Opening a Comic Shop: What would YOU stock

In My Humble Opinion
1

Yes, it’s that time, my friends. As some of you may remember, I’m opening a comic and game shop.

We’re getting ready to put in our first order for comics from Diamond and I thought I’d crowd source some ideas. Our consultant - a very established owner of several stores on the west coast - advises just ordering the top 100 selling trade paperbacks and individual issues and being done with it. That’s likely good advice.

But I thought I’d ask you guys. Here’s my thoughts:

  1. I’m very leery of ordering any of the big, expensive hardback compilations. They tend to have a MSRP about $100 and I’m not convinced they’ll move quickly.
  2. My own tendencies run toward independent black and white books. My staff has already built a 'JC’s pretentious shelf of comix as a display. But I know I can’t buy a lot of those if I can’t count on them moving and some are pretty obscure.
  3. I don’t want to order full runs of trades. I see too many shelves where trade 1 and 2 are gone and 3-10 are sitting on the shelves because people can’t get entrance into the story without the first one.
  4. I’m considering ordering 2-4 of the most popular books and moving one. Both individual issues - floppies, I guess - and trades to provide some level of multi-sale opportunities.

So what are your thoughts? How would YOU - yes, YOU - stock a comic store. We can get to the games later as I have my own thoughts on those.

What’s worth stocking? What needs to be there. What’s to be avoided? What has artistic value but can’t be overly committed to?

2

Do you want to focus specifically on comics? I honest to god always assumed most of the actual money was in collectibles and toys.

3

Will your store have a website? I might want to shop there.

4

I read mostly superhero comics but I have read superhero comics sales are slow. Some titles I have heard are hot are:

Saga

The Wicked and the Divine

Lazarus

But despite what I wrote above I am sure you also can’t go wrong with the Staple Marvel and DC hero titles.

5

Yes, it seems to me as you are starting out, that you primarily carry things you are pretty sure you can sell. So, consider the advisor’s advice and also consider the previous owner’s sales patterns.

I’d say, starting out, you might want to “spice” the popular stuff with some stuff that reflects your personality (pretentious shelf), but you don’t want to have too much capital invested in things you aren’t sure you’re going to sell. As you establish a track record and get your feet on solid ground, you can slowly expand the non-popular stuff as you understand how much you can afford to stock.

I’d say order extra copies of volumes 1 and 2 or re-order them as soon as they’re sold, so that if someone does want to get 3-10, they’re available, but there’s always 1-2 available for beginners. But, again, this should fit your overall turnover rate and inventory limitations.

Yes, I think you do need to make room for “floppy” monthly issue buyers and collected paperback buyers. I almost exclusively buy collected paperbacks, but I don’t know how much of the market still buys monthlies. I would guess that younger readers still go for monthly issues.

It depends on how much space he has. Around here, very small stores specialize—only books, or only anime, or only games—but big stores have huge collectibles and games sections. I suspect you are right that collectibles and games are more lucrative, but there are book-only stores that seem to run okay.

Again, JC has to keep an eye on his particular market and what moves and what he can afford/has room to keep in stock. My closest comic book store is tiny—smaller than my living room. It’s almost all books—monthlies, collected paperbacks mostly, with a few hardbacks, and a very small number of toys/collectibles as “spice.”

6

Right now, if I were you I’d put about fifty copies of Watchmen on the shelves.

Beyond that, as an occasional comic reader the feeling I most get when walking into a comic store is being overwhelmed. I know a lot of the characters, I’ve seen many of the movies, and I have a couple of boxes of graphic novels I’ve collected over the years. But when faced with a shelf of hundreds of comics, especially spines out instead of front covers showing, I’m at a loss.

So possibly something you could do is to assemble some “prix fixe” bundles to help people get over that hump, where you select a few graphic novels (I think this isn’t the best route for individuals) that are both good and somehow related in theme or subject matter while still having some variety. Label them as “If you liked X, then try this…” It doesn’t even have to be at a real discount; the value is in doing the selection for the shopper with too many choices. If they happen to already own something in the bundle, let them swap it out for something of equivalent value.

Ideally this starts up a conversation with them and leads to a more regular customer. You’re selling them your judgement and taste, which ought to be the reason they’re coming to a comic store instead of just clicking things on Amazon.

Could even throw in a related T-shirt or something to sweeten the deal.

7

What are other similar businesses in your area selling? If you’re the only place around selling indie B&W titles, you’ll have the demographic to yourself. But if there are already other stores selling them, you’ll be competing over a share of a small market.

If you can figure out something with crossover appeal that you can sell that other area stores aren’t selling then you’ll get people to come to you for those items. And then as long as they’re shopping in your store anyway, they’re more likely to buy their mainstream comic books from you as well.

8

From a purely business angle, I’d lean toward product that will appeal to newcomers to the medium. Hardcore comic collectors are like junkies, it’s hard to steer them away from their usual supplier.

9

I love classics and hope they still sell: Crumb, André Franquin, Sheldon/Sheridan/Mavrides, Moebius… I wish you luck! Will you set up a web page or web shop?
My comic shop in Berlin has two enormous tomes (guessing from memory about DIN A2 size) from the Taschen Verlag with the old Crazy Cat and Little Nemo stories. They cost 160,-€ each, but I am badly tempted (will need a car to carry them!) and they get me back to the shop time and again, and I often buy something different.
Promoting local amateurs through some kind of competition might be a good idea.

10

you know I got interested in comics mostly because you used to be able to go and buy a sample pack of 6-12 comics in a wrapped pack in target Kmart etc I think places bought old stock and resold them that way because some of them did say "company x is not licensed or endorsed by dc marvel etc …

before that, all I knew of was the marvel and dc main titles because of the cartoons on tv…

do they still sell those? you might get a few of those as “starter packs” or make your own

11

You are a brave, brave, man and I wish you luck.

Single data point: personally, as a 40-something American, when I buy comics these days it’s to catch up on or replace comics I used to have and lost, and it’s the stories I’m interested in, not the investment, so the compilations are mainly what I look at. As an adult I can afford a more expensive product, and it’s just not worth it to me to buy 32-page single issues that I’ll read in about 3 minutes.

I realize this does not make me your target clientele, but I am a guy who will walk into your shop once and spend a few hundred dollars in one shot, and I’m certain I’m not the only person like me.

12

Hasn’t had a new issue since July 2018.

13

It’s an interesting conundrum, really.

The average comic shop pulls a bit more than $1MM annually. I know I can make it profitable from there and I’ve got the money to ramp it up. But choosing the inventory is the tricky part right off the bat.

The goal here is to combine comix, games and art. Magic the Gathering is evergreen so we have to stock a bunch of that but other games I’m hoping to carrying are the smaller, casual oddball games. The large, complicated ones simply don’t move much.

In terms of collectibles? Some more - not the statuettes - and some don’t. Which do is really entirely a local phenomenon. I can’t have a proper feel for that other than the other nearby shop has a lot of stuff that’s been there long enough to have dust on it. So I’m hoping I can stock funkopops and some other gear along with T-shirts and allow the market to define itself.

14

I think I’d try and get an idea of what your clientele will be; your inventory will need to be different if you’re selling to fortysomething lifelong comic nerds vs. 11 year olds with $25 bucks to blow every so often.

Also it’ll be important to establish whether you’re going to be a more classic style comics shop where you sell mostly comics and a few games/knick-knacks, or if you’re more of a catch-all nerd culture store with comics being “first among equals”, so to speak. That’ll also affect what your inventory will need to be.

15

It’s catch-all. Clientele in local stores in young men - college age and military - playing games.

Comic buyers don’t have a great store here and I see a market opportunity to promote games and comics for creatives as well as women.

If we draw in established comic nerds - like myself - it’ll be an ancillary market and not a core one.

Marketing is based upon trying to become the core location of nerd culture. We have meet ups for games, creators or games and comics as well as tournaments and discussion groups. We have about 8 six-foot tables set up as well as experienced play testers who will demo new and existing games. We’ll even have a lounge area with couches and tables for people to just hang.

Weekends? Food trucks. Weekdays? Vending machines.

16

Are you opening in time for Christmas? Can you have a stocking-stuffer sale?

Whatever you choose to begin with to appeal to hardcore collectors, I’d try to have two additional displays:

  1. Great starter comics for kids. As a parent, I’m mostly buying comics for my own children, and it’d be helpful when first going into a comic shop to get some pointers about what would work for a kid. This means knowing which issues are the start of a storyline, not are picking a storyline up mid-scene.
  2. “What should we stock?” display. Somewhere for folks to record titles or other products they wish they saw on the shelves.
17

Most of my comic book purchases are old teen, humor, romance and horror comics. If there’s a fifty cent box or a dollar box I’m going to dig through it and look for the giveaway comics from the local forestry council or the bike safety committee or the dairy, and if there’s a yellowing thing from the 1950s with no cover, chances are it’s coming home with me.

Diamond doesn’t really stock what I’m after, so I don’t know if I’m any help at all, but I DO know that when we’re pawing through somebody’s pile of Secret Hearts, Betty & Veronica, or Young Romance, there’s somebody next to us waiting to dig through that same pile, so we’re not alone.

18

We’ve got two large walls with chalkboard paint on them. One, behind the register, is for staff to communicate with customers. The other is out on the sales floor and is designed to allow customers to communicate with each other and with the store management. So yes, there’ll be a place for people to let us know what they want to see.

19

Baby Yoda

20

I’d have a section with comic books that have movies or TV series based on them. I figure a lot of people who aren’t regular comic book readers would be coming in looking for those specific titles from having watched them on the screen.