Innovating Comics Retailing!

For more than seven years I have been the respected assistant manager of an incredibly busy and profitable comic book store. Year after year, I have studied the art of comics retailing and have honed my skills to that of a master retailer. Working and refining every corner of my store, I have left no stone unturned in my accomplished quest of creating the perfect comic store. It is an indisputable fact that I am an expert in comic retailing.

The vast majority of comic fans do not have a single brain to share between the lot of them. This is the truth!

Let’s use the simple innovation that I have brought to my comic store as an example of my thesis statement above. When I was hired as the assistant manager, to (no doubt) save the store from the financial ruin it was undeniably heading towards, the store had a primitive system wherein customers would request certain issues or titles to be set aside for them.

Now my store is equipped with a state of the art procedure for maintaining and updating each customer’s “list” and making sure that their comics are separated into different bins marked with their names, where they remain until the customer is ready to pick them up. I invented this marvel of organizational marketing, which I have dubbed “The subscription service”.

Despite how well designed this procedure I devised is, there are still many comic fans who are too stupid to follow it. From beginning to end, there does not seem to be a facet of this ingenious service that the average comics reader can grasp.

The first problem I have with new subscribers is the way they ask for their books. Invariably some brain deficient customer will stumble in and come up to the counter and just look at me; expecting me to remember his face or read his mind for his heart’s desire, as if I were some kind of large, manly Moonstar. I just stare back at them until their speech centers warm up and they ask me for their books.

Even then, what I usually get is, “File,” or “Can I get my books?” At this point what I do is pull out the contract they signed agreeing to the subscription service. I point to the paragraph just above their signature, where they agree to ask for their subscription materials by using my prescribed phrase. Once I hear, “Please, Hal, may I have the books that you have held for me?” I give them their comics.

But my frustrations don’t end there. Once these simpletons flip through their stacks, they usually come back to the counter and begin whining again.

“You left out a copy of this, and it’s on my list.”
“I didn’t order a hardcover of this.”
“There’s a food stain on this cover.”

Now I have to remind them that, as per the contract they signed, if there are any changes to their weekly orders, they will not get their full discount. I have had belligerent customers buy their weekly order and then separately buy extra issues they say have always been on their lists. The other day one guy did this and as he left he said, “Ridiculous!” Once the door closed behind him, I said, “Yes. Yes you are.”

True comic fans, like myself, people who really know comics and the ways of comics, are few and far between. We are creatures of extreme intellect, who truly appreciate the wondrous worlds of fantasy, SF, and comic fiction. I suppose it is the curse of the real comics fan to have to deal and fraternize with so many fan wannabes who wouldn’t know the difference between Harry Mudd and Elmer Fudd.

The opinions expressed above are entirely the author's and do not represent those of Silver Bullet Comics, or any of its staff, or contributors.