So I feel like all these things are going my way. But of course things crop up now and then that get me all sad about my position in the industry all over again. So I’m alternating, as usual, between feeling like a superstar and a complete pudd-whacking loser.
THE BABY
When we had Oscar, I sent out a mailer to everyone on the Tabloia Mailing List saying I was a dad. Then I sent out pictures to all our friends, including all our comics professional friends – artists, distributors, editors, reviewers; everyone. It was great to get all these fun emails from all my comics celebrity artists, and I’m tempted to post them up at the website somewhere. We’ll see…
So that’s the positive part. The bad fall-out was, this mailer caused people, for the first time in the eight mailers I’ve sent since November 2005, to ask to be removed from the mailer. And since it’s the first time, I second guess myself and wonder if I’m not partially responsible, and I feel guilty as hell. Will this be the mailer that goes down in history as “that” inappropriate mailer.
The previous mailer, I had mentioned how Elizabeth was dilated three centimeters and her cervix was thinned out eighty-five percent. Then, down in San Diego, I was telling everyone the same figures. Finally, Elizabeth pointed out to me all the disgusted faces with which so many people replied to my figures, that it may be a little too much information for a lot of people. So then we joked, Okay, I’ll have to send out a follow-up email that there is a change in policy, and beginning now I won’t mention your cervix, vagina, or other body parts. But then I sent out that very email, and all of a sudden, it didn’t seem so funny any more, and I had insecure misgivings about it.
I like to think this is the reason we had our highest (and only) requests yet to be removed from the mailer. The reason I feel especially sick about it is that one of the requests came from a major player in the industry and distributor of my books. Yow!
DISTRIBUTION PROBLEMS
When I submitted my Dr. DeBunko story for distribution, I also informed them I wanted to send out flyers with Dr. DeBunko sneak peeks to all the stores who sell indie comics. I’d done this when my first issue of Tabloia came out, and I thought I would try it again, now that I was publishing a comic that began with issue #1 – the ultimate marketing strategy, as opposed to my previous “issue number 572” as a first issue – which turned out not to be such a good marketing strategy.
I was just recently switched to a new representative, because my original one got a promotion. My new one admitted he wasn’t sure how to do this promotion, but that he would check with the original rep to get me set up.
So for the last two months I’ve been emailing or calling him and asking him what he needs from me so that we can make sure these flyers get sent out. A month ago I finally printed out and sent him 600 flyers, which cost me over a hundred dollars to print and send. Still no word, so finally today I called my original rep to see if he could enlighten me on the progress of this effort. I learned that I shouldn’t have sent them to the rep, I should have sent them to the warehouse, but only after getting a Purchase Order, which of course I’d never gotten. All this being the case, he informed me that there was no way these flyers would get out to stores before stores ordered the books. So in other words, not only am I out all the time and money of designing and printing these flyers, but also I will not be getting any promotion for this comic that I wanted to really push.
I was pretty pissed, but what can you do. Except fume about all the other stuff that’s gone wrong, which I will continue in next week’s thrilling blog installment!
As I say, rock star, loser, super stud, failure…What a roller coaster this industry can be.