shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Jul 6, 2014 7:08:50 GMT -5
There's no denying a continued trend of traditional comic conventions including more and more pop culture guest celebrities in their lineups each year. Inevitably, bringing in half-forgotten B actors from the days of yore casts a wider net in drawing in crowds, but it seems to alienate/upset some of the more traditional convention attendees as well. San Diego Comicon is the clearest example of this: a convention once devoted entirely to comic books is now more of a multimedia entertainment experience, with comic dealers cast off to the sides in order to make room for the big ticket features that really bring in the crowds. But is doing what it takes to draw a larger crowd necessarily a bad thing? Is catering to a wider selection of interests at a show you're going to spend one to three days attending a possible benefit? Ultimately, can a satisfactory balance between comicdom and pop culture be achieved? I personally attend one to two comicons each year, and both are shows with large pop culture presence because I enjoy attending with my wife, my children, and our friends. They are not comic geeks, but they ARE geeks about some things, and its fun finding ways to share our passions even though I will never care about Doctor Who the way they do, just as they will never care about Bronze Age Marvel comics the way I do; and my kids utterly flip whenever a Klingon hoard passes by, or a remote controlled R2D2 approaches and chirps at them. Our favorite show to attend, by far, is Motor City Comicon, a perfect balance between comic book and pop culture geekdom. They offer a lot for everyone, with entire rows of actors from decades gone by, as well as discussion panels devoted to comic book greats like Chris Claremont and Gerry Conway. It's a win-win in my mind. In fact, of all the people I've ever met at a convention, the one that excited me most wasn't a comic book guest. It was Brian Tochi, largely forgotten actor and voice talent of the 1980s who, in addition to doing some semi-memorable roles in Police Academy, Revenge of the Nerds, and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies, voiced "Bunji," my favorite character from my favorite childhood cartoon show: The Bionic Six. He was as thrilled to have a fan who actually came to see him as I was to reminisce with him about the show and the stories from behind the scenes that I'd never heard before, and an unforgettable moment like that one didn't drive up the price I paid for my ticket at the door either. Really, a good pop culture convention has a wide spectrum of celebrities so that everyone has someone there they are excited to meet, and what comic book fan couldn't find some pop culture celebrity to be excited about? We all have interests outside of comics. So where do you fall on this? Are you a comicon purist, or do you enjoy a dash of pop culture in your conventions? |
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Crimebuster
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Post by Crimebuster on Jul 6, 2014 12:19:38 GMT -5
I prefer my comic cons to be all comics. However, having said that, some shows have found a balance simply by expanding. Boston is an example. Back in the day, it was all comics. Now there are a lot of major media stars, but it hasn't come at the cost of the comic side of things. There's as much or more comic book stuff as ever, the show is simply bigger so they can do all the pop media stuff in addition. As long as we get the comics, I don't mind the other stuff, and it certainly helps bring in a larger and different crowd. If even just a few of those new guests get into comics as a result, it's worth it.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2014 12:29:05 GMT -5
AS long as it doesn't become a Wizard World Event, I am usually good. Mid-Ohio Con used to be a legendary mid-sized comic show. I would see ads for it all the way in CT and even had planned to make the trip to go to one before I ever met anyone here in Ohio, but it didn't pan out. It was comic-oriented, had great guests, and was reasonably priced for admission/attendance. Then Wizard World bought it out. Ticket prices quadrupled, pop culture become the focus and comics got shunted to the side. It may be a bigger draw, but it is now reviled by the comics community here, as the dealers/attended who had built the show and made it what it was were shunted aside. Small to mid level dealers could no longer afford to exhibit at the show, as tickets were not the only prices to quadruple, exhibitor fees did as well. Local small press creators were priced out of attending as well.
It's like the difference in the 2 Cinci shows here in Sept. One is welcoming to smaller dealers and creators and is more focused on comics. Dealer/exhibitor tables range from $50-$150 depending on size and location. The other has much more of a pop culture focus and does not want small time exhibitors, so dealer/exhibitor tables start at $350 and go up depending on location/size. Amazingly the first show is sold out of exhibitor space, while the second still have tables available just a few months before the show...
I don't mind the pop culture element in comic shows, it can be fun and bring in the crowds. I do mind when the con organizers price out the grass roots element that makes comics what it is, making the show poorer in the process.
-M
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Jul 6, 2014 14:54:55 GMT -5
I don't mind the pop culture element in comic shows, it can be fun and bring in the crowds. I do mind when the con organizers price out the grass roots element that makes comics what it is, making the show poorer in the process. So then it's less an issue of pop culture vs. only comics, and more an issue of shows becoming bigger and more profitable, and alienating the little guy in the process. And I think there's a significant contradiction at the heart of it: the majority of comic book guests are going to be current creators with something to promote. Classic artists can still sell sketches (so long as Marvel doesn't go all Gary Friedrich on them), but unless a convention is going to pay them a nice amount to attend (and most don't), a classic comic writer can't turn any kind of profit by attending these shows. They're only going to do it for the love of it. And yet, if it's easier to attract current comic creators, they're going to attract fans of new comics, and those folks don't generally read and buy the older stuff that most dealers are carrying. You can only have so many tables of dealers selling the new stuff you could just as easily get at your LCS, along with some high priced variants. So, without classic comic creators present, comic vendors aren't going to be much of a presence at these shows either. So unless a convention is willing to invest a good amount of money into drawing classic comic guests who aren't going to attract as many attendees as a pop culture icon, it becomes more difficult to create an effective comic book presence at a convention than a pop culture one. And that's really because its a reflection of the changing interests in our society in general -- there isn't anywhere near as much interest in classic comics as their used to be. It's not as profitable a convention presence anymore. That being said, I still feel the ideal convention should strike a balance between the two, and if it means paying classic comic creators more to attend than they pay their other guests (and some conventions generally don't pay anyone other than their featured guests), even if those classic comic guests seem to attract less attendees than the pop culture ones, the balance they create by being there makes the show a more desirable and profitable one overall. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2014 15:27:39 GMT -5
It's possible to get larger and more profitable without pricing out the grass roots fan base and smaller creators.
Say I go to Wizard World Ohio, I pay $60 a day to get in and Stan Lee is a featured guest (like he was last year) and say Jewel Saite from Firefly. SO I pay for autographs for both, that's $160 out the door just to pay to stand in line to pay for autographs for maybe 2 minutes of time to spend with the people I wanted to see because he handlers are moving the line along. 3/4 of my day and most of my budget has been spent on that, so where is the time and money to go look for classic creators or at vendor stuff? The guys who are paying for table space to exhibit at the shows? They stop making money, they stop coming, and suddenly you don't have the revenue coming in on the front end to afford venue space and big name guest fees. You may still get it at the back end, but you now have to front it and hope you get the attendance.
If your guests grumble at return on investment, they don't come back the next year. If there grass roots guys who don't spend all day in line for big names know the smaller vendors/guests have stopped coming, so will they. If the talent doesn't enjoy the experience, they likely won't return or will up their fees to make it worth their while, and suddenly you as organizer are looking at bigger NOT being more profitable. Not every show can be SDCC, NYCC, and C2E2.
A lot of those table vendors and small press creators don't have shops or books in Diamond distribution. Doing shows is how they make their money from comics. If they have top pay too much they cannot make a profit at the show they will stop coming.
Jesse Noble is the organizer of Gem City Con here in Dayton. It is a show that keeps growing and is mostly focused on comics. For him, the balance is not comics vs. pop culture but getting bigger while not becoming impersonal for the guests and attendees. How to offer more while allowing the experience to be enjoyable for everyone-guests, exhibitors, and attendees. I think he's doing something right, as last time he talked he told me he was attending another con and comic talent was approaching him asking if he was interested in having them as guests at next year's shows. They had heard through the grapevine it was a great show for both guests and attendees and wanted to be a part of it. So his show gets bigger, yet he still took the time (even though he had laryngitis at this year's show) to stop at every dealer and exhibitor booth to make sure they were having a good show, if they needed anything, if they wanted to come back next year, if they had any suggestions, etc. The show grows bigger and more profitable each year, yet Jesse is mindful of why people come to the shows (guests, exhibitors & attendees) and what has made it possible for him to keep growing. He knows that the long term growth and profitability for the show is on repeat business. On not only getting people there, but having them want to come back next year and talk up the show as a good experience through the year so it does even better next year. If people leave your show bitching they will never come back because of bad experiences, poor value for the money etc. you can still grow, but you have to keep spending a lot more money to do so to keep making a bigger splash, but eventually the returns on doing so diminish and you end up being less profitable even though you are bigger.
Shows that are top heavy lack the strong foundation built on the grass roots to sustain that growth in a profitable fashion.
As an aside, media guests at gaming conventions are a whole different animal. A couple years back, media guests like Tricia Helfer and Kevin Sorbo were guests at Gen Con and Origins, and I laughed every time I went by that there were hardly any lines there. I asked a friend in the industry why these guests didn't draw and his answer was, because gamers come here to play games not meet famous people. They'd rather spend their money on more dice and games than autographed pics. Do you know how many novelty t-shirts they could buy for the price of one autograph? The organizers have the media guests to get press and casual attendees from the local area, but the hardcore attendees could care less about the media guests, that's why they get stuck at the back of the exhibitor hall out of the gamers way....
It all depends what you want out of your con experience I guess.
-M
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Post by Randle-El on Jul 7, 2014 9:53:49 GMT -5
I agree that I think a healthy balance can and should be struck between the two.
If it's profitable and feasible for the management to run a comics-only show, that's great and as a comics person I would fully support that. But I understand that even in today's market, even though comic book superheroes have massive exposure, comic books themselves are still pretty much a niche market. So I totally understand it if a con decides to include programming and guests from broader pop culture. If it's the difference between that and not having a con at all, I'd rather the former. I'd point out that similar types of reasoning can be applied to comic shops that also dabble in something else -- whether it's tabletop gaming, manga, sports cards, etc. -- the reality is that in today's environment, those things often enable the store to stay in business and continue to offering comics.
I would also argue that it makes a certain amount of sense to offer broader pop culture programming. It makes sense to have celebrity guests of TV shows or movies that are adaptations of comics properties. And there's usually a high degree of correlation between comics fans and fans of other types of genre entertainment -- Star Wars, Star Trek, sci-fi in general, anime, gaming, etc. Personally, I'd like a con where you can score some deals on comics, get a sketch and/or some books signed, and an autograph or two -- so long as the non-comics stuff hasn't taken over and creates massive amounts of traffic.
I think that last part is where shows like SDCC have lost me. I've never been, but everything about that show gives off the impression that a lot of unrelated programming has completely overrun the show. Maybe I'm being territorial or projecting childhood experiences onto it, but it feels like when the cool kids at school discover and take over the cool hang-out spot where you and your nerdy friends used to congregate.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Jul 7, 2014 16:11:23 GMT -5
Maybe I'm being territorial or projecting childhood experiences onto it, but it feels like when the cool kids at school discover and take over the cool hang-out spot where you and your nerdy friends used to congregate. So as "Geekdom" becomes more mainstream in general, those of us who never wanted to be cool to begin with are going to have to work harder to marginalize ourselves  |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2014 18:07:07 GMT -5
Separate the con into two rooms. One with comics only for one price. One with "pop" culture in another for one price. Or a multi ticket between the two.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Jul 7, 2014 20:09:26 GMT -5
It's possible to get larger and more profitable without pricing out the grass roots fan base and smaller creators. Say I go to Wizard World Ohio, I pay $60 a day to get in and Stan Lee is a featured guest (like he was last year) and say Jewel Saite from Firefly. SO I pay for autographs for both, that's $160 out the door just to pay to stand in line to pay for autographs for maybe 2 minutes of time to spend with the people I wanted to see because he handlers are moving the line along. 3/4 of my day and most of my budget has been spent on that, so where is the time and money to go look for classic creators or at vendor stuff? The guys who are paying for table space to exhibit at the shows? They stop making money, they stop coming, and suddenly you don't have the revenue coming in on the front end to afford venue space and big name guest fees. You may still get it at the back end, but you now have to front it and hope you get the attendance. If your guests grumble at return on investment, they don't come back the next year. If there grass roots guys who don't spend all day in line for big names know the smaller vendors/guests have stopped coming, so will they. If the talent doesn't enjoy the experience, they likely won't return or will up their fees to make it worth their while, and suddenly you as organizer are looking at bigger NOT being more profitable. Not every show can be SDCC, NYCC, and C2E2. A lot of those table vendors and small press creators don't have shops or books in Diamond distribution. Doing shows is how they make their money from comics. If they have top pay too much they cannot make a profit at the show they will stop coming. Jesse Noble is the organizer of Gem City Con here in Dayton. It is a show that keeps growing and is mostly focused on comics. For him, the balance is not comics vs. pop culture but getting bigger while not becoming impersonal for the guests and attendees. How to offer more while allowing the experience to be enjoyable for everyone-guests, exhibitors, and attendees. I think he's doing something right, as last time he talked he told me he was attending another con and comic talent was approaching him asking if he was interested in having them as guests at next year's shows. They had heard through the grapevine it was a great show for both guests and attendees and wanted to be a part of it. So his show gets bigger, yet he still took the time (even though he had laryngitis at this year's show) to stop at every dealer and exhibitor booth to make sure they were having a good show, if they needed anything, if they wanted to come back next year, if they had any suggestions, etc. The show grows bigger and more profitable each year, yet Jesse is mindful of why people come to the shows (guests, exhibitors & attendees) and what has made it possible for him to keep growing. He knows that the long term growth and profitability for the show is on repeat business. On not only getting people there, but having them want to come back next year and talk up the show as a good experience through the year so it does even better next year. If people leave your show bitching they will never come back because of bad experiences, poor value for the money etc. you can still grow, but you have to keep spending a lot more money to do so to keep making a bigger splash, but eventually the returns on doing so diminish and you end up being less profitable even though you are bigger. Shows that are top heavy lack the strong foundation built on the grass roots to sustain that growth in a profitable fashion. As an aside, media guests at gaming conventions are a whole different animal. A couple years back, media guests like Tricia Helfer and Kevin Sorbo were guests at Gen Con and Origins, and I laughed every time I went by that there were hardly any lines there. I asked a friend in the industry why these guests didn't draw and his answer was, because gamers come here to play games not meet famous people. They'd rather spend their money on more dice and games than autographed pics. Do you know how many novelty t-shirts they could buy for the price of one autograph? The organizers have the media guests to get press and casual attendees from the local area, but the hardcore attendees could care less about the media guests, that's why they get stuck at the back of the exhibitor hall out of the gamers way.... It all depends what you want out of your con experience I guess. -M Essentially, I think this comes back to size and profits. Any convention that can draw in more crowds and bigger profits is going to do so. They can try to keep down costs for small vendors, but (as you point out) those vendors are still hurt if attendees are dumping all their money at a high priced celebrity's table. So, as conventions become bigger, they will find more profit in catering to non-comic fans and non-comic merchandise. Classic comic vendors can still make money at a big show if classic comic fans still attend and still reserve a large chunk of their cash for classic comic purchases, but there's probably a point at which the cost to set up becomes too high for the dealer, and the cost to attend causes too significant a dip in what the classic comic fan can spend at the show. So, if bigger venues remain committed to keeping costs down for smaller vendors, attracting classic comic guests, and keeping prices down at the door, AND if classic comic fans remain committed to supporting classic comic dealers even when they want a $60 autograph from Stan Lee, then the balance can still work. That being said, in Ohio we still have a ton of smaller shows that are comic book exclusive. Unfortunately, you don't get the kind of selection at a small show put on in a Knights of Columbus ballroom that you would at a larger convention. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2014 20:30:53 GMT -5
That being said, in Ohio we still have a ton of smaller shows that are comic book exclusive. Unfortunately, you don't get the kind of selection at a small show put on in a Knights of Columbus ballroom that you would at a larger convention. Maybe not anymore, but the one con I went to regularly in CT in high school was at a VFW hall and I can remember multiple dealers having copies of AF #15, FF#1 Avengers 1 & 4, or just about any key Marvel Silver you wanted , usually in a range of grades too, a fair number of Gold books (one dealer brought a collection of Cap 1-20 he had bought a week before, it's the only time I have gotten to see a Cap 1 in person) and the only things you couldn't find at the shows were late Bronze and more recent (this was circa '84-87 I went all the time). DC Silver keys were harder to come by, as were Silver DC in general. Again pre-internet days where the bulk of purchases on key books were at shows like that. I think the growth of the online comic market is what killed the ability to find books like that at smaller shows, not the growth of cons into pop culture shows. Faster turnover on books like that online means books never make it to shows for display and sale. -M |
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Jul 7, 2014 20:35:52 GMT -5
I think the growth of the online comic market is what killed the ability to find books like that at smaller shows, not the growth of cons into pop culture shows. Faster turnover on books like that online means books never make it to shows for display and sale. -M Actually, the biggest problem I see at those shows is that most fans of the new stuff aren't interested in the old stuff. Each year, I see more and more of those tables devoted to variant chase covers of comics that are still on the stands. And I can't tell you the number of times I ask a dealer if he has a specific run of comics, and the answer inevitably is, "Yes, but I never bring those books. People aren't interested in them anymore." If it isn't from one of the big Marvel/DC superhero runs or a big Marvel/DC superhero key issue, no one's carrying it because no one's buying it. That being said, if you're ever up for visiting Northern Ohio, probably the best mid-size comics-only show with tons of variety is Lake Effect Comicon, which is always put on at the end of May. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 7, 2014 20:46:26 GMT -5
Looking at the pics from the show, I recognize a lot of regulars from the con circuit here, I think Sean Forney and Craig Boldman are at every show I have attended in Ohio...
-M
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Post by The Captain on Jul 7, 2014 21:07:59 GMT -5
Actually, the biggest problem I see at those shows is that most fans of the new stuff aren't interested in the old stuff. Each year, I see more and more of those tables devoted to variant chase covers of comics that are still on the stands. And I can't tell you the number of times I ask a dealer if he has a specific run of comics, and the answer inevitably is, "Yes, but I never bring those books. People aren't interested in them anymore." If it isn't from one of the big Marvel/DC superhero runs or a big Marvel/DC superhero key issue, no one's carrying it because no one's buying it. I have found a similar problem at the Pittsburgh Comicon. Last year I really wanted to pull the trigger on a Werewolf by Night #32, but there was 1 copy in the entire room, and the guy wanted a ridiculous (relative to condition) amount for it. I've had issues hunting down key issues in a number of different series because, as you so aptly put it, they don't get brought because the majority of people don't want a Defenders #10 or Captain America #110.
On the flip side, the lack of interest in late-Silver/early-Bronze Age books has led to some great deals when people do bring them. Last year, a guy had a huge box on mid- to high-grade Daredevils in the issue #50-100 range for $3 - $5 apiece, and I've grabbed huge chunks of mid- to late-Bronze Age books out of $1 boxes while other people gobble up the latest variant covers at $40 a pop.
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Post by earl on Nov 7, 2014 20:31:24 GMT -5
The last two years Lexington, Kentucky has had some big pop culture cons, but a few years before that they had a couple small shows in a hotel with mostly just dealers and some more local regional artists. Those small shows ere great for finding books and not a freaking mad house like the last two shows with all of the TV star hullabaloo. The big shows are fun, but personally some of the better cons I went to back when I was a teenager in the 80s was the small more dealer led shows with maybe some local comics creators and maybe a couple of real pros. The two places that I know I went more than once was in South Bend and then up in Grand Rapids, which had Jim Starlin and a few of the Detroit and Michigan pros at it (and there was a few back then).
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Post by Deleted on Nov 9, 2014 13:30:37 GMT -5
It's not only celebrity guests. It's also the panels and the corporate booths. Sony and MGM having booths at a comic convention? Lego and NBC?
SDCC is almost a trade show for the entertainment industry at this point, which still includes comics, but just barely.
Some cons want to separate the dealer section and artists alley completely from the regular con, like a different building altogether, from what I've read.
So yeah, the promoters are trying to cater to a new audience for the big cons. The way around it, for those who don't like that, is just go to smaller cons. Easier to get tickets, cheaper admission, less crowds, easier to get a room if you need it, and it will be a buyers market at the smaller venue.
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