Mr. Echols -- Are you willing to help anyone looking to start their own comic book store business?

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Random Chance
"Never take life for granted."

Phillip,

I'll have to defer to Jim H on this one. I've been running a brick and mortar since 1995, a brick and mortar that was about to succumb to the speculation holocaust that took place mid-nineties.

I was very creative in the ways that I financed and rebuilt the business, and I also made some terrible mistakes that almost cost me everything, despite my desire and ability. Now the business is pretty solid, and generates a profit most every week.

Money buildings permits etc, will not do anything but get you open for a few weeks. If you want to open a "comic book store", you better either be prepared to have a partner who will work it with you for free so you can both have day jobs to support yourself while you "build it up", or you better be independently wealthy to begin with, because there isn't THAT much money in it frankly.

When I bought in to Comics Outpost in 1995 it was a mess, to put it bluntly. Now its a shiny happy store that people love to come in to and buy comics from.

The only business plan I had was that I loved comics, and wanted to be sure that there was a place where people could buy them. I had never done retail before, but learned pretty quickly [img]http://209.198.111.165/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

And Rory, Chris, and Jim, while the topic may have been bandied about to death forever with no real changes and cynicism is an easy thing, I mean I agree, still new blood like these guys have more energy than we do, and we can encourage them to stick up for us [img]http://209.198.111.165/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

But if you want to keep your love of comics intact, honestly, about the last thing I would tell you to do is open a comic shop.

The type of marketing that usually works and is free, is bad news. "McFarlane's toy being banned...type stuff. Superman (TM) is dead type stuff. Not, good stories...on artists or writers or others involved in the industry. People snore ... But, doom and gloom bring out the tabloid mentality in people, non comic customers at best. Shame that it works.

To Random: Indeed I am interested in helping people start their own comic book (or other) businesses. Unfortunately I do not have much available time right now, as I am in the middle of starting my own business, the comic book (and related) festival that my username is taken from. It is my way of doing what Philip and joem are talking about, working to promote the industry. I would love to work with you, time permitting. If you are not in too much of a rush, I will certainly have more time come December, after the show. But I can also see what I can do right now. Please understand that Business Coaching is my living (well, aside from event production, which has kind of taken over right now), so I am not free. But I do try to keep my rates reasonable. (Whew, sorry about that everyone, that was a bit more shameless self-promotion than I meant it to be.

To Philip: You keep beating this drum, man. You are right, the cynics are wrong. This *obviously* needs more discussion and *action* since its not like that little industry line in Comics Retailer is going up every month. Now is it guys?

To the Cynics: So, if it's been discussed already to its conclusion, why *is* that little line in CR still on a downward slope? Is it because we have no good comics? I don't think so.

To jack: Your own words contradict your conclusion: "But if you want to keep your love of comics intact, honestly, about the last thing I would tell you to do is open a comic shop." Looking at your post, one can see your obvious enthusiasm and pride.

Lastly, how may people here *are* actually members of PACER, or some other professional organization?

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James Echols
Founder - UncommonCon, www.uncommoncon.com
Business Coach, Uncommon Solutions

Okay where to begin?
As has been pointed out, this subject has been tossed around tons of time, but I don't really believe that any answers are in any of the old post and if they then what a true shame that would really be.

To me the answer seems clear. Several things need to happen for this industry to climb out of its slump and many of them can be debated till the day Wolverine's is cleared up. One thing however that needs to happen seems clear to me. Publishers and retailers alike need to advertise outside the medium.

To me it is astounding why the companies that have the most and stand to loose the most aren’t doing anything about it. Why don’t we see some advertising of the books in they publish in sources outside our own little circle. I’m talking about getting advertising for the Vertigo line in some magazines like “Spin” or “Rolling Stone”, or even an entertainment magazine like “Premier”. It seems to me that the CrossGen line of comics would be able to find audience in the pages of Fantasy & Sci-Fi magazines?

It seems to me that the all of the advertising dollars are put into ads that would only reach people who are already into comics. If there is a company reaching out to a new audience please let me know, because this is just too much to believe.

The simple fact is that advertising works, just ask Coca-Cola. In fact, it has often created an incredibly high popularity out of nothing. Pokemon didn’t creep up on us it was an instant success due largely to the huge media engine that was behind it.

Advertising works. Plain and simple. If the first as run in particular magazine doesn’t work then try a different ad. We can’t give up on this one, because no matter what is being published, good or bad, super-heroes or not, whatever the quality, none of it will succeeded without an advertising plan that not only brings in the current readers, but brings in new ones.

Think about it. How many people do you know, who don’t read comics, would buy a copy of Wizard?


David Belmore
Ironhorse Comics www.ironhorsecomics.com

>>To me it is astounding why the companies that have the most and stand to loose the most aren’t doing anything about it. Why don’t we see some advertising of the books in they publish in sources outside our own little circle. I’m talking about getting advertising for the Vertigo line in some magazines like “Spin” or “Rolling Stone”, or even an entertainment magazine like “Premier”. It seems to me that the CrossGen line of comics would be able to find audience in the pages of Fantasy & Sci-Fi magazines?<<

It's been tried. Mostly it doesn't work.

Examples:

DC advertised Sandman in Rolling Stone; there was no appreciable change in circulation that could be directly attributable thereto, as it was described to me. DC advertised the Thomas-Kane adaptation of The Ring of the Nibelung in Opera News (a natural connection, you'd agree?); again, a slight increase in orders, nothing to write home about.

Please remember that even companies like DC have ad budgets and that their ad/promotion departments have to justify how that money is spent.

Let's say an ad in Wizard costs $1000; experience tells us that such an ad can increase sales by, say, 15%. (Bean-counters don't care who's buying, just that more people are, BTW.) An ad in Rolling Stone costs $4000, and results in the same 15% increase in sales (actually, it probably results in quite a bit less).

Now which expenditure would you rather justify to YOUR boss?

Best, Pat

I am so tired of this, "it doesn't work mentality". If one ad doesn’t work that doesn’t mean the entire concept is flawed, just that one ad, its location, or both , didn’t work. Damn it! Make it Work! Find that right ad in he right location. Find that mix that brings in the new readers, but don’t just toss up your hands and say oh well.
What’s that old adage about try, try, and try again?

Even if the ads only garnered a small percentage of new readers; in the long run this is the only way we are going to be able to make the industry grow.

Of course the same ad in Wizard magazine brought in more sales. Wizard is a magazine that can tote that all of its readers like comic books. After all why would they be buying the magazine at all? Now, granted, Rolling Stone readers are not all comic readers or even potential readers, but I'll bet there are some. Some that don't read comics, but would if introduced to the medium. They aren’t going to reach out to us; we have to reach out to them and the only way to do that is through promotion.

By only putting ads in a magazine like “Wizard” or even “The Comics Journal” is akin to preaching to the choir. Like a religion the practices isolation and abstinence we are doomed to fade into none existence if we do not do something about to bring in new readers.

As far as the publishing industry goes; movies don’t just advertise in movie magazines, album ads do not appear in only music magazines and books are not advertised only in literary magazines. All that I have just mentioned in fact have run ads in comic books. If the producers of these products believe that comic readers share certain interest with them, then is it not only logical that they share some interest with comic readers and therefore may actually be interested in comic book.

I’m not saying all of their money should be spent on outside sources, but I would like to see some spent on a consistent level. I just don’t see any other way.

I would explain to my boss that if he wants to be here in ten years he’d better do something along these lines or start looking for a new job. I would tell him or her that I believe that we are being so concerned with today that we are failing to see the dangers that lie in tomorrow. I would defend and will continue to defend my point until offered a reasonable alternative or the very industry itself falls. In such a sad case I would star it all over again.

- “Never give up, never surrender.”
The Captain from Galaxy Quest

Hey it may be corny, but there’s a lot of truth in that.

Dave Belmore
Ironhorse Comics www.ironhorsecomics.com




[This message has been edited by Dave Belmore (edited 09-04-2000).]

Interesting discussion and (for the most part) I agree with Dave. But the issue is, unfortunately, not so cut and dried. Let's assume, for sake of argument, that advertising outside of 'genre' sources (Wizard and like-minded magazines, Comic Book Resources and like-minded websites, etc) works. As Pat implied in his example, this type of advertising would work but probably not to the extent that the beancounters and other number-crunchers at Marvel or DC would like numbers wise. So let's assume that the advertising hasn't been effective, for whatever the reason. So, they FIX it and get the advertising right (as Dave says, "Make it Work!"), at least from the point of view that the ads WOULD bring in new readers. Where do these new readers go to get the comic that they see advertised?
See, to my mind, that's the biggest problem. 4000 stores is just not enough of a retail base to draw new customers in. So, either there needs to be more Direct Market stores or non-Direct Market stores must be more aggressive in carrying comics (graphic novels, etc…) that they are either not carrying enough of if they carry them at all. What are we talking about here? Bookstores, video stores, gaming stores, hell, "you name it and I want a comic in it stores" store! If someone sees an add, getting their ass into a place that they feel comfortable in and having a reasonable assurance that they'll find it when they get there is critically important (I think there was a recent article on savantmag.com about this, but my memory could be off). Is that realistic right now in today's market?
To be honest, I'm not sure. I think it's terrific that someone like Larry Young wants to publish only Graphic Novels and by-pass the serial nature of comics altogether. Why? Because a reader who isn't a comic fan per se gets their fix without having to wait. If the Internet, television and the last 15 years have proved anything, it's that people want their "sound bite" (for lack of a better term) FASTER then they ever could before. They don't want to walk into a store for the first time after seeing the 'cool ad' and picking up issue #1 and then waiting at least a month for their next fix, let alone buying issue #3 and hunting for the first two issues they missed. They want a complete story. No screwing around waiting. No incomplete fixes. I want it now so give it to me NOW.
I am an ex-bookstore guy, so maybe I'm biased because of the complete nature of books (and yeah, I wasn't a big fan of Stephen King's idea of 'going Dickens' when he initially released the Green Mile as a serial story). I've also been a comic collector since the early '80s and my tastes have certainly changed. I'm just not interested in the serial nature of comics. I want STORY, whole and complete. And I can't imagine that someone alien to the comic book world would feel differently ("give me a slice, man, and I'll wait a month to get it again" - I just seriously doubt that).
So, before I get totally rambling here! Advertising is a vicious circle. To work, you must understand your target audience, in this case a NON-comic buying audience. What do they want and how can you give it to them? Is there enough stores to make the advertising practical? If not, then the first job isn't advertising to a potential customer if they can't get what you are advertising readily. So you must first establish a beach head in the non-Direct Market to establish that comics are viable. But the Big Two, aside from a few titles (Vertigo and the like) don't have enough of a broad base to actively attract a non-comic book (super hero buying?) public. And I'm not sure if they really WANT to diversify their products enough to do that. So, who does it fall to? The Indies. And unless I'm totally wrong ('cuz I just can't see a day when PRINTED comics will disappear) there will be a quantum shift in how comics will look and be sold in the next 10 years. So, Dave: you are absolutely right, they must advertise. But a lot of OTHER things need to be fixed first.


[This message has been edited by Von Allan (edited 09-04-2000).]

[This message has been edited by Von Allan (edited 09-04-2000).]

>>I am so tired of this, "it doesn't work mentality". If one ad doesn’t work that doesn’t mean the entire concept is flawed, just that one ad, its location, or both , didn’t work. Damn it! Make it Work! Find that right ad in he right location. Find that mix that brings in the new readers, but don’t just toss up your hands and say oh well.
What’s that old adage about try, try, and try again? <<

How many times can you essentially waste thousands of dollars of your employer's money and still keep your job?

>As far as the publishing industry goes; movies don’t just advertise in movie magazines, album ads do not appear in only music magazines and books are not advertised only in literary magazines. All that I have just mentioned in fact have run ads in comic books. <

Actually, yeah, books ARE virtually only advertised in publications devoted to books. About the only place you see books advertised in newspapers is in the weekly book review sections.

The book industry does exactly what the comics industry does--it preaches to the choir, by advertising only in those places that people most likely to buy LOTS of books are going to be. The difference is that the major book publishers have a lot more money to spend on advertising, the number of likely outlets to advertise is greater (nearly every big city paper has a book review section on Sunday), and the number of book-selling outlets is higher.

Best, Pat

"...publishers and retailers alike" need to advertise.

What, you don't think we've tried? Over my 18 years in business, I've advertised on the radio, T.V., local newspaper, school papers, yellow pages (big ads), you name it. All money pissed away, as far as I could tell... You are paying rates for advertising that potentially reaches 100% of the population, which may be a good idea for Walmart, but maybe not such a good idea when your potential audience is 5 or 10%. I'd much rather buy more comics, more books, more inventory. I'd much rather get the carpet repaired, the signs fixed. I'd much rather put my money into something I can see. Advertising money is thrown into the wind...to what effect you can never tell.

Anyway, if very few retailers or publishers are advertising, did it ever occur to you that maybe all of us have tried, many, many times? You assume that we are just too stupid or lazy? If you were to open a business, the first thing you would do would be to advertise heavily...most new shops do, because they are told that this is what they should do, and advertisers are very aggressive and good at selling to new blood. And after a year or two of throwing money down a rat hole, you would do what the rest of us do. Advertise sparingly and prudently. But I invite you to try. Open a store. Advertise. Put your money where your mouth is.

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Duncan McGeary
Pegasus Books of Bend