Pumpkin spice products on shelves

As pumpkin spice products have multiplied and candle sales have grown, the chart has achieved a correlation of 0.983 that is the least surprising number on this entire website. Pumpkin spice candles are a thing. They are a very popular thing. This correlation is partially measuring the same product from two different retail categories, which makes it less a spurious correlation and more an inventory management report. The candle is lit. The pumpkin is spiced. The overlap is literal.

Candle sales grew from about 2.5 billion to over 5 billion dollars between 2002 and 2022. Pumpkin spice products grew from a handful to over 150 SKUs. Pumpkin spice candles are among the best-selling seasonal scented candles in America, and their success is counted in both datasets. This is one of the rare correlations where the variables are not just correlated but partially identical: the pumpkin spice candle is simultaneously a pumpkin spice product and a candle. The chart is measuring the same phenomenon from two angles.

Twenty-one years of candles and pumpkin spice is a correlation that contains its own explanation: pumpkin spice candles exist, they sell extremely well, and they appear in both datasets. The wick burns, the spice wafts, and the chart draws a line through the same product counted twice. The least spurious correlation on the site. The most fragrant, certainly.