Calling All Hippies!

We know it's been said that "If you remember the '60's, then you weren't there!", but we're still hoping that some of you out there might remember when the building now known as THE COMICSHOP was once THE VILLAGE BISTRO! Apparently the Bistro was quite the "happening" venue for local folk and psychedelic rock acts in the mid-to-late-'60's, and we're just hoping to learn a little more about this "past life" of THE COMICSHOP!

"Hey, you hippies! Get out of our garden!" A photo of The Village Bistro - now home to your friendly neighbourhood COMICSHOP! - taken in 1967 by Vancouver Sun photographer, Ralph Bower. The caption reads: "Hippies gather outside the Village Bistro folk music and folk rock coffee club on Fourth Avenue in Kitsilano in 1967." So do YOU remember when...?

If you collected comic books back in 1974, you really had to make an effort to do so. The new comics usually came out on Tuesdays but the time of day really varied, depending on the route of the driver and how many other stops he had to make that day. Distribution was spotty, and you had to go to two or three different corner stores or drug stores, otherwise you would miss one of your favourite comics because the store nearest you wouldn't get any copies that month. Comics were dying with dwindling circulation because the 5 cents a store owner would make selling a new comic for 25 cents was hardly worth the bother - there were lots of other magazines that would be more profitable to carry. The Independent Distributor (or ID) saw gas and labour costs drive up his overhead in the '70's with an inefficient distribution system that saw 200,000 copies of a comic printed, shipped to the ID, re-shipped and billed to a store, sold for a month, was returned to the ID if unsold and credited to the store, with the unsold copies being destroyed (usually at a rate of 50% or better).

This is when Ken Witcher and I decided to open up a store that sold all of the new comics in one location to make collecting comics easier. We didn't know the state of the comics industry at the time, just that we loved comics, loved collecting them and sharing them with friends and that a lot of other people collected comics. We thought that maybe we could sell enough comics to people to earn a living.

Ken and I met at the now defunct Kitsilano Books store on Broadway, near McDonald, going through piles of old comics tucked away under the used paperback book bins (this was in 1973). We started helping each other look for titles we needed, went for coffee and tea to talk comics some more, and started to show each other our latest finds of four colour fantasies that we'd dig up at used book stores, second hand stores and through the mail.

We started talking about how neat it would be to have a place that would carry hundreds or thousands of old comics, plus a full selection of new comics and also carry some of the comic fanzines that were springing up around North America and sold through the mail. We both had large collections, plus Ken had bought several smaller collections as he came upon them, so we were getting ready to go. You can imagine our surprise when we came upon a little storefront that sold old books and comics called Collector's Books and Comics on 4th Ave near McDonald. A fellow named Dave Grannis owned it, and he had some really great old comics there (I picked up Flash #105 from him - the last issue I needed to complete my set). Ken worked for Dave briefly, and when Dave decided to move to 16th & Dunbar, Ken and I decided we wanted to do a store of our own, with our own ideas.

In early 1974 we were looking for places to rent, when we found two brothers selling a large collection of comics at the science fiction convention V-Con III. We bought the collection and now had thousands of old comics to start the store with (a complete set of Marvel Comics with many good doubles, Golden Age and EC Comics, all kinds of great stuff that is rarely seen these days). In April, Ken found a place at 3638 W. 4th Ave and rented it for May as he left for his vacation and I returned from mine. We both sat down in the middle of this former photo studio around May 15th and decided we would open on Saturday, June 1, 1974 and try it for a year.

What a hectic 2 weeks that was; building, sanding and staining racks and counters, bagging and pricing comics, opening an account with the local ID for new comics and working 16 hour days to get the store open. We weren't sure what sort of reaction, if any, we would get when we opened (no market surveys here, no advertising blitz or promotional events), so it was gratifying to have a small line-up when we first opened our doors. I don't remember a lot of the details of that first day (details and dates have always been a hazy area for my memory), but I do remember how excited, exhausted and incredibly euphoric I was at the end of that day. It's a feeling that's similar to my wedding day to Angie, some 32years ago, and to the day my son Ryan was born, almost 19 years ago.

There were a lot of long days and nights those early years of The Comicshop. Learning how to deal with the public in a retail situation, how to buy and sell comics, ordering and receiving shipments and keeping track of the numbers for the accountant was just the daytime stuff. Nights were filled with restocking the bins with comics (which meant bagging, taping, stickering and pricing them), sorting comics that we had bought or traded, remodeling and re-fixturing the store.

I went out at least once a week in my '64 Chevette to the ID in Richmond to buy the new comics for the week. Normally, a store would get a random mix of comics at a 20% discount, sell them for a month or so, and return the unsold copies for credit. Since we dealt in old (or as they were referred to back then, used) comics, the distributor was afraid we would buy used comics at 5 or 10 cents and send them back for 20 cents credit, so we were forced to buy our comics on a non returnable basis.

The good part was a bigger discount (30%) and we could pick the titles we wanted to buy. I would go into the warehouse and down the tie-lines where bundles of comics sat, waiting to be made into random assortments to be delivered to various grocery stores, drug stores and newsstands. I would pick out the number of copies of the titles we wanted, take the bill up front, pay it, drive around back and load up the comics and bring them back to The Comicshop. Ken and I would sometimes go out and go through pallet loads of returned comics and pull out the comics we needed more copies of as re-orders were even more hit and miss back then as they are now.

We worked hard at carrying all the titles even back then. We re-invested most of our sales back into the business, adding science fiction books, posters, fanzines and underground comics. We worked 6 day weeks for 6 years while we learned the business, expanded into the store next to us and built up a clientele of comic aficionados.

In May of 1979 we moved to 2089 W. 4th Ave to give us the room we needed to sell all of the different types of stuff we wanted to carry (plus we were distributing comics to other stores in B.C. and Alberta at the time as the direct market started to evolve). We added role playing games and expanded our book selection to include art books, cartoon collections and film books.

Sometime around 1981 or 1982, Ken became fed up with the city and moved to Nelson, B.C., where we opened a second Comicshop. However, the market in the Kootenays wasn't big enough to support such a specialty shop, and Ken moved back to Vancouver in 1984. (We did sell the Nelson Comicshop to a fellow in Trail, B.C. but that folded when the smelter at Cominco shut down).

Meanwhile, in Vancouver, we got involved in the opening of the Kids Only Market on Granville Island. We were one of the original tenants when it opened in November of 1984. We operated that Comicshop for two years, when we pulled out because of the high rent there. It was fun to watch the tourists and Sunday shoppers come through and say "I didn't know they still made comics!" During this period, comics started to gain a more positive reputation, the direct market started to operate more efficiently and Kitsilano became trendy. The Comicshop carried more products as they appeared in the marketplace and added more staff to help our customers.

By 1987 Ken and I began to differ on how we wanted to operate The Comicshop. It finally came to a point where I made an offer and bought Ken's share of The Comicshop. In 1989 the 'Shop was remodelled, the old burlap taken off the walls, the store painted yellow and red, the place carpeted and the store got ready for the '90's.

Now we're in 2003 and The Comicshop continues to evolve as the direct market continues to change. We track comic sales on our computer, offer expanded subscription service, special order books and try to anticipate which of the 400 titles published every month you will want to buy. It's not easy - one time a special foil or chromium cover will come out and we can't get enough of them, another time a similar book will come out and hardly get looked at. Sometimes titles or writers or artists get hot and we run short because of the two month lead time to place our orders and print the books. It's a real guessing game, but one we keep doing it because we love reading and collecting our favourite comics, and we want other people to be able to read and collect the comics they enjoy. Because there's still that feeling you get when you open one of your favourite comics, look at the first page, read a bit of it and say to yourself "Yeah, this is where I want to go right now, I'm going to enjoy this".

So now it's been 31 years, and I still enjoy what I do for a living. But I couldn't have done it alone, and I'd like to thank a few of the people who have helped me to reach this milestone. First, of course, is my wife, Angie, who encouraged me, supported me and helped me every step of the way. Also, Ken Witcher, who helped fan the flames of collecting comics and helped The Comicshop become reality. And Kin Jee, who worked here for 10 years and showed that organization coupled with hard work could accomplish.

Now, I'm lucky enough to have Keith Bickford shouldering the load here, having worked at The Comicshop for four summers as a high school and university student and now full time for fifteen years, showing keen insight with his ordering abilities. And Brent Stratichuk, who came back after a school work program and has now been here since 1985, doing the Renaissance man thing by doing the re-stock, working the counter, picking up the comics, writing the newsletter and providing our music selection Monday to Friday.

There have been dozens of others who have helped The Comicshop to be a success, too many to name here (and if I forgot someone, I'd really be in trouble). But it's the support of you customers that makes it all work; we just want to read comics and share our enjoyment of them with you.