Diamond Summit

Can't remember if I mentioned this earlier, but I was in Baltimore this weekend for the Diamond/Alliance Retailer Summit.

Man what a blast! My head exploded. Bits of it are still in Baltimore.

I learned a LOT about the comic industry, and it still intimidates me. But with my best friend's help (and the support and advice of my fellow retailers), I should be okay. I just need to learn enough to not make any grievous errors in the beginning, and I think I'll get the hang of it pretty quickly. Unlike games, you have to really be on top of periodical comics, and the lead times are several months in advance. At least you don't have to have a new game in every Wednesday.

Speaking of games, I saw a lot of great ones at the summit. The standard gamer icons were there, but I got to see offerings from the more family-friendly companies as well, which is more of what I want initially. I need a good family/kids section for the store considering how community-friendly and involved I want to be. All the more mature gamer stuff will be there, of course, but the goal is to pull new customers in and slowly convert them to the gaming hobby. You've got to start 'em young, they say, and a kids section helps.

The seminars were very helpful, especially the "50 cheap and easy promotions" one. Lots of fantastic ideas in there. I also met a lot of really nice folks very willing to help me out, including pretty much all the major game retailers in NJ. It was nice to see a bunch of familiar faces, and have them express pleased surprise at my game/comic store intentions. They were very warm and inviting, and I'm thankful for that. After all, retailing in this industry is a community. New Jersey is dreadfully understored, and the more (successful) retailers we get out there, the more exposure the industry gets, and comics and games are on the cusp of become accepted and welcome by mainstream culture. Look at all the pop culture lately - sci-fi, superheroes, fantasy, all of that stemming from comics and games. And then there are tons of popular and critically acclaimed films that were actually graphic novels, but nobody knew that. The industry is about to see a renaissance, especially with Disney buying Marvel. That alone shouts legitimacy.

Okay, so I went on a tangent. But I'm excited. Even not knowing much about comics, I'm still excited. There are big things on the way, and even though I'll miss the holiday season this year, there will be tons of event opportunities for me to take advantage of when I do open the store.

Now that I have the name, incorporation will follow soon, and so will membership to GAMA, the Game Manufacturer's Association. If the locations I like pan out, I can get moving on lease negotiations. Things are starting to really move.

More to come.

Paper Heroes Comics & Games

The official name of the store will be Paper Heroes Comics & Games. The name passed the "I like it" survey, and it looks to be available for incorporation. The only drawback is that both paperheroes and paper-heroes are taken as domain names. I'm planning on registering both paperheroesstore and paperheroescomicsandgames as well as promoting the sites in the various search engines. Online presence is crucial. I'll probably use blogspot for the store blog and link to it from the store website.

I guess I need to get better at blogging, huh?

And podcasting. Need to learn how to podcast.

I'm excited. This is going to be a fun ride.

Still not great with the blogging, but I'm trying. Less than a month between posts is pretty good for me.

Lots has been happening. Lots and lots.

I'm going over to Drew University for a day to be a vendor at the university center. Hopefully that will do good things for me.

In the meantime, I've been working like crazy on the business plan for my game store, which is now a game and comic store. It still doesn't have a name, but everything else is starting to fall into place. My rough trajectory for the store is:

• December - first draft of business plan finished and incorporate to an LLC
• February - settled on a location and begin build-out (and quit my job)
• April or May - Soft opening, trying to take advantage of free comic book day.
• June (after the already scheduled and booked vacation) - Grand opening.

I'm still wrapping my brain around what kind of demographics I'm looking for and why the demographics I think are good aren't actually as good as I think they are.

I've registered on this wonderful resource called (appropriately enough) the Game Store Resource Forum, and I've met a lot of wonderful people and gotten a lot of support. This is really going to happen. I have to keep pinching myself... this is taking on a life of its own now and all I can really do is keep stumbling forward so the momentum doesn't knock me down.

Going to a trade show in Baltimore next weekend to meet a few of these guys and attend some seminars. Hopefully I can get the business plan to a point where I'm comfortable showing it to people and discussing. These guys would be more than happy to help me refine it. I think that's not an unreasonable goal, either. I'm very close to having it at a stage where I feel comfortable with people reading it.

I'm excited. Maybe this time next year I'll be blogging from my store. That'd be nice.