Bend has gotten bigger. Bigger than I ever thought it would be.

But that doesn't mean we're BIG.

A constant reminder to me of this is the daily "On the Road" feature in Diamond Comic Distributers website. Some of the stores featured are on their second go around, by now. On the Comic Book Industry Alliance, stores are constantly talking about visits from their 'reps' from the comic companies, from game companies, from Diamond. They talk about different writers and artists who not only visit their stores, but are regular customers.

I've never been visited by a rep from any company except I think Top Shelf, and that was more or less happenstance. Even Dark Horse and Oni and other Portland companies tend to ignore us.

What would it take for a visit? Well, someone would probably have to start from Portland or Eugene or Medford and so they are looking at a minimum 5 hour drive to and from Bend, to visit ONE store.

I was going to google the distances from the valley to Boise, from the Washington border all the way south to Reno, because I believe I'm the only full scale, long term comic shop in all the area. But I think I'm safe in saying that there are THOUSANDS of square miles without comic shops.

A missed opportunity? Not unless you intend to sell comics to jack rabbits and coyotes. It's a big empty space.

So, as far as I'm concerned, my customers are the good people of the tri-county area and tourists. Maybe a couple of hundred thousand possible customers.

Now according to the big influential retailers, that ought be enough people for several stores. They count how many stores are in metro areas, and arrive at the figure that 50k or on the upside 75k out to be enough for a store.

I'm not sure what they're missing. The synergy of the metro population? A different demographic? But I can tell you that after 27 years of operation we still are only 2/3rd the sales in monthly comics as the 'average' comic shop. It's possible I'm just really doing a lousy job of it. But even that is somewhat compensated by the fact that probably 20% of my business comes from tourists.

But because they are the big retailers, they are listened to. I, being a small retailer, probably don't know what I'm talking about -- otherwise, I'd be a big retailer, right? Even though I'm like the perfect test case -- a store with a full inventory, isolated from all other factors.

What's important is that I know it.