Alamo City Comic Con -- September 11-13, 2015

[mysterio]

Just boarded my flight out of San Antonio. I'll try to post pics sometime soon. It was a great show, and it was a pleasure to meet a few more Texas boardies. I'm already looking forward to 2016!

[Jazzno]

Looks like not everyone had fun ....

 

'Hobbit' actor arrested, accused of assault while in S.A. for Comic Con

[mysterio]

Looks like not everyone had fun ....

 

'Hobbit' actor arrested, accused of assault while in S.A. for Comic Con

 

[Monster's Lair Comics]

Made it home safe and sound. Had a great time and had a good show.

[mysterio]

I haven't had any time to download any of my photos from my phone, and to be honest I didn't take that many to begin with because we were so busy, but I'll try to get a few posted here. Maybe tonight.

 

Overall this was a really fun show. I can break the experience down into a few pros and cons.

 

Pros:

We had really good sales, which was a giant pro. Very steady crowds all three days, and we sold a lot of dollar books (about 6-7 long boxes emptied) and a wide variety of better books. Our wall ranged from $10-1000, and sales ran the gamut. Most, of course, were in the $10-75 range.

 

We met some boardies for the first time (THB, Trev), got to know others we'd met only briefly a bit better at the board dinner (Weird Paper, MYNAMEISLEGION), and Gsims also stopped by for a bit. It was great seeing everyone. Bubbagump, Black Cat, and the guys at Duncanville also get a shout out here.

 

Cons:

The guest list was thinner than last year, particularly on the comic side.

 

The layout of the sales floor was weird, with artist alley separating a smaller front sales floor (with all sorts of non-vendor booths like a museum and a wrestling ring) from the bulk of the vendor space at the back. This made the room very long and vertical, and it is quite possible that anyone who stopped when they got to artist alley didn't even see the back of the vendor space.

 

Preview night on Thursday was a bust. There were more dealers in the room than customers. The weather may have affected this, but the early VIP hours on Friday and Saturday weren't any better.

 

Lastly, it seemed that half the con were wearing exhibitor passes. It is weird to see families of 4-6 all wearing exhibitor passes, but we saw this multiple times. This may have been due to the large number of non-dealer sponsors (Hard Rock Café, lawyers offices, restaurants, etc) that had table space. If they weren't exhibitor passes then they were media passes. Just because the 8 year old kid has a camera that doesn't make him media...

 

Overall it was a good show and it is likely that we will be back next year, barring some major changes.

 

 

[THB]

A little recap as well....

 

It was a fun con and a great learning experience for me. The board dinner was excellent and it was nice to hear stories about comics, cons etc...... and apologies to Mysterio and Master J for getting lost in my own city and taking the scenic route to the board dinner.

 

Preview night was a bust but I sold a wall book and it made everything better. Hulk # 181 sold within ten minutes. The rest of the con was a series of spurts and they were only a few lulls where there were no browsers.

 

Sold a lot of $1 books, mid grade keys, guest related comics and a few surprises:

 

Space Riders # 1 x 2

G.I. Joe # 1 x 9 (Larry Hama was here)

Hellboy the Golden Army # 0 x 6

Gold Key Scooby Doo's to a first time collector (She said they were her first comics)

Spawn # 1- 40

Nam # 1

Flash # 1 New 52 NM x 4

Punisher mini series # 1- 5 etc....

 

Some wall books that left for new homes:

New Teen Titans # 2 NM,NM-,VF-, Fine + this was the most asked for book and two copies sold to a huge chain store from SA along with......Batman Adventures # 12 VF

Batman # 227 VG/F

Superboy #68 Fine+

Dr. Strange # 169 Fine +

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac # 1 First Print NM

Star Wars # 1 NM, NM-

Hero for Hire # 1 South Africa edition F/VF

Captain Marvel Adventures # 18

Elseworlds 80 page giant NM

Saga # 1 NM

Batman Killing Joke NM

Amazing Spider-man # 129 PR

Strange Tales #178 Mark Jewelers Fine

Ms. Marvel # 1 (Kamala) NM x3

and others.....

 

The buyers were diverse with kids, tons of girls and the older serious collectors using their Jedi buying mind tricks to haggle a little bit off. The kids were all about Deadpool and Thanos while the ladies were buying Vertigo, Wonder Woman, Steven Universe and The Flash.

 

Looking forward to next year already!!!

 

 

 

[DvilleBookstore]

We did well but not as good as last year. I think that had to do with several different factors. The room was set up differently with the dealer room as far away from the front entrance as possible which means we did not have people seriously buying until a hour after the show opened. Don't get me wrong, there was traffic but people were already spending money well before they reached us. I talked with dealers closer to the front and they said sales were good not great each day so maybe it did not affect us as much as it felt like it did. Our inventory also probably hurts us as well. This was our third show in four weeks so our wall books were thin. I also made the decision not to bring cheaper books because I didn't want to change out $20 bills all weekend for a $2 purchase. I had already gone that route two years ago. Finally, the dealer room was bigger for the third year straight. There were quality books in the room but most of the dealers were from the Texas area. I think the national dealers would have be disappointed if they had shown up. I don't think the people at this show were looking for high end books. We sold several $100 to $200 books but only a few big purchases this year. We sold a graded ST 110, a graded BA 12 and a graded IM 55 but I knew two of those purchases were coming and third one went to someone I have known for awhile. This was the second year for Stan Lee to be there but we did not have hardly anyone ask for books to get Stan to sign. A handful at most. That tells me that they had already found something or just didn't care.

 

I do think the show had plenty of positives about it. The promoter got the people through the door. The place was packed all three days. (Preview night does not count at this show as far as I am concerned) I just think the people either did not have extra money to spend or they didn't know what they were looking at. Load in and out was better this year but still has some bugs to be worked out. The staff were friendly and helpful. It seemed the crowd had a great time. I was able to pick up some great books over the weekend and got some promising leads. Had a few wall books walk up to the table during the show, bought a great stack of pre-hero marvels, silver age keys and a few pre-code horrors books from another dealer and was able to seal a deal for 5 magazine boxes of pre-code horror, including over 250 EC's.

 

Overall, it was a good show and worth doing for us. I think it will continue to grow and I think the people will learn what to expect and be better prepared in the future. The show has some things to work out but this was only year three. They listen to their dealers and their artists so I am sure most of the issues will be addressed. Everyone I talked to made money, we were just hoping for a bit better.

[thehumantorch]

Thanks for the reports guys.