While 20 pushcart clothing vendors are allowed downtown during the month, along with 10 mobile food vendors, the city allows year-round retailers such as Caccavaro to set up pushcarts outside of their shops for no fee.

Leonard Pickel believes the key to being successful in the city is to be original and not sell merchandise that other shops sell. In August, he opened the True Story of Lizzie Borden, a museum dedicated to the 19th-century Fall River woman who was acquitted of charges of murdering her parents.

"We're trying to be completely different from anybody else so we're not stepping on anybody's toes," said Pickel, who says the Borden museum fits into Salem's tourist genre because it describes a dark part of history in the state.

"We want to be very different. But it won't be long before the T-shirt shops in town will have Lizzie Borden T-shirts in them. I have no doubt. And they'll be cheaper than ours."

Down the block on Essex Street, Mike Vitka stood on the sidewalk and spoke loudly through a megaphone. Billed as The Abominable Dr. Vitka, the Salem man works as a carnival barker in the summer months and decided to open a sideshow this year in a small room in the back of a gothic store. Vitka said business has been good so far, and he attributed the success of his fledgling act to the fact that he's the only barker in town.

Still, he knows another barker or sideshow may turn up next year. "Everybody is trying to find out what everybody else is doing. After work, you can't go into a bar or restaurant and talk about business because everybody is listening," said Vitka.

"Everybody wants a piece of the action and if you've got a good idea, somebody's going to hear it. Whispers carry very loudly around here."

Steven Rosenberg can be reached at srosenberg@globe.com.