Buddy the Elf loves candy corn. Do you?

Shopping data gathered ahead of upcoming Halloween celebrations finds one favorite confection continues to dominate for American shoppers while a few, lesser known retro goodies appear to be staging comebacks.

And fresh Utah polling results help us finally crack, perhaps, a recurring seasonal mystery — who the heck is still buying candy corn?

Recent shopping data shared by delivery services Doordash and Instacart show that Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are the No. 1 choice in the U.S. this time of year for filling up trick-or-treat bags and home candy bowls, and it’s a spot the peanut butter and chocolate delight has held down for years.

Many may not know that the premiere Reese’s treat has been around since 1928 and was developed by a former employee of the U.S. king of chocolate, Hershey’s.

Harry Burnett (H.B.) Reese started making and selling his “penny cups” as a side hustle, leaning on a name that reflected how much he charged for the candies at the time, according to a Business Insider report. While Reese would go on to find great success with his candy innovations, his six sons sold the company in 1963, seven years after their father’s death. In a circular twist of fate, the purchaser was Hershey’s, which paid $23.5 million for the enterprise.

Hershey’s is the maker of another perennial favorite among Halloween candy buyers, its classic milk chocolate bar, while the Mars company has a couple of entrants in the top five including Snickers and M&M’s.

Doordash notes that other contenders have cracked the top 10 including Sour Patch Kids and Skittles, a sign that Americans may be turning back toward “nostalgic comfort in the timeless classics.”

And, as it turns out, Halloween candy connoisseurs like to get an early start when it comes to stocking up on their seasonal sweet treats.

“We’re seeing households start to shop weeks ahead of October — not just to be prepared, but because Halloween has become an experience people want to stretch out and savor,” Alex Orellana, trends analyst at Instacart, told Food & Wine magazine. “Whether it’s nostalgic classics like Reese’s or polarizing favorites like candy corn, these treats are part of the traditions that make Halloween feel special.”

The controversial candy corn can trace its history even further back than Reese’s penny cups, to the late 1800s. And even though the colorful corn-shaped candy, made up of mostly sugar and corn syrup, has developed its own legion of vocal haters, Instacart data from last year found the sugary triangles made up 2% to 3% of all U.S. candy purchases last October.

“The fact that some states can’t get enough of candy corn while others avoid it altogether shows how personal and regional these rituals really are,” Orellana said.

How do we really feel about candy corn?

Fans of the holiday movie “Elf” will know that Buddy’s four main food groups are candy, candy canes, candy corn and syrup.

While candy corn doesn’t make much of an appearance at Christmas, it seems to spill out of Halloween bags everywhere. And people either love it or hate it.

For Utahns, it leans much more toward love.

A new Deseret News online poll conducted in partnership with the University of Utah’s Hinckley Institute of Politics on Oct. 17-22 of 809 registered Utah voters, included a question that got right to the heart of the issue.

Below a photograph of a pile of shiny yellow, orange and white candy corns, the survey asked, “Do you like or dislike this candy?”

Turns out a whopping 64% of respondents said they like the treat “somewhat” or “a lot,” while 36% say they dislike the candy. Of the candy corn lovers, 29% fell into the top level of fandom, while on the other end of the corn row, 20% reported strong distaste for the confection.

The survey conducted by Morning Consult has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

In the poll, women and men expressed liking candy corn equally, both at 64%. While more than half of people age 18 to 34 like the treat, older people really like it. The survey found three-fourths of those over age 65 like candy corn as do the same number of baby boomers.

Whatever the demographic — Republicans, Democrats, Trump voters, Harris voters, high wage earners, low wage earners, white, Hispanic, urban, rural — well over half like candy corn, according to the survey.

The local survey appears to jibe with national data.

Brach’s, a maker of candy corn, found Utah along with Kansas and Iowa are the top purchasers of the confection in the country. The ranking in based on candy corn purchases per 1,000 households in 2024.

While Utahns’ love of candy corn may be tracking well above the national average, a few other quirks showed up in the shopping data that sets their Halloween candy habits.

For starters, the state’s collective sweet tooth is championship level, according to Instacart. As reported by Food & Wine, Utah shoppers spend 50% more on candy than the national average.

The magazine reports that while states in the West and Midwest dominate candy shopping — with Wyoming, Nebraska, and Oregon having a significant share — the coasts adopt a more reserved approach. Instacart shoppers in Florida, New York and California are least likely to buy candy.

And, while Reese’s Peanut Butter cups are the No. 1 choice for 14 states, Utah held to its contrarian ways when it comes to top treats with Sweet Tarts coming in as the state’s most preferred candy fix.