Were moving into our 7th year. Is that old in way of Comic Book Shops. 

Looking for new digs - yes

Looking to move into the online shopping option more - yes
We have online stock space that is now 50/50 online/ floor space - time to downsize in the physical store.

Dollars dropping again - it's like groundhog day. The push to increase exports over imports affects us greatly. 

No more flooding so far. Until the major road works start i suppose.

Standing order mail out option has increased. thankfully - and with downsizing it should increase more.

Yesterday  is over, today has begun, tomorrows to come.

​Jeannine

Quick Blog
May 2018.
Times flown, waters flowed (major flooding inside the store in November 2017)  and comics read.
We turned 6 in April. Noice! Hopefully we’ll survive again the loss of traction predicted for the dollar, the major disney owned stores running with the  pop culture frenzy and digital comics  we’ll make it to year 7.

We had our 12 month review from Workplace Australia – passed with flying colours. Kinda chuffed we’ve grown into a professional employer here at HHQ. We have a lovely team  here, losing some sadly  and hopefully if  things  pick up, we can gain another after winter trading.
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Keeping up with the new titles flowing out of the States is still a major buzz each month. Gotta love the Standing Order Customers, who are still there on the journey of reading books. We get there in the end. Good team work.

Free Comic Book Day is powering down on us. different format this year. I didn’t order so many as we were left with so many over last year. Plus the cost to bring them in negates the free bit for us. It is nice to have some of the people still around from the 2017 day. Increasing the regulars

Free Comic book day is such a fun day. The challenge is to showcase the comics and separate the movies, Netflix and merchandise out. So many people love the merchandise that is everywhere now that finding the fine line between mass produced for the masses and collectables for the collectors is very, very fine.
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The website…its 2 years old now – 3000 comics, a few graphic novels..the new thought is merchandise as that’s what’s being searched the most on it...can’t hide from the data I suppose.

Diversifying to add to the $ trickle...to keep "alice" (aka alive). Workshops, Games nights,market days, costume making, secondhand comics...and the ideas keep coming.

See you on the other side of FCBD.
Jeannine 

its not going to take away from our new comic book stock. that arrives fortnightly as scheduled. But it is lovely seeing them go to new homes.

Changes, planned - the back junior academy room at the store. Its being divided into a meeting/workshop space and sales space. Google "how to build a dividing wall" is good and has taken some of the "Struth!" out of it..

Frill Neck studios is developing into a strong team. Nice to watch them grow ideas.

​over winter, and its only just arriving! 

Heaters on this week, thought the need for gumboots at work was finally over with the blockage in storm water being cleared – nup - flooding Sunday night past. However, the rain and wind affected more that our corner as trees fell and streams flooded all over town.

Fair Work Australia (FWA) contacted me in mid March to say Heroes HQ was part of the random pick of businesses in Ballarat to be audited. It was pleasing to be able to have everything naturally in place, to send in within the very short time frame for the audit – (about 4 days), as well as having an accountant who moves around the background doing counting things and making the legal changes (and offering advice) required for staff conditions, awards and other comic store thingy  stuff. 
Anyhoo’s  - FWA gave us the big tick of approval. 

It was lovely to thank the current team for moving through change in those initial 8 - 12 months of ownership (they required so much patience and understanding as I moved them through legality, onto timesheets, testing rosters or not, emailed payslips, learning Xero and then direct banking.)

Free Comic Book Day (my second) is nearly here. I’m not as nervous or worried this year. (That either means I’ve settle well into the role or I shouldn’t be taking the prep so calmly.) I haven’t ordered as many comics this year. Many of my left overs last year found some good homes at the Base Hospital pediatric ward and a few schools. 50 titles and much anticipation in 2017.

The web-store is slowly picking up. Data shows we had 14,000 global hits in the last 30 days. It floors me. Well maybe not floors, but it does ground me. Over 2000 comics on line now and the back issues area is slowly leaving the shop floor. It’s heartening when a local comic book customer tells me they enjoy looking at the webpage. One found the search button the other day and told me it made his life easier – he’d been keeping a check on what page he was slowly trawling through. We chuckled at his discovery of the search button saving him hours and hours of looking. I did tell him it had been there all along – it has made me think perhaps it doesn’t jump out at people and to re look at its design.

Guardians of the Galaxy is hitting the Movies ANZAC Day eve. This and Wonder Woman are the two movies for me this year.  I have loved the story line and artistry in the Wonder Woman comic. So much so that I look forward to getting the next chapter. 

X-Men Prime, Gold and Blue are awaited also, hoping they live up to expectations. The short series of He Man was enjoyed.  Dark Chrystal and Kill and be Killed has been great reads.  The joy of owning a Comic Book Store is the reading in the quiet times, sadly only when the store responsibilities allow.

Jumped feet first into stocking Warhammer – another steep learning curve, as people ask for figures…screaming cannons - it’s a learning curve into Chaos.
I’m enjoying the chatter and advice from customers.

​Onward and upwards. We’re 5 this year. 

​ Second attempt.
Not sure what happened to the many words written last week.

Considering I cant remember what I wrote means it might have been meant to be lost!

I do remember mentioning the many stormwater overflows, causing some continued major flooding, on the corner of Shepperd and Davies Street last year. Longest winter and many late nights sand bagging to keep water levels in the loading dock and Blue Academy Room water free. Just when getting to know where to place sandbags, the ceiling leaked quite a few times. Some stock damage and a few days without heating due to waterlogged gas heaters.  A visit last week to let me know the gas lines in this end of Ballarat are being upgraded was happy news.







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Summers here, winter in the US. Some good titles released and tho slow to hit my shelves due to fortnightly shipments when they get here it’s a good chat session over the following weeks regarding the artwork, storylines and what’s next.

Shipments are a continued consideration around costs. It would be great to have weekly shipments but…
Tim has brought the comics up from the airport customs point in Melbourne for the last 12 months, sadly for us he has changed employers and can’t take the time off work for the delivery run anymore. Finding a local comic lover (and courier) has been wonderful. Pat is in the customs pick up area at Tulla on Thursdays. It means shifting everything our end to suit, (shop hrs, staffing and Standing Order availability) across twenty four hrs. Hopefully the change won’t take long for our comic clock to adjust. A positive is that the occasional delay due to storms or plane malfunctions won’t be noticed as it will be as per usual for us with delivery being a Thursday.

Plans for the HHQ fluctuate. Thankfully the local comic book community are always at the ready when testing ideas or offering ideas.  Epic Armory stock will increase. We won’t be doing a Comicon again unless Rural (like Bendigo) and we are now open 7 days (except public holidays)

On a global note - The World changed a major leader. As with the Y2K bug we didn’t need the stock pile of water, BBQ’s and first aid kits, mind you catching the 7 pm news every day is a must to catch what’s a foot.

 Heroes HQ is celebrating 5 years in Ballarat this year in April. A huge thanks: to the many customers that have continued to support the Store during the change of ownership and move to new premises.  The Facebook page is still the main social media drop in point to see what happening in store, future events, or what's locally coming up.  We do keep the web page updated regarding events. Pat will be GM for the next Games night in Feb, he’s a true Leader – all hail Pat.

Sheroe’s Day in March, HHQ Birthday in April and Free Comic Book Day in May are a focus for for the team. Hopefully these events offer our local community a focus to plan for too.
Roll on Feb.
Jeannine

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