Contest of Challengers

Recording star Poppy did NOT come to Bucktown today. The making of our 1979 man-on-the-street Sale video. January 2020 sales vs 2019. Ryan Browne signed at both stores this week! Please stop asking us for donations. The reality of River North. Consignment update. What are we going to do for Free Comic Book Day with 2 stores? Thanks, Patrons!

The first wave of McFarlane DC Multiverse figures are in, and we have thoughts! Ordering Marvel Legends for the rest of the year, with no real information. More frustration with our Point of Sale system. April 2020 DC and Marvel solicits. More $10 80th Anniversary specials! So many Empire crossovers! More X-Men titles! What would you rather buy, 6 X-Titles that ship twice-a-month? Or 12 X-Titles that ship once-a-month?

A 1-star Yelp review + Reddit + the UK website The Poke = quite the internet week for Challengers. One more round of identity theft, because having the last one back in October is just too long ago. Patrick is going to be on David Harper's OFF PANEL podcast next week. Voice-over cameo by Jeanna Challenger!

When business is slow in Blue vs Red The second change to Blue's layout in a month. How we work our Back Issues. The Local Artist section really needs to be re-sorted. Marvel's Outlaw series announcements. And Empyre. Remember the Kree/Skrull War? A look back.

Thanks, Matthew Rosenberg!! NO subscriber complaints! We mean BY us, not ABOUT us. But we still complain about 1 customer interaction… Top 100 Comics sales notes. Top 100 Graphic Novels sales notes. Overall 2019 sales notes. Thanks, Patrons! Some events are coming up, including our one store-wide sale… and speaking of that particular sale's T-Shirt… the artist is…

Retail sure is weird this time of year! Spending New Year's Eve at Challengers (Red). Christmas makes us feel like we carry all the wrong things. Club members are responding positively to our tighter subscription enforcement. Diamond is not making it easy to give subscribers the information they need to keep their lists current. The really great 2 days of Christmas sales. Matthew Rosenberg wants to help us sell Hawkeye Freefall #1. 2 different color stores means 2 different color sale t-shirts. Dal has a strict rule about getting the different colors. Patrick liked Marvel's "Incoming" special. What did Dal like this year in Comics?

Dal is very hungry. You can hear the tension between Dal and Patrick at the start of this episode. Profanity warning for around the 21 minute mark. Theft! Things were stolen today. A chase ensued. There is no happy ending to this story. Sales just really don't go up that much because of Christmas anymore. The process of buying presents, and the obligation therein. How easy this first month of the new location should have been, and the external reasons it isn't. R.I.P. Steve Johansson and thank you for all the joy. Merry Christmas to you.

Commuting between the 2 stores is all new to us. We're still learning our new routines. Potential changes to Blue's layout, already. Changes to the way we enforce our subscription rules for 2020. No changes to the way the subscriptions work, but we're no longer giving any slack. Plenty of computer issues with Diamond. Still. Almost insurmountable changes… we'll see… How warped the market is for Marvel Comics, with a hat-tip to Brian Hibbs for doing all the research. This upcoming week of comics is H-U-G-E. It is impossible to give every comic coming out the attention it deserves.

Patrick was on the news talking about Chicago's new bus lanes. "If you think like Patrick Brower, you'd be wrong!" Johnny Cadillac Marvel is NOT releasing too many comics…? What would it take for Image to be a tastemaker again? DC's new iteration of the Suicide Squad is really good!! The new store has put Dal in performative mode. The distance of River North. I don't remember what that means, but it was written down in the show notes, so I added it. And I also changed from third person narration to first. This is all over the place!!

The counters arrived!! We made it. We are now a chain! 2 stores! Hear about the final week of prep and the first day of sales. No Black Friday Sales this year. Batman is your friend, but only when no one else is listening. Challengers-exclusive Diamond problems for the week. 2 of 'em! Industry-wide Diamond issue for the week. Protect that data!! Dark Knight The Golden Child vs China. Arrgh! Here there be (internet) pirates! Thanks, Patrons! We've added another 2-Store/1-Day creator signing! With… **** ******!