Brand Man

Wow, I was reading through some other industry blogs, and came across a reference to Brand Man.

The story goes that Tom McAlister was looking for a job and decided to leverage his creativity by having an artist help him design a comic book for his resume. If you click here, you can see the actual comic resume.

Isn't that a great idea?

Reminds me of how I included caricatures and comic fonts in the business plan I wrote.

Missing Comics!

Today when we received our new order, we found that about a third of our order was missing! We were NOT happy campers!

Andy called our distributor to find out what was going on. In the meantime, I looked up our shipment on the UPS site and noticed that one box had been marked "Exception." I called UPS and found out that it was still waiting for pickup.

Apparently, they had a new employee who hadn't checked the COD amount when he checked out the order. NOT good!

But all's well that end's well, and we now have our new comics - which are jumping off the shelves!

The lesson? Make sure that the person picking up the order knows how many boxes to expect and that s/he gets a total from the UPS attendant prior to handing over the check!

It's that time of year....

It's that time of year when you never know WHO is going to walk into the store. Here is a picture from a recent visitor:



Mardi Gras Costume Shop is just next to the plaza where Comic Zone is located, so I suspect we will see even more in the days to come.

This weekend is Halloween weekend. We have Stephen Jung, a local artist, coming into the store. He is known for Dark Fantasy art. You can find out more about him at http://www.jungarts.com.

Anyone who does come into the store on Saturday and/or Sunday dressed in a costume will receive a free comic or two or three.

And there will be sales..... Stay posted for more details.

Obama Nation

We have a new product in the store. It's a card game called Obama Nation. (You can find out more about the game here: http://www.obamanationcardgame.com/).



My understanding is that it is simple to play but it has twisted rules. Being a supporter of Obama, I'm not really sure how I will like this game. But, if I set my political leanings aside, it looks like it could be a hoot.

We are planning to have a team in on a Saturday in November to show folks how to play. In fact, we just may make it a gaming day.... so stay tuned. I'll let you know more as I do.

Wow!

I walked into the store today and boy, was I surprised!

Over the months since we have been open, although our comics are always neat and well-organized, the counter behind the register has been capturing lots of miscellaneous piles of stuff. Our storage area has been a mish-mosh of this and that, and it was becoming harder and harder to get to some of the stuff as we needed it. We have had a running backlog of items that needed to be tagged and filed in the back issues bins. That was how things were when I left the store last night.

I walked in today, and the back issues box was empty - in fact, gone - and all of the comics had been tagged and filed. The counter is neat and organized and everything is labeled, and the storage room is suddenly bright and easy to navigate, and seems three times bigger than it did yesterday. The floors are vacuumed. The gaming area is neat and orderly. All of the little things that had been bugging me have been fixed.

Turns out that Sean and his friends came in after hours last night and worked all night to bring this about.

Wow! I am SO impressed!

Progress...

Avery has been working diligently to upload many images to our point of sale system, which in turn will be feeding our webstore. I am amazed at the progress he has made. He has discovered a great new tool called Image Grabber. It doesn't always grab the right image, but more than 90% of them are spot on.

As an aside, even without the images, the webstore IS fully functional, and if there is something you would like to order from the comfort of your own home, we even discount EVERY product on our webstore by 20%... so buy away!

http://stores.intuitwebsites.com/comiczoneaz/StoreFront.bok

Trivia Game

This Saturday, Sept. 12th, at 2:00 PM, Comic Zone is hosting a Trivia Game based on comic book information.

The format will be similar to Jeopardy, and it should be a real blast. There is no admission to be a part of the game, so come on by to see how well you know your comics.

There will be first, second, and third prizes awarded, based upon total points earned. The prizes will be store credit in varying amounts, although exact amounts are still to be determined.

If you absolutely want to be a part of this, come early on Saturday and claim your spot.