The new racks are up at division. Some of them anyway. I will probably add more in the next couple months.
So far we have the ability to add 30 long boxes of new back issues and have already added over 1,000 new comics last week.
Everything from Spawn to Lady Death and Wildcats went out as it seemed to be the best of the early 90’s! We still have about 4 more long boxes to go and all are backerboarded and cover pretty much everything that came out from DC, Marvel, Image and the early split offs from Image during a 4 or so year period of time.
I am going to move most of the games back to the Northtown mall location but we will be keeping a top 20 best sellers in the US section.
If you are interested in playing any games we are currently running D&D, Heroclix, Magic, Pokemon and YuGiOh. Please check the calendar on our webside for times and updates on new games. We have a Pokemon League Cup this Sunday which is always a nice competitive tournament with some really great prizes from Pokemon including special playmats!
The new and old toys section at the division store is slowly growing and will soon overwhelm the area that the games currently inhabit. I should have a new load of old/new toys in the next week or so to bring it back to overstocked!
Just because I didn’t have enough back issues to go through and price, I picked up about 3,000 more which are being added to the pile. More 90’s books primarily DC and Marvel with just a few Image and independents.
We got in our new Comic Book Shop T-shirts this week! It’s a reprint of our last design which is the Logo Front version. I intended to create a new one but time kept slipping by and it wasn’t happening so I went with what they had in their files to get the ball rolling. More designs hopefully in the next few months! This run of shirts is only $9.95 and runs from small to 6xl in mens sizes and s to 2xl in Womens cut! The quality is extremely nice.
New comics have now been ontime for 3 weeks in a row! Hopefully I didn’t jinx it but we may be back on a regular schedule until the middle of December when its always a bit wonky.
Division got in a good order of action figures and other toys this week which is the start of the mid year makeover where they will replace a chunk of the games we sell there. We will be keeping the top 25 or so best sellers from the national sales lists which should be a much better fit for the store rather than trying to do it all along with all the other stuff we sell. Onward and upward!

I am heading off to look at a comic collection this afternoon which, if I get it, will give us some really amazing books including a pretty copy of Fantastic Four #1 and most of the other #1’s and first appearances of the early Marvel Silver Age! Keep your fingers crossed!

We just got in a full run of the Walking Dead trade paperbacks used and in really nice shape if you are looking to spend the next 48 buried in zombies!

From a recent collection I picked up I started making packs of mini series from the 90’s through the early 2000’s. Its a great way to read some full stories, many of which have never been reprinted in trade form, without having to hunt down that random issue that always seems to be missing from a set. Even better, I got a really great deal on them so I am pricing them really low!

We have a massive reorder of POP! figures this next week! It looks like somewhere over 1,500 figures which will be split between Division and Northtown and a new small section at CandyWorks!

The mall location is having a huge back to school backpack sale with 25% off all backpacks in stock! Lots of Anime and Manga and a ton of Pokemon all ready for your first day of school or new job!

I bought another really large Marvel collection a week ago or so which included complete runs of Fantastic Four, Avengers, Daredevil, Strange Tales, Tales to Astonish, Hulk 1,3,5, Tales of Suspense 39 and tons more keys and amazing books! Looking up on this note, I mentioned that I was heading out to look at this collection. Short story shorter, I got it….

The big books are all at CGC in Sarasota FL and arrived just in time to see all the sites including the biggest hurricane to hit the US in a century! They will have quite a tale to tell when they float back into town.

I just noticed that I have been forgetting to actually publish these notes on our website for the past month…. They have been sitting in the draft portion and I have just been adding to them…..

The game section at Division has now been mostly moved to the mall location and have been replaced with hundreds of POP! figures! We will just be keeping the bigger sellers in stock instead of chasing everything.

I am going to post this one right now just so I dont forget again!

Kuronekocon was last weekend. Two days of Anime and Manga madness with over 2,400 of our closest friends! It took me three trips in our mega sized store van to get everything there and only only one and a quarter trips to get the rest of it back out! It was a very busy and good show and everyone looked like they were enjoying it!
Thanks to all the staff that helped us have a great show and to Carly who came back from the world beyond working here to help man the tables.
We had a Pokemon pre-release weekend the weekend before Kuronekocon and it was the largest turnout that we have had so far. One hundred and fifteen people split between two tournaments which from what we can tell looks to be the largest pre-release in the state! There are still several days that events can be run so someone might beat our totals, but its looking pretty good so far! What those numbers mean for us is that we will get enough pre release kits for 168 players in the next set! Pokemon is now running neck and neck with Magic in overall sales for us! Not bad for just starting their events a couple of years ago.
I am putting some new shelves this week to handle back issues at the Division location. We seem to have a lot more comics than room so its time to build upwards. The new shelves will allow us to put in another 30 or so long boxes (about 10,000 comics) which should solve all our space problems for about 8 days…

This weekend is Kuronekocon! Two days of Anime and Manga madness and panels and cosplay unequalled by any other show in Spokane! Two days of dances, merchandise, near heat exhaustion, video games, streaming anime rooms, nerf sword battles, computer and video gaming and live cosplay chess await you.
Please go to https://kuronekocon.com for all the information on this show and we will see you there!
We have started moving a bit into the classic toy market and will be dedicating some room to it near our current toy section. Please check back each week for new stuff! So far we are putting out 30 to 40 ‘new’ old cool toys each week.
We are currently putting out about 1,000 new back issue comics. This week it’s the best of the 90’s! Lady Death, Vampirella, Pitt, Maxx, Aria and more! We also put out about 500 Uncle Scrooge and Donald Duck from the 60’s through the 90’s. Most are priced from $1 to $3!
Hopefully all of our shipments will be back on regular schedules! 5 of 6 weeks they have been late for us which means the books don’t hit the stands until about noon which is really annoying for the both of us. Keep your fingers crossed.

The Lilac City Comicon was last weekend and it was by all accounts a success! I don’t know the final attendance numbers but it was crowded from the beginning of Saturday morning nearly to close on Sunday afternoon.
Generally the second day of a show is rather slow which is why I was so much against it but I was wrong about this one. I think there was probably 2/3 as many people the second day and nearly as many costumes as day one. It was a really good day business wise as well which was the biggest surprise of all. I think most dealers were pretty happy compared with other shows.
The next show up is Kuronekocon which is the Anime/Manga show! If you thought there were lots of costumes at Lilac City, you aint seen nothing yet….. Where 20% of the attendees were in costume this last weekend, probably 60% or more will be dressed up for this one. We have six or so tables at that show and have an insane amount of costumes and plush figures and stuff and we bring in lots of new stuff from Hong Kong just for the event! That will be July 29th and 30th.
We sell passes for Kuronekucon at the Mall store only.
We just got in two Spawn collections 1-40 and 50-200! If you are missing any now is your chance. The first 20 are pretty common but after that its really spotty and they don’t show up that often in large groups.
Life lesson of the week. I just had the oil changed in my van and requested the cheapest service as it’s a new van and really doesn’t need special treatment etc. I was informed that the computer at the oil change place recommends synthetic oil as that’s what was in the vehicle and was only $79.99. I told them I wanted the $30 service and was informed with lots of hand gestures that you cant just switch oils, it has to be a step down process or it will adversely affect the engine. My ‘huh, I have never heard that one before’ mixed with my natural look of ‘do you have to have your mother help you with your shoelaces each morning?’ had him backpedaling pretty quick and he offered the basic service. The lesson is you can switch at any time as many times as you want and unless your car requires it or is really high miles, save the $40. Synthetic oil is regular oil with extra additives and is not a magical brew. The more you know! -Craig!

Lilac City Comicon is this weekend! We will be there both days selling…. T-shirts! T-shirts and hoodies are the winners this year and we will have somewhere over 1,500 of them all on super sale! The more we sell the more new ones we can get in at the mall location so we want to sell a lot!

If you still need tickets we have a few left at both stores. The VIP tickets are gone but we still have day passes. You can save a few dollars by buying in store rather than online.

I think we will also be selling fidget spinners at the show as well. We just got in a massive order from one of our vendors so what better venue than a group of 5,000 happy people that need something shiny and spinny.

I have decided to start bringing in more collector toys to the Division location which should start in the next month or so. It takes a bit of time before everything arrives.

The Division location is now buying Magic singles Monday through Thursday 11-4! Adam will be your point of contact. Please call first to make sure he is here just to be safe.

Free Comic Book Day is only a week and a half away!

Batman has been confirmed as a special guest for the morning so bring your camera!

Andy Owens will be on hand signing copies of his new series IT from Black Box comics! We have the first two issues available on the new comic stands!

Andy will also be selling original art from some of the hundreds of books he has worked on for DC, Marvel, and Dark Horse!

Here is a near complete list of his credits:

http://www.comicbookdb.com/creator.php?ID=1552

Andy will be signing from 11:00 to 2:00.

The Division Location will be open from 11:00 to 7:00 and the Mall Location will be open from 10:00 to 9:00.

Secret Empire #1 came with an interior panel that was unreadable so Marvel is supposedly going to replace all the bad copies. As they shorted us 50 copies anyway, that means they will actually fill our original order!

We have another massive Gundam order on the way with some of the Perfect Grade included which will primarily go to the mall store which has been selling a ton more since we moved a few weeks ago.

Posters are on the way too! Something like 300 posters have shipped from New York and should be arriving in the next few days!

We just got a huge shipment of Anime and Pokemon merchandise from China Wednesday! I am still shocked at how much faster we can get 300lbs of stuff shipped direct from Hong Kong than the same quantity shipped from Salt Lake.

We need to say good bye to a couple of our people this week – Josh who had been our in-house Pokemon expert and who had been running our tournaments for the past year or so has moved on to a full time position with the school system. JW will be leaving us in several weeks also for the school systems. Hmmmm looks like a trend.

At the Division location, Kevin is also heading off into the sunset as he moves over to UPS!

I would like to thank each of them for all the hard work and attention to the shop over the past few years and each one contributed immeasurably to the position they had and replacing the experience and knowledge of each one is going to be difficult.

With that in mind we would like to welcome and have started the arduous task of training their successors: Liam at Northtown and Adam at Division.

Liam brings a broad knowledge of strategy and RPG games to the mall store and a solid background in Magic play and singles. We hope to get him up to speed on Pokemon current rules and singles pretty quick.

Adam who also has a solid background in Magic and some games and reads comics and has been one of our baggers for the past year or so will be bringing all that expertise to the Division store where I hope to increase our Magic singles buying and selling to somewhere near what the mall store does.

Last but not least is the Lilac City Comicon! We still have a few of the VIP passes left but they are running out quick and when they are gone, they are gone for good. There were only 500 initially available and they are disappearing fast.

-Craig!

I spent several days in Boise last week visiting family and checking out the local comic and gaming stores. It was interesting.
The store that I bought comics from in the late 70’s announced last week that they were shutting down. It was a bookstore that sold back issues and I dont know if they ever did sell new comics. They are one of the reasons that I am actually in this business. When I was a kid they charged me so much for some books when I was 15 or so that when I opened my first store 15 year later, the books still hadnt reached those values. I have never forgotten that and I vowed my stores would never do that to anyone else.
It was an interesting trip through the past in the their store though. They had actually moved next door from where they were when I shopped there but I think they kept the exact same setup as the layout seemed to match my memory from 1977. They owners son who sold me the the back issues all those years ago was actually the guy behind the counter when I went in.
I found that out when I asked whatever happened to the red headed kid who worked there and he said it was him and commented on how he still had his red hair. I really didnt want to offend him by noting that not only did he not have red hair but his hair was whiter and grayer than mine…..
Anyway we had a about a 10 minute conversation about the state of the book and comic world and my need for nostalgia was filled.
Next time I go back they will be a 2nd hand store or a craft brewery and I will try and remember exactly which storefront was theirs and I will remember the DC 100 page books I bought there for 5 and 6 dollars each when the cover price of comics was .25 cents.

There is one really nice gaming store in Boise but it is located well off the beaten path and even if you lived there it is a bit out of the way. And just to make things more interesting, the guy in charge of renting space in GGP malls in the western half of the US texted me and told me he would make me an insanely great deal on space in the Boise Towne Square Mall. Its a pretty upscale mall with an Apple store, a Dillards (like Nortstroms)and a bunch of other higher end stores and about 3 times the size of Northtown.

I really wish I knew how to manage a store long distance. I could fly down and back the same day once a week for about $115 per trip so it would just be like going to work in the morning like usual…. Unfortunately I dont have any kind of support staff down there or framework to start with. They do have several Hastings with all those great abandoned fixtures still in them though…. I could get a skeleton of a store set up in about a week or less….

One of the things that is really stopping me right now is we suddenly need someone who has a broad knowledge of games current and upcoming, the ability to sell them and a great personality. A knowledge of Magic and Pokemon cards buying and selling is needed too. If you fit all those categories we would love to get a resume from you for the mall location.