From the minute we walked into the convention center to set up our table this con felt far different than what were used to locally ie The Motor City Comic Con. We easily found our tables and the con staff was very friendly. This was the general gist among all the exhibitors we talked to. The people working concessions at the center were also really good to us. It was probably all they could do in lieu of the high priced con food, Prices aside we did very well sales wise. We actually sold out of everything we brought to sell. I even managed to do a few convention sketches
It helped that we went guerrilla with our marketing just like the old days. Instead of pricey business cards we opted to print pocket size flyers talking about who we are and what we do. What was also a convention hit was our Comic book Manga Workshop initiative. This is a Saturday class we do in Pontiac in partnership with the nonprofit Better Pontiac. The culmination of this class is our yearly free comic book day addition of our popular anthology IMAGINOS PLUS. People also loved that we give back to the community.
We got to see a lot of people we hadn't seen in a while. The highlight was seeing Desmond Jones, brother of comic great Arvell Jones. Desmond has always supported me and I thank him very much for it. We also got a chance to hang out with our buddy Ervin Johnson our homie from the fledgling manga company SHINING OTAKU and the rest of Detroit Tradecraft. There were so many cool people there it was hard to count. What was the coolest is our studio mates Shyla Crump and Trey Ragatz came out to help man the table.
Parking was more expensive than the last time we set up at a show down there. With Downtown Detroit jumping like it is I can see why prices have gone up. I am kinda bummed that I missed CHARIVARI, the house music festival put on annually by Todd Johnson (co-creator of TRIBE,the best selling black comic book of a all time). Oh well maybe next year.
