Good cons, shows and signing locations

[lene1949]

Originally Posted by MargaretLake

That's interesting about Barnes & Noble/Borders. How does that work for indies?

What are indies?

I have wanted to ask this question for quite a while, but didn't want to appear stupid... That has now changed.

[Steven Lake]

Indies = Independents. IE, people doing stuff independent of the big houses, be that publishing, movie, music, etc.

[MargaretLake]

Originally Posted by lene1949

What are indies?

I have wanted to ask this question for quite a while, but didn't want to appear stupid... That has now changed.

At least you had the nerve to ask. I wondered about it for a year before I finally figured it out.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by lene1949

What are indies?

Individual authors/publishers like me, for instance.

[Steven Lake]

Ok, I'm scratching MediaWest*Con from my list of recommended events. It turns out that it's not the "Fan Con" they advertise it to be. It's a rather thinly veiled promotional event for T'Kuhtian Press. And if you're not one of their published authors, hell will freeze over before they'll let you in. I should know. They kicked us out, claiming that they had oversold their vendor booths. And yet when you check with their vendor rep, they've actually got quite a few left unsold. So, uh, yeah. Someone was afraid of the competition and make sure that we couldn't come. So don't even bother with these guys. It's just a self promoting publisher event in the guise of a fan convention.

[Steven Lake]

OH yeah, and before I forget, I just happened to stumble onto a group who's doing comic cons that are actually quite huge. CES or E3 huge if you know what I mean.

http://www.wizardworld.com/

They're called Wizard World Conventions, and they do comic book and gaming conventions the size of GenCon, Dragon Con, and Comic Con. IE, 50,000-150,000+ people at each event! And they have like 12 different shows stretched across the eastern US to choose from. ^_^

[Steven Lake]

http://www.durandfantasyexpo.com/
http://www.kerrytownbookfest.org/

Well, I've been running around, trying out different cons, and experimenting with which work best and which don't, and I have to say that I've actually taken quite a few off my list. The above ones are new events I've come across that are good locations for book sales and signings. And yes, you can sell ebooks there too! You just need to bring them in on CD is all. Now, as for the other events I listed before, let me update those and which ones were good, and which sucked. (or which genre other than sci-fi would work)

Best Books - Jackson Crossing Mall, Jackson MI
- Scrub this as a good location. In the short term it seemed good. But in the long term it's not.

Evolution Games - Lansing, MI
- It's only really a good location if you're selling books involving games or gaming.

Penguicon - Detroit, MI
- Excellent location! Good sales in general. But you actually get better kickbacks if you mingle with the con goers than if you just remain in the dealers room.

Detroit Motor City Comic Con - Detroit, MI
- Outstanding show! Face time could be a LOT better, but as for sheer sales numbers, it's top notch!

JaFax - Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI
- Uh, not a good location for anyone. Anime stuff will sell, but since it's a free con, people typically don't buy much here, but rather to just hang out and have fun. You can make sales, but it doesn't typically justify the table fee. You do however get EXCELLENT face time with the con goers, as you get a lot of attention and plenty of people stopping and talking to you, all of whom are very friendly. So even if you don't sell many books or manga (manga and anime stuff goes over best here), as long as you have at least a fantasy or sci-fi book, you'll get some nice publicity and interaction.

Gencon - Indianapolis, IN
- It's an incredibly wild event. Lot and Lots and LOTS of buyers and people flowing past, sales are outstanding, and books go quickly. However, you get almost ZERO facetime. It's like consumerism gone insane. It's a good event if you want raw sales numbers, but it will NOT give you any good face time or help increase your fan base.

DragonCon - Atlanta, Georgia
- Same as Gencon, only bigger.

Anime Central - Chicago, IL
- Uh, unless you're 100% hardcore anime, don't even bother. If you don't have something anime or anime related, they won't even talk to you. And even if you do, the sales and facetime are sorta blah. Most people seem to be there just to look, but not buy.

Youmacon - Detroit, MI
- Same as Anime Central, only with a whole lot less people.

Also, if you do go to any of these conventions, always, always make sure that you get a table near the door or the front (if you can), and be sure to put an advertisement for your books in their publication or convention book (if one is available) as it'll actually help your sales.

Also, I've found a couple other sources of conventions that are worth looking into. The best thing to do however is to google dive for conventions of the type of genre your book(s) are in. If you're into sci-fi, you'll find a LOT of really great lists, including several at wikipedia, and another at fanboyslist.com.

[kcmay]

I've found this list helpful (I write SFF):

http://www.fanboyslist.com/

[Steven Lake]

Yeah, fanboyslist is a goodone. But he needs to expand it a bit more.

[Joseph Mitchell]

Steven, I'm interested in what you said about selling 500-1500 books. Can you elaborate some? First, how do you get all these books? Do you have to rent a u-haul to transport them all in, and spend all day carrying heavy boxes of books from the parking lot to your table to sell?

I love GenCon. I've been there twice, just as a fan. Going there to sell books is something that definitely interests me, so long as I don't have to spend every minute at the table. I'd like to see some of the sights while I'm there.

[Steven Lake]

Well, getting them in for me is the easy part. Well, sorta easy. It's like 50 or so cases of books just for my stuff alone. But by the time the show is done, you're typically taking orders because you ran out of books towards the end of the third day of the show. And that's just Gencon. Dragoncon is even more so.

As for getting the books in, we usually caravan down for Gencon, and spread out our books (I go with one other author to the event and we split the table fee and share the table, cause it's better to divide the costs between you and another, as it makes your overall costs less) between several vehicles. Three to be exact, each one packed to the roof with cases of books. Now Dragoncon, since you need quite a few more books for that, you get a uhaul and you caravan down with each of you carrying a trailer, or filling your vehicle with books. It takes two trailers and three vehicles to get them all down there.

As for carrying them in, that's easy. They won't let you drive inside with your stuff, but you can bring large carts to move your stuff around. Some places will rent them to you. If you can't rent one, you can get a nice dolly from Menards or one of the other big warehouse building supply places, like Lowes and so on. Then you just stack your stuff onto them (I recommend getting a dolly with the ability to be lowered onto 4 wheels) and make a couple trips and load up your booth with as many boxes as will fit, and then leave whatever is left in the trailer. If you run low during the day (You really should pack your booth as full as you can get with boxes behind your table, and still comfortably move around) you can always go grab more. If you need to stock up in the morning, you'll have time before the floor opens to bring in more boxes.

As for how I get all those books, I buy them from my publisher at printing cost + a small service fee. Also, the larger your purchase size, the cheaper the printing costs, and thus the cheaper your book costs. Also, buying from your publisher (I'm referring to print copies, mind you, although you *can* do ebooks on cd if you like, which I highly recommend doing) is how you get print copies for signings. As for how you'd get an ebook on cd, well, you'd have to work that out with your publisher.

And lastly, do you need to stay at the table all day, every day of the show? Not really. If there are more than one of you there (I highly recommend having no less than 2 of you at the table), which will free you periodically to leave and do other things. And as I said before, it's best to do it with at least one other author. Also, I recommend doing what I call a sales tag team. IE, you help the others sell their books, and they help you sell yours, while each of you are trying to sell your own. Also, if you have print copies, or posters, or anything else that can be signed, and you need to step away from the table, be sure to leave behind at least two cases of signed print copies, and at least 20 or more signed copies of other things if you have additional items there for sale that can be signed.

Going to conventions to sell books is mostly about selling print copies of your books, posters of characters and book covers, ebooks on CD, audiobooks, and other tangible products to the visiting guests. And believe it or not, for every 1 ebook on cd, or just one ebook in general that I sell, I easily sell 10 print copies. Now that's not a knock against ebooks, but rather a fact, that when people leave they want something tangible they can hold in their hands, and for some reason they view print books as a bigger bang for their buck, and a more valuable asset than ebooks. That may change at some point, but for now that's the way it is.