Posted in: Comics | Tagged: comic stire in your future, comic stores, Comics, Magic: The Gathering

Comic Store In Your Future: Bad Times And Good Customers

Published Fri, 27 Oct 2017 08:00:29 -0500

Last updated Wed, 15 Jun 2022 16:30:40 -0500

Rod Lamberti of Rodman Comics, writes weekly for Bleeding Cool. Find previous columns here.

As I type this up I have gotten three hours of sleep. I returned from a wedding in Vegas days ago. Found out my family actually reads my columns on Bleedingcool. Even was asked how I knew Rich Johnston. Makes typing these up a little different knowing they read these. Trying to get back up to speed. Hoping to be a good teacher to our new employees.

I will not lie. This year has been a mixture of good things and not so good things. In a previous column when I said things can change quickly. They do. Some things I wish would change such as Marvel. Marvel looks to have lost its way. I keep reading the newest Previews in hope that Marvel will return to greatness and after so many disappointments I still don't see Marvel returning to the sales force they used to be. Marvel can make movies that make lots of money. Their comic books? Not so much.

Still no Fantastic Four book by Marvel. Somehow Black Panther can have two titles after having two cancelled this year but the Fantastic Four is not allowed to have one.

Years ago I would have said DC putting out their own version of the Fantastic Four, the Terrifics would be a waste of time. Now, though people who want to read about the Fantastic Four seem alright about buying a DC version.

Think owning a comic store is all fun and games? This month has been a little bit of a kick in the teeth month.

The Marvel lenticular covers are costing the store money. The ordering requirements Marvel had made them unprofitable for us. Though as I often say I can only lose as much as I am willing to bet. I placed a losing bet and that is on me.

As part of my lease we have to have our air and furnace checked out yearly. I was charged an extra $50 bucks because the air is on the roof of our one story building. So $150 for nothing. The air has always been on the roof but this year there was an extra charge for it. I even made the joke afterwards that every time they come out and check it something breaks in a few months. Sure enough water started leaking when the air was running. When they came out I brought up about how once again somehow something broke afterwards. I was told they didn't check the air. But yet I was charged an extra $50 to check the air since the air is on the roof. A catch pan rusted out. I thought well at least that shouldn't be much. $2,500 I was told. What? The catch pan is connected to the coils so they have to be replaced also I was told. Time for a second opinion. Which cost $75 to get. Which I was told the same thing again.

The store I own but not the building. Everything that breaks in the store I rent I get to fix. That's commercial renting for you.

Spent roughly $100 getting the locks to the store replaced. Yeap, we had some bad stuff happen. Burning through the money reserves. Dealt with issues facing the store while in Vegas for a wedding. The bright spot being my crew did a really good job while I was away. They really came through. They are large part of why I renewed the lease. I remember telling one my staff "If you are on board then I am going to resign the lease." With the economy doing so well currently it is tough to find good help.

Most comic stores sell the card game, Magic the Gathering. It is very popular. So popular big chain stores carry it. Then I check out Facebook and see this:

Thanks, Wizards of the Coast (the makers of Magic the Gathering)! You already let Target and Walmart break street date by selling early while making darn sure to enforce the street date on local small business stores. Why? Because the small stores don't make as much money for Wizards of course. Always a pleasure when people come in letting me know they already got a box of Magic from Wal Mart or Target because they broke street date and I didn't.

People at times wonder how a comic store owner could ever get out of the business. Or how a comic store owner becomes the stereotype grumpy old comic book store owner. While some comic store owners make is seem easy and care free it really can be a lot of work and stress. Magic may be very popular but as I have stated before a lot of the diehard Magic gamers play for as cheap as possible at a store and get all the product they want elsewhere. The hours of being at the store they play at being taken for granted and something some gamers feel entitled to. Currently we are having good fortune with Heroclix players. They haven't been taught to take a store for everything they can. Our aim when having Magic events is to have it be fun and casual. We have a good Magic group. Though if Wizards keeps increasing their benchmarks for Magic gaming we may get out of the gaming side of Magic. Their benchmarks are for number of gaming events a store needs to hold, one gaming event has to be so many people, and so on. The casual magic player that never plays at any stores but at home with their friends are the ones that make up a majority of our magic sales.

Did have a person come in and cancel their pull box. That was good. We were told so we won't be pulling comics and guessing how long we should keep pulling before giving up. Totally okay with that. It's when people just abandon their pull box and ignores our attempts to contact them to find out if they still want the comics that it becomes an issue.

People that shop at their local comic stores often take the store for granted. I shopped at Dragonfire Comics for over a decade. Took it for granted till one of the owners that I was friends with sold his half and left. I collected action figures and heroclixs at the time and all the sudden Dragonfire stop ordering them so I had to start looking for them elsewhere. That fun friendly atmosphere that I took for granted was gone. Part of the reason I opened up my store. I missed the enjoyment of collecting. I have had past customers of Dragonfire tell me they shop here because it reminds them of Dragonfire. Which puts a feather in my cap.

Often times people will talk down to me thinking that as a small business owner I am hurting for money. I can see how they would think that. My primary car is from 2008. I don't dress in expensive clothes. I don't brag. The store is small. What is a slap to the face is when people thinking I am hurting for money think that I will give a discount because we are hard up for money. Like offering a poor person a smaller sum of money because they are poor. No thank you. If the store was hurting for money I simply would not have renewed the lease yet again.

Want a comic store to stay open? Shop at it. Instead of thinking about how saving a few dimes by getting a pack of cards or comics elsewhere or online then blowing even more money on going out to eat or drinking maybe just skip eating out or drinking one night out of the week. People need to think for themselves. The downfall of gaming is the group tends to follow the lead of the cheapest person. That person is cheap so I can be also. Then the group wonders why gaming gets dropped. Owners don't like to babysit. Especially when actual babysitters get paid more and don't have to provide as much.

Want a comic book owner to try? Then treat them the same way you would want to be treated. Everyone wants good customers service. On the flip side no one wants to deal with rude customers.

A comic store is not an entitlement center. A person telling a store owner they can get something for a dollar cheaper elsewhere and expecting to get it a dollar cheaper is entitlement. My responses to that line is usually either this, "I just had a customer spend $500 dollars here. Are you going to match that?" Or "if I had a everything for a penny sale would that store match it?" One store has free gaming along with free prizes. I get asked when I am going to do that. We aren't that hard up to do something that loses money just to get people into the store. We are a legit business. Not a hang out.

People get to spend their money anyway they want to. It is their money. I respect that. I respect people that don't shop here. It's just the people that come in and whine and cry that their previous store went out of business and they now want to shop here but they want the same discount they had that just makes me shake my head and think did you ever think that maybe that discount helped put them out of business and that is why we won't match it?

Shoplifting and other forms of stealing is something store owners get to deal with.

Is it the end of the world? No, just some things as a store owner that we go through. Things could be a lot worse. Health problems or something. Someone always has it better, someone always has it worse. The air I can just wait to fix until next year. The store has the money on hand. But who knows if something else will go wrong. Heck, just read on Bleedingcool.com that a vehicle hit a comic store so hard they had to move to another location. That would be a pain.

Am I saying to feel sorry to store owners? Nope. Just treat them how you would like to be treated. Often times when a magic player or someone trying to sell comics comes in to sell they want top dollar for it. If the card or comic is worth 20 bucks they want 20 for it. Not understanding that businesses cannot buy something and sell it for the same price. But that same person wants a discount on any cards in the store that they are interested in.

Seriously just treat a store owner and their employees the same way you would like to be treated. That's it. We are human (though I have been accused of being a cyborg or other things due to all the work I do). Create a good relationship. No big secret about it.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!