|
|
Friday, March 6th, 2009
| |
11:47 am - Ars Gratis Pecunea; Conventions
|
Conventions.
Normally I love conventions. They are a chance to get out and meet fans, which I love, meet other professionals, which I love, eat something other than my own cooking, which I love, and make a quick pile of cash money, which I love to pieces.
I will talk about the other stuff some other time. Today we're talking about money.
You would think that since we are online, where people can purchase from us whenever they want in the comfort of their own home, people wouldn't buy as much at conventions. Whereas this will no doubt be more and more true in the future, people actually purchase quite a bit at conventions. They like buying stuff directly from us. Now when they buy online, they already DO that, but there is a satisfaction to actually handing cash money to the actual creator of the thing you love that, I believe, cannot be overlooked. There are a number of people who don't like to buy things online, for whatever reason. There are those who don't have access to computers. There are those for whom going to a convention is a special event and a part of that event package is Buying Books They Want. For whatever reason, we usually sell a lot of books at conventions.
The operative word here is "usually". I have just finished a run of three conventions. One in New York City, one in Washington D.C., and one in San Francisco.
Sales were terrible at all three. Now I can make excuses, and come up with reasons why things were slow, and I will, if you're interested, but the inescapable conclusion is that our industry is not "bulletproof". In hard economic times, people in any branch of the entertainment industry console themselves with the "knowledge" that even bad times, people want to be entertained. This is true, but we are not many people's first entertainment choice. TV is free, as is sex (if you're doing it right). Netflix is an invisible cost. There's all kinds of outdoorsy stuff that better people than I indulge in for free. My graphic novels, while beloved, are not free, or even cheap.
It wasn't just me. Almost every other creator I talked to and heard from reported slow to downright dismal sales.
Now like I said, there were reasons;
i. The show in New York was the worst. There was over 75,000 people, and yet I lost money. AAAAH! How wrong is that?! How could this happen?
Well…the show was held the first week of February. People were still hurting from the spending they did for the holidays. The convention has actually addressed this already. The next NYC show will be in October, when people are spending for the holidays. Smart move.
February was also when the news of the collapsing economy was just breaking in all of its terrible majesty. People were thinking twice about buying anything. Not what you want in an industry like ours.
The convention itself was held in NYC's Jacob Javits center. A fine venue, but one run by total amoral sharks. The booth space cost more than an equivalent space at San Diego, and when I got there, I discovered that the price didn't include little things like a table or chairs. That ran me another $750. Read that fine print, kids.
On a personal level, I think I was hurt by the fact that I didn't have anything new. We have a new book coming out in May, but a lot of people showed up, asked if there was anything new, and being told there wasn't, moved on. Ouch.
The other two conventions were the same story. (The one in Washington DC was made worse by having my entire weekend take stolen, but that is an extraordinary circumstance that cannot be considered part of the normal bell curve, but it certainly added to the extreme suckyness of the experience)
The show in San Francisco was run by the comic-con international people. I love these guys. Since I do work for them, I get a deal on my hotel room as well as my dealer's table, so if there is any con where I'm going to make money, it's this one. Technically, I did, but it was nerve wracking.
So. What have we learned from this kids?
1. New products drive sales. This is always true, but is especially true now.
2. The economy is in the toilet. People are terrified and are cutting back on their recreational money. I personally think that things are going to get a lot, lot worse before they get better. Yes, I believe that they will get better, but it's going to get pretty fucking grim. And thus-
3. Studio Foglio is severely cutting back on the conventions it's doing in the next year or so. I don't have to be Adam Smith to figure out that if I had stayed home the month of February and cranked out desktops and private commissions, I would have made a lot more money than I did. We'll do San Diego, and conventions in Seattle, but other than that, forget it.
From now on, we will not do a convention unless we have new products.
|
|
(57 comments | comment on this)
|
| Monday, February 2nd, 2009
| |
10:17 am - Ars Gratis Pacunia Part 1
|
For awhile now, I've been toying with the idea of talking about the economics of being a cartoonist. Kaja said I should use this forum for something, and I thought it sounded interesting.
Well now it got real interesting.
Yesterday, I had to take Kaja to the hospital emergency room again. Many of you who follow our writings are aware that Kaja suffers from Chrones disease. This is a form of Colitis, and a real annoyance.
The good news is that she got into the hospital early enough that there is no need for surgery and there shouldn't be any life threatening complications.
The bad news is that she will not be going to the New York Comicon or Katsucon. I almost wasn't going either, but my mother-in-law will be here to watch the kids as well as Kaja when she gets back, and Kaja reminded me that (a.) we we need the money these shows will bring in, and (b.) we already shipped 40 boxes of books out there.
Both of these arguments are pretty valid. It's been a slow year so far. The economy has slapped everyone pretty hard. My fellow webcartoonists have reported that sales and ad revenues tanked immediately after the holidays. Conventions are a source of fast cash, if done right, and that is what we need.
So, I will try to go into economic detail over the next year about how we run our business. Just warning you in advance.
current mood:  determined
|
|
(44 comments | comment on this)
|
| Friday, January 16th, 2009
| |
11:55 am - Flag Note
|
This Tuesday I'm doing something I haven't done in eight years. I am displaying an American flag on our house. I have owned an American flag. I have been fully aware of the Patriotic occasions when one traditionally displays an American flag. I am a patriotic American in that I vote, pay my taxes and resist the temptation to sell nuclear secrets to terrorists.
However eight years ago, I watched America blithely submit to a stolen election, and things have gone downhill ever since. I have watch as my beloved country was led by incompetents and criminals who sincerely believed that their actions were blessed by invisible superheroes who live in outer space. They squandered our resources, ignored our laws, undermined our freedoms and enriched their cronies.
Even worse, they ruined the image of America around the world. Now don't get me wrong. I don't think that America's foreign policy anytime in the last fifty years was exceptionally smart, benevolent or even well thought out. But we could speak out against torture with a clean conscience. We could We could chide other countries about unfair elections with a straight face. We could demand that governments that attacked other nations for no reason should be indicted for war crimes. Around the world, everyone hunkered down and hoped they survived until a new government came to power. All those world leaders that talk about Mr. Bush as a serious, sensible world leader? I'll be real curious what they have to say after he's safely left office.
And hey! He is leaving office. Now in addition to the thousands of last minute laws he's leaving like mines, I'm sure he'll pardon every single person who's helped make things a little more miserable over the last eight years, but it's a step in the right direction, and, I'll just throw this out here. He can't pardon himself. Just sayin'.
And now here comes Mr. Obama. Don't get me wrong. I do not think he is a magic man of hope who sprung forth from the dreams of good children everywhere, who smells of peppermint and will fix everything by the power of goodness, love and, did I mention, hope. Nothing would please me more than to be proved wrong on this, but I'm not holding my breath, because blue isn't my best color.
But one thing he did do is get elected honestly. No one can deny that we actually elected him to this office. He will be the legitimate president of the United States of America, and I know that I am not alone in saying that it is about time. Good, bad or indifferent, my government has returned from exile, and I can once again display my flag with pride.
current mood:  hopeful
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Friday, May 23rd, 2008
| |
1:57 pm - Robert Asprin
|
Bob Asprin died yesterday.
Bob was the guy who actually got me my first actual job within both the science-fiction community AND comics. When Kelley Freas left Starblaze, the company that was publishing Bob's MythAdventures series, he recommended me to replace him as the series' illustrator. When he sold the series to WARP Graphics to be adapted into a comic, he recommended me as the writer/artist.
This was a text book example of the old "It's Who you know, not What you know" at work, as I had never done any of these things before. Now they're what I do for a living.
I met Bob when I was just starting college, and thus had entirely too much time on my hands. To use up this time, I attended science fiction conventions in the midwest. They were fun, and not too expensive, and I had a friend who loved nothing more than to drive long distances in fast cars (Hi, Jim), so I attended a lot of them.
After awhile, Bob and I noticed that we kept seeing each other at these cons, and became acquaintances. I can't even really say why we became friends, as we had widely different interests.
Bob liked to fence. I'm a spud.
Bob liked the SCA. I hated camping.
Bob liked to drink. I didn't drink at all.
Bob liked the ladies. So did I, but not the same ones, and Bob was a true gentleman, in that no matter how outrageously he pursued them, he never talked about it afterwards.
Bob liked to sing. It's best for all concerned if I do not.
However both Bob and I liked entertaining people. Telling stories. Getting people to laugh. He was very good at it, and I really enjoyed working with him.
So long, Bob. Thanks for everything.
|
|
(32 comments | comment on this)
|
| Thursday, September 13th, 2007
| |
2:29 pm - More About Credit Cards
|
Hey.
Sorry for the extended absence, but I've been a busy boy.
So- I promised to talk about taking credit cards. In my opinion, taking credit cards is a sign that you are serious about being a business. I am of the school that says that you should make it as easy as possible for strangers to give to give you money. On our website, as well as at Dealer's tables at conventions, we accept credit cards (We also take personal checks, travelers checks, paypal and sweet, sweet untraceable cash). At San Diego in particular, I heard more than one customer mention that they were buying from us because we took credit cards.
For a long time, we were with a company called Cardservice. As it turns out, they are Tools of Satan, so I would not recommend giving them your business. We signed up with them because we were a brand new company with no credit history, no experience and no one offering the priceless, avuncular advice I am dishing out to you now. Thus, although we realized that they were perhaps not giving us the best deal we could have got, they would do for now. Fourteen years later we here at Studio Foglio got off of our fat asses and actually looked into other systems and realized just how totally hosed we had been for lo- those many years.
We never claim to be brilliant, but whenever we do learn something, it is usually driven home so thoroughly by hideous circumstance that we truly learn our lesson.
So. If you have a genuine business license (if you don't have one-you should get one), go to the bank where you have your Business Checking Account (if you don't have one- you should get one) and tell them that you want to start taking credit cards. We are in the process of getting one from our bank (Key Bank, if you're interested, one of the friendlier appearing megalithic, octopus-like financial institutions burrowing through the husk of our society). They offer a hand-held device that will allow you to process credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, Discover and Amex) while you are at conventions. Not only can you process cards, but since it uses cel phone technology (Sprint, no less), it can verify the card right then and there. That's right, no bad cards. (If you run a card, and it comes up bad, don't assume that the person is trying to cheat you. Fans are goofballs. They'll go to a con and spend like a drunken sailor and drain a card faster then you'd believe. It's not like there's a little alarm that goes off when they reach their limit. So when this happens at your table, you politely ask for another card. If they don't HAVE another card, no sale. [ In all honesty I must say that on those occasions when we could not verify cards {see Satan, Tool of}, and wound up accepting a few that were subsequently shown to be tapped out, we just ran them a week or two later, and they went through just fine. Most of the creative people reading this are like us. Our readers really like us, and aren't trying to cheat us, they just don't manage their money as well as they should. I can relate.] You'd be surprised how many ostensibly destitute people show up later with good old cash. Perhaps they sell plasma.)
Now taking cards is not cheap. One of these snazzy little units of which I speak cost around $1000. AIEEE! (I hear you say). Key Bank, at least, has a lease to own option that spreads the pain out over a period of time. They also charge you for a million little things. There is a charge of around 25¢ every time you swipe a card. Then they take a bit less then 2% of every sale. Then they charge around $20 every month for cellular phone stuff. I'm sure there's stuff I'm forgetting, but for us? IT IS SO WORTH IT! And the more conventions you do, the more worth it is.
We also take credit cards through our online store. I am not yet sure if it still applies, but formerly, we had to have two separate credit card accounts. One that ran through the online store, and one that was run through the handheld device. They were both Studio Foglio accounts, but since they dealt with different revenue streams, they had to be kept separate, or else the sun would explode, I guess. I will let you know if this is still the case.
For our finances, we use Quick Books. Quickbooks is a wonderful accounting program that will change the way you run your business. It runs on both Macs and PCs (however most accountants and bookkeepers are nitwits about anything that isn't accounting and bookkeeping [I'm cool with that, by the way, I'm not hiring them to dance for me]. Every other frigging machine in the place is a beautiful, perfect Mac, but we have to have a filthy, no-doubt-choked-to-the-cyber-gills-with-viruses PC chugging away in the basement that we keep the business stuff on because our accountant and bookkeeper cannot figure our how to read Mac files (Yes, even if we save them as PC files. Yes, I go through a lot of aspirin). Again-so worth it!
|
|
(14 comments | comment on this)
|
| Friday, August 10th, 2007
| |
2:27 pm - I Meant Those OTHER Times
|
A quick edit here, brought about by my lovely wife coming over and smacking me in the head with a sock full of sand that she keeps handy for those special moments.
"You are trying to kill me," she remarks. "I thought we LIKED the 'Looking For Group' guys."
"What for you hit me onna head with the sock? Their strip is awesome."
"Your latest LJ post. You're talking about San Diego. They were opposite us. They had a flash animation of their strip. With Singing."
"Fucking shoot me now."
So. I would like to apologize at this point to the Looking For Group guys. Yes, they had animation. Yes there was singing, and I completely forgot about it because most of the time, they had it turned down. Occasionally, when the crowd warranted it, they turned it up. When the crowd died down, they turned it down. They made a complete mockery of everything I said about having video at your table and I'm very embarrassed and annoyed about it, mostly with myself.
Here is a link to their excellent strip (http://www.lfgcomic.com/) and I will shut up now.
|
|
(14 comments | comment on this)
|
| Thursday, August 9th, 2007
| |
1:38 pm - The Taxing Business of Webcomics
|
Hey.
More blathering about San Diego today. A number of folks asked me questions, I'll get to them all, I promise. Feel free to send me more.
Sales tax. California is one of those states that is actively trying to balance it's books by taxing every bit of commerce that occurs within it's borders. Therefore you have to deal with the nice people from the State Board of Equalization. And nice people they are. Seriously. And a good thing, as you have to deal with them anytime you do a show in California.
Go to their website (http://www.boe.ca.gov/info/reg.htm) and download form # BOE 400 SPA. You can save this file on your computer and fill it out year after year. Getting a temporary Sellers Permit costs you nothing. But you have to give that number to the nice people running the convention before they let you set up your booth. Period. If you forget to bring your number, you can call the San Diego office that day and they will give you your number within 3 minutes, as your humble reporter discovered this year. (I wasn't alone, I was told that 6 other people so far had called about the same thing). On the form they will ask you how much you expect to make at the show. Make a reasonable guess and then cut it in half. They will not care.
Once you're at the con, you have to decide if you're going to actually charge sales tax or not. You don't have to, your customers will be thrilled. I always do charge, as people are expecting it, and I AM doing this to make money. The rate in California is 7.25%. Do not try to figure it out each and every time. Life is short. What we do is just write down the adjusted price on the tablecloth behind each stack of books. Many people price things to the .95¢. At cons we bump it up to the nearest round dollar ($9.95<$10.00) and tax from there. If you feel guilty about this, don't. No one will care. If you must, tell them you'll sign it for free. It is perfectly okay to use a calculator.
Sometime after the show, you must fill out the form and actually pay your taxes, if only so you can do business in California again. Honestly reporting every dollar of income that you made, even completely untraceable cash payments that you received for artwork done at the show is, of course, the shining ideal towards which we all strive.
When you sign up for San Diego, the forms asks if you want a power drop. Always say yes. It's free. You might not need it NOW, but who knows what you'll need a year from now? On that note, let's talk about video stuff at your booth.
Hey-look at that! Your pal knocked together a flash animation demo of your comic. Everyone who sees it laughs at the jokes and everything. And there's singing! A wonderful thing to show at that pitch you make to Miramax. Good luck with that. Do not install it at your table. Especially if you are sharing with other people, and absolutely not if you are in the booth opposite me, because after hearing and seeing that thing 547 times, you might get slightly tired of it, and I can assure you that everyone around you hates it and you with the hate of a thousand burning suns. Yes, you will occasionally grab some people who wouldn't have ordinarily stopped, but you will lose your soul...as well as your friends and probably your tires. If you MUST do this thing, make it a silent movie or use earphones.
Next time- Credit cards.
|
|
(11 comments | comment on this)
|
| Monday, August 6th, 2007
| |
11:35 am - Webcomics At San Diego 2008 Part 1
|
Hey.
Well, we are back from the San Diego Comicon and frantically preparing to head off for GenCon. Haven't been to GenCon for years. The last time I went it was still in Milwaukee. I will miss the gentile rust-belt ambiance of the city (it's not often that you find numerous used book stores in the heart of the downtown area, not mention at the airport) and there are a few restaurants that I will cherish, but I've never been to Indianapolis, so I'm looking forward to it.
So- San Diego.
This was the first year for the official Webcomics area. There had sort of been a webcomics area in the past, when the con had stuck the Keenspot guys near the Penny Arcade guys and bing! Instant webcomics nexus. This year you could actually request that you be in the Webcomics section, and a number of people did so. The webcomics community noticed that it existed and promoted it on their sites. Studio Foglio was there, and we had an amazing year, sales-wise.
Next year, a number of webcomic luminaries who should have been there this year will be joining the area. I highly recommend it. Now a booth at San Diego is not cheap. Trust me, I'm aware of that. We're talking around $1800.00. A lot of people cannot afford that. The best way to get around that is by getting a booth with other people. You can do that. Here are a few other tips.
A booth is 10 feet square. You get 1 8 foot table and two chairs. If you buy a corner booth, it costs around another $300 dollars. Rent another table from convention services ($150, I think) and bang!- you've doubled your useable space without having to spend another $1800.00. Chairs cost around $60 each, but you can bring your own, or buy a damn folding chair from the Office Depot which is several blocks from the convention center.
Don't crowd your booth. Okay- yes, if you and 18 other artists go in on a booth, it'll only cost you $100 each. Please. You want your booth to look like it's staffed by professionals. You don't want it to be mistaken for a dorm room. For a 10 foot booth, I'd recommend no more than 4 people, and that's pushing it, as it means that each artist has only 2 feet each of table space, so you might want to do it in shifts.
When you sign up for a booth, you'll have to give them a name for the Booth. The name is important, because San Diego uses a point system when assigning spaces, the best spaces going to people who have the most points. One of the things that gives you points is seniority. The more years you've displayed at San Diego, the more weight you have. Studio Foglio has displayed at San Diego for over a decade, and we've also had booths under the names XXXenophile Books, Palliard Press and Slag-Blah Entertainment, and they all count. So if you can afford a booth all by your lonesome, great. If you're sharing, you have to decide what name you're going to use. Now you might be able to list ALL of them, if so. great. Call and find out. But if not, figure out what you all are going to be called, and start letting your readers know NOW.
Sign up for a booth as soon as possible. It only gets more expensive if you wait. Plus the sooner the guy in charge of laying out the actual floorplan (Hi, Justin!) sees how many people want to get into the webcomic section, the bigger it'll be, which is good for us. When you fill out your form, tell them you are a webcomic and that you want to be in the Webcomic section. That is important.
Some people will hesitate about filling in the form right away because it asks you for your California Sales License Number. Relax. You can leave this part blank and send the form in now. It's important, but we'll talk about it next time.
current mood:  chipper
|
|
(11 comments | comment on this)
|
| Wednesday, May 16th, 2007
| |
4:49 pm - Science Has Not Failed Me
|
Hooray!!
Got a surprise phone call from Kaja this afternoon. The hospital deemed her "Sufficiently Cured" and I could come and take her home.
This I have done.
She is feeling a bit weak, and has a bucket-load of pills she has to pour down her throat every day, and she seems to be faintly glowing, but they didn't have to gut her like a fish, for which I am pretty darn grateful. For those of you who wrote to say (in essence) "hang in there", thanks! Those who got a card into the mail- double thanks!
Now I can get back to work. Whew!
|
|
(57 comments | comment on this)
|
| Monday, May 14th, 2007
| |
1:00 pm - Kaja Foglio is in the Hospital
|
Hello, just a brief note.
Late on Saturday, Kaja had to be taken to the emergency room of our local hospital. She was checked in and will be there for some time, apparently.
Kaja suffers from an ailment known as Chrohn's disease, which is an inflammation of the digestive system and can be life threatening if it is not treated.
Here is a link to a site that will tell you more than you ever wanted to know about Chrohn's disease; http://digestive.niddk.nih.gov/ddiseases/pubs/crohns/index.htm
She had a similar attack around eleven years ago that almost killed her, and resulted in major surgery, but she healed up, and there's been no major problems until now.
This time, we caught it pretty early, and she might be able to avoid surgery by the simple method of being given a wide range of experimental and quite powerful drugs. I'm talking about stuff that the administering doctor has to get dressed up in protective clothing for, so that they don't accidentally splash any on themselves. No joke. She is hoping that she gets mutant abilities or at least a third eye out of the deal, but we'll just have to see.
The bottom line is SHE WILL BE FINE...eventually, but could easily be in the hospital for several weeks.
We will do our best to continue posting Girl Genius, but as Kaja has to walk me through everything on the phone at this point, if she does have to go in for surgery or if the drugs convince her that she can only converse in Venusian, we may be out of luck.
This was Kaja's idea, by the way, I was quite prepared to put up a "We are experiencing Technical Difficulties" banner, but she insisted we try to work through it, so I hope you appreciate it.
Nothing would make her happier than to receive a 'get-well' card or two. These can be sent to Studio Foglio. The kids and I will visit her every day.
Thanks for your support, and let's hope that she gets home soon, and if she does get a mutant ability, it's something useful.
current mood:  worried
|
|
(82 comments | comment on this)
|
| Monday, July 3rd, 2006
| |
1:03 pm - Hayao Miyazaki Is Alive and Well After All!
|
Normally I hate being wrong, and I hate admitting it even more. However in this case, I will do so cheerfully.
My friend, who informed me that Mr. Miyazaki had passed away, wrote to me this morning to tell me that he had been mistaken, and that Miyazaki was alive and well.
He is normally a good source of information, because he has a lot of contacts in Japan, and follows animation news and events there very closely. I have no idea what caused him to believe that Miyazaki had died in the first place, I'm just damn glad he's incorrect.
Sorry for throwing a scare into everyone, and I promise to smack my friend around the room a few times. Now I'm going to go watch 'Spirited Away'.
|
|
(42 comments | comment on this)
|
| Saturday, September 10th, 2005
| |
7:51 pm - I Have Been Asked to Write an Appreciation of Penny Arcade. Here It Is.
|
Penny Arcade is, arguably, the most popular webcomic on the planet. Its creators are Mike Krahulik (artist) and writer Jerry Holkins. One of the longest-running online comics, Penny Arcade began posting in 1998 and has been active ever since. This, in a medium where a run of three weeks is considered a noble effort, is quite impressive. It is one of the few online strips that is popular enough that its creators do not need an outside job. An astonishing accomplishment when you consider that the strip itself is given away for free, and that they have yet to publish any collections.
Penny Arcade is about the day-to-day adventures of Jerry and Mike. Sort of. In a stunningly cognizant move, we do not follow Jerry and Mike per se, but their easy-on-the-eyes cartoon avatars, Gabe and Tycho. Gabe and Tycho play games. Console games. Online games. Computer Games. Mind games. Plus they kill each other. A lot. Some people would say that it's obvious that they're both sociopaths who have been permanently desensitized by excessive consumption of violent video games. To this we say; thank goodness they have a job where they never have to leave their houses.
In fact, Jerry and Mike take their caffeine-fueled hate and turn it upon the game industry. Most people who write about "The Game Industry" tend to suck up. They figure that writing nice things about Nintendo will increase the chances of the newest Zelda beta test landing in their mailbox. Jerry and Mike prefer to rule by fear. Rest assured that they get advance copies of games. They are flown out to various game company headquarters around the country to be wined and dined by young ladies who seem to have forgotten to put on half their clothes and presented with advance screenings of the latest techno-froth that said company has to offer. This is because said companies know that these two unprepossessing fellows could utterly destroy them. Penny Arcade is faithfully read by several hundred thousand readers. Readers who like games. Readers who have no desire to waste hard earned money on shoddy game product, and will take Penny Arcade's pronouncements into consideration when deciding where to spend said hard earned money.
Now various game companies have attempted to subvert Gabe and Tycho's street cred by actually hiring them to do work for their games. Relying, no doubt, on the old-fashioned concept that when somebody pays you a bunch of money, you are less likely to want to hurt them. A valid assumption, were it not for the fact that Mike and Jerry are in a very real sense, predators, and view such attempts at appeasement as a sign of weakness. It is this ability to disregard the established protocols and morés of civilization, to openly portray themselves as feral, ruthless creatures unafraid to stalk freely through the corridors of the powerful, turning upon those who would seek to use them, that gain and keep them their ever growing legion of followers.
Mike and Jerry have used the power thus given to them to do great things for humanity. In 2003 they set up a charity (http:www.childsplaycharity.org) to donate money and games to various children's hospitals, and in two years, managed to raise over a half a million dollars, as well as get a huge number of game companies to sign on as sponsors.
Last year they started their own convention, PAX, a three day event dedicated to gaming and the further glory of Penny Arcade, and really, who could blame them?
current mood:  calm
current music: Legend of Zelda
|
|
(36 comments | comment on this)
|
| Saturday, August 20th, 2005
| |
5:11 pm - Mr. Foglio Goes To San Diego- Part 5
|
Sunday.
The last day of the convention is like any other day of the convention,
but with a lot more work. The first thing we do is sweep the hotel room
and make sure we have all of our stuff. Then we get breakfast, and then
I check us out of the hotel and we haul our suitcases to the convention
center.
These get stashed behind the Skyline display, and then we
restock the table.
I glumly survey our remaining stock. No matter how I slice it, we'll be
shipping stock back home. The question now becomes 'How Much'? There is
always a chance that today will be the much-desired "feeding frenzy"
day. As you have no doubt gathered, dealers have endless reasons for
why any day might be a feeding frenzy day. The justification for Sunday
is the idea that, hey, it's the end of the con, people realize that
they still have money in their pockets, they came here to buy stuff, so
they might as well blow that money on something big. The heart
wrenching thing is that feeding frenzy days do occur. They can happen
on any day, at any show, and there's no way to predict when it's going
to happen. You just have to hope. Our hopes will be in vain, however.
Sunday will be comparable to Thursday. Not bad, but not great.
I have several jobs today, above and beyond the usual. The first one is
wholesaling. This is where I amble along to distributors like Cold Cut
and the larger stores like Mile-High and sell them as many books as
possible so I don't have to ship them home. I actually enjoy this, as
it gives me an opportunity to get an idea of how my books are doing in
the bigger stores. (Girl Genius- very good indeed) I manage to move
several boxes of books.
Then I have a meeting with Diamond Books. Diamond is THE comic book
distributor in the United States. Twenty years ago there used to be
almost twenty comics distributors, but as the market for comics has
shrunk, so has the support network. Diamond traditionally is the means
by which we get our books into comic shops. Recently, they started up a
new division specifically geared to getting graphic novels into
non-comic shop venues, like Tower and Borders. To my surprise, my
meeting today is not with my day-to-day representative, but with the
man in charge, Kuo-yu Liang. We seem to hit it off okay, and the
meeting goes very well. We talk about why we aren't selling more books,
and how to correct this gross injustice. We talk about book design, and
the possibility of printing editions in different formats. Apparently
big thick books are doing really well. It makes sense. It the book is
thick enough that you can put a snappy picture in the spine, then it
doesn't matter it the store doesn't put your book face out on the rack.
This is certainly worth considering. The people at Diamond give the
impression that they like our books, and I go away with the feeling
that if they have anything to do with it, sales will be improving.
Neat!
I then spend some time at the table. I get a lot of people saying they
enjoyed my emceeing at the masquerade. We have sold out of all of the
secondary products that we brought, such as ashcans and games and
candy, and are left with the core products. I now start keeping an eye
on the clock. The hall is supposed to stay open until four, but our
flight leaves at six, so I will declare the booth closed at two. A lot
of people stay over Sunday night and leisurely fly out tomorrow, but if
I'm going to collapse, I'd rather do it in my own bed. Sales have
slowed quite a bit, so I don't feel bad about leaving. I make a final
sweep through the hall looking for gifts for the family. A lot of the
other artists are sitting slumped in their booths. It's been a long
show.
Two o'clock. I tell the staff to shut it down. I then pretty much get
out of the way and let them do their stuff. I act as the front man, and
handle the few remaining sales. The first job is to get everything that
has to be shipped home packed. Then it's my job to haul it to the
shipping area, fill out the paperwork and send it on its way. Meanwhile
the Skyline is stowed,
the suitcases are repacked, adding table covers and book racks, and the
area is policed. As it is, something always gets left behind. This
year's winner is Cheyenne, who loses his little twenty gig jukebox, and
is now forced to actually listen to the voices in his head. This could
be a problem.
As always, tear down and packing takes longer than I think it will, and
now begins the mad dash to the airport. The first thing I have to do is
find a cab. Ideally a van. This proves impossible. Luckily we get two
cabs and split the load. Then we find ourselves in a huge traffic jam,
as the convention ends and thousands of comic fans pour out and wander
into the street. I mean it, they just wander into the road like sheep.
The traffic cops are at the point where you can tell they're
contemplating shooting them, but then their rotting carcasses would be
in the street, and they'd move even slower. I am starting to really
fret over the time, but when we actually get to the airport, it's all
anti-climactically easy. We punch in our e-tickets, we deposit our
luggage, we ease through security, and there we are. The only thing
left is the (hopefully) boring plane ride home.
Normally, I just work at home. I hate dealing with business and having
to be organized. It's one of the reasons I'm in the financial and
cultural obscurity I'm in. I'm too damn lazy. When I'm on the road,
entirely different parts of my brain awaken and take over. I sometimes
wonder what it would be like if these parts of my brain were active all
of the time. I suspect that I'd get a lot less art done, but what I did
do would be very well marketed. These parts of my brain are beginning
to shut down. For the first time in five days, I find myself doodling.
Another San Diego has come and gone. Back to work.
It will be several weeks before I discover that, much to my sorrow, I
have not won the Pikachu car.
AFTERWORD; My regular readers may notice that there are no
hyperlinks on today's page. That is because after I spent 2 hours
laying them in, I hit the wrong button and they all went away. I
apologize, but Hell if I'm doing that twice.
current mood:  pissed off
current music: N/A
|
|
(14 comments | comment on this)
|
| Saturday, August 13th, 2005
| |
7:38 pm - Mr. Foglio Goes To San Diego- Part 4
|
Saturday.
After breakfast we march over to the Hall before it opens to the public and restock the table. Judging how much stuff to bring is a frustrating game. On the one hand, the more stuff you bring, the more money
you make, theoretically. On the other hand, just because you bring
something doesn't mean you're going to sell it. Even at the best of
conventions, we usually wind up shipping about three boxes of stuff
back home.
Occasionally, while packing, I do a quick calculation, and figure that
if I shipped another ten boxes, I could make eleventeen skjillion dollars! Pay my mortgage! Buy a car! Let my children eat something other than oatmeal and the escargot
I catch in the garden! Woot! However, succumbing to this urge usually
only results in having to ship thirteen boxes back from the convention,
as opposed to three. The ultimate goal,
which I have only ever achieved once, in all my years of selling at
conventions, is to end the show with exactly one copy of everything.
(Starting the show with only one copy of everything is considered cheating) This shows that you brought enough for all interested customers, but did not miss any sales because of insufficient stock.
Anyway, restocking we are. A quick calculation has me worried that we
might not have brought enough Girl Genius collections. If Saturday is
the day long feeding frenzy everyone so desperately wants it to be,
then we might have problems. Unfortunately, it's not. Busy? Yes. Crowds
of happy people pouring down the aisles? Sure. The crowd so thick that
you can't see the booth across the way? Nope, not this year.
Now some of that might be due to the venue. A (very) rough calculation
says that there's probably close to ten miles of aisles. Even a hundred
thousand people are going to spread out a bit. Sales, while good, are
slightly disappointing in that they're pretty close to what we made on
Friday. This is an assessment that I will hear from a large number of
my fellow hucksters. A lot of people are bitching about the economy.
All too soon, things are quiet enough that I feel I can leave the
table. Unfortunately, I've seen pretty much everything I wanted to. I
wander over to the webcomic area again and try to convince some people about the importance of getting a bar code and an ISBN number on their books. I admit that they're really only important if you want soulless places like "stores" to actually carry your book, as opposed to keeping it "real", by only selling them off your website and out of the trunk of your car.
Today, when the room closes, I go to emcee the masquerade. Martin Jaquish,
the man who runs the masquerade, keeps calling me up for the job every
year and paying for my tuxedo, so I can't complain. The hall holds over
4000 people, and the masquerade staff refers to them as "The World's Most Dangerous Audience".
I myself don't think they're that different from most modern audiences,
there's just more of them. The problem is that modern audiences don't
know how to behave in a theatre venue. These days people are too used to watching their entertainment in their living room. Few of them go to The Theatre, opera or symphony, where you're supposed to sit down and shut up. If they go out, it's to a rock concert or Monster truck rally, where the audience is encouraged to get rowdy. The masquerade staff has tried to get actors
as emcees. The problem here is that they're actors. There is no script.
They don't know what to say. They want the audience to like them, so
they encourage the audience to "have a good time". I don't particularly
care if the audience likes me, so I feel free to be grumpy. This works wonderfully well.
The masquerade itself runs for over three hours. There are over 60 contestants. Aside from a few glitches with the sound system, everything goes pretty smoothly. But I am no longer fooled. As far as the attendees are concerned, it's a magical evening of fun, enchantment, and pole dancing. However as soon as I'm done I know that I have to find Martin, wrest the gun away from him, and give him the bottle of 151 rum
the convention committee issued me and assure him that no one up front
knew about the fire or the big knife fight between the sailor scouts
and the X-men, or any of the hundreds of other problems that he dealt with during the show. Martin works very hard.
After the show, I get to swan around in my tuxedo for awhile. This is not as much fun as when I have Kaja hanging off my arm in a slinky dress, and my throat is a bit shot,
from introducing people for three hours, so I decide to cut things
short. Traditionally I treat myself to a drink after a gig like that,
but last year, I ordered some whiskey
at the hotel bar and re-discovered that hotel bars cut their alcohol
with water. By the taste of my drink, by at least fifty percent. Most
expensive glass of water I've ever bought. To hell with them.
I head up to the room, and pack. Tomorrow is the last day and we're out of here.
current mood:  artistic
current music: Chinese Gong Music
|
|
(7 comments | comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, August 2nd, 2005
| |
9:22 pm - Mr. Foglio Goes To San Diego- Part 3
|
Friday.
Unlike science fiction conventions, comic conventions, as a rule, have no nightlife. When the Dealers Room
closes, everybody leaves, and presumably spends the night reading
comics. Not that I'm complaining. Today will see the beginning of the
return customers-people who had never heard of Girl Genius, had bought the first collection and now come back the next day demanding everything we have in print-right now!
There is a small morning rush, then we are again subject to the random
ebb and flow of the crowd. A gratifyingly large number of people ask if
I'm going to emcee the masquerade this year, and are pleased when I say "yes'. All too soon things are dead enough that I feel I can leave the table.
I enter the raffle for the Pikachu car and wander about. I find Stephen Notley and we chat, and I discover that he has recently moved to Seattle. I invite him to my next poker night. He confesses that he isn't very good at cards. Excellent.
I wander about. I don't buy a lot of stuff. Money is tight, and honestly, the vast majority of this stuff doesn't interest me. Superheros leave me cold, for the most part. With a very few exceptions, it is a genre that I find as tiresome and formalized as Kabuki.
I return to the table, and am informed that while I was gone, I missed a representative from an animation house. They had expressed an interest in Girl Genius and promised to be back later. Unfortunately, all they left was a sticker, as opposed to something useful, like a business card with an actual person's name. Not only do they not return that weekend, but this will be only the start of a series of people and companies
I would be very interested in talking to, who wait until I pry myself
away from the booth before appearing. The only one I am there for is a
guy from a film studio, who is obviously here under orders from someone
higher up on the food chain. He wanders up and asks if we have anything his studio might be interested in. I say yes indeed, and hand him a copy of Girl Genius. He briefly considers that he might have to read the comic and his eyes glaze over. He asks if I have a treatment. I admit I don't, but by gum, I'll have one for him next year.
I actually have a panel today. It was sponsored by Cold Cut Distribution, and it's on Independant Publishing. As this is one of the few
subjects I feel I can talk about knowledgeably, I have a good time. The
rest of the day is extremely uneventful. Sales are up from yesterday,
but we still have time to check out the rest of the convention. Soon
seven o'clock rolls around and it's time to close shop.
Tonight is the Eisner Award ceremony. I am nominated. I will not win.
Luckily, I do not have to sit through this year's ceremony, which in
addition to handing out awards to people who are not me, is larded with
endless tributes to Will Eisner,
who passed away quite recently. Many people, myself included,
acknowledge that the man was a pioneer in the field, and he certainly
deserves all the praise he got throughout his life. I met Mr. Eisner
once. Nice guy. He was unfamiliar with my work, and I thought the best stuff he'd done was back in the forties. We didn't talk much.
The Eisner award ceremonies will run for over four hours.
I am spared this because I'm having dinner with Carla Speed MacNeill. As we do every year, we head out to one of my favorite restaurants, Filippe's. They have excellent Italian food and cheap Chianti (essential for really fulsome Italian food), as well as a wonderful salumeria
counter. I always try to get here early in the convention, A. because I
can stock up on deli meats so we don't have to buy ten dollar hot dogs
at the convention center for lunch, and B. because once the convention
starts, the line to get in becomes enormous, and indeed, when we
arrive, it's already out the door and halfway down the block. Not bad
for a Comicon Friday.
In the line, we run into a friend of Carla's, Diana X. Sprinkle, who although I don't recognize her name at the time (because I have a brain made of cheese, thanks for asking) has produced some stuff
that I thought was quite good. While we're waiting, a couple of other
artists join in and I find out a lot about working as an artist for
Tokyo Pop.
The wine arrives. It is sour and just this side of being vinegar. In
other words, perfect. Strangely, no one else appreciates it, and thus I
find myself drinking a lot of wine. Over dinner Carla and I talk about
our kids, how it sucks that our spouses aren't there and various ways
to squeeze blood from the turnip that is independent comics. She is
very interested in the great online experiment. I think she'd do well
with it. Traditionally,
in restaurants, if one doesn't finish a bottle of wine, you don't take
it home, it is left for the waiter, as a sort of a consolation prize
for having to be a waiter. I cheerfully (actually, at this point, you
can pretty much take it as read that everything I do should have the
adjective 'cheerfully' stuck onto it. I am feeling good.) leave a
significant amount of this fine Chianti. Halfway to the door, the
waiter tries to force the bottle on me. Obviously he appreciates how
hard it is to find a wine this good.
We stroll back to the hotel. I wander through the lobby for awhile, and
have a few idle conversations. Then it's up to the room and give Kaja a
call. During the call, Cheyenne stumbles in and collapses face forward
onto his bed. He has sat through the entire Eisner award ceremony. He
will not move for the next nine hours.
current mood: good
current music: more damn anime soundtracks
|
|
(18 comments | comment on this)
|
| Friday, July 22nd, 2005
| |
11:36 pm - Mr. Foglio Goes To San Diego- Part 2
|
Thursday.
I insist on everyone getting breakfast
whenever we do a show. We all troop down and have a so-so
breakfast at the hotel restaurant. I have to stay as far away
from carbohydrates as I can,
so I have some weird mexican thing and several cups of weak
coffee. Not to say the hotel serves bad coffee, but at home I
brew my own and I like my coffee slightly chewy. Just as we're
about to leave, one of my teeth cracks. Wasn't chewing anything
hard, thank God there's no pain (nor will there be all weekend), I
guess I'm just starting to crumble. Save the tooth chip and off
we go. (NOTE FROM THE FUTURE; Turns out it was just a filling
coming loose. Whew.)
We head over to the convention center, and are gratified to see a huge
line waiting outside. Always a good omen. Inside there's a
frantic bustle as people put finishing touches on their booths.
The air conditioning is cranked way up high. Good planning, as
it'll have to fight the heat of over a hundred thousand people
through-out the day. When the doors close at seven tonight, the
temperature will be perfect. I remove my jacket to
help move some boxes, and feel a breeze. A quick check reveals
that somehow, without my noticing, my pants had split. I hastily
don my jacket again, and send minion #2 back to the hotel to get
another pair. I begin to worry about this day. Minion #2
jokes that these sorts of thing always come in threes. So what's
next? I soon find out. Kyle Baker is sitting opposite
us. He cranks up a projector which screens some animation he's
done. I will see these cartoons approximately seven thousand
times over the next four days. No one deserves this, least of
all, me. I vow to sacrifice any shoplifters I catch to
Baphomet. I feel better. Religion has never been my
strong suit, but sometimes you just find yourself falling back upon the
faith you grew up with.
The lights go to full power. The friendly voice from on high
counts down, The doors bang open on time and a horde of people pour
through. The International Comicon has officially begun.
Yay.
Again we're surrounded, and again we're tossing books out to the crowd
and raking in cash. However, this begins to slack off after the
first half hour or so. At the start of any show, you get people
who just love you and your work and cannot possibly survive without The
Latest. Well, they're happy now and they're off to see what else
is here. From now on, we have to actually sell the book to people
who have never heard of it, a depressingly large number of people.
All too soon, we get a lull. That's a period when no one is
looking at your booth. This is usually when we take turns
scuttling out from behind the table and looking around the convention
ourselves. Since I'm the Boss, I go first.
I wander around the rest of the Independent Publishers. I see
Michael Gagne and his wife, and I buy a book for my kids. I stop
and chat with Batton Lash. He tells me that I have forced his
hand and he is turning his comic into a webcomic as well. Good
for him. His wife, Jackie Estrada, who is in charge of the Eisner
Awards, asks if I'll be there. I have to tell her that an old
friend is buying me dinner that night, so I won't be able to
attend. However I will be sending minion #1, the ever-optimistic
Cheyenne, to represent me. If someone has to. Because I'm
mentioned. Or something. Jackie, being an old hand at this,
just gives me this thousand yard stare. Curses.
I then wander back over to the webcomics area. The Keenspot and
the Modern Tales booths are right next to each other, and both are
packed with a crowd of shy, timid web cartoonists who obviously don't
get out much. Much to my surprise, I am known here. A few
of the artists, like the too-talented for my own good Shannon Garrity
and long time gamer guy Chuck Whelon, are established acquaintances, but
a surprisingly large number of complete strangers say that they like
Girl Genius and/or have been following my work for decades. I
meet the ebullient Aeire in person for the first time, and am
introduced to Dirk Tiede, Jeff Darlington, Chris Daily, and Joe
D'Angelo, amongst a slew of others who foolishly did not hand me
something with their name on it.
I hang around for a bit, and I notice that there is an energy in the
webcomics area that seems to be missing from the rest of the publishers
I talk to. These people are doing something new. Something
different. There seems to be a closer sense of community.
I'm sure that will fade in time, but, right now, it's very refreshing.
Reluctantly, I move on. Nintendo is here. I don't ever
remember seeing them here before, but they've got a huge space.
They're running preview demos for the next Zelda game. They're
running a Pokémon tournament. They're having a raffle for a VW
Beetle tricked out to look like Pikachu (which I entered 4
times). I am left with a burning question; What the hell
does this have to do with comics? The answer is obvious.
Nothing. This show is expected to have over 100,000 attendees with free
time and money. It doesn't take a marketing genius to realize
that this crowd is ripe for advanced forms of entertainment
product. I will be astonished if there isn't a huge collection of
gaming companies here next year. Then the question becomes,
should they be here at all? They are not comics. (Kaja says: They're
cartoons! We all like cartoons, right? Anyway, Legend of Zelda is a
thing of beauty and my life is NOT empty, there's tons of comics and
video games to play with. Nya.)
To be fair, there is a certain amount of precedent they can point
to, what with all those movie companies hanging around. But the
movie companies consistently reestablish their bona fides by adapting
comics into movies, and they can get around to Girl Genius anytime now,
thanks. There really hasn't been a spectacularly successful movie
based video game, and I'm not really holding my breath for one, because
blue isn't my best color. No, the game companies are different
because they don't care about comics, they just want our customers.
Okay, so what? There's always dealers that really don't have a
comics tie in. I myself love this kind of thing. After ten
dealers selling comics, comics, comics- it's nice to find yourself
looking at a some well made swords. And now that I think about
it, that's a poor example. there's a lot of artists that like
being able to buy a sword that they can use for reference when drawing
those mighty thewed barbarians. This year I saw a booth that sold
these terrific carved masks from Indonesia, and several that sold
delightfully decadent corsets, several of which Kaja did not already
own (Reference!). So what is the big deal?
The big deal is that these are major corporations. They insist on
having a BIG presence at the show. The area that the Nintendo
booth took up would have held around thirty normal booths. It
probably cost them around sixty thousand dollars. What I want to
know is how many little comic book companies weren't able to get a
booth? How many creators who work in the industry that this
convention is supposed to be about, found themselves shut out because
of Nintendo? One the other hand, maybe none. I don't
know. I might be getting worked up over nothing. But it
looks like the start of a bad trend to me. Send 'em back to
GenCon.
The rest of the day is good. Sales, while never overwhelming, are
steady. Both Cheyenne and Alice work hard, but find time to
wander the hall. The corridors of the convention hall are
packed. The doors finally shut at seven. We have been
working the table for nine hours. Our take for the day is almost
exactly what we made yesterday in only three hours.
For dinner I meet up with my friend and former business partner, Greg
Ketter. Alan Payne of Tokyo Pop takes us out to dinner. I
find out a lot about the state of the manga business from the
distribution and marketing end of things. Manga is apparently
still hot. (Note to self; why the hell aren't I Japanese?
Not doing that was a bad business move).
Get back to the hotel and call Kaja, which in many ways is the high
point of the day. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot to say.
Tomorrow I resolve to be more interesting. Hmm. I could
throw a pie at Neil Gaiman or win an Eisner. Decisions,
decisions...
current mood:  okay
current music: music from the twenties
|
|
(18 comments | comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, July 19th, 2005
| |
3:54 pm - Mr. Foglio Goes To the San Diego Comicon Part 1
|
Whew!
Cheyenne, Alice and I have just returned from the San Diego Comicon.
This was a rich tapestry of experience that I'm not even going to try
to get it all down at one go. Someone asked me why I just didn't update
from the convention- AhHAHAHA!! Forget it.
So. Flew into San Diego Tuesday morning. Schlepped all our stuff over
to the hotel, claimed the twenty boxes of books that we shipped down in
advance, and managed to convince a very nice bellman to help us lug
them over to the convention center itself. Found our booth pretty
quickly, it was located in the Independent Press Pavilion. The Comicon
staff likes me, for some inexplicable reason, and so we always get a
pretty good spot. We are located between Terry Moore, who's always a
nice guy, and Hurricane Entertainment, who prove themselves to be
equally nice, if not more so, as they unhesitatingly lend us sharp
objects.
Then it is off to Kinkos to print up some fliers advertising the
website and the regular Studio Foglio website. Then Alice and I watch
Cheyenne buy some shoes. We give the clerk a flier for the Girl Genius
website and he is so amazed that he knocks two dollars off the price of
a pair of shoes. Sadly, a subsequent experiment reveals that we cannot
get a pair of shoes for free in return for ten Girl Genius fliers, and
we remain stuck using regular money for the rest of the trip.
We don't really do anything exciting after that. Not surprising, as
most of us have had about four hours of sleep in the last thirty six,
and we're all feeling the dehydrating effects of a plane trip. We
wander around the Gaslamp District. We eat at a bad Mexican restaurant.
We go see 'Batman Returns', which is an amazingly good movie, and then
we get chocolate shakes and go back to our hotel room and go to bed
early. ARE WE WILD AND CRAZY KIDS OR WHAT?!?
Wednesday we go to the convention center and we put together the booth.
What this actually means is that Cheyenne tells me to go away while HE
sets up the booth. I think I embarrass him.
At this point, most of the booths are still deserted. The lights are at
half power, which always gives everything this kind of spooky feeling.
The convention center staff, hundreds of them, are bustling everywhere.
Laying carpet, or racing around in fork lifts, or hanging banners from
the ceiling. Whenever you have to ask them a question, it seems to take
them a few seconds to realize that you're an actual person and not just
another temporary structure. I assume that while the convention is
actually running, they're down in a sub-basement, resting motionless in
hundreds of identical niches along a long dark corridor.
A few of the more grandiose booths are being assembled by minions of
the larger companies. Bud Plant is standing around watching a bevy of
good looking women shelve books for him. It's a sight well worth
watching. I decide to save a lot of time and just hand Bud my wallet.
He nods in appreciation. It's good when someone understands how things
are supposed to work.
I find Kevin Eastman at the Heavy Metal booth. As Kevin is a
multi-millionaire, I'm a bit surprised that he's there assembling the
booth by himself, but after watching him for awhile, I think he just
enjoys doing it himself. Me, I'd build giant robots, or hire Bud
Plant's women. But I expect Cheyenne wouldn't let them assemble the
booth either, and then I'd be stuck with a bunch of giant robots and
decorative women and I'd have to start a Manga company, and no one
wants that.
Then there's the small booths. The ones for small presses or individual
artists. Chatted briefly with Stan Sakai and his lovely wife while they
were setting up. They asked about me taking Girl Genius online, and are
impressed when I say that I've doubled my readership in three months.
Sales are up too. This is a reaction I will get an awful lot in the
next week.
Ran into the Penny Arcade guys as they were setting up their booth. It
appears that San Diego has created a new section specifically for web
comics. I wonder if we should set up here next year? Could be
interesting.
Eventually I wander back to the booth and Cheyenne and Alice have it up
and looking beautiful. A couple of small press guys wander up and
admire our Skyline display. Terry Moore has one too, and they ask if
they are supplied by Comicon. I tell them yes, they're free with their
booth space and that there's still time to get one even though things
are getting pretty hectic, so they might try to blow you off. If they
do, just tell them that you want your free Skyline backdrop chop chop
without any lip and if they say that don't provide one, then someone is
lying (technically true) and you can tell them that Scott Kurtz said
so.
They are half way down the aisle before Cheyenne can catch them and
tell them that I'm hallucinating because I missed my medication.
I really do think I embarrass him or something.
Because we're all grublike fan people, we find excuses to stay at the
hall the rest of the day until the doors open that night for the
special three hour "Preview Night". Originally Preview Night was
supposed to be just for the retailers. To give them a chance to
see what was new and exciting and let them cut deals with small
publishers in relative quiet. This high minded concept was
quickly abandoned, as people realized that it was the perfect time to
get rare promotional stuff relatively easily. So every small mall
kiosk comics shop would register with a staff of seven hundred and
twenty "employees", all desperate to pick up a souvenir for their
AuntiE-Bay. So now it's open to everybody.
The doors open on time and the crowd pours in, and for the next three
hours they're three deep around the booth throwing money at us and
grabbing up everything they can get. Normally we get two booths,
because we have so much stuff. However, as readers of this blog
are well aware, we've been eating dirt and selling plasma lately, so we
had to scrape to get up the money for one booth ($1800.00, if you're
interested). This meant that we couldn't bring everything, and
there was some disappointment.
A surprisingly large number of people came up and wanted to know where
issue 14 of Girl Genius was. They got web fliers. Most of
them were happy, with a few notable exceptions. Obviously we
still have to spread the word about our jump to online to more, if not
most, of our established readership. Everyone is on their feet
and at least one of us is actively engaged in a transaction for the
entire three hours.
Finally, the show is over. They sweep the remaining people out,
and we clean up the debris before trudging back to the hotel. I
feel pretty good. This was a real pressure cooker, but sales were
good. It might kill us, but if we maintain this level of
activity, we will make some serious money. I begin to worry that
twenty boxes of books might not have been enough.
I might have spared myself the anxiety. From a time/motion perspective, Wednesday will be our best night.
current mood: to be back
current music: various anime soundtracks
|
|
(18 comments | comment on this)
|
| Friday, July 8th, 2005
| |
10:25 pm - Curses!
|
Drat!
The very fun and excellent Dragon Con called today, wanting to know if
Kaja and I would like to be Guests this year. OF COURSE WE WOULD,
and then Minion #3 proceeded to rain on my parade by informing me that
we were already committed to being at Cascadia Con, this years NASFIC,
which falls on the same date. This bad news is certainly no fault
of hers, but Minion #3 is spending the weekend in the Leech Tank just
as a matter of principal.
With any luck, we will get to go to Dragon Con in 2006. We
haven't been in several years, despite the fact that one year, while
selling in the Dealer's Room, we experienced The Perfect Dealer's Room
Experience®, where we sold everything we brought except for one last
copy of each book. (If you sell Everything, you have the nagging
feeling that you should have brought more. Having only one copy
left means that you have judged the audience to a nicety) Out of
respect for the good people of Atlanta, we did not, as is traditional
up north, light the table on fire as we were leaving, but other than
that, it was perfect.
A number of people have actually been donating money to us via
PayPal. Naturally, being American liberals, we are racked with
guilt. Therefore, we are aping the system used by a number of
other fine webcomics, and starting a system where when you donate, you
get to download a special exclusive, not found in stores, desktop
picture. If you donate even more, you do not have to download the
desktop picture at all, so we have high hopes.
Getting ready for San Diego. We'll be in Booth 2207. Looking forward to seeing a number
of friends I only get to see once or twice a year and boring them with
pictures of my kids. Kaja is in the process of writing up a list
of stuff she wants me to pick up. I myself have a small list of
things I'd like to pick up, but I don't really worry about it too much,
as I am attempting to sever my ties to material possessions and just
keep the cash.
current mood: okay
current music: Tibetian banjo duets
|
|
(14 comments | comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, July 5th, 2005
| |
2:01 pm - Sandwich Boards and Bullhorns
|
I've been busy the last few weeks racking my brain for new ways to spread the word about Girl Genius.
The trick is getting this information to as many people as I can, for as little money as possible. Like many other small publishers, I have mixed feelings about advertising. On the one hand, it's a total money pit. You can shovel in thousands of dollars to no appreciable effect. On the other hand, we've had instances where a well placed ad spiked our sales quite markedly.
One of the benefits of going online has been that all we have to do is
give people a URL and they can find out more than they ever
wanted. This means that we can use things the size of classified
ads and get all the important information to the viewer.
Now there are a few things I'd really like to try, billboards, Battle-bot sponsorship, carving our URL onto the moon with a giant laser, but those are too expensive. Don't get me wrong. Expensive ads can be a lot of fun, but before I can spend $200,000 on an ad, I want to have $200,000.
Obviously what I need is an intern who is learning marketing or something. On the other hand, I could also use interns who are studying housekeeping, gardening, child wrangling, cooking and advanced errand running. Where are those beautiful robot servants the future promised me?!
current mood: lazy
current music: I don't know. What the hell is that? la-la-de-dah...
|
|
(33 comments | comment on this)
|
| Wednesday, June 29th, 2005
| |
1:42 pm
|
The other night the wife and I were talking about George Lucas, which always causes me to start breaking furniture, and my son, who is six, and thus can be excused for liking 'The Phantom Menace' asked me, "Do you like anything, daddy?"
A question like that, it makes you think.
Of course I like things. My problem is that as a creator, I spend a LOT of time and effort on writing. An inordinate amount, apparently, when you look at all the wildly successful books, comics, TV shows and movies out there where the writing has logic flaws, deus ex machinas, overall sloppy writing, or the use of what I call "an idiot plot" (An idiot Plot is so called when the only way the story can proceed is by everyone acting like an idiot).
You'd think that I'd be used to this by now. "The starlet was SO
dumb that she tried to get ahead in Hollywood by fucking the writer" is
a very old joke indeed.
But it continues to drive me crazy. When you consider the
millions of dollars pumped into entertainment these days, you'd think
that they'd want to get the story, the thing you're building the entire
rest of the product around, to the point where a five year old can't pick it apart.
But I'm ranting, which does not make for interesting reading. I
should be beyond this. These are not my creations. I should
not care. But that George Lucas-is he a fucking idiot or what?! Ahem.
Just to prove that there are things that I do like, like in an completely unqualified way, things that fill my soul with light and joy, except when they bite, here's a short list for them what care.
Comic Books; PS 238, Usagi Yojimbo, Finder.
Traditional Newspaper Comics; Arlo & Janis, 9 Chickweed Lane, Doonesbury
Webcomics; Narbonic, Something Positive, PVP, Penny Arcade, Least I Could Do
Movies; Casablanca, Rocketeer, Spirited Away, the Original Star Wars (before George messed it up)
Anime; Inuyasha, Negima, Rosen Maiden.
Favorite authors; Terry Pratchett, George MacDonald Frasier, Lord Dunsany, James Branch Cabell
Music; Easier to list what I don't like; Country & Western, The Blues, Gangster Rap, Cool Jazz
TV; Star Trek DS9. (Beyond that I can't really say. Watched
the first episode of 'Enterprise' and I ripped out my antenna system
and haven't watched broadcast TV since. Never got cable.)
So there you go. See? I'm not completely cut off from the outside world. I'm just working on it.
current mood: cynical
current music: New Age
|
|
(54 comments | comment on this)
|
|
|
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
philfoglio's journal
