Part 100 - 109

Part One Hundred

Mal and I, along with our two kids, had just spent a week in England with my sister’s family, then a week alone in Paris (including a trip to Euro Disney, now renamed Disneyland Paris) then we finished this great vacation with another week at my sister’s rented home in Windsor, England. My sister’s husband, Greg, took some time off from his work to introduce us to some local places of interest including the Windsor Horse Racing Track, The Chesington Amusement Park, and the famous “white cliffs of Dover.” These white cliffs are actual cliffs that contained part of the World War Two English command headquarters. This underground system of tunnels, communications centers and war rooms was restored to illustrate how this actually looked during the war and it was a relaxing and educational trip. All in all, this three-week vacation was really enjoyable, mostly because of the hospitality of my sister and her family.

When we returned home to Bolton, Massachusetts, we began to prepare for the beginning of the new school year for Adam and Cassy. Adam was to begin his second year at Lexington Christian Academy. His first year went extremely well and he made friends quickly there. He was elected to be the sophomore class president by his newfound peers based more on his popularity than any serious “campaign promises.” The previous year he had his first serious girlfriend but that didn’t last very long. He began to be more interested in Emma, a classmate who was a good friend and confidant. After a short while his friendship became more of a boyfriend-girlfriend thing but it didn’t take them too long to realize they were better off as friends. Then came Meridith. She was transferring to this high school as a sophomore and it didn’t take very long for something to develop between her and Adam. Meridith was a good friend with Emma and when it was apparent that romance wasn’t going to happen between Adam and Emma, she expressed interest in Adam. Adam fell for her pretty fast.

Mal was still battling her Fibromyalgia and she was exhausted and in pain all of the time, but she was trying to continue on with her regular routine as much as possible. One day after dropping Cassy off at The Imago School, Mal was invited out to breakfast with Kim, an old friend of ours. Kim had recently lost a significant amount of weight and Mal was surprised to see her eating bacon, eggs, and cheese for breakfast. Kim told her that she was successfully using “The Atkins Diet” and she explained the low carbohydrate diet to Mal. Mal was excited to try something new to get rid of the small amount of “extra” weight that she was unhappy with. She had tried other diets and had only occasional success with them. If she could lose some weight and still get to eat some bacon every now and then, this sounded like it would be worthwhile to try it. She’d just have to cut out bread, pasta, processed flour, and foods that are high in carbohydrates. Mal bought the Atkins book and read all about it before she tried it and it seemed to make good sense. After faithfully following this diet for a month or so she found that she had lost most of her unwanted weight but more importantly, she began to feel better. It seemed as if the symptoms of her Fibromyalgia were diminishing. Some scientists believe that Fibromyalgia is caused by a yeast imbalance and this seems a likely possibility since almost ninety percent of the people the disease affects are women. The medical community has been divided on this disease for many years. It was sometimes called “The Yuppy Disease” because it seemed to primarily affect women between the ages of 25-40. The environment to which many women were exposed was thought to be the cause since many of these women lived in new homes that were airtight and perhaps the air they breathed was contaminated. I don’t know what really causes this disease but I know my wife began to feel healthier when she cut out certain foods.

Since I had decided to “retire” from day-to-day involvement at my comic book and collectible store I knew I needed to be able to count on a stable, regular income for my family. Previously, I existed by paying all of the store’s expenses and paying all of my employees before I took any money for myself. My “pay” varied from week to week. Some weeks it was huge and some weeks there would be no money available for me, but that was okay because I was a pretty good saver. When the money was rolling in, I didn’t spend much of it. I knew I might need it later. So Chris, my company manager, and I agreed on a regular amount that would be paid to me each week in a paycheck. This turned out to be about forty percent less than I was accustomed to take but I knew that it was very important to allow the business to be comfortable to pay for the everyday expenses and to have the funds available to hire the additional people to replace me. (Don’t feel bad for me, I’m still making a good living.)

We also had to deal with paying off the loan for our huge building in Worcester. We financed this building by taking out a mortgage on my family home so I wanted this paid off. Each month, since 1992, we had paid an extra amount over and above our required mortgage. Some months it was only an extra one thousand dollars, but sometimes we paid an extra five thousand dollars directly to the principal loan amount and by the beginning of 1996 we had paid off the entire loan. It’s a liberating feeling to be free from the nagging obligation of loans.

Next chapter: Chris, the store manager, books a great line-up of sports celebrities as guests at the stores.

Part One Hundred & One

Chris, the manager of my Worcester store and overall company manager now that I was “retired” from active involvement, knew that he needed to keep the gross sales increasing each year at both of our stores. Through a mutual friend he arranged to have the first Boston Patriots football quarterback, Babe Parillo, come to our store as a guest. This was a modest success and it inspired Chris to try more sports celebrities. In the meantime, I had learned that Boston Celtics’ great, Dennis Johnson, had a son who attended the same high school as my son, Adam. I asked Dennis if he’d be interested in spending a day at my Worcester store and he said he’d possibly consider it if we’d be willing to donate his usual fee to a charity of his choice. I explained to him that it was our current “policy” to offer free autographs to our customers so his usual fee had to be reasonable enough so that I could financially justify it. I relayed this information to Chris and let him “run with it.” After several phone calls to Dennis Johnson, it was decided that he’d be our guest on Saturday June 15, 1996. I was disappointed because I had already booked a family vacation cruise for this same date and it would be the first big event at the store that I would be unable to attend, but it was the only convenient date for Dennis Johnson and I had confidence that Chris and the rest of our staff could handle this without me.

Our staff wanted this to be a big event and worked together to make it so.A connection was made with the local sports-talk radio station and they agreed to do a “live-remote” from our store during Dennis Johnson’s appearance. Someone in our organization got the idea to contact the mayor’s office to inform them of this exciting event for the fans of the area and since we were allowing everyone to get Dennis’s autograph at no cost, the city government decided to assist us to make this event even bigger. The mayor agreed to send a representative to our store on the day of the appearance to make an official proclamation declaring June 15th Dennis Johnson Day in Worcester. Once the local newspapers heard this they were all willing to help us promote “Dennis Johnson Day.” The newspapers included our event in their calendar section and one paper ran a small announcement. We mailed thousands of flyers to the customers on our mailing list and our employees put flyers in everyone’s bag at the cash register. They also tried to make sure everyone heard about it verbally.

Chris knew that we’d have to try to recoup our expenses by offering the attendees an opportunity to buy some Boston Celtics items or photographs for Dennis to sign. Chris ordered Celtics key chains, bumper stickers, pennants, and basketballs. He also ordered hundreds of 8x10 color and black and white photos from a company that is fully licensed to print them but he wasn’t able to convince the company to offer a return privilege on the photos we couldn’t sell. These photographs would have to be sold for four dollars each for us to make a modest profit and we were not sure that our customers would be willing to spend that much since they were used to our normally lower prices. Our previous events had much cheaper photographs available because the other celebrities didn’t care if the photographs were officially licensed. We worried that our customers would think we were just being greedy so we decided to give a portion of all of the proceeds to “Sports Alive,” a local charity that promoted athletics and educational programs in Worcester’s schools and neighborhoods. Chris also arranged for “Fleer,” a large trading card company, to donate lots of basketball cards for us to give away to everyone who attended this event. Everything seemed to be under control and it was almost all arranged without much involvement by me. My key employees, Chris, Ken and Dave paid close attention to all of the details and they were prepared to handle this guest appearance.

I was on a cruise while this event was going on at my store but as soon as the cruise ship docked in St. Thomas I began calling Chris to see how everything was going. I kept getting a busy signal. I continued to dial the phone number, over and over again, for almost two hours! Who could possibly be on the telephone for that long on such an important day?! I finally got through to the store after the event was over and found out that the sports-talk radio station “took over” our only phone line to broadcast the appearance from our store. It was a major detail that none of us had anticipated and I’m sure that it disrupted our business and probably frustrated many people who were trying to contact our store to ask questions about this event.

Chris explained that things had gone fairly smoothly. The customers enjoyed it (especially the free autographs) and we sold enough stuff to pay for all of the expenses. Chris was smart enough to have Dennis Johnson autograph a few hundred of the unsold photographs that we would have been stuck with so that sometime in the future we might recoup some additional funds. These signed photos would also be good to have available for the customers who couldn’t make it to the store for the actual event. We sold dozens of them over the next few months.

Later, when I ran into Dennis Johnson at my son’s high school, he told me that my employees had done a nice job and he was pleased with how everything went. He was honored to have the mayor declare that day as “Dennis Johnson Day.”

Next chapter: A look into my character…not too pleasant.

Part One Hundred & Two

I like to think I’m not complex but I know I’m not really simple. I’m eccentric in many ways and I don’t do things that most “normal” people do. I’ve spent most of my life doing things in ways that seem contrary to the current trends. My business accountants tried to encourage me to use other people’s money by borrowing money from a bank to expand my business. I didn’t want to do it that way. I expanded my business only as sales allowed me to do so. I wasn’t comfortable taking risks with the future of my comic book stores. I have a responsibility to the many employees and their families to keep this business profitable. Slow and steady growth was my plan.

I was also unconventional in my home life. My wife and I tried carefully to plan most of the major events in our lives, especially children. We waited almost six years before we had children so we could get to know each other without the stress that children may bring to a relationship. Once we had kids, we wanted to raise them in a loving environment. I didn’t like the way many other parents let their kids control the whole family life. Many of these parents stopped enjoying a social life because they thought the kids couldn’t be quiet and they’d only be able to sleep in their own beds. I believe that children are flexible and adaptable. We brought our kids almost everywhere we went and when it was time for them to sleep, they’d just lie on a blanket on the floor and fall asleep. Mal always brought blankets, books, paper, crayons, and toys to keep the kids quiet at get-togethers. They learned that there were times that it wasn’t appropriate to speak. We taught them to behave in restaurants. My kids were almost always well behaved. We also taught them to have fun and there was usually lots of laughter in our family.

Laughter was one of the few emotions that I was comfortable expressing although I was capable of experiencing other emotions. If I watched a sad movie, I’d realize that it was sad but I was never moved to cry. In fact, I hadn’t cried since I was a young teenager. My wife, Mal, was very emotional and she had no problem crying. Cassy occasionally cried. Adam had a very sensitive side and he had no problem expressing it. When he was a sophomore in high school he learned of a schoolmate who had been involved with some drug use. It bothered Adam so much that he and a few other students went to her, Bible in his hand, to pray with her. He cried when it was apparent that she was going to continue using the illegal drugs.

Unfortunately, I had no reservation when it came to expressing anger. It didn’t take much for my anger to build up and explode in a rage. Although I know it wasn’t true, it seemed as if Adam was deliberately trying to irritate me. He was a great kid; well-behaved, courteous, intelligent, loving, out-going and funny, and I was proud of him; but there was friction between us because he didn’t always do things the way I thought they should be done. Adam was almost never disrespectful to me but he’d just say something “wrong” and it would trigger my anger. I’d end up screaming at him. Adam never yelled back at me. He’d just listen to me and when I really hurt his feelings he would cry. It was really a problem with me, not with Adam. I rationalized that I wanted “the best” for Adam and I thought it could be achieved only by doing things my way. Mal loved Adam, unconditionally, while I wanted Adam to accomplish certain things as he got older because that was my plan. I wanted to control him and guide him to be what I wanted him to be. I was wrong to impose my plans on him. I needed to be there to guide him as a parent should, but I certainly wish I hadn’t been so hard on him. Somehow, I did have patience when it came time to teach Adam how to drive a car. I’d heard from other parents how tense this could be but I really enjoyed this whole process. I was delighted that Adam was becoming an adult and I was glad to be a part of his life during this time. Adam always knew I loved him even after one of my “screaming angry attacks” and within a short while, we’d be laughing about something together that only the two of us shared with our bizarre sense of humor.

Cassy, on the other hand, was Daddy’s little princess. She was adorable and fun to be around. It seemed as if there was nothing that she could possibly do to upset me. Before I retired from day-to-day involvement in my comic book stores, I’d come home from work to be greeted with joy by Cassy. She would run to me and jump into my arms exclaiming, “Daddy’s home!” Adam would also come running to me. This continued for years until one day when Adam was about twelve years old and Cassy was eight, I came home in a grumpy mood and snapped at them, “Please just give me a minute before you jump on me! I’ve had a rough day!” I know I hurt their feelings because they were rarely so excited to see me come home after that night. As a parent, I should have known better. What could be more important than expressing and receiving love from your children?

Both of my kids loved to act and they performed in plays every year beginning in the first grade at The Imago School. In 1996, as a sophomore in high school, his girlfriend, Meridith, convinced Adam to get involved with a local community theater group for teens that she had been involved with for many years. Adam auditioned and got the part of “Nathan Detroit” in “Guys and Dolls” opposite Meridith as “Adelaide.” As the lead male comic character, Adam was fantastic. He danced, sang and acted as well as any of the other actors in the theater group. Now, you may think that I was impressed mostly because he was my son but the opposite is true. I was highly critical of my kid’s performances. I thought it was better to be honest with them rather than praise less than good performances. If they asked me how I thought they did, I’d tell them the truth. They knew I didn’t “praise” everything they did, like some parents did, unless I thought it was above average. Usually, both Adam and Cassy did a great job when they were on stage. They were always prepared and their “delivery” of the lines was very natural, as if they were saying them, not merely repeating lines they had memorized. Cassy had major parts in her seventh and eighth grade school plays of “Tom Sawyer” and “Wagon Wheels West” and she showed that she had the dedication and skills needed to be a talented actress. I was proud of both of them and Mal and I attended every performance.

Now that I had been retired for a while, I found that I was missing the interaction with my friends and customers from the stores. I guess I enjoyed the attention I got from them. I was once known all around the country as an expert and a leader in the comic book business while I worked with my old partner, Jay, at “Sparkle City Comics.” We really dominated the comic book conventions in the late 1970’s and we were very influential in the pricing trends of that time. We worked as advisors to the comic book price guide and provided important sales information. In the small world of comic books we were famous (or infamous) but when we split up, Jay got the convention part of the business and I got the store. I no longer had to travel forty weeks each year and I could establish relationships with my local customers in a way that couldn’t happen when you’re in a different city almost every week on the convention circuit. But I was no longer important as a “national” comic book guy. I realized that I missed that bit of recognition. I came up with an idea that could give me national recognition again.

I called Ken, one of my most trusted employees, and asked him to find out what it would take to have us nominated for the prestigious “Will Eisner Spirit of Retailing” award for excellence in the comic book business. Ken tackled this task with his usual enthusiasm and attention to detail.

Next chapter: The hoops we were put through.

Part One Hundred & Three

After over fifteen years of operating my comic book and collectible stores in Worcester and Fitchburg, Massachusetts, I missed the national recognition that I had enjoyed in my time with Jay Maybruck as “Sparkle City Comics.” We were known all over the country as the dealers with the best inventory in the comic book business. Our customers loved us and frequently our competing comic dealers hated us because we “monopolized”
most of the retail business at the comic book conventions. We were really good at what we did and we were industry leaders. I wanted national recognition again for two reasons. I wanted it for my own ego and I also knew that I could create publicity that would increase awareness of the stores and ultimately, increase our sales. The most prestigious award that was available in the comic book business was “The Will Eisner Spirit Of Comic Retailing Award,” named for comic book artist, writer, and genius, Will Eisner, and I wanted to win this award.

Although all of my employees have strong points, Ken Carson was the right man to tackle this huge task. He got to work right away and within a short time he got us nominated for “The Eisner.” That was the easy part. Now we had to convince the panel of judges that we deserved to win this. We were required to submit documentation about our physical location and the quality of our store image, our inventory, our support of small and innovative publishers, our community activity, our customer service policies, and more. Ken wrote:

Good Retailing Practices:

“That’s Entertainment has developed a strong presence in a number of collectibles areas, including sports cards and autographed memorabilia, Japanese toys and animation, model kits, and role-playing games. These product lines draw a reliable and enthusiastic group of primarily male customers in the 12-50 year old range.

“In the area of sports cards and autographed memorabilia, That’s Entertainment has carefully cultivated a reputation for integrity. We’ve had all of our displays custom-built to properly showcase the high-end items. Sports card packs are a natural compliment to the rarer cards and autographed items, and often serve as an affordable entry-level collectible for younger fans.

“Japanese popular culture has grabbed the attention of high school and college-age customers, with many gathering large collections of imported animation and figures. We maintain several direct accounts to keep hard-to-find items available.

“Role-playing games have likewise appealed to young people seeking new and challenging forms of entertainment. A recent innovation that has come to the fore is the collectible role-playing card game, with “Magic:
The Gathering” the genre leader. “Magic” has enjoyed extensive media attention in the past months and That’s Entertainment has been involved from the beginning.

“Comic books remain our number one product line. Our new comic racks are impossible to show in one photo; they stretch over 100 feet along the walls, displaying somewhere around 1700 different comic books at any given moment. We “genre” rack (by subject) to put the small and large publishers on the same footing, and we order just about every new comic book released. Our custom-created subscriber database is not just a time-saver; it’s a tool that allows us to “link” new titles to established comics. Both “genre racking” and subscription linking quickly put even small press titles into the hands of readers who already support similar material, so they can check it out for themselves.

“Browsing is encouraged! We understand that a person has to open a comic book before he or she can be drawn into it! We promote a bookstore atmosphere, with employees eager to guide customers through the infinite diversity that fills the racks and bins. Give us a glimmer of a memory, and we’ll all get involved to track down that particular issue. If something sells out, accounts with several distributors allow us to get it back in stock.

“We’re proud to have many couples as customers, as well as some second-generation subscribers. Diversity within a positive environment makes this possible. We’re also set apart from other comic book stores by our constant and respectful attention to the innovators of the past.
Colorful and informative end-cap displays have highlighted the groundbreaking works of famous comic book creators like Jack Kirby, Wally Wood, Dave Stevens, Will Eisner, John Byrne, Scott McCloud for the uninitiated. We envy new readers the excitement of discovering such gems for the first time!

“The innovators of tomorrow also get shelf space at That’s Entertainment, with amateur comics displayed right alongside the work of the pros. The names of Matt Oreto, Memo Salazar, and Derek Ring are well known to That’s Entertainment customers. The rest of the world will have to catch up. We’ve had striking success lately with a creator-published comic titled “Monster” that outsold many major releases off of the horror rack!

Knowledge of retailing and collectibles:
“Store owner, Paul Howley, has been actively involved in reading and collecting comics since 1959. In 1973, he began retailing comics at the early Boston conventions. In 1976 he assisted in opening “The Great Escape” in Nashville, Tennessee, and he later helped establish “Sparkle City Comics”, then the nation’s largest convention dealer.

“Paul established That’s Entertainment in 1980, at a 2000 square foot location in Worcester, Massachusetts, New England’s second-largest city.
In 1989, he added a second location with the purchase of a financially troubled comic shop in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. Carefully balancing inventory, expanding product lines, and putting the focus on friendly customer service brought a doubling of sales within eight months.

“In 1992, That’s Entertainment, bursting at the seams, purchased a 20,000 square foot building in Worcester, and created a 10,000 square foot retail space, the largest full-service collectibles store on the East Coast.

“Along this route, Paul has acquired as much knowledge about collectibles as anyone, and each of us here has his own special areas of interest. These preferences come out in our displays and recommendations, many of the latter coming with a money-back guarantee to our customers. We all share the knowledge that each customer has his own tastes, and that listening is the first step in using our knowledge and experience. We also keep current in the medium with trade magazines, subscriptions to “On the Floor,” “Magazine and Bookseller,” and through study of the Internet.

“As a retail business, That’s Entertainment has grown into profit sharing, employee reviews, “Skillpath” seminars and training, and an annually updated handbook. We belong to the “Chamber of Commerce” and the “Central Massachusetts Employer’s Association.” In the competitive marketplace of entertainment, we are convinced that continuous professional development is necessary for exceptional customer service.

“Company manager, Chris Ball, was named “Salesman of the Year” in the small-business category by the “Worcester Business Journal” in 1994.
This is a prestigious award that validates our professional approach within the context of the entire business community. Among comic shops, our sales figures place us in the top 2%, with an increase every year, sixteen years running. In fact, sales are up 21% for the first quarter of 1996. We’re using computers to handle information about customers’
wants. We always knew that “keeping an eye out” for something special for a customer was good business, but the database lets us “remember”
more than ever, and to target mailings and calls effectively.

Community Activity:

“We take a variety of approaches to get comic books and our store name out into the community in positive ways. Paul has brought comics as literature into local schools through classroom demonstrations, and a store manager has spoken about comic books at several local libraries.
We’ve coordinated successful fund-raising auctions to benefit a local youth battling Leukodystrophy. Several times, we’ve played volleyball for “Easter Seals,” luckily for us, just participating makes you a winner.

“This year alone, we’ve aggressively pursued opportunities to donate comic books to libraries, a hospital pediatric ward, and a school excellence program. The local PBS TV station auction has regularly featured our contributions over the past few years.

“We’ve used traditional advertising in all media to promote the medium of comic books. The highest profile was a series of custom cable TV spots, but we’ve extended our reach (and budget) creatively with cross-promotions. We’ve had comic books delivered with pizzas, and made comics available to the stationary-bikers at local health clubs.
Theaters and video stores have proved to be natural partners in tying comics to the higher profile productions they inspired. We make displays and contests for all of them from “Crumb” to “Casper” to “The Crow.”

“That’s Entertainment rented a theater and gave away tickets to the first “Batman” movie as a promotional event and “Thank You” to our customers, and staged an elaborate funeral for “Superman.” Having stars Billy Mumy, Davy Jones, and Boston Celtics Dennis Johnson in our store for free autographs exposed literally thousands of people to our product lines. Comic fans also enjoyed appearances by comic creators Neil Gaiman, Michael Zulli, Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, Steve Bissettte, Mike Mignola and many more. Throughout these events we’ve worked hard to develop and maintain a quality relationship with our local media and we believe that this has resulted in a positive effect on public perception.

Quality of our store image:

“That’s Entertainment is known throughout the Northeast for depth and breadth of stock. Other stores send in their customers for obscure and small publisher material, and dealers fill their “want lists” here.
Besides offering superior customer service, we take pride in being a “one-stop” collectibles store. Our sheer size and sales volume let us stock and restock all the best in comics. But if even we don’t have an item, we have refined our special order/want list procedures to a science. Our image? The place that either has it, or will happily get it for you!

“Full-visibility comic racks, custom built floor display units, product-line departments, newly remodeled register and office areas create a dynamic, open, bright and inviting atmosphere that is a browser’s paradise.

“That’s Entertainment is always taking steps toward expanding the appeal of popular culture collectibles. It is the genre we love, and even in a highly challenging retail environment, that fact is making the difference in our continued success.”

Along with the above information, Ken needed to have some “visual aids” to include with the package for the award judges to consider so he began to collect some of old photographs and articles from local newspapers. He also came up with the idea to enlist the help of two of our loyal customers to produce a short videotape movie about the store.

Next chapter: Memo Salazar, a gifted filmmaker, helps out.

Part One Hundred & Four

In our pursuit of the “Will Eisner Spirit of Comic Retailing Award,”
the comic book industry’s equivalent of the “Academy Award,” we needed to have visual evidence of many of our claims of excellence. Luckily for us, we had two customers, Memo Salazar and Aaron Banyai, who were talented filmmakers.

I had been involved in minor parts of two previous film projects of Memo’s; one was a very funny look at a local county fair and the other was a low budget, full-length movie in which I portrayed the owner of a comic book store (what a stretch!) My “big” scene was filmed in my Fitchburg store one night after we closed and although the finished scene was only about four minutes long, it took almost an hour to film. Although I was apparently snubbed by the Academy of Motion Pictures (and didn’t even get an Oscar nomination) it was still fun to be part of the movie-making process.

Memo offered his creative gifts to make a short video about our store. He filmed the store building, the displays of new product, back issues, and collectibles. He interviewed customers who were willing to give “testimonials” about our service and vast inventory. He filmed some of our key employees as they described their function in the “That’s Entertainment” hierarchy. In this video, Ken explained about our commitment to creating a pleasant shopping environment while David explained our philosophy of ordering new comic books and related products. I was filmed describing our combined decades of experience in the comic book hobby and business and our commitment to expanding the community awareness of both the comic book industry and our store.

Memo used a clever technique to try to convey the huge size of our store to the viewers. He placed himself on a wheeled cart and filmed while Aaron moved the cart up the aisles so the whole length of our retail space was apparent.

When Memo was finished editing, Ken packaged the videotape, all of the pictures, testimonial letters and documentation needed for the panel of judges. I was confident that this package would convince the judges that we were worthy of this award. A few weeks later I was contacted by one of the judges and he asked me if I’d be interested in organizing a retailer seminar at the San Diego Comic Book Convention (where the Eisner Award is given out) on successful retailing of back issue comic books. I was honored that they thought I could offer sound advice to my fellow retailers and I thought that, perhaps, this invitation was a hint that I was to receive the Eisner Award. I told the judge that I’d be interested in attending if I knew I was the winner but he wasn’t able to confirm anything for me. I wasn’t thrilled about spending almost $1000 for plane tickets, hotel, rental cars, and food, only to be embarrassed by the Eisner Award being given to another retailer. Since the panel judge couldn’t give me any confirmation, I felt I had to decline the offer to attend the award ceremony. In my opinion, it really isn’t “an honor to be nominated.” It’s only an honor if you actually “win.”

I’m glad I didn’t go. We didn’t win the “Eisner.” A comic book store in Australia beat us. I’m quite sure that they’re out of business now.

Next chapter: Ken runs a great new event: The Pro-Am Comic Jam.

Part One Hundred & Five

Ken Carson had an idea for an event to be held at our larger store in Worcester, Massachusetts. He thought it would be fun to invite some professional comic book artists to come to the store to interact with a group of amateur artists in order to share information with each other and the “general public.” Ken called this event “The Pro-Am Comic Jam.”

We all discussed the budget and the basic concept of this “Pro-Am Comic Jam.” Since this event was going to be rather low-key, Ken was encouraged to plan the whole thing by himself but he had access to any employees that he needed. I was confident that he was up to the task because I had witnessed his expertise when he helped us with other in-store event planning.

Although Ken knew that this event could be a fun experience for our loyal comic book customers he envisioned this as more of an “outreach”
to the general public. He publicized it through the regular media outlets as we usually did. He also wrote a separate “press release” and mailed and faxed it directly to the art departments of the local schools inviting the teachers and students to come to interact with these artists. He hoped that teachers would encourage their more serious art enthusiasts to attend.

Ken had invited and received confirmations from “small press” and local artists Derek Ring, David Tata, Andy Fish, Ted VanLiew, and Memo Salazar. Andy, Memo and Ted had done work for “amateur” comic books (called Fanzines) while David Tata had done some commercial artwork for several interesting products including a series of X-Men illustrated boxes of “Nerds” candy. Derek was a regular customer of my store who created a comic book titled “Monster.” He had copies printed locally and we promoted them to our customers and tried to keep these in stock at all times. It wasn’t very hard to convince comic fans to try this comic book because it had a well-written story with great artwork. When we would sell our last copy, Derek would bring in a few more. Within a few months it actually outsold most mainstream comic book titles including “The Avengers,” “Daredevil,” and “The Hulk.”

To represent the “Pro” part of this event, Ken invited Paul Ryan, artist of “The Flash,” “The Fantastic Four,” and “Superman” and Randy Buccini who illustrated comic books for “Dark Horse Comics.” Paul lived in Massachusetts and he was respected in the comic book industry for his high quality artwork and his ability to meet his deadlines. We knew he was very busy so we were pleased when he agreed to be a “Guest of Honor.”

By the morning of the event, we had no idea if it would draw a crowd.
Many of our regular comic customers told us that they either couldn’t attend or they just weren’t interested. (This kind of thinking always surprises me. This is a free event! If the customers came, they’d probably enjoy themselves!) As it turned out, we shouldn’t have worried about it. Hundreds of “general public” came and had a great time! There were lots of families; mothers and fathers with their teenagers who had some artistic ability that they wanted to share with the professional and amateur artists at our store. All of our guest artists were willing to evaluate and critique these enthusiastic young artists without hurting their feelings. Our guests were also willing to do free sketches for the attendees. It was funny to watch professional artist Paul Ryan get requests to do multiple sketches of Spider-Man even though that’s not one of the famous super-heroes that he had done in the comic book industry.

We had a few librarians come to the store to see what this event was all about and we had the opportunity to begin long-running relationships with them that continue to this day. Most librarians are eager to support programs that encourage reading of any type of literature, even comic books.

This event was a success in several ways. It was a low-cost way to encourage young artists, promote the comic book industry in a positive way to lots of families, and many of the attendees have been regular customers now for quite a few years contributing to our increased store sales. Ken had covered all of the bases.

Next chapter: Tragedy strikes my youngest brother.

Part One Hundred & Six

My youngest brother, Rick, was only six years old when I got married so we weren’t very close when he was really young but there had been a period of time when we got to know each other pretty well. In the late 1970’s and very early 1980’s Rick worked with me at the many baseball card conventions where I set up booths of cards to sell. Even though he was only a teenager, he had a good head for math and knew more about sports and the players than I did. It required long hours and hard work at these card shows, but we had a fun time together. But after Mal and I had our son, Adam, we weren’t attending as many card shows anymore and as Rick got older he got more involved in school, sports, and girls.

Rick eventually married his high school “sweetheart,” Lori, and they had a son, Jordan. Rick was a hard-working man who frequently worked over sixty hours each week at a physically demanding job in order to provide a good lifestyle for his family. They bought a nice home in a quiet rural town because they wanted to have a pleasant and safe place to raise Jordan. Even though it required Rick to drive a long way to work each day, Rick was willing to sacrifice a lot for his family.

In April of 1996, Lori was pregnant again, this time with twins. As they were preparing for life with twins, they were stunned when Lori began to have complications during her 19th week of pregnancy. She was hospitalized in Boston from that time on. During the 28th week of her pregnancy, it was determined that an emergency surgery was needed and Lori gave birth to Ryan and Tyler Howley on October 23rd. The two tiny babies each weighed only two pounds, two ounces and had serious health concerns. While Lori was on another floor, recovering from the surgery, the doctors told Rick that Ryan wasn’t going to make it. Rick held Ryan in his arms as he died. Rick then had to bring Ryan to Lori so she could say her “goodbyes.”

I couldn’t possibly understand what Rick and Lori went through during those weeks. Lori had been hospitalized far away from their home for nine weeks. Rick had visited Lori in Boston as often as possible and he also had to deal with going to work and keeping as much of a normal life as possible for Jordan. Some of us helped out by taking care of Jordan when we could, but much of the time, Rick handled it all. Now they had lost Ryan and Tyler was in danger. They also had to arrange a funeral for Ryan.

Although I don’t remember all of the details of the funeral and burial, I’ll never forget the intense look of sadness on my brother’s face at the cemetery. As I watched him live through this tragedy I wished I could help to relieve his emotional pain but I had little to offer him.

A high school English teacher had convinced me that death was just “part of life.” I wasn’t an emotional human being and death rarely surprised me. I still felt very saddened by the death of those people who were close. I understood why people would cry but I was unable to let the emotion out. In his time of need, I wasn’t a “good” brother for Rick.

Rick and Lori’s new son, Tyler, continued to lose weight and soon weighed only one pound, eleven ounces. It was a scary time for them as they waited for Tyler to become healthy and strong enough to be released from the hospital. Thankfully, he survived and is a healthy young boy today.

Part One Hundred & Seven

Although I was retired from daily involvement in my comic book stores, my life seemed busier than ever. Driving my son, Adam, to his high school was a commitment of at least a few hours each day (although it was usually a nice opportunity to spend uninterrupted time together), but it was a relief when Adam got his drivers license in 1996 and he began to drive himself to school. We still had to drive our daughter, Cassy, to her school but we had wonderful car-pool partners to share the driving. Both of my kids were heavily involved in the performing arts including voice lessons and acting in school plays and community theater. We loved watching them perform and we usually went to every one of their performances. Sometimes this meant seeing the same play as many as seven or eight times! We learned a lot about the whole theater “business” that would be useful to us later on.

Chris, the manager of my two comic book stores, called to discuss his idea for expanding our business through the Internet. He believed that it was imperative that we get on board and embrace this relatively new technology so that we could begin to reach the potential worldwide audience. He did his best to convince me but I wasn’t very interested in the new technology. I didn’t understand all of the details but I gave my “permission” for him to move forward to gather some information about the costs and potential benefits. Chris shopped around and came up with the “best” deal available at that time. He found a local company who would act as our “server” for $120 per month. This would give us unlimited Internet access, email communications, and they would build us a database program that we could use to list the hundreds of thousands of comic books, trading cards and toys that we had in our inventory. We all had visions of brisk sales to eager buyers all over the world. We were excited by the possibilities. Internet providers spent lots of money trying to convince consumers and businesses that we MUST be on the Internet in order to survive. We thought that this could “protect” us if sales at our store locations were to decrease so we signed a contract and began the process of becoming part of the “net.”

Meanwhile, our second store (in Fitchburg, Massachusetts) was becoming a frustrating experience for us all. Sales were sluggish (not horrible, but we were getting concerned) and the downtown area location was deteriorating at a pretty rapid pace. Fitchburg was a factory town with mostly “blue-collar” workers and unemployment was high. The Main Street area that was once filled with interesting stores that had been around for many years was now becoming a ghost town. There were dozens of empty stores. Social service offices, dentists and lawyer’s offices now replaced once profitable retail stores. The area became a hangout for drug-dealers and bums. It was becoming a dangerous place to try to run a business and the local politicians didn’t seem to understand the problem and they certainly didn’t have a solution. They attempted to “fix” things by spending millions of dollars on consultants to analyze the situation but the only solution they came up with was to beautify the downtown by putting park benches and small grassy areas with plants along the street. All this accomplished was making the low-life loiterers more comfortable! This situation really affected Richard, our Fitchburg store manager. He knew that it was increasingly more difficult to get new customers to come to our store because of the rough, downtown location. He did the best that he could with the situation but he finally called me when he couldn’t stand it anymore. He had to clean vomit from our doorway twice in one week and there was nothing being done by the city officials to straighten out this deteriorating downtown. Richard asked me to find a better location for our store.

I spent an afternoon driving around in some of the better retail areas of Fitchburg and found an empty store in a fairly big plaza on the busy “John Fitch Highway.” This store was previously occupied by a video game arcade and pool-hall. The owner of the plaza was happy to get rid of them as tenants because they made a mess of the store and they weren’t very reliable when it came to paying their rent. I just happened to discover this location a few weeks after they had moved out and the landlord was eager to have a trustworthy, new, rent-paying tenant. The owner realized that we would make a great addition to his plaza. I negotiated an initially low rent and although the owner wanted me to agree to sign a long-term lease, I was reluctant to commit to it so I agreed to a one-year term. It’s nice to do business with a realistic landlord.

The store was in bad condition so we tore out almost everything including the walls, ceiling, carpet, and lighting fixtures, and replaced everything. We bought many new fixtures and display cases and within a few weeks were ready to get out of the downtown area. After we notified all of the customers on our mailing list about our exciting new location, we relocated our entire inventory in one long night of work and were ready to do business the following morning. This move was made with no interruption in our business.

Next chapter: Ebay.

Part One Hundred & Eight

One day in late 1996, when I happened to be in my Worcester store, one of my favorite people, Zvi Szafran, came in to pick up the huge lot of new comic books that we reserve for him each month. As usual, we spent quite a lot of time trading bad jokes and talking philosophy. As I’ve mentioned before Zvi is the most intelligent man I know so I’m pretty sure I learned more from him than he learned from me. During our time together that day, Zvi mentioned an exciting new website he had discovered. He tried to explain to me the concept of this interesting new way to buy and sell collectibles through the Internet, but I didn’t understand how this whole “cyber-space” thing worked. We went up to the office area of the store and he typed in the website address of eBay, showed me the basic workings of this auction-based site and related a few of his buying experiences on eBay. I told him that I didn’t really have time to play with this right now so he “bookmarked” this website so I could easily get to the site sometime in the future.

Even though I didn’t yet grasp the importance of the Internet, I had just recently allowed my son, Adam, to establish a connection to the Internet at our home. Adam knew how to navigate his way around the Internet but I didn’t even know how to connect to it! After a while, Adam taught me some basic things and one day I remembered what Zvi had told me about eBay. I connected to the eBay site and somehow I figured out how to do a basic search for a collectible item I had been actively looking for over the past ten years. I typed in “The Man From Uncle Thrush Gun” and I was shocked to see that someone actually had one of these ultra-rare toy guns available in perfect, mint condition, still in its original box! The current bid price was only five hundred dollars.
This was “The Holy Grail” of “Man From Uncle” collectible toys from the 1960’s. After many years of searching, I was beginning to think that these guns were originally sold without a box because none had ever been seen at any of the toy conventions or in any of the printed toy publications.

I asked my wife if she’d mind if I spent a bunch of money on this gun set and she encouraged me to go after it. I bid one thousand dollars for it and I was still the high bidder as of the final day of the seven-day auction. I made sure that I was sitting by my computer when there was only fifteen minutes left for this auction and I was excited that I was still the high bidder. If I got this “Thrush Gun” it would be the most rare “Man From Uncle” toy in my massive collection. I waited as the minutes went slowly by. With only five minutes to go I was quite secure that I was going to be the high bidder at the end of this auction. Certainly no one would think that this toy gun set was worth more than one thousand dollars!

I decided to spend a moment or two searching on eBay for another item I was looking for. By the time I went back to check on the “Thrush Gun”
I found that I had been outbid and there was only one minute left before the auction ended. I quickly placed another bid of $1,100 but four other collectors outbid me within the final ten seconds and this rare toy ended up selling for $2,700! The “collectors world” has gone crazy!
Within a year eBay would become an important part of our business.

Next chapter: Chris, our company manager, gets Ty Law of the New England Patriots to be a guest at our Fitchburg store.

Part One Hundred & Nine

Since we had just recently moved one of our comic book and collectible stores from a deteriorating Main Street location to a much better shopping plaza, Chris, the manager, knew we needed to get some publicity to inform the community that we had moved. Chris had made a “contact” with a limousine driver who frequently drove football players from the New England Patriots. The driver was willing to act as an “agent” for us and he invited a few of the players to be guests at our new Fitchburg, Massachusetts store.

Since the football season was in full-gear, the only player who was available was Ty Law. He was unable to play because of an injury. Mr.
Law agreed to spend four hours at the store to sign autographs and meet the fans for only $500 plus the cost of the limousine transportation.
Surprised that he would be willing to make this appearance for such a small sum of money, we were thrilled to make this agreement. The low cost would allow us to give our customers the opportunity to get Ty Law’s autograph without charging any fee for it. We hoped we’d make our expenses back by selling our customers photographs, cards, football helmets, and footballs for Ty to sign.

My employees wanted this event to be a success but we didn’t have as much time to plan this as we usually did. Ty was only willing to come on November 18th and this only left us a few weeks to put this together. We contacted the mayor’s office and explained the situation to them and they offered to make an official proclamation honoring Ty Law and The New England Patriots football team. The Fleer Trading Card Company offered to get involved by sending us lots of free football and baseball trading cards to give away as prizes to the attendees so we decided to create an interactive event that we called a “Card Carnival.” During this “Card Carnival” there would be several types of games that the customers could play while they waited in line to get a free autograph.
Fleer football cards had a “secret code” area on the backs of some of the cards for that year so my daughter, Cassy, would dress up as a gypsy at a special booth to “decode” these cards to see if they were prizewinners. My father agreed to dress in a type of military costume for a game we called “Pack Wars.” One of our employees would dress as a fortuneteller for a game we called “Cardnak The Magnificent.” We also planned games of “Card Flipping” and “Card Tossing.”

As this was all coming together to be a fun sounding event, we notified the local newspaper and they agreed to write a story about it, mostly because the involvement of the Mayor’s office seemed to give it some much needed credibility. This wasn’t just a store intent on making money; it was a fun, free event for the community.

When November 18th arrived, we were confident that we were prepared. The store looked great when we re-opened that night two hours after we had closed at our normal time. Almost all of our Fitchburg store employees were there and many of our Worcester employees also came to help out. My wife, Mal, was there to help with “crowd control” in case she was needed. My son, Adam, couldn’t be there because he had commitments at his high school. Cassy was there ready to play the part of the gypsy. My film making friends, Memo Salazar and Aaron Banyai, were there to videotape the festivities and they caught lots of the excitement on tape.

A half-hour before we got ready to open up the store again, we were told that there were a couple of hundred customers already lined up outside in the freezing cold, eleven degree night. I quickly called the local newspaper again and told them about the potentially huge turnout.
They immediately dispatched a photographer and a reporter to get photographs of the waiting crowd and to cover the event because it would make a good local story. When we finally opened the doors, the huge crowd of eager customers streamed into the store. The noise level was very high with customers laughing and shouting as they played all of the games we had set up to help them pass the time while they waited in line to meet Ty Law.

Unlike our Worcester store, the Fitchburg store is a small store with only 2000 square feet so the store was really too crowded to allow the customers to shop for much merchandise other than the Ty Law photographs and other football items that we had displayed on the tables near him.
We needed to keep the line moving because we had certainly exceeded the maximum number of people that the fire marshals would allow to be in the store at one time. Although many fans brought their own items for Ty Law to autograph, by the end of the four-hour period we had sold almost everything we had available.

Ty Law had such a good time that he “put in a good word” for us with other New England Patriots players and within a few weeks we had inexpensive contracts with several other players. Adam Vinatieri and Ted Johnson agreed to make an appearance together in January of 1997 for only $500 each. Shortly after the deal was made, The New England Patriots won the AFC East Conference and the price for these players went through the roof; however, all of the guys we had agreements with honored their commitments. These athletes were all nice guys and great guests.

Next chapter: My family meets The Monkees again!