Dead Firms Graveyard

For the Halloween season (for those who observe it), explore why once-successful firms close and how this can affect the economy.

🪦 Dead Firms Graveyard!

Working in pairs, students investigate a firm that has ceased trading and create a tombstone explaining its closure using economic concepts.

🔎 How does it work?

1️⃣ Choose a firm – Select a firm that has closed down. Check that the whole firm ceased trading, rather than simply closing some branches.

2️⃣ RIP (Research In Progress!) – Investigate the economic reasons for its closure. Did changing tastes or better substitutes reduce demand? Did rising wages, rent, or raw material prices increase costs? Did stronger competition reduce sales and profits?

3️⃣ Design a tombstone – Include the firm’s name, what it sold, and the years it operated. Use one of our A4 or A3 templates, or create your own.

4️⃣ Explain the “cause of death” – Write a short explanation linking the evidence to demand, costs, revenue, and profit. Add a demand and supply diagram where relevant, explaining what it shows.

5️⃣ Consider the consequences – Explain one effect on workers, consumers, or other firms. For example, workers may become unemployed, consumers may have less choice, or competitors may gain customers.

6️⃣ Present and display – Share your findings before adding the tombstone to the classroom graveyard. Which economic factor best explains the closure?

💡 How to use this activity in IGCSE Economics

🔹 Demand – Apply changes in consumer tastes, incomes, and the availability of substitutes.

🔹 Costs, revenue, and profit – Explain how falling sales or rising costs can make a firm unprofitable.

🔹 Competition – Explore how rival firms influence prices, sales, and survival.

🔹 Unemployment – Consider the effects of closures on workers and local communities.

🎨 Refresh your classroom display while bringing Economics to life!

📥 The tombstone templates are available on our Seasonomics site page here.

Click on the icon below to see some examples from Pinki Panchal and her students at Podar International School, in India.

Many thanks to Pinki for sharing these photos with us!

We’d love to see your students’ creations!

🎃 Happy Halloween to those celebrating!

Think IGCSE. Think InThinking.