Comic shopping.

On Tuesday I went into Kings Comics once again.
The Boys impressed me so much that I decided I should place a standing order for it, as well as reserving a copy of Doktor Sleepless, once it arrives.
I approached the counter, only to have some arrogant twat stare down his nose at me. I smiled and a conversation ensued:

Me: "Hi, I'd like to set up a subscription thingy for a couple of titles" (yes, I had a brief mental blank)
*blank stare for a few seconds*
Shop drone:"Do you mean a standing order?" said in a tone that indicated his estimation of my intelligence was lower than that of a small bowl of cold cream-of-mushroom soup.
Me: "Ahh! Yes. That's the word I was looking for. Thanks!"
Shop drone: "Was it just for one title?" he asked, indicating that my business really wasn't worth his time
Me: "Well, two actually, but one of them hasn't started yet"
Shop drone: "*sigh* A standing order requires at least four regular titles and you'll have to update your credit card details with us every fortnight. If you don't pick up your order we charge it to your card" he recited, like a really bored machine that had far better things to do. Like standing behind a counter and offering no assistance to customers.
Me: "Oh... ok then... I guess I'll see if there's anything else worth getting"
Shop drone: (turning back to the conversation that I'd obviously interrupted) "Ok"

Now I understand that his job may not be thrilling. I understand that there are certain things about which he has to inform me. I'm totally cool with the fact that they have rules around standing orders. The issue I have is that this tool treated me like a retarded bum who just asked him for a blowjob.
Maybe the fact that I train people in customer service has given me unrealistic expectations, but how hard would it have been for the guy to say something like "Which titles were you looking for?" followed by recommendations of other titles in which I may have been interested? How hard would it have been for him to simply be polite and attempt to encourage me to place an order (guaranteed money for the store)?

This experience led me to search for another comic shop from which to make my purchases. A friend recommended I check out Comic Kingdom, which is a lot closer to my place of work. I headed down there on Wednesday and was pleasantly surprised to discover a slightly run-down shop, nowhere near as flashy as Kings, with that slightly musty comic shop smell. The place was stacked with memorabilia and back-issues galore. I approached the counter and was greeted by the shop assistant, a much older man who was actually smiling. The following conversation ensued:

Me: "Hi there, how are you"
Shop-dude: "I'm great. How about you?"
Me: "Very well, thanks. I was wondering if you could help me, do you guys do standing orders?"
Shop-dude: "We sure do."
Me: "Great! So, what's the deal?"
Shop-dude: "Well, you do have to order a minimum of five titles. Then all we need is your name and a contact phone number."
Me: "Ok, there were only two I was really interested in at this point. It's been a few years since I've bought anything"
Shop-dude: "Which ones were you after"
Me: "The Boys and Doktor Sleepless"
Shop-dude: "Hmm. I'm not familiar with those. I usually work in the memorabilia section downstairs, but the guy who's usually here will be able to help you out. He's just gone to lunch"
Me: "No worries. I'll have a bit of a poke around and see if there's anything else that catches my eye"
Shop-dude: "Well, once you decide, just give us a list of the titles and the number you want to start from and we'll hold them for you. The only thing is, Marvel don't do reprints at the moment, so we might not be able to get you back-issues for Marvel titles."
Me: "Not a problem. Thanks for your help."


Can we see the difference there, boys and girls?
This guy was helpful, upfront and interested in keeping me as a customer. He explained the deal and offered a way to sort out anything that he couldn't do himself. Now sure, it means I need five titles rather than four, but they don't want my credit card (not that that's an issue anyway) and are willing to get in back-issues if I need them. That, my friends, is customer service.
I mentioned to this guy that he was a lot more helpful than the staff at Kings and that thier attitude was rather arrogant. His response was "Yeah. We get that a lot."


It appears I have a new shop from which to purchase my comics. Now I just need to work out the three other titles which will be worth ordering.

Tommy

Oh wow.
Tommy Monaghan is coming back!
With Ennis and McRea at the helm, we're getting a new Hitman/JLA story. This is several kinds of awesome. It's a "lost" story, so no coming back from the dead for Tommy (unlike those damn penguins). The comic nerd in me just went in to overdrive.

Looks like I picked a good time to get back into comics.

Return

I'd forgotten all about this for a while.

That seems to happen to me a great deal. Things get lost. I forget stuff. Just the other day I was cleaning up and came across a box of stuff I'd not opened in 4 or 5 years. Did you know I own Sandman and Death action figures, as well as a model of Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost In The Shell? I sure as hell didn't.

Well, that's not entirely true. I knew but the knowledge had left me for a while. I own a great deal of crap.

Speaking of forgotten things, I bought some comics today. It's been many years (probably about 6) since I last purchased comics on any sort of regular basis. I was too poor to afford them and had a habit of committing myself to far too many titles at once. Recently the old craving has come back & the cleanup, resulting in my discovery of all the issues of Dark Victory, had me thinking it was about time I see what's out there.

The result of all this was a trip to King's Comics on my lunchbreak today. There was a lot of stuff I'd never seen before. Some looked interesting, some looked like complete shite. The only problem with the interesting titles was that they were all about 7 issues in & I couldn't be bothered looking for back issues.
Then I spotted it.
On a bottom shelf.
A series with a great name and a brilliant writer/artist combo. Best of all, they had all 6 issues in a single pack. I have discovered the joy of The Boys by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson. How can it get any cooler? The guy who wrote Preacher (as well as some of my favorite Judge Dredd stories) combined with the artist responsible for Transmetropolitan. It's absolutely brilliant. Violent, funny, clever, witty. Oh, and filthy. If any of you were fans of either Preacher (or Hitman, Adventures of the Rifle Brigade, Just a Pilgrim, etc) or Transmetropolitan, you simply must check out this new series. It's currently on hiatus, having been pulled by DC due to issues with the content, but it's due to start up again next month.
I can't wait.