Paperback Bazaar (Somersworth, NH)

Ralph DiBernardo reports:

Since its’ inception, the paperback bazaar has been a huge supporter of Free Comic Book Day.  Each year we spend thousands of dollars promoting the single best comic book event of the year. 

Free Comic Book Day 2005 at the paperback bazaar was a huge success.  Hundreds of people came through for their Free Comics, hot dogs and our storewide sale.  Later in the day we had Free Comic Book Day creators Rich Woodall and Matt Talbot of Johnny Raygun and Craig Rousseau of Ronin Hood come in to do free sketches and to sign comics.  Jennifer O also showed up with her PBBZ special FCBD offering.  Bringing in guests that have a FCBD book available certainly adds to the festivities.  In the past we have always had guests but we found last year that being able to provide new readers with the connection of meeting the people that produced one of their FREE books helps to commit them to the book.  That brief meeting gives them a connection to the people/person and they keep coming back for more.

Since we plan a big storewide sale the day always starts off strong – even in the middle of a rainstorm.  We opened the doors at 9:00 am and by 9:30 there were 30 plus people in the store.  This year there was less of a “have to be there ASAP” attitude as there has been in the past.  We stock the FCBD offerings in depth and by now people have come to realize this, so they do not feel like they are going to miss out.  At no time, from 9 – 5 were there less than 30 people in the store.  It never felt like we were slammed but there was always a decent crowd, shopping and perusing the FCBD offerings.

At 11:00 am the owner, James Morrison, fired up the grill (luckily, though it was pouring, we have a storage trailer behind the store – the perfect dry grilling spot).  By 2:00 pm Jim had served over 24 lbs of hot dogs, pounds of potato chips and hundreds of free sodas.  FCBD is a true national event and it has to be treated as such.  If you don’t go the distance for Free Comic Book Day you won’t realize the true potential of Free Comic Book Day.

Between 2:00 pm and 3:00 pm the creators showed up and immediately began doing Free Sketches.  Many patrons that had stopped in early in the day, came back to visit with the creators.  Several people brought portfolios to have reviewed.  Jennifer O, of Squarecat Comics was the first to arrive and provided people with her take on various heroes.  With a new trade paperback coming from Jetpack Press, Jennifer was happy to provide patrons with a small FCBD sampler, prepared for the paperback bazaar.  As Deathlok is one of my all time favorite characters she provided me with her version of Ralphlok!  Rich Woodall and Matt Talbot arrived next, fresh from their FCBD visit with Larry’s Comics of Lowell, and barley had time to put down their bags before the sketch requests came in.  We gave away nearly 500 copies of the Free Comic Book Day Edition of Johnny Raygun.  Since the creative team is local, and their book was actually the next sequential issue of their story arc, people came out of the woodwork for it.  Craig Rousseau was the last to arrive.  We had held off on giving away his book until he arrived and they were almost all snatched up with in the hour.

In the end our sales were a little bit less than they were the year before but it was still a highly successful day for the paperback bazaar – we will be back for next years FCBD.