Someone wisely asked me what I meant by the good stuff, and I told them, and someone else asked me what I meant by pushing it, and I told them as I will tell you.

What I mean by the good stuff is the comics you enjoy.

If you yourself have stopped reading comics, and sad to say, many retailers have—there’s too much out there, or one day they found they no longer enjoyed West Coast Avengers and gave up on the whole field, disillusioned—then browse around. Ask friends, ask your staff, ask your customers.

But most of you have comics you like. And you should be pushing them.

How?

It doesn’t involve much—for example, you can put a rack near the door of things you’re proud of selling.

You can order just a few more copies of things you think are really good and try and sell them.

You could offer a money-back guarantee to anyone buying something you have faith in. It’s not a hard thing to do.

Pick a comic of the week and push it.

Suggest to the customers who don’t read what they buy that maybe they should read these things instead of just bagging them.

Try to familiarize yourself with what’s out there, and let your tastes influence your customers.

If your customers are mostly adolescent boys who go away when they tire of childish things, well, make sure they know that there’s life after Spider-Man. Put a little effort in and you have a customer for life.

This is a good thing.

We are living in a remarkable time for comics: there is more exciting material available now than ever before. I mean it: there’s more excellent material currently in print and available, going all the way back to Little Nemo, than at any time.

This is also a good thing.

Do I want any of you to make less money? Of course not.

I want you all to have Jacuzzis in your Cadillacs, more stores than you can shake a stick at—or indeed, more sticks than you can shake a store at, if that’s your idea of fun.

While we’re at it, I’d like you to be happy, healthy, and never again bothered by telephone salespeople. May your luggage always be first on the airport carousel, and may your pets never spontaneously combust. All these things I wish you.

But remember what it is that you’re selling people.

When I go on tour I like to ask people how they started reading my stuff.

Mostly it’s word of mouth. Friends tell friends. Friends force friends to sit and read it. And, in a lot of cases, store assistants tell customers they’d like it. Sometimes it’s sexually transmitted.

In stores where the salespeople like Sandman, and push it hard, we equal or outsell whatever’s “hot.” And the people who read Sandman buy a copy and lend it around. We get readers, and we get new readers.

And the new readers go back to the comic store and buy all the trade paperbacks, to catch up on the story so far, and then they buy an extra copy to give to their friends . . .