Captain America the Winter Solider the movie was a hit. I enjoyed it more than the first one. Two end credit specials. Almost didn’t see the second one till Joel announced there was another end credit scene. Are mutants now called “miracles” in the Marvel film universe since Marvel Studios can not use the term “mutants” giving that term to another studio (Fox) to use. Miracles doesn’t have the same ring to it that the word mutants has. Plus miracles are usually associated with “good” things. Subbing the word mutant with miracle could be odd. That dirty mutant! Sounds better than that dirty miracle! Oh no it’s a mutant! Oh no its a miracle! Kill the mutant! Kill the miracle!

Next up for a private movie showing is the upcoming Spiderman on May 3rd. Which will also be Free Comic Book Day. Along with the final AVX Heroclix throw down. Will the Avengers score at least one win as a team before its all over with? May 3rd will be a very busy day. We will be opening at 11 our normal time that day.

The Godzilla preview did look good. Sadly we will not be doing a private showing for Godzilla. I have a previous engagement on May 17th.

It has been brought up in the store about the fact that American comic sales are so much lower than comic sales in other countries such as Europe and Japan. The good old U.S.A is where comic books first originated from. But are selling far less.

I think it has a lot to do with free time. Other industrial countries have more vacation time for employees. Other countries have laws that mandate companies to have vacation time for their employees. No law or laws exist in America on if and how much employers need to give their employees vacation time. The USA ranks low in vacation time compared to other industrial countries. Many people don’t even use up all their vacation time and just lose it each year. Many more do their work during their vacation. In the current economic conditions many people work even more and harder worried that another could take their place. People with kids spend a lot of time being in their kids’ various activities. There are more after school programs and activities for kids than ever before. All of this takes up time.

Many people work multiple jobs (like me). Meaning far less free time. Heck, watching T.V. is a rarity for me. Walking Dead, Agents of Shield, and Arrow are all shows that I don’t watch due to lack of time. Part of the reason I rent the movie theater for the various superhero movies is so I get to see them. Do I still read comics? Yes, I usually stay late on Tuesdays and try to be up to date on various titles coming out. Such as Batman, Forever Evil, Walking Dead, Superior Spiderman, ect. Again less free time means less time for hobbies.

In short us Americans work to much! Me included. I joke that I have yet to talk to anyone on their deathbed and hear them say “I wish I would have spent more time at the office.”

2014 has seen a ten percent drop from last year on comic sales nationwide. Again that is nationwide and not here at the store. That I would say is due to the lack of new ideas and new talent. Daredevil’s re launch had the exact same sales as the previous issue here. There were no new readers checking it out sadly here at the store. With all of Marvel’s slapping number ones on various titles with a new storyline and not truly first issues it most likely just blended in. Plus the previous Daredevil came out roughly a month before the new number one with the same writer. Meaning it could have easily just carried on the pervious numbering. So well Daredevil 1 sold well nationwide a lot of those copies are unsold. Not all by any means. Since comic stores can not return what we order we are stuck with all unsold material. Meaning Marvel makes money on all the unsold copies and we don’t. Same with all the other comic companies. Unless on the off chance a title is offered as returnable. Which DC does more than any other company. But still not that often.

The Marvel non stop re launching of their titles has been done to many times. The well is running dry. Batman once again outsold all Marvel comics along with the new number ones. Marvel increased their market share over DC but the whole market shrunk. Re launching is a quick fix sell. Not a long term solution.

Marvel’s Original Sin (not to be confused with Marvel’s Original SinS which will be running at the same time) and Amazing Spiderman 1 will sell a lot of copies for Marvel. But it will be due to variants, not an increase in readership. Amazing Spiderman 1 is estimated to sell 500,000 copies. That is indeed a lot of copies. Heck, I ordered hundreds of copies of Amazing Spiderman. To get the various variants high orders had to be placed. Such as the one in three hundred variant. There are so many different variants now I have lost track of how many different variants are due out for that issue. I knew how many when I first ordered then more were added as time went on.  Marvel kept adding more and more. Instead of focusing on bringing in more readers Marvel is taking a short cut and making money on the people who want the variants. Again it is a short cut and not a long term solution to bring up sales.

Marvel has already announced there will be a second printing for Original Sin 1. Which we can still order the first print of and Marvel is still taking orders on the first print to set the print run for the title. Meaning Original Sin 1 hasn’t been printed up yet and orders for it are still being accepted. By announcing a second print Marvel makes it look like the first print of Original Sin has sold out even though at this point it is impossible to have sold out.

Thankfully we sold out of Inhumans issue 1. Marvel has announced that Inhumans issue one which just came out last month will be reprinted for free and included with this months Amazing Spiderman 1. Which means if you bought Inhuman 1 already and are buying Amazing Spiderman 1 when it comes out you might regret you bought Inhumans 1.

Word is Marvel paid artist Joe Madureira a lot to have him work on Inhumans and it is selling far lower than Marvel would like. Inhumans has been advertised to be like Game of Thrones. I read the first issue. If Marvel thinks that issue is like Game of Thrones then they have never seen the show or read the book. Yes, Medusa is a queen. Other than that zip.

Marvel’s previous Infinity crossover was not a hit with the readers. It was also used to launch the Inhumans crossover that introduced new superpower characters that were Inhumans. It was also under whelming. This has led into a rocky launch for the Inhumans comic.

This may be why Marvel is offering so many variants and incentives to retailers to order more of the upcoming Original Sin crossover. It has worked. I ordered lower originally on Original Sin than I did on Infinity due to many customers saying Infinity has burnt them and they wanted nothing to do with the next Marvel crossover. Now I have ordered higher to get the better discounts and variant covers. Marvel does great marketing their material they just need to improve their products to keep readers interested.

Where is the new character for the next generation? With creators having more rights and more freedom to create where is the new hero for the next generation?

Is Spawn which first appeared in 1992 the biggest newest comic creation? Meaning there have been no new characters created since 1992 that have eclipsed Spawn in popularity? That is very sad. Spawn is even a shell of what it once was.

A new rumor is that Nick Fury (not Nick Fury Jr) will be getting “killed” to make way for Nick Fury Jr to be the one and only Nick Fury. All in the effort to get the Nick Fury from the movies into the comics more. Which results in no new readership even though that is Marvel’s hope that it will. The mythical new readership as I call it. The big screen and comics are two different beasts. What works for one doesn’t translate well for the other all the time. Remember the X Men in the comics went to the black leather look to be more recognizable as the X Men from the movies? It didn’t work and that era of the X Men has been mostly forgotten. Marvel focus on telling good comic stores. Not trying to get that one mythical new reader who went and seen a Marvel movie and all the sudden will see that character in comic book somehow. There is no advertising by comics in the mainstream to get the average movie goers attention. The average non comic reader is unaware there is a monthly comic based on what movie they just went and seen. Some people don’t even know comics are still published.

When the Keaton Batman movie first came out the media blitz was very good about covering the source material. I remember watching the news and being impressed by the coverage. Local comic book owners were interviewed about Batman. Big news outlets actually went over in great detail about the history of Batman and the Joker. Naming their first appearances. Who created them and more. Now mainstream media just announces upcoming movies and mentions in passing what comic book hero they are based on. Which is surprising since there is so much more info readily available in this day and age. There was no Internet when the Batman movie staring Keaton came out. Yes, I am old!

I used to have a display case at the local movie theater featuring comics of upcoming comic related movies. It did result in new customers. I also remember thinking “Wow, I do more promotion that there are comic based on these movie properties than the million dollar corporations that publish the comics and movies do. ” Isn’t that odd? Yes, I admit Time Warner and Disney have more money than I do. Don’t tell anyone

If you are interested in running Star Wars rpg or D&D rpg come in and talk to me. I have people that want to play it but not run it. If we do have game nights again for D&D and Star Wars rpg it will need to be on Tuesdays.

Journey Into Nyx MTG prerelease on April 26th!

Also I am working on  a possible purchase of a major collection of Magic cards. Meaning there is a lot of them and a lot from sets from before the store opened. It isn’t just binders of magic cards it is a storage of Magic cards. From the last From the Vault collection to multiple original Jace’s. What happened to make such a major Magic collector get out of Magic? A bad gaming experience that ticked him off at a store. Not here thankfully. Tonight I should know more.

I am hoping this month to have an updated website with a working checkout for online shopping!  With some new images for the site. Wish me luck.

Plenty of great reading material here at Rodman Comics. Come on in and purchase some!

Not having Magic on Sundays and Mondays have cut back on costs. By not giving away prizes such as booster packs it save me money.

Some gamers have a differnet outlook to gaming. Almost like by me having gaming it is an entitlement program. One gamer threatened not to come to a free gaming event. I was more confused than anything. How does that hurt my business in anyway? Oh no one less person hanging out in my store for free.

The heroclix gaming goes well. But the cost for the prize support for heroclixs events keeps going up. I have only been open a full three years. In that time prize support for heroclixs has more than doubled. AVX Round 4 prize support cost me in the triple digits. So over a hundred bucks just to give out prize support for the last month of AVX. That doesn’t include the previous three months of prizes which were at less less than $100 expect for the first month of AVX. But the costs adds up. War of Light month 6 prize support I still do not know how much it will be. As retailers that field the games we order often before knowing the costs for prize support. At the moment I know what months one and two of War of Light will cost. Sure we can cancel our order but if I start War of Light and end it in its second month that will leave the gamers less than thrilled. Though truthfully it may be time for Rodman Comics to get out of Heroclix events. Its great to give out giant heroclixs as prizes but not cost effective. If it were up to me I would do just op kits with three different regular size heroclix and maps to keep costs down.

As I have stated before the War of Light Heroclix Event to me as a fan looks cool. The way it is set up as a retailer I just shake my head. Seriously encourage us retailers to order overly heavy since Wizkids does not expect for months 5 and 6 to have boosters on hand? We are suppose to stock up so we have them on hand because Wizkids will not do so? How does that make business sense for us store owners? We invest heavily to hold on to material that we will have paid for months in advance? I am going to tie up money for months hoping that interest in War of Light stays high in its last two months? I called it right with the Fear Itself monthly event. The demand and prices dropped like a rock after a few months. People will not wait to play the game each month to get the heroclixs they want. They simply got them off the internet as time went on.

Have the next heroclix event be weekly or bi weekly. Then more people will play the events. In this day and age of instant gratification people will not wait a month between events. Which shocking enough a weekly format is rumored to be something Wizkids is thinking about for an upcoming heroclix event.

And seriously Wizkids? You wait till this month to announce that stores that had left over Fear Itself boosters that were only suppose to be sold in the gaming events could sell them as regular boosters? That showed a lack of foresightedness. And for War of Light you want me to stock up on boosters? Then if I have left over boosters I have to wait for your blessing to sell them? Even though I paid for them months ago? Try that with Walmart and Target that you give exclusive heroclixs to sell to. Tell them they need to stock up on Heroclix inventory to hold on to for months before being able to sell them. Let me know how quickly they laugh off that idea.

If I had my way I would have indoor and outdoor map kits return for sale with 3D objects along with an exclusive heroclix to help get people into heroclixs.

Sadly I have seen no real connection between heroclix gaming or Magic gaming or any type of gaming leading to noticeable increase of sales. Meaning it does happen but far more people will walk in and buy heroclixs or Magic or X Wing items outside of gaming events. People that have no interest in playing in events buy at a far greater rate than gamers that play in events. The casual gamer is our money maker when it comes to gaming sales.

And then the casual gamer that starts showing up for events is taught by a handful of others not to shop here. To buy online instead. To play elsewhere. The hours spent playing here? Entitlement is taught. Its like if the owner is stupid enough to let people hang out here for free or at $1.33 an hour then shame on the owner.

Again back to Sundays and Mondays. The highest sales days were when there was no gaming going on. I still remember coming in one Monday and asking what the sales were. It was a record sales Monday. I asked my employee how many gamers showed up. “None” was the reply. People came in bought things and left.  Sales were higher when there were no gaming going on for those days.

Magic at least provides free prize support. And sends material to help out. For that I am grateful.

There are plenty of gamers that are quite positive and add to the gaming experience at the store. I started listed some but realized that I most likely would over look someone and hurt someone’s feelings. You should easily know who you are. There are those that I miss to. Andy where the heck you been? Judah I still get to see once in awhile but wants to do the responsible family man thing. The nerve of some people! Judah did make a cool proxy Rodman Comics card. I do like the quote he added to it.

Basically would the time be better spent on simply selling items? Our average non gamer comes in buys something and is grateful.

Does it make business sense to focus hours of time on gaming events instead of focusing more on sales? On one hand prereleases for Magic are money makers. Should I just do prereleases at the store instead of Magic twice a week? Those packs for prize support on game nights are paid for by me. With Magic products it isn’t a question of if they will sell it is a question of how quickly they will.

I enjoy heroclixs but it makes little business sense to buy something for over a $100 just to give it away. If I just want warm bodies in the store I can just say there will be a free ten dollar bill for anyone that comes in. The place will be packed in no time but what business sense does that make?

It is like free comic day. I do have one person who says it brought him back to comics. Which I didn’t even know till recently. And that was pure luck. He showed up at last years free comic day. But he didn’t know it was free comic day. He was in to buy some Magic packs and I wanted to get rid of the left over free comics sense it was late in the day and insisted that he take them. And he has been getting more into comics ever sense.

So Free Comic Day works you say? Those Free Comics cost me more than what one new customer brings in. Though if he is reading this I am still glad it worked for him. Don’t get me wrong. It would have been easier to give him comics from my over stock.

It is all a big balancing act. Just because comic sales are big right now doesn’t mean they always will be. It’s all a cycle. How long will the cycle last? If I keep the gaming going will it start bringing in more sales?

I say this just so everyone knows. There is no vindictiveness when I state this. In the future Heroclix gaming events may need to go. Again in three years the cost has more than doubled for prize support. There is nothing saying it will not double again. Five years ago if anyone would have said prize support would cost stores over $100 the players would have thought you were crazy. From what little I have figured out AVX is not the hit Wizkids is hoping for. It is too costly for the fans and it is too costly for the retailers. So maybe in the future Wizkids will learn not to go for the stars with the prices.

Saturday Night Magic is also something that may need to go in the future. $5 a person for 3 hours of entertainment is not something that can be locked in forever. As everyone knows everything keeps getting more expensive. My costs do. So $5 per person may need to change or the event may need to simply go away.

Star Wars X Wing. I should never have bought prize support for that. ‘Nuff said. It was doing better with out it.

Basically more selling less gaming may be the way to go in the future. Its what works best for us. When a gamer spends hours here and then announces he can buy something for a dollar cheaper off line I have to stop from replying I can just sell it online and save hours and money by not running gaming events. It is the truth.

Speaking earlier about Free Comic Day it has just been announced that the Mouse Guard hardcover due out on this year’s free comic day will be heavily allocated. Which will just make people want it more. No one will buy any issues of it afterwards but people will want what is preceived as hard to get. Much like the 3D Villians month covers from last September. Fun for all.

Wow, I sound bitter. Had a great sales week. Wasn’t sure what to type up for this weeks Projections. Let the fingers type away and produced more material for this weeks newsletter than I thought I would be able to by far.

Only thing comic wise that is new that comes to mind is why hasn’t more people said anything about Catwoman’s, Black Widow’s, and the Black Cat’s costumes? Do they all share the same black leather outfit with a big oval ring for a zipper and a knack of showing plenty of clevage? That is one heck of a zipper. Never moves after doing back flips. Stays in place even after a near by explosion  flings them off their feat against a near by wall. It is amazing the zipper ring being as big as it is never gets caught on anything.

What the heck I had to google this to make sure when I was told this. The White Queen used to be a stripper? How many male villains or heroes used to be Chippendale?  Sigh, and people wonder why more women don’t get into comics.

Alright I am done sounding like the bitter store owner for this weeks Projections.  No Saturday Night Magic this week. It will be back the following week. Friday Night Magic is still game on. Saturday X Wing Miniatures is good to go. AVX Round III is good to go this Saturday. Can the Avengers pull off their first win in the event?

Saturday April 5th we will be seeing the new Captain America movie. So far the buzz has been good.

As always feel free to like us on Facebook. And much more importantly always feel free to stop by and purchase from us! Thousands of comics on hand. Tons of heroclixs. Wide variety  of Magic cards. Statues galore. Great selection of action figures. And more!