http://scoutcon2008.com/


Above link is for this 1st time show in Tampa, FL Saturday, May 24 which is Memorial Day Weekend. I have no idea what to expect but have signed up to give it a try. I spoke to the promoter at last Sunday's Tampa Comic show.....ScoutCon2008 is a fund raiser for the Boy Scouts...they have gotten a lot of media partners and look to have a fantastic list of guests lined up. Don't know how many dealers will be set up there...the promoter said he only had spots for 20??? That seems very light for a place as large as the convention center?? I know at least I will be there!

I have some of the promo material left over from this past weekend. I will attempt to get some more as the show gets closer.

So if you are in the central Florida area make a day of it and come on out!

David

Got an email from the lovely Alyssa at Inkworks today...I will have additional goodies to give out at this show a week from Saturday. Once I get them I will let you know what they are.

David

Ok...the good news...the truck is packed and the goody package from Alyssa arrived from Inkworks today! I will have sell sheets for Journey to the Center of the Earth and Kung-Fu Panda as well as promos from Kung-Fu Panda, Family Guy New Hope, Lost 3, Smallville 6, AVP and probably some others that I did not see. Stop by, say hi and get some goodies!

The bad news....AC went out and I am waiting for the service guy now...who knows when I will get to bed tonight!!

I hope to see you there tomorrow.

David

Here is your show report:

This was a 1st time show that the local Boy Scouts Council was putting on as a fund raiser. I spoke with promoter at the last Tampa Comic Show and it was apparent that he was a little new to this. They had a large # of autograph guests...around 20....but the promoter was planning on very few dealers. I decided to give it a try.

The show was at the Tampa Convention Center downtown on the waterfront. Although I have driven by it many times this was the 1st time I have gone to the convention center. It is a beautiful facility and the scenery on the water is fabulous! The room was about a 1/3 the size of the Tampa Comic show....the guests were on the perimeter of the room against the walls. The 'dealers' were 20 tables...10 tables back to back...in the middle. I put 'dealer' in quotes because a few were not your traditional show dealers...AT&T was selling phones, there was a financial adviser, and local theme park, Cypress Gardens, had a table but they did not show up. I had 3 tables and my friend Jim Cara had 2...so we accounted for 25% of the total dealers' tables. There were 4 other dealers set up only 1 of which had cards besides me. He had mostly gaming cards, but had some misc. non-sports packs....SW, Hannah Montana, comics, etc. Needless to say there was a dearth of merchandise as the focus of the show was the guests/autographs.

Having said that the show was pretty good for me. The day started slow and I had my worries early on. But things picked up as the day went along as more people came in and I ended up doing pretty well. Cards were the best seller of the day accounting for 40% of my total sales, with posters and toys coming in a strong 2nd at 16% each. Sets sales were strong...the new Indy set, Tomb Raider, Wizard of Oz, LOTR, STTNG, and a lot of Disney sets. Binder inserts sold well also....lots of Disney from many sets, Farscape, LOTR, Heroes and a lady who bought all of my remaining Bloom County inserts. A couple of box sales....Disney 2 from Skybox and for $2 a box of American Pride Stickers.

Gave out a lot of sell sheets and promos....thanks again to Alyssa at Inkworks for providing these.

All in all not a bad day for a 1st time show. The promoter is planning on expanding to 3 days next year. I will think about returning...I highly suggested that he get more vendors.

David