What do you guys think of this.....?

[Gatchaman]

There is a comic store in AZ that has quarantined off part of his store to only people who have a pull box. Here is one of his reasons -

 

"Mike Wheeler: You also have to understand that here in the valley there are 30+ comic/game shops. Every one of them has their own niche. I want to brand myself as something other than a comic shop. A high end comic/collectible shop. I want to do something that's edgy, trendy, and pretty much down right cool. You know those metal trading cards artists print their stuff on? Well we ordered some of those and are making club cards we are going to hand out to all our pull box holders. Complete with a lanyard and everything. It will be like walking into a con every time you come in our shop. We will offer insane discounts in regards to pricing and awesome monthly giveaways to our pullbox holders. We will also have con variants of books slipped in from all the shows we do free of charge! It's going to be fantastic. Well at least I think so."

 

[porcupine48]

turn me off

[Artboy99]

it depends.

 

Am I a file customer? Then that is great!

 

Am I a customer there but I don't have a file? Guess what...I probably won't shop there anymore if all the good stuff is behind some roped off area.

 

 

[Gatchaman]

Imagine all of the people that may just be passing through. There are plenty of people who are in town on business, visiting family, etc. You walk into this shop and guess what? There goes any potential sales.

[budsbundy]

couldn't you just open a pull on the spot, and then head on in?

[Gatchaman]

couldn't you just open a pull on the spot, and then head on in?

 

He charges $2.50 a month to have a pull box.

[dupont2005]

Probably not going to work

[SquareChaos]

The best LCS experience I ever had was with an owner that seemed to put forth extra effort to cater towards collectors (as opposed to people that read and didn't care about condition).

 

If an issue from my pull was damaged when it arrived from Diamond, he'd do his best to fix it. If literally every issue of that book was damaged, or I was the only one with that book on my pull, he'd still get on the phone with his rep and get me a new copy, and if it was sold out, he'd reach out to other shop owners he knew to get me one that way. He was always extra careful with the books when handling them if he knew it was for a customer that actually cared about the condition of his spanking new moderns. It was a nice change from some other shops I'd briefly known - some of my books from those places would look like they were shot into my subscription box with a t-shirt canon.

 

So, that aspect of it, the customer service aspect, could be nice. But I don't understand the exclusivity angle - why would you turn people away at the street? There's some small percentage change of creating a recurring customer from someone that wanders in off of the street, especially if the owner and employees put effort in to that. There's an even higher chance curious browsers will purchase something - even if they never return, that's a sell right?

[Shadow Images]

Business model set up for failure. Good luck.

 

 

He should stop and listen to his own statement. There are a lot of shops opening here and turning off / away new customers is a interesting way to go about it. jmho

 

[Gatchaman]

I agree. I have seen many posts, on here. where members are going to be in a certain town and have asked if there are any good shops to check out while they are there. Do you think this one would be on that list? Nope.

 

I am hoping to move to AZ, in a couple years, where I lived in the 70's, for my health and everything I hear about this guy just turns me off and a lot of other people in this FB group that see his tactics.

[Gatchaman]

Mike Wheeler I will make Comic Shops great again! We will build a wall and keep people from bending up our books!

[MetalPSI]

Bad enough my LCS growing up never ever offered me any incentives at all, being a customer and a file customer for 8 years. Having a area roped off just doesn't seem to make good business sense. Everything should be for sale.

[Bronty]

I don't think a stop sign is a good way to engage your customers

[NP_Gresham]

There is a comic store in AZ that has quarantined off part of his store to only people who have a pull box. Here is one of his reasons -

 

"Mike Wheeler: You also have to understand that here in the valley there are 30+ comic/game shops.

I think he is right. The market is way over-saturated. I would guess the market is about 400% over normal capacity.

There is going to be some ugly fall out when this ends. The printers and distributers of all those worthless variants don't care.

This is going to end badly for so many of these shops. They DO need to distinguish themselves somehow if they hope to survive the reckoning.

As to his approach... well not my cup of tea. But good for him for recognizing the problem and being pro-active in his approach.

[Guardian Comics]

I'd first look into getting rid of that embarrassing sign. Makes the shop look so bush league.

 

Jim

[jaeldubyoo]

But it's "edgy, trendy, and pretty much down right cool." No thanks.

[Sal]

He would probably be better served to have after hours events which were invitation-only for his pull box folks. Get the same cachet with none of the pesky class warfare

[cloud cloddie]

I'd first look into getting rid of that embarrassing sign. Makes the shop look so bush league.

 

Jim

 

Right. I can't take anybody seriously that says they want to be high end, but can't even use a straight edge to make a stop sign.

[Couchy81]

Couldn't the guy just offer a nice discount to all the regular customers instead?

 

I'm thinking part of his reasoning is he wants to prevent speculators/flippers from pillaging the stock every time something hot comes out.

 

I think his heart is in the right place but his head didnt think thi sone through.

[Ken Aldred]

He would probably be better served to have after hours events which were invitation-only for his pull box folks. Get the same cachet with none of the pesky class warfare

 

I'm not too keen on snobbishness, 'preferred customers' and that type of approach, either. Once it shows up in comic shops or with dealers, I tend to look for somewhere a bit more down-to-earth.