Ethan Peacock of Elfsar Comics & Toys in Vancouver, British Columbia shares his experience with Free Comic Book Day 2008 (see “National Comics Holiday this Weekend”), and says it exceeded their expectations:

 

We at Elfsar Comics & Toys are big believers in being proactive and spreading the word that comics are a truly a unique form of entertainment and that the medium that we love so much is constantly reinventing itself.  Although the evolution of the comic book art form is changing almost every year, certain elements of what makes up a good story essentially remains the same.  These elements share a common ground with novels, movies and even videogames.  We are working everyday to spread our infectious love for comics and we believe nothing seems to spread it more than Free Comic Book Day (FCBD).

 

It is now one month after FCBD 2008, and I have had time to reflect on the day itself.  FCBD has been the most successful event that Elfsar hosts and 2008 proved to be no different as we greatly exceeded our expectations.  On May 3rd, Elfsar Comics & Toys gave away over 8,000 comics to over 800 people within only eight hours.  But we did not stop there; we made a large impact on our community by raising food and money for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank (the result was an overflowing amount of over  three times of what we generated the previous year).

 

To get the word out about FCBD we did everything that we had done in previous years by sending out media kits, mailing flyers, posting interior and exterior posters, using bag stuffers, posting on message boards, providing additional info via our website, MySpace and Facebook, and most importantly had staff tell everyone who came into our location about the event (starting roughly two months in advance).

 

But just like last year, there was a missed opportunity with the “Marvel Marketing Machine” and the traditional superhero movie that has annually been linked to FCBD.  It is disappointing that one of our industries top publishers still made no attempt to link the premiere of Iron Man to FCBD, even if just for the one day before (May 3rd).  Unlike the premiere of Spider-Man 3, this time we were better prepared and took on the responsibility ourselves to get the word out about our annual international geek holiday.

 

We felt compelled to reach out to our local theater in downtown Vancouver where two things stood out to provide a fantastic amount of exposure for our store and FCBD/fundraiser.  First, Elfsar participated with the pre-screening event that was held on Wednesday, April 30th where we set up multiple signs and a table promoting the FCBD event (these signs and table were up until the end of day May 3rd).  We donated prizes to be given away and had a crew there on the night of the pre-screening telling the public about FCBD and what we were doing for the fundraiser for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank.  We provided flyers telling the public the same information and had the theater hand them out after each screening of Iron Man up until late afternoon on May 3rd.

 

Second, we created a coupon given out on FCBD from our store location for a chance to win a $250 shopping spree at Elfsar Comics & Toys.  All the public had to do was drop off the coupon at the Scotiabank theatre, thus providing an effective bounceback promotion that the theatre was very pleased with.  Although we were disappointed in Marvel for the lack of any mention of FCBD, It did not hurt that Iron Man was truly a fantastic film and that Marvel had released two new well written Iron Man comics (Invincible Iron Man and Iron Man: Viva Las Vegas) that the newly inspired public could jump onto.

 

The FCBD day itself was not only a celebration of comics or to shine the spotlight on what we do; it was also an opportunity to throw a mini in-store-convention for the public.  This year, we had artist Steven Sadowski (Avengers/Invaders, Project Superpowers) doing free sketches and giving fans a sneak peek at some of his work.  We also had donations from Team Epic (a Toronto based free Webisodes site) and the Vancouver based Zeroes 2 Heroes, also known as the Peoples Publisher.  What convention would be complete without costumes?  We had several costumed superheroes and villains who were on hand all day.  We had a store-wide buy 2 get 1 free sale, Heroclix gaming demos and tournaments, raffles, charity food drive, etc. All of this made it more than about just giving a free comic away.  FCBD at Elfsar was an experience.  I personally can not fathom or understand how a few other stores seem to participate year after year simply out of a sense of obligation and not embrace the fact that this is the best time to shine.

 

Anyone who came to visit Elfsar on May 3rd got to select from five different comics and for those who also donated to the Vancouver Food bank were allowed to select an extra five plus have access to our selected private backstock, which consisted of selected books that we felt truly represent good comics.

 

The number of new faces and the amount of children that came out to this year’s event made it all worthwhile. It is a month later, and we are still seeing the benefits from FCBD as we continue to see the number of returning faces grow.  I still don’t understand how anyone would purposely choose to skip this event.  Whether you are a creator, publisher, retailer, collector, reader or fan, we feel everyone should love comics and as an event it is an especially momentous experience.  Speaking as a retailer, just the amount of return visits and the number of people who have recently joined our monthly file saver program alone has been staggering.  Equally surprising was the amount of Web traffic this event has generated for us.  In the future, I would like to see more product tie-ins jump on board FCBD.  It would be nice to see more toys, novelties, games, posters… etc.

 

My only complaint was with the 2008 FCBD promotional bags.  Don’t get me wrong, the bags themselves are great and the advertising of FCBD on them is highly effective, but this year’s bags only promoted the event on only one side (the 2007 FCBD bags had promoted on both sides).  Instead, this year’s bags had advertising for the New York Comic Con and New York Anime Festival. Being on the west coast; this was something that I feel we did not benefit from, yet paid for.  Promoting the San Diego Comic-Con I guess I could understand, however I still feel a little cheated.  As a retailer, I paid for the bags in full with the intention of promoting FCBD and not the NYCC. If the price was being slightly covered by the New York Comic Con than I can understand, however the FCBD bags were never solicited as such, and the price was not less than the ones offered for the 2007 event.  So I feel that I only got a little more than half the value of what I paid for.  Mind you, a bag is still a bag and my disappointment is not with the function of them.

 

Regardless, FCBD 2008 was the biggest success for us to date and we look forward to FCBD 2009!

 

The opinions expressed in this Talk Back article are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.  Share your Free Comic Book Day story at Comments@ICv2.com.