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Post by mikesheawright on May 17, 2023 1:10:20 GMT
so i really want to get some physical comics/zines in front of people who might not ordinarily come across them. whenever people ask what i do and i tell them i make comics and if we get past the "oh like batman?" part no one ever has any idea that self-published comics and shows and communities exist.
i have july and august work-free (teacher schedule) and am thinking about approaching some coffee shops, vintage stores, record stores in brooklyn (to start) with the idea of putting a small rack of self-published stuff somewhere in their store, maybe by the register or something. aiming at like "get a coffee and a comic for your commute" crowd. and/or "buy a record and a comic and go home and get stoned" crowd. and anyone else out there who might come across this stuff in a non-comic shop. some loose thoughts:
1. ideally this is a group effort, seems weird to have a rack of 1 person's work in a shop and a communal collective sort of thing would be fun
2. not sure how to handle stocking/restocking it without keeping a ton of shit in my house
3. would be cool to have these in different places around the country (/world??) 4. would be cool to have a name for whatever it is, and like a QR or something on the rack for more info, maybe a webshop with more stuff to purchase? 5. there are a million anthologies out there but i would not have a problem with this resulting in some anthologies as well? 6. the actual rack would have to be pretty small i think so as not to inconvenience anyone who works at the store. kind of a like impulse buy thing i'm thinking, unless the store is super interested in the idea and wants to run with it?
sound off on thoughts/interests/concerns/etc.
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Post by mikesheawright on May 17, 2023 1:46:54 GMT
also i have zero interest in making any money off of anyone else's work here, just thinking of this as a get stuff out there sort of opportunity. i'm about as lefty as it gets with this kind of thing and just want everyone to get what they want out of it, keep what they sell, etc. i assume the shops will want a piece of whatever gets sold, but i'm expecting this to be a pretty small potatoes venture, at least at first. open to all thoughts on this.
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Post by eheitner on May 17, 2023 12:57:08 GMT
Just a thought, but does it make sense to approach Cartoonist Co-Op with this idea, since they've already got some of the infrastructure in place? cartoonist.coop/
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Post by eheitner on May 17, 2023 14:30:27 GMT
Also: another idea might be to *limit* by focusing on, say, "local" NYC artists that would give stores an incentive and build a sense of community, and cut into the shipping/logistics costs?
Just an idea, not saying its necessarily a way to go.
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Post by zaponator on May 17, 2023 14:58:40 GMT
About the distributing to other countries n stuffs, it would be really handy to have a spreadsheet to organize restocking! I'm sure others that are interested wouldn't mind spreading them to their local stores so all the boxes aren't piling up in your living room or something
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Post by cartoonysam on May 17, 2023 15:37:39 GMT
Just a thought, but does it make sense to approach Cartoonist Co-Op with this idea, since they've already got some of the infrastructure in place? cartoonist.coop/I'm a member of the Cartoonist Co-Op. Should I relay this to them?
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Post by pietrykowski on May 17, 2023 16:43:40 GMT
I do have a little experience trying to sell comics and zines at coffee shops and record stores. I was asked be apart of a anthology that never went anywhere but here is some things i learned. Small shops and store are usually cool with selling local artists work. Size/floor space equals money in a thrift shop or record store...So display stands usually need to be small enough to fit next to the cash register. Prices probably need to be standardized to make it easy on people working the cash register. Having a cashier tally what was sold can sometimes be hard durning rush hours.
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Post by mikesheawright on May 17, 2023 22:21:47 GMT
I'm a member of the Cartoonist Co-Op. Should I relay this to them?
sure, totally! i've never heard of this co-op before, interested to learn more though. it seems pretty limited that you can't buy stuff on the site, but it's cool that it kicks out to each artist's store. this already seems like too many artists though? and feels very "comic-y". like if someone has never heard of self-publishing before i could imagine them landing on this site and immediately leaving from being overwhelmed. it would be awesome for this to be super approchable to non-us, let's call them norms for now i guess. if we had a site it would be cool if it kind of reflected the rack, just highlighting a few things. maybe only artists on the rack are on the site? and it changes monthly? quarterly? sites like that co-op site just feel like a repository where things get buried. it feels like a basement haha. no offense to anyone involved, it does seem rad in concept. and i'm not sure how else to do it without becoming a shitty gatekeeper for some dumb club. i'm gonna look for something that might be a good point of comparison, something that would feel not-daunting to norms.
Prices probably need to be standardized to make it easy on people working the cash register. yeah good call, maybe everything on the rack could be like $5 and that becomes part of what's enticing about it? or $3 i dunno. also possible we could create work specifically for the rack, as a gateway to finding more of our stuff, so no one feels like they're underselling a book they'd usually sell for more. it would be really handy to have a spreadsheet to organize restocking! yes 100% love spreadsheets, communal google sheet maybe another idea might be to *limit* by focusing on, say, "local" NYC artists that would give stores an incentive and build a sense of community not opposed to this but also open to stuff being from anywhere. i know a lot of local NYC artists already have stuff in desert island and wherever else, might be nice to get some stuff from a wider region? but also desert island is small and can't carry everything and stuff can get lost there, especially minis and zines.
all good ideas! i am going to start a spreadsheet for people who are interested in participating so if that's you lemme know here, maybe with real name and username?
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Post by cartoonysam on May 18, 2023 16:09:46 GMT
I'm a member of the Cartoonist Co-Op. Should I relay this to them?
sure, totally! i've never heard of this co-op before, interested to learn more though. it seems pretty limited that you can't buy stuff on the site, but it's cool that it kicks out to each artist's store. this already seems like too many artists though? and feels very "comic-y". like if someone has never heard of self-publishing before i could imagine them landing on this site and immediately leaving from being overwhelmed. it would be awesome for this to be super approchable to non-us, let's call them norms for now i guess. if we had a site it would be cool if it kind of reflected the rack, just highlighting a few things. maybe only artists on the rack are on the site? and it changes monthly? quarterly? sites like that co-op site just feel like a repository where things get buried. it feels like a basement haha. no offense to anyone involved, it does seem rad in concept. and i'm not sure how else to do it without becoming a shitty gatekeeper for some dumb club. i'm gonna look for something that might be a good point of comparison, something that would feel not-daunting to norms.
Prices probably need to be standardized to make it easy on people working the cash register. yeah good call, maybe everything on the rack could be like $5 and that becomes part of what's enticing about it? or $3 i dunno. also possible we could create work specifically for the rack, as a gateway to finding more of our stuff, so no one feels like they're underselling a book they'd usually sell for more. it would be really handy to have a spreadsheet to organize restocking! yes 100% love spreadsheets, communal google sheet maybe another idea might be to *limit* by focusing on, say, "local" NYC artists that would give stores an incentive and build a sense of community not opposed to this but also open to stuff being from anywhere. i know a lot of local NYC artists already have stuff in desert island and wherever else, might be nice to get some stuff from a wider region? but also desert island is small and can't carry everything and stuff can get lost there, especially minis and zines.
all good ideas! i am going to start a spreadsheet for people who are interested in participating so if that's you lemme know here, maybe with real name and username? During a NY Comics Symposium interview with the Deadcrow Comix crew, I recall Floyd Tangeman saying he's tried a distribution model where he gives some copies of his comics to other people he knows in other places to sell them to shops. Since a lot of us here are dispersed around the country and world, I'm thinking we could do something similar by sending in copies of the comic books that will be in our catalog to collective members who will volunteer to convince shops in their area to sell the books on a rack.
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GHO
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Post by GHO on May 19, 2023 1:28:04 GMT
the questions I would have are... who is acquiring these racks for the comics? how and who is approaching stores? should we restock our own books ourselves? this is nyc local correct? should an individual be responsible for a store? should we do one first to get traction and see how the logistics work out? should we try and make all books the same price to ease shop clerks' checkout time?
lotsa Q's don't feel the need to answer all of them
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Post by cartoonysam on May 19, 2023 14:05:26 GMT
should we try and make all books the same price to ease shop clerks' checkout time?
Personally, I would prefer if the books were kept at the $8-10 or less price range instead of all the same price since that wouldn't be practical for everyone depending on how much the book costs to print.
should we restock our own books ourselves?
I would assume creators part of the collective are responsible for checking in on how their work is doing and sending more copies to restock.
should an individual be responsible for a store? mikesheawright would likely be the one to run the store even if other people can volunteer to contribute.
Mike probably has different thoughts on these questions, but this is how I feel like some of them should be approached.
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Post by mikesheawright on May 19, 2023 20:30:32 GMT
yeah so i was thinking that there would be like a chief person in each area where the racks are, that person could be in charge of restocking like once a week? every two weeks? depends on the capacity of the rack i guess. i was gonna scour around and see if i could pick up a few random racks in different places, ebay, craigslist, container store, whatever. and whoever wants to have books on the rack you can send like ten to me and i'll try to keep them on the rack as often as possible?
just for my own sanity i think maybe 1 store to start as like a pilot program, just to get all the logistics together. and then scale out to other stores, cities, etc.
also i think maybe a monthly rotation might be the most practical. here's what i'm thinking for stocking stuff:
1. we get a full list of people who want to participate
2. i'll track down a rack that seems like a good size, see how much stuff fits on it. we'll have to figure out a book size limit too, off the top of my head i'm thinking 5.5" x 8.5" (half a letter-size sheet) or smaller, just to keep it simple and manageable for the store employees.
3. if all the participants' work fit on the rack, great! if not, i'll put together a list of people who want in (i guess in random order?) and we can rotate stuff out monthly?
4. i'll do some reconnaisance on shops that might be interested, pick one to pilot the thing and see how it goes. this will also include some questions about how they'll track purchases on their end, will have to figure some stuff out with how we can keep track of that as well. again i don't want any money from this so everyone keeps 100% of whatever they sell. but each shop might have their own inventory thing so that might get tricky.
that sound like a plan? i'm happy to do the legwork to get this up and running as long as everyone else is cool with that. i have minimal but workable storage space at my apartment to stock a few artists' work at a time.
any thoughts on a name for this collective??
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Post by mikesheawright on May 19, 2023 20:31:16 GMT
also i think $5 for each book makes the most sense but up for debate. anything more than that seems steep for a cash register grab and go thing, anything less than that seems like it kind of trivializes it?
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Post by cartoonysam on May 20, 2023 16:13:06 GMT
i'll track down a rack that seems like a good size, see how much stuff fits on it. we'll have to figure out a book size limit too, off the top of my head i'm thinking 5.5" x 8.5" (half a letter-size sheet) or smaller, just to keep it simple and manageable for the store employees.
Many of us are probably doing comics in the standard comic book size which is around 6.7” x 10.2”, so I feel like that should be the book size limit. It's still a manageable size.
also i think $5 for each book makes the most sense but up for debate. anything more than that seems steep for a cash register grab and go thing, anything less than that seems like it kind of trivializes it?
Alternatively, we could price all books within the $5-10$ bracket and organize the rack by each price unit (i.e. $5, $6, $7, etc.).
any thoughts on a name for this collective??
The Comix Shack sounds fitting.
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GHO
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Post by GHO on May 22, 2023 16:40:43 GMT
"also I think $5 for each book makes the most sense"
"Alternatively, we could price all books within the $5-10$ bracket and organize the rack by each price unit"
I think two price points would be best just so the coffee shop has less confusion maybe 5 and 8 or 5 and 10
any thoughts on a name for this collective??
I like Comics Rack or either "Just Comics" "Or Comics"
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