Confessions of a Comic Book Guy is a weekly column by retailer Steve Bennett of Mary Alice Wilson's Dark Star Books in Yellow Springs, Ohio.  This week, Bennett continues his discussion of how a comic store can compete against the mega-stores. 

 

Last week I talked about how an independent bookseller could compete against national bookstore chains through personalized service and the addition of supplementary product lines.  But if you're out there saying that comic book shops don't have any competition (except for other shops going after the same dwindling number of readers), well, you're wrong.  And it's the same one that Dark Star contends with every day.

 

I have seen my pain and its name is Barnes & Borders.

 

Back in the 90s there was a persistent fear that a national comic book shop chain would pop up over night and bury our unaffiliated Mom & Pop operations.  This never happened

...unless you count Barnes & Noble and Borders mega-stores which operate unacknowledged as de facto comic shops.  Waldenbooks and B. Daltons may carry some comics and graphic novels, but even they can't compete with what Barnes & Borders have to offer:

 

Most Marvel and DC titles in attractive eye-catching displays.

 

Graphic novels from the newest X-Men collection to Fantagraphics' latest attempt to create a comic book equivalent of the McSweeney's literary anthologies.  Not to mention dozens of books about comics.

 

A simply staggering amount of manga (Dark Star carries a lot of manga; they have everything).

 

Comics-related magazines including CBG, Wizard, Toyfare, Anime Insider and Newtype.

 

Not to mention frequent buyer discounts, big comfy chairs, and large comfortable cafe areas with designer coffees and cookies, where you can browse for hours without ever once receiving the skunk eye from a clerk.

 

Now I've never seen anyone actually buy a comic there.  And though I have seen teenage girls happily geeking out amongst the rows upon rows of manga, I never saw a single volume getting rung up.  But that's one of the advantages of manga being just one of dozens of product lines in a mega-store; it doesn't really hurt their bottom line much if nobody buys comic books on a Wednesday.  We can't say the same.

 

So how can we, with our limited resources and less visible locations, ever possibly hope to compete with all of that?  I mean cookies, man, fresh cookies...

 

Just like there are people happy to buy a new hardcover book at full price from Dark Star when they can get the same item discounted 20-40% off elsewhere, there are those who want to buy from a comic book shop.  These are our rank and file, The Committed (as opposed to the mostly anecdotal casual) Comic Book Readers.

 

I recently had one of our pull file customers who, when we didn't have the How To Draw book he wanted in stock tell us (rather pointedly) he could get it from Barnes & Borders

-- but wanted to buy from us.  Of course under the surface of that platitude was the hardly hidden threat that he was perfectly willing to take his business elsewhere.

 

Except when it took two weeks to get the book from Diamond he waited, because he didn't really want to go elsewhere.  While we can never take them for granted, I don't think we're in much danger of losing The Committed to Barnes & Borders; they just can't compete with our informal atmosphere, wide selection and pull files.  But I do believe were are competing with them for new readers and we should be working harder to take their money by making comic book shops more comfortable places for them to be.

 

Which is usually the cue for a lecture about keeping your shop clean and well lit, but I'm going to assume you're all professionals who know the basics.  Well, most of you; a friend in another state told me a horror story about a shop where each week the new comics were put in a comic book box on the floor and customers had to rifle through it to get their titles (you know who you are and man, you need all the help you can get).

 

I'm talking about adding product lines - all of which can be gotten on a returnable basis.

Setting up accounts with each company is relatively easy and the extra money will more than make up for the time spent doing the paperwork and restocking the displays.

 

New Books - Baker & Taylor/Ingram

They offer SF and horror paperbacks, comic strip reprints, books about comics (Gerard Jones' Men of Tomorrow should be required reading for retailers), movie tie-ins and the girl-appealing WITCH chapter books and graphic novels...to mention only a fraction of what's available from them.

 

Magazines - Ingram Periodicals

Ever wondered if you could sell more copies of Wizard, Toyfare or Anime Insider?  Wanted to test the waters with Archie or Vertigo titles without having to eat more unsold comics?  Plus there's Heavy Metal, Fangoria, Psychotronic Video, Giant Robot, Shock Cinema...

 

Crap, Junk & Stuff -- Ephemera

I'm talking about funny buttons and magnets, relatively low cost impulse items that can keep non-comic readers happy for what will seem like hours (the only downside to these is have to listen to customers read them out loud, over and over...).

 

You might want to try bumper stickers from either Northern Sun or Pegasus, although they're not returnable - but if you choose ones that suit the needs of your store, they're likely to sell.  Choosing new products suitable for your store...that sounds like a topic for another column.