So today is an exciting day for me at my comic & toy shop Conquest Comics. For today is the day that I start (once again), our gigantic comic back issue restock. This is where I infuse our floor stock of older issues. The reason I’m so pumped to hop back into this project once more is it allows me to focus on several areas simultaneously. We get to straighten up the back room where hundreds of long boxes are stacked floor to ceiling, and restock not only the back issues…but the dollar boxes and choice wall books as well. So this project checks a lot of boxes.
Speaking of boxes, I’ll be adding in a couple hundred long boxes of back issues on the floor for customers to browse by the time I finish…which might take me a year to fully finish. But once it’s complete, we will be a more organized well oiled machine when it comes to back stock. Right now, if it’s not on the floor…it’s back here which is slowly being organized and usually not able to be found efficiently. The goal is to change that.
We have our over 300 long boxes on the floor sorted in alphabetical order and separated by Marvel, DC, & Indy books. Today I’m starting with Marvel letter A which is a big letter due to long running titles such as Amazing Spider-Man & Avengers. A will probably take me a couple of weeks to get through on its own.
Funny enough, we need most of the run of Alf which comes as a surprise to me…outside of the nutty #48…who the hell is buying Alf these days?!? Ah well, more filler is a good thing as our back issue selection is one of our strong suits here. Most shops these days have little to no back issues, so we take great pride that we have almost too large of a selection.
Separating wall books is fun as well. Sone of this stuff hasn’t been seen in years, so as I go through em I stumble upon tons of cool variants, key issues, and first appearances that I separate. That stiff will either end up on the wall here, or in some lucky cases, even sent off to CGC to get graded. You can even see where there are lots of gaps as Amazing Spider-Man wall books sell like hotcakes!!! I’ll have lots of new deliciousness to display shortly!
Today has been slower so far which is good for projects like this as it allows me to kinda work uninterrupted for a bit. I have to blend 2 different sources of Marvel letter A’s while seeing what we need on the floor. Bag & board em up, price em, and make sure everything is in order while separating dollar books. I have a hard rule that if it’s not a key issue and I have 4 or more copies of any issue, I take the most beat up one for the bargain bin. Those get attacked hardcore as well as we have a wide selection of books there for a buck each or 12 for $10. It’s a good place to fill runs. Currently all of the boxes on the bottom are empty meaning I have lots of tastiness to add here.
Dollar boxes are a phenomenal way to get rid of big chunks of inventory in a hurry. People love getting a deal, so these get raided often…and it’s not all trash. Perfect example is last week we bought a collection of about 1000 books. They were all in decent to good shape but had one major problem. They soaked up a lovely mildew small as they were stored in a dank attic for years. So I popped 99% of them books straight in here including Infinity Gauntlet #1, X-Men #4, Uncanny X-Men #282, Amazing Spider-Man #365, and a few other smaller 1st appearances. Sone of those books are $15-$30 dollar books. Not too shabby a find for a buck or less.
Well, lunch is over and I better get back to it. This will be my view for the next…uh…well this year basically. Let the fun begin!!!
Thx for checking out my nonsense!
Blewitt
If only your shop was somewhere nearby where I could come lurk there...menacingly...
I fear one day me pulling up and seeing you lurking…creepily in my parking lot like a nerdy vagrant. But seriously, I’d love to give you the tour one day if you can ever muster your way up here.
I've been talking about visiting Massachusetts sometime in the next year or so with my wife, if we do end up heading that way we'll just make a detour to NJ and I'll come say hello, bruv.
That would be awesome. I’ve had a bunch of friends from here visit throughout the years. Would be an honor to have you stink up the joint.
That's a lot of comics. Do you ever stop to read one? I hope this is a good year for you.
To be honest, I don’t really read too much these days. I miss aspects of it, but daily life sucks enough of my time away that I don’t have it in me these days to get sucked back in. Lol
Well I hope you enjoy it all in other ways.
Oh there’s still a ton I love about comics in general. One day I’ll get back into reading again. Probably when I exit the shop in the future.
But for now, I’ll enjoy paging through em briefly to peruse the art, piercing together my Amazing Spider-Man run that’s been in the making for 3 decades, and living vicariously through my customers. Lol
I see no LABELS!!! How do you track these?
Also do you have an e-commerce site because it is that hardest thing in the world to get a full series of DC without it being severely thumbed or just wrong comics...I would rather buy it from someone I could trust..
Lol. We have an archaic but efficient way of dealing with inventory. Lol
We don’t do a ton online. We focus on in the shop and even conventions now and again. We dabble online when we sell one of our exclusive variant covers. Hopefully I’ll have a truly badass one this year to share.
Lmk what you are looking for? Where are you based? No good shops near ya?
There is no comic shop in Saudi Arabia lol...I try to get what I can from Amazon but have been burned way too many times...
Oh wow. Nothing there at all? Damn!
I’ll hit you up on discord abd connect t on my day off. We can discuss to see if I can be “your stateside nerd source”. Lol
Seeing this reminds me I have a box like this I need to sort through to offload the contents. I have it in storage at a friends and it just keeps getting put off and put off haha. On my last visit back we did get round to cataloguing the contents but then I zipped off again and still the box sits there in the dark waiting waiting …
If you ever need help going through it, I’d be happy to help you zip through em for any gems. Just lmk!
Awesome! Whats the best way of linking up Discord?
Yup yup. What’s your info there? I’ll hit u up.
scubahead#2640
Just reached out.
I would definitely loved to visit your comics shop. Its beautiful and i love reading too. So you can imagine. You are doing amazingly well, sir. Well done.
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Veews
I’d love to have ya! Are there any cool shops in your area???