Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Comic Book Store Events...

What kind of events have stores you been to put on?

What worked best?

What was an epic fail?

What would you like to see?

Please let me know your thoughts on the subject, it may lead to something spectacular.

Any replies would be much appreciated, I'm asking because it could help with a potential job.

My local comic shop is also a gaming store, and has events every week (weekend especially) for Magic the Gathering and similar games. Tabletop RPGs like D&D and Pathfinder and Warhammer Quest seem to also get some play.

Actual comic book related events, I haven't seen, although there are games involving superhero figures and whatnot that also get played, and there are several tabletop superhero RPGs (the most currently active being Mutants & Masterminds, but also including GURPS Supers, Aberrant, Marvel and DC games, etc.).

A larger city, or one with an active convention scene could have a cosplay contest, although that can be problematic (issues with creepy behavior, for instance).

The size of the store, the location, etc. might impact what sort of events it can handle. If it's a cramped little space with limited parking, on a busy street, you obviously can't have fifty-plus people show up for a tournament or cosplay competition or whatever...

Where I live, locals would spontaneously combust at the thought of customer service, so events don’t get much further than signings.

But elsewhere… like Set, there’s a lot of gaming crossover so I’ve seen Magic, Heroclix and broader board game clubs. There’s also wargaming and RPG depending on how much of a crossover there is., although I’ve seen a lot less of the RPGs
Regular, recurring events can be Comic Book Clubs, Local Indy Comic promotions, the usual signings, cosplay, superhero face painting, art competitions, FCBD extravaganzas, writer/art workshops.

I know someone who did a read through/ voice over thing of a Kenzer KotDT issue that they said was fun. Prizes for hamming it up no doubt.

There's a huge number of Comic related films/TV/games. it's a fair bit of work rotating things around, but regular little mini-events/ campaigns keep it eye catching, current and interesting.

Tying everything into the numerous movie releases seems obvious enough. No films out that month? Do the same for TV series/ indy month/ Anniversaries of comic releases such as Hellboy. Look at movie releases and promote that genre for a month. Also good if you sell any DVDs. Smaller companies with franchise tie ins must be useful as a launching point here too.

The comics needn’t be the launching point for any of this. It really depends on the store and the amount of other merchandise that’s sold. It’s George Romero’s birthday? Zombieday on related merchandise! It’s the anniversary of Bram Stoker’s death? It’s vampire day! And on and on…

There has to be a momentum behind events. Doing one grudgingly once every blue moon is pointless. It has to be sustained and variable and look to broaden the number of people who will come to the store. Where is the shop? It might be a great event, but if the shop can’t be seen, there’s no online presence, the shop doesn’t make any local impact beyond being “that comic place”, and no one bothers promoting it, is it really worth the effort?

It also has a lot to do with the staff. There has to be a certain amount of buy in to a lot of this. Which would lead me back to customer service which is what the first version of this post swerved into…

One do-it-yourself sort of mini-event might be to stuff a photocopied page of black and white art for some relevant-at-the-moment character (such as Cap, during the month that the Winter Soldier came out) in the purchase bags of customers that week, with a two week return date to bring back the colored page, the winner of the contest getting a movie poster or Cap anthology or blue-ray / DVD of The First Avenger or something relatively inexpensive.

The winner and runners up could be posted on the wall for the rest of that month.

Similarly, a page from a recent popular issue / book could be 'de-lettered' and patrons encouraged to come up with the funniest (clean!) dialogue replacement. Sort of a 'You're the writer!' contest (with the above idea being a 'You're the colorist!' contest).

That sort of contest might end up getting patrons to involve their kids (if they hand out the pages to be colored, for instance) or others who don't regularly visit the store, and give them some incentive to return the pages, if the potential prizes are cool enough. (Free trade-issue for coloring something in, or writing some funny dialogue? Why not?)

Gift certificates as prizes are excellent, since a free trade issue always costs you money, while a gift certificate occasionally goes unused or is forgotten / lost / discarded, and, when it is used, brings the person back into your store to 'spend' it.

THAT! is a REALLY cool idea. I have a board in the classroom I call the "refigerator" for art or whatever. I might steal this idea.