A specialty of a specialty.

To continue to line of thought from the last post:

The irony -- as I mentioned with Euro boardgames -- is that I can do a specialty of a specialty easier than I can do the entire line of specialty. Except for one major exception.

I've always been a "full-service" comic shop. By this I mean, I carry the entire gamut of comic product. I carry supplies, and I carry all the many types of comics. Not all of them sell well -- some are 'prestige' titles that I think every "full-service" store should carry. Maus won the Pulitzer Price, but sells slow, but I'd not be a good comic shop if I didn't carry it.

I carry a full inventory of comic related material; full runs of graphic novels, back-issues, new comics, etc. etc.

It means keeping up with the news. It means keeping up with the product. It means devoting a large portion of my working life to being aware of the comic biz. It means devoting a significant amount of my space, time, energy and money to comics.

I can do comics because, at least so far, the mass market hasn't figured out how to take away the business. It's too detailed, too idiosyncratic, too service oriented. Even the internet can't quite fit the bill. (Though I need to qualify that statement -- with a "So Far...." Both the mass market (with graphic novels) and the internet have been making steady inroads; back issues, for instance, have become predominantly online.)

So I can be a "full-service" comic store.

Problem is, comics have always only gotten me 2/3rds of the way to viability.

I used to be a 'full service" card shop; but all the best-selling product got taken away from me, and I was left with all the service but none of the sales. I whittled and whittled it back, until I have the three or four things I still do, not the dozens of things I used to do.

To fill the gap, I kept looking for a specialty that I could do "full-service." Several times I was ready to make the leap into Gaming, but every time a full-service game store opened just as I was ready. So I would back off.

Eventually, I started filling in the gap by selecting parts of different specialties that I could do.

In essence, instead of being able to do a specialty, I narrowed it even further and did a specialty of a specialty.

I actually don't know of anyone else doing this. It may be unique to my situation: the town, the store, and me.

So instead of being a game store, I do very selective games.

Instead of being a card shop, I do very selective cards.

Instead of being a new bookstore, I do very selective books.

Instead of being a used bookstore, I do very selective used books.

Instead of being a toy store, I do very selective toys.

Instead of being a Japanese themed store, I do very selective manga and anime.

And so on.

In each case, there is something that gives me a small advantage, an edge, a way to make it work.

Sports cards:

In sports cards, I can piggyback the new boxes of cards on top of the large inventory of older cards. The older cards were paid for long ago, and so any time I sell one, it's pure profit.

I don't trade or buy or do current singles or try to have every brand or watch sports center every night or carry any reference books beyond the Becketts or discount or carry any but the most basic supplies.

But the cards have a small footprint (stackable) and I was already half-way there, so it was worth my while to select a portion of the new hobby boxes that come out every year.

Toys:

I find that if can either wait until they are on sale (past where the mass market is still interested) or can buy singles or just know that while 999 people out of a 1000 aren't going to want a toy, I know that I have a couple of people who will.

Games:

Like I said, the Euro games are stackable and relatively easy to carry and the mass market hasn't caught on (yet.)

Books:

Carry my favorites, cult genres, classics, and books I know will sell. Skip the bestsellers, mostly.

Assembled together under one roof, in a busy, tourist oriented downtown, and these small segments of small specialties ADD UP to enough to make up the other 350 50% of sales that I need to survive.