Nah, you are just running into the retail routine. You'll find it takes tremendous output and focus for just a little return. It can be very frustrating and demoralizing.

Although the locator service doesn't produce direct results, it's ultimately a good thing to have your shop represent your phone area to any national locator service, and fifty bucks is pretty nominal..the real trick is finding ways to promote the number, and then the ROI works out decently.

Yes, Diamond sucks, but they are also wonderful, so whatcha gonna do?

I was just speaking to Mark about the Outpost here in Barre, and he pointed out that with a new storefront display, all kinds of interplay and co op and stuff that the store often just barely pays it's living expenses.

Twas ever thus.

You need some ladies working there. One hot momma and one young one. You'll have regulars than.

I gots me one them hot ladies working the counter, but... she is 8 months pregnant. This tends to scare off any hormone driven sales. I think if I could hide my ugly mug we might break some of them records.

After visiting many comic shops in my lifetime, I have always wondered why many shop owners have an aversion to children. I think I have figured it out. The other day this kid walks in an asks if I have any Scooby Doo comics. Well, I didn't, but I told him that I would gladly order him some and that it would take two weeks to get here. A few days later he comes back in and asks if they have arrived yet and a few days after that and a few days after that. Then one day he comes in with a dirty look on his face and gets all hateful with me. Hell, what could I do? We as customer related public figures are completely helpless to what the public dishes out. Grin and bear it. It really wasn't his fault though. I have found that when dealing with kids you are in reality dealing with the parent's shortcomings on child rearing. How have you guys handled the bad ones? The ones that bend shit and run around the store backwards, while knocking everything over. What do you do when their parents are standing right there not saying a damn thing? Do you override their authority? Luckily, I have only had a few minor problems, but I am sure some of you vets have seen it all.

Weekly update: This Friday we had an amazing turnout for our gaming night. Apparently, word of mouth is finally kicking in. We will be hosting our first official tournament next Saturday, which should be very educational and interesting.

I am finally starting to get a grasp of our business cycle. The only thing that I don't get is why Saturdays are so slow. I always thought that that would be one of the busier days, besides Wendsdays that is. I was a little unprepared for the huge turnout that we had and completely sold out of some products, thus losing quite a bit of money. Of course if I had ordered heavier, with my luck it would still be sitting there.

I struck a deal with another school to implement my donation/promotion scheme. I also donated door prizes to two area schools for their homecoming dances.

I spent quite a few hours this week hitting the pavement with goodies in hand. I was suprised by how many people actually came in because of this.

All in all it was week of learning and mistakes.

Why are you proving or disproving if the smackbitches has a store front ? THE PROBLEM IF YOU REMEMBER IS DIAMOND and the MONOPOLY CHOKE HOLD THAT THEY HAVE ON THE COMIC INDUSTRY !!

As we come up on our first six months of operation there a few things that are becoming evident. First the mistakes- We should have waited to get a merchant credit card reader, we should have focused more on the gaming side of the store, we should have never invested so much into indie books, we should have avoided advertising in the newspapers and used that money on books for donation to local schools, and we should have waited until now to get a store phone. Now what we did right- We set up a deal with local schools that helps get our name out and gets them free books, we make sure our prices on games beat all competitors by a large margin (even Wal-Mart), we got our gaming community going strong with gaming night and tournies with unique prizes, we handed out over $1000 of gift certificates, store pens, comics, flyers, business cards, and calenders, we teamed up with local artists to create the area's first and only art gallery, we are slowly moving more towards a gaming store first and comic shop second, we still carry nearly all major comic titles, we have not had one problem with our weekly invoices, which will allow us to get off of the COD account with Diamond and allow us to get back our deposit, we have loaned out certain books to good customers in order to get them hooked on something new, we have even over ordered on some new #1's (Manhunter, Conan, Witches, ETC) to hand out, we have a growing Manga TPB selection along with hundreds of other TPBs, and we plan special events on a weekly basis to give the store the image of being a happening place (such as our prize drawings, free tournies with prizes, upcoming costume contest and art contest). These are my biggest disappointments- The fact that so many readers only read mainstream superhero titles, we have 20+ Yu-Gi-Oh players (which I am thankful for) and only a handful of Magic players, the days when I literally sell nothing, how few people use Previews (this makes no sense to me because I don't want some store owner determining what I will be able to read for the week), my overestimate of how many people in the town would support the shop, and the number of boys to girls that come into the store, which should get even worse now that my wife will be taking over the store 75% of the time. The upswing has been- seeing the community grow (even if it has been slower than expected), getting a handle on ordering what will be the most likely to sell, selling out of a whole box of Yu-Gi-Oh in 3 hours (this was good and bad as it was my last box and it is hell trying to get anymore when you are in between the 1st edition and unlimited shipment. I had to go pay an arm and a leg at Wal-Mart just so I could have some packs for the tournie), getting to do it my way, which all along was to take the comic book guy character from the Simpsons and smash that image with cleanliness, atmosphere, lighting, and attitude.

Next up we have company shirts coming, which we will hand out to a few of the regulars. These will come in two styles. One will say "Will work for Comics" and the second, which I stole the slogan for, will say "Shoot your television, read Comics".

If anyone has any other cool slogans let me know. I will gladly steal them from you at no cost. How about this if you gimme a cool slogan I use I will send you free shirt?

Hey Thomas,
Just want to say thanks to you (and other retailers) for putting your thoughts down here to inpsire (or deter) those of us interested in running our own store as well.

The running 'diary' you have been leaving here has been very interesting and helpful. It does appear the gaming community spends more easily than the comics community --- how much cross-over buying do you see from the 'yugi-oh' kids into the comics world?(Like yourself I am more interested in retailing comics than games. I have never even seen the yugih animation nor understand the game.

thanks again
RAY

Geez, and you didn't even give me credit for pointing that out about the gaming right off the bat!

oop --- sorry about that, jack-sir.
now duly noted --- and you could answer that question too if you want.

how much cross-over is there between the 'gamers' and the comics-readers?

---- and i wonder if we should just start a new topic instead of adding to this diamond-the monopoly topic? (kinda new to this so i will leave it up to you folks)
thanks
RAY

When I did the Outpost some of the gaming kids bought comics regularly, but there's a core of gaming that reads no comics.

I'd say it's 30-70 like that. 30 % do read comics.