Free Comic Book Day Recap
Each year we do a recap email about Free Comic Book Day, easily our biggest event of the year. There’s quite a few reasons why:
To provide links to photo albums and videos, because it’s awesome to find a cool photograph of yourself in there.
- To provide links to all the business and artists who helped us but the event together. Get a sketch from an artist and want to check out more of their work or set up a commissioned piece? Or want to know who made those cool litho’s or beer labels for us? We work with the same local people in Cleveland because they have proved themselves time and time again.
- To show you things you may not have seen or known was there so that next year you’re better prepared to take it all in.
- To make you jealous if you couldn’t come out so that you’ll plan early to be there next year, Saturday May 2nd, 2015!
First up is an article by Bleeding Cool. We had a reporter covering the event from the inside Friday Night. For those that don’t know I’d say it’s safe to say Bleeding Cool is one of the top three comic book new sites out there. According to him, Bleeding Cool considers us to have one of the top five FCBD events in the country when it comes to the full scope of the event; not just handing out lots of free books. I respect the reporter because he did not ask for any line jump or special consideration, and he bothered to put links to everyone he encountered. He fully interacted with the Gonzo Journalism Style. Here’s The Link!
(And if you are one of the artists who turned in a cover for the bar, you’ll see it in the extra photo’s at the bottom of the article)
Next up is the video’s we had made, one for the day event, and one for the night. There’s links to both You Tube and Vimeo because You Tube can be wonky and Vimeo just don’t care.
Day Event
Night Event
We’ve also got a couple cool photo gallereies up on Facebook from Heather Campbell and Laura Wimbels. We’re very grateful to both of these ladies as we truly believe there’s no gift like a really good picture. (Don’t have Facebook? You should sign up. We do a weekly catalog of new product and have a lot of fun on the page. It acts as a social extension of the shop when you’re not there.)
The bar was a really big hit this year!
We went through 90 of Cleveland Action Brewery’s ‘Strucker’s Pretzel Lager’ in 12 minutes which severally tested our bartender Macklin.
The beer was made by John Sefcik over at Cleveland Action Brewery
Donuts were made by Peace Love and Little Donuts in the plaza, and they had their best weekend ever since the new owners took over.
Beth Pearson at Darkside Desserts went above and beyond this year and made some of the best treats I have seriously ever had.
The Hydra Buttons that were given away at the bar were made by Erin at Factory Kid buttons. Very reasonable rates if you’re looking for that sort of thing.
- Also popping into the midnight party were the local factions of the 501st, Rebel Legion (Great Lakes Base) and the Madalorian Mercs (Rancor Clan)
Tables were set up by:
- The Doctor Who Society of Cleveland
- GeekCle
- Cleveland Concoction (website comic soon!)
- Akron Comicon
- Pop The Comic Culture Club
- Every Bar in Lakewood and The Side Quest
- The Ghostbuster Cleveland Chapters weren’t there on any official business but were all class and we hope to work with them in the future. Like their page!
Thanks for the support and we look forward to seeing more events from these ladies and gentlemen.
A big help this year was out volunteers, so much so that I’ll list them by name:
Joe Carroll – Dan Clifford – Jenn Clifford – Jeremy Wiggins – Rebeccca Galo – Jefferson West – Joel Warger – – Mark Biszantz – Josh Biszantz – Willow Rosen – Dick Powis – Jason Fitch
Free Comic Book Day is run by only eight staffed employees, so it was these twelve individuals help this year that really helped the event to sing.
The art portion this year was off the hook, and it was due to the organizational work of Randy Crider, Jeff Hulligan, Ryan Finley and Greg Golem.
Randy organized the artists for the night event, Jeff was responsible for the art gallery (and can be found at http://popshopgallery.com/ ) while Ryan and Greg took over Randy’s job for the day event while he went to work on the mural with the Rust Belt Monster Collective.
Here’s links to the full artists list for the Friday Night Event
And another for the Saturday Daytime Event
All of these artist sat and did free sketches for everyone and for that we are forever in their debt. We’ll keep these links up on our web page in case you ever need to find them.
The Rust Belt Mural was a beautiful thing to watch being made, and is currently hanging up at the shop.
Going back and forth from the shop to the event area and checking in on it’s progress was a highlight of my day. The last hour when they worked dynamically over each other to put the finishing touches on it was really something special too.
Marc Sumerak was our guest of honor this year, and sat diligently and signed over 200 free copies of his all ages Franklin Richards Graphic novels!
And as always a big shout out goes out to Jameson. This is his third year making all of the promotional materials for the event, and his hard work gives it all a unique sense of cohesiveness and style. From the lithographs to the beer labels to the wrap up video and more.
The best compliment I can give is that he does the kind of quality work that I believe should be out of my price range, but isn’t. What’s more, he has founded a business this year with Heather Campbell (his sister and event photographer) and Jessica Mellen called M33.You can learn more about the M33 Collective’s creative services and see their work online: www.weareM33.com or follow them on twitter and tell them what you think: @weareM33
The final thank you goes to the incredible staff you CNJ Comics, James Guilliams, John Shearer, Ben Munday, Kevin Monahan, Jason Kusma, and Reid Silva. We have the best comic book staff that I know of. Lastly, thanks to Carol Cazzarin, my mom, who is finally getting to see years of hard work pay off as more children and female customers are finding their way into comic book shops. She was a big believer of creating a comfortable atmosphere for people from all walks of life so they could enjoy their hobby on equal ground. Carol was a pioneer in the realm of women in comic shops and events like this have the success that they due to 30 years of her life defending her passion in a male dominated industry. Hats off to you mom, sincerely.
Please feel free to email us with any suggestions, comments or questions you may have about this year. ( No, we don’t have any books left. 🙂 ) We are always trying to grow this event each year so that every year you can say that it was the best one ever!
Peace!
