The newest TILTING AT WINDMILLS is up at Comic Book Resources.

Go. Read.

-B

Labels: Brian, retailing, Tilting

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Whoops, forgot to mention it earlier in the day: you can find May's TILTING AT WINDMILLS right here

-B

Labels: Brian, Tilting

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The new TILTING AT WINDMILLS is up at Comic Book Resources: thoughts on 20 years, New York City, Going to the Well, and "amazonfail"

I'm nearly caught back up on all of my work, reviews again from me in a few days...

-B

Labels: Brian, Tilting

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First off, the new TILTING AT WINDMILLS is up at Comic Book Resources -- it is all about the ComicsPRO meeting from last week, and also has a look inside Diamond's new warehouse.

But this week's bigger news is that on Wednesday, April 1st, it is the 20th anniversary of Comix Experience.

Whoa. Man, it sure don't feel like 20 years.

On 4/1, we're going to hold a food drive for the San Francisco Food Bank. If you bring a can of food in as a donation, then you will get 20% off absolutely anything in the store.

And, yes, Wednesday is New Comics Day; and, yes, that discount will apply to that week's new comics as well, so, y'know, it is kind of a good deal.

The discount will ONLY be given with a food donation, so do make sure you bring one, otherwise you'll have to run next door to the market and have to buy one, and you'll probably feel a little silly.

Anyway, I do hope to see you there, and I would certainly appreciate it if you can help spread the word. I'd very much like to have the big food barrel all filled up when they come to take it back the next day!

Finally, speaking personally, I know that I will be happy to take any and all donations of 20 year old scotch whiskey, and I'll be just as happy to share it with people who show up as well, so we can drink and have a good time too, as well as helping out a great charity.

Hope to see you there on Wednesday, April 1st, at Comix Experience!

-B

Labels: Brian, Tilting, Twentieth Anniversary

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Personally, I think I did a really good job this month. You can judge for yourself, by going here.

Dirk Deppey calls the beginning A "feelgood throat-clearing", and I know why he does, but, honestly, a lot of that is the great feelings that Ben's school instills in me for the Future and America.

Like I JUST got back this morning from the school, and Jazz musician Marcus Shelby (who is one of the "Artists in Residence" there) just performed a concert for the kids. In between songs he talked about Obama's presidency, and MLK and Rosa Parks, and all of the first graders and Kinders got up to sing "We Shall Overcome", and I had a genuine lump in my throat.

It is easy to be cynical; but I'm trying to live for Hope these days...

Anyway, go read the column, lemme know what you think!!

-B

Labels: Brian, Hope, Tilting

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You can find it over on Comic Book Resources!

As noted in the article, you can also pre-order Tilting at Windmills v2 TP, with the end of my tenure at Comics & Games Retailer, as well as my entire run at Newsarama, from any store with a Diamond account by using the order code of DEC084122, thanks to the loverly folks over at IDW, hooray!

Go ahead and preorder that copy and put some pennies into my pocket!

Feel free to drop any comments here, as well...

-B

Labels: Brian, Tilting

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You can find it right here, if you haven't stumbled upon it already

-B

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Go read the newest TILTING AT WINDMILLS on CBR!

-B

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You can find the newest Tilting at Windmills up right here. Go, read, give Jonah hits.


-B

Labels: Brian, retailing, Tilting

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The new TILTING AT WINDMILLS is up right here.

[If you hit the link below for the label "POS", you'll get the whole series, too]

We're very nearly a year later on installing the POS system, and several conclusions about it are in the new TILTING.

We've been spending the last 2 (and probably next three) days going through each "Hasn't sold in a year" title to set it's Minimum Point (the place where it triggers a reorder) down to zero -- it's a pretty laborious task on 1400 items, but there you go. I've made a couple of suggestions on how to make it better to Mark & Ben & AJ at MOBY, and we're trading mails back and forth.

Once I clear off all the dead books from the racks, then I have to do the same process for the floppies. Thankfully that's mostly limited to 3 racks where my natural weekly pruning skills are probably not enough.

At a guess, and not killing myself to get it done, I'll have all of the stale merchandise removed from inventory, and never again automatically reorderable by 7/31, which is the "official" start of POS date.

After that, I'll be running weekly (probably) stale item reports, and it will only be, say 5 or so items a week we'll be looking to yank, which will be an easily manageable task. This one is a pain in the ass because of the scope, but then I'll be down to a lean-mean, retailing machine.

The FUNNY thing is that There's now about 10 books that were "On The List" that actually sold this week. I won't be restocking them, but not all "Dead" merchandise is creating equal, y'know?

Finally, just because I pulled out the entire database to look at a few things, here's a list of the 100 (well, OK, 114) Top Selling Books at Comix Experience over the last (roughly) last 11 and a half months, after the jump:



1 LOEG BLACK DOSSIER HC 2ND PTG (OCT078350)
2 WATCHMEN TP (FEB058406)
3 BUFFY SEASON 8 TP VOL 01 LONG WAY HOME
4 Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 01 UNMANNED (OCT058020)
5 WALKING DEAD VOL 7 THE CALM BEFORE TP
6 SCOTT PILGRIM GN VOL 04 SCOTT PILGRIM GETS IT TOGETHER (JUN0
7 Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 09 MOTHERLAND (FEB070362) (MR)
8 Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 02 CYCLES (OCT058281) (MR)
9 100 BULLETS TP VOL 11 ONCE UPON A CRIME (MAY070233) (MR)
DMZ TP VOL 03 PUBLIC WORKS (JUN070267) (MR)
FABLES TP VOL 01 LEGENDS IN EXILE (APR058372)
12 EX MACHINA TP VOL 06 POWER DOWN (AUG070308) (MR)
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 10 WHYS AND WHEREFORES
14 LOEG VOL ONE TP (JUL068290)
LOEG VOL TWO TP (FEB058407)
16 HELLBOY VOL 07 THE TROLL WITCH & OTHERS TP
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 03 ONE SMALL STEP (MAR068027) (MR)
18 BATMAN YEAR ONE DELUXE SC (OCT060163)
FABLES TP VOL 02 ANIMAL FARM (MAR058123)
20 ALL STAR SUPERMAN HC VOL 01 (DEC060188)
SANDMAN TP VOL 01 PRELUDES & NOCTURNES (DEC058090)
V FOR VENDETTA TP (APR058272)
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 04 SAFEWORD (APR058056) (MR)
24 ACME NOVELTY LIBRARY HC #18 (SEP073597) (MR) (C: 0-1-0)
DMZ TP VOL 04 FRIENDLY FIRE (DEC070294) (MR)
FABLES TP VOL 10 THE GOOD PRINCE
POWERS TP VOL 10 COSMIC (MR)
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 08 KIMONO DRAGONS (AUG060299) (MR)
29 BUFFY SEASON 8 TP VOL 02 NO FUTURE FOR YOU
FABLES TP VOL 09 SONS OF EMPIRE (MAR070271) (MR)
WE 3 TP (APR050419) (MR)
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 06 GIRL ON GIRL (SEP050317) (MR)
33 BATMAN DARK KNIGHT RETURNS TP (DEC058055)
THE FART PARTY TP
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 05 RING OF TRUTH (MAY050306) (MR)
Y THE LAST MAN TP VOL 07 PAPER DOLLS (FEB060341) (MR)
37 BLACK HOLE COLLECTED SC
COMPLETE PERSEPOLIS TP
CRIMINAL TP VOL 02 LAWLESS (OCT072158) (MR)
DMZ TP VOL 01 ON THE GROUND (MAR060383) (MR)
POWERS TP VOL 11 SECRET IDENTITY
SANDMAN TP VOL 02 THE DOLLS HOUSE (APR058268)
SHORTCOMINGS HC
44 DMZ TP VOL 02 BODY OF A JOURNALIST (NOV060292) (MR)
FABLES TP VOL 08 WOLVES (SEP060313) (MR)
PREACHER TP VOL 01 GONE TO TEXAS NEW EDITION (MAR050489) (MR
ZOMBIE SURVIVAL GUIDE TP (DEC058019)
48 CRIMINAL TP VOL 01 COWARD (MR)
DC UNIVERSE THE STORIES OF ALAN MOORE (NOV050268) (MR)
WALKING DEAD TP VOL 08 MADE TO SUFFER
WORLD WAR Z ORAL HISTORY OF ZOMBIE WAR SC
52 CIVIL WAR TP
FABLES TP VOL 04 MARCH OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERS (OCT058021) (M
JACK OF FABLES TP VOL 02 JACK OF HEARTS (JUL070305) (MR)
JUDENHASS GN
PREACHER TP VOL 02 UNTIL THE END OF THE WORLD NEW EDITION (M
PREACHER TP VOL 03 PROUD AMERICANS NEW EDITION (JUL068334) (
SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN TP VOL 02
WALKING DEAD VOL 2 TP MILES BEHIND US TP NEW PTG
60 DARK TOWER GUNSLINGER BORN PREM HC
EX MACHINA TP VOL 01 THE FIRST HUNDRED DAYS (SEP058036) (MR)
HELLBOY VOL 01 SEED OF DESTRUCTION TP
SAM & MAX SURFIN HIGHWAY TP (SEP073953)
64 EX MACHINA TP VOL 03 FACT V FICTION (JAN060357) (MR)
FABLES TP VOL 05 THE MEAN SEASONS (JAN050373) (MR)
HELLBOY TP VOL 08 DARKNESS CALLS
WANTED GN (NEW PTG)
68 ALAN MOORE THE COMPLETE WILDCATS TP (MAY070211)
BATMAN GRENDEL NEW PTG TP
BOYS TP VOL 02 GET SOME (DEC073541) (MR) (C: 0-0-2)
BPRD TP VOL 07 GARDEN OF SOULS
CHANCE IN HELL HC
EX MACHINA TP VOL 02 TAG (JUL050285) (MR)
EX MACHINA TP VOL 04 MARCH TO WAR (AUG060269) (MR)
JOSS WHEDONS FRAY FUTURE SLAYER TP
LAST MUSKETEER SC (OCT073506)
NEXTWAVE AGENTS OF HATE TP VOL 01 THIS IS WHAT THEY WANT
SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN VOL 1 TP
SIGNAL TO NOISE 2ND ED HC
WARREN ELLIS CROOKED LITTLE VEIN HC
81 ABSOLUTE SANDMAN HC VOL 02 (JUN070259) (MR)
ASTONISHING X-MEN TP VOL 03 TORN
CONFESSIONS OF A BLABBERMOUTH (JUN070258)
EX MACHINA TP VOL 05 SMOKE SMOKE (DEC060271) (MR)
FABLES 1001 NIGHTS OF SNOWFALL SC (DEC070297) (MR)
FILTH TP (MR)
FUN HOME TP
GOOD AS LILY (MAY070226)
JACK OF FABLES TP VOL 01 NEARLY GREAT ESCAPE (NOV060300) (MR
KINGDOM COME TP (NOV058067)
LIFE AND TIMES OF SCROOGE MCDUCK TP VOL 01 2ND PTG (FEB07823
LIVING AND THE DEAD GN
MAKING COMICS STORYTELLING SECRETS OF COMICS MANGA & GN SC (
PRIDE OF BAGHDAD SC (OCT070256) (MR)
PULPHOPE ART OF PAUL POPE SC (JUL062792) (MR)
SUPERMARKET TP
ULTIMATES 2 TP VOL 02 GRAND THEFT AMERICA
98 ASTONISHING X-MEN TP VOL 4 UNSTOPPABLE
BPRD TP VOL 01 HOLLOW EARTH & OTHER STORIES
BPRD TP VOL 08 KILLING GROUND
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER OMNIBUS TP VOL 01
CASTAWAYS SC
CHRONICLES OF WORMWOOD LAST ENEMY GN (AUG073417) (MR)
DOOM PATROL TP VOL 06 PLANET LOVE (OCT070251)
EMPOWERED VOL 02 TP
FABLES TP VOL 03 STORYBOOK LOVE (MAY068085) (MR)
HELLBOY VOL 02 WAKE THE DEVIL TP
HELLBOY VOL 06 STRANGE PLACES TP
INVISIBLES TP #1 SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION (SEP068118) (MR)
PREACHER TP VOL 04 ANCIENT HISTORY NEW EDITION (MAY050299) (
SANDMAN TP VOL 03 DREAM COUNTRY (JAN058148)
SUPERMAN RED SON TP (NOV058130)
THE ARRIVAL GN
TRANSMETROPOLITAN TP VOL 01 BACK ON THE STREET (JUN058246)

-B

Labels: Brian, POS, retailing, Tilting

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The new Tilting at Windmills is live here

Always interested in your thoughts.

-B

Labels: Brian, Tilting

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