Since it's inception in 1984 I've attended every year at Winnipeg's annual science fiction/fantasy convention, Keycon. Interested folks should check out www.keycon.org
Since 1990 I've been actively involved in helping run the convention itself, from general grunt labour volunteering to being a CoChair of the 'con, running Operations, and sitting on the Board of Directors.
This year I'm taking a "break" and setting up a sales table in the dealers room. To that end I've scoured my stock for all the SF/F related stuff; books, etc. I'll have a 6' table and a couple of standing bookshelves unit to fill, and I've gathered enough to do so-and then some. I'm also working ahead of time ensuring a healthy stock of books by our guest authors to go through the autograph line. These will be listed as collector's items online after signing.
What with the majority of the stock at $2 ea. and some nice collectors' items at anywhere from $3 to $10 I should be able to easily recoup my table 'rental' for the weekend. There will be maybe one other used bookseller there and my prices are better. Most of the convention attendees know me well, many are friends and out of the 400-500 expected attendance I'm confident to generate some sales.
I'm also bringing a couple of boxes of stock that I either have not yet had time to list online or don't want to list them due to a slightly deteriorated condition. These I'm labelling as "Loony Bin" sale boxes under the table. Why "Loony Bin"? Because I'd have to be crazy to sell them for a Loony each! (Loony being the nickname for the CDN dollar of course)
The May long weekend will be a nice change of pace for me. Instead of working my tuchis off all wknd long with minimal chance to socialize or sit in on the nightly music jams, I'll have the set hours for the dealers room to work, then spend the evenings socializing.
John "The Bear" Speelman, Book Collector/Hobbyist
Jack of All Trades, Master of...well, a few...
johnthebearsden@gmail.com
http://johnthebear.blujay.com
eBay sales: username 'johnthebearsden'
Since 1990 I've been actively involved in helping run the convention itself, from general grunt labour volunteering to being a CoChair of the 'con, running Operations, and sitting on the Board of Directors.
This year I'm taking a "break" and setting up a sales table in the dealers room. To that end I've scoured my stock for all the SF/F related stuff; books, etc. I'll have a 6' table and a couple of standing bookshelves unit to fill, and I've gathered enough to do so-and then some. I'm also working ahead of time ensuring a healthy stock of books by our guest authors to go through the autograph line. These will be listed as collector's items online after signing.
What with the majority of the stock at $2 ea. and some nice collectors' items at anywhere from $3 to $10 I should be able to easily recoup my table 'rental' for the weekend. There will be maybe one other used bookseller there and my prices are better. Most of the convention attendees know me well, many are friends and out of the 400-500 expected attendance I'm confident to generate some sales.
I'm also bringing a couple of boxes of stock that I either have not yet had time to list online or don't want to list them due to a slightly deteriorated condition. These I'm labelling as "Loony Bin" sale boxes under the table. Why "Loony Bin"? Because I'd have to be crazy to sell them for a Loony each! (Loony being the nickname for the CDN dollar of course)
The May long weekend will be a nice change of pace for me. Instead of working my tuchis off all wknd long with minimal chance to socialize or sit in on the nightly music jams, I'll have the set hours for the dealers room to work, then spend the evenings socializing.
John "The Bear" Speelman, Book Collector/Hobbyist
Jack of All Trades, Master of...well, a few...
johnthebearsden@gmail.com
http://johnthebear.blujay.com
eBay sales: username 'johnthebearsden'
So of course my good friend who#s running this years Operations Dept for Keycon asks me to be his 2IC...he knows I have the experience, knowledge and such for the job and he wants the best possible crew with him. He even agreed to leave me mostly alone during the day so I can run my sales table. So, faced with running my table until dinner time or later, then having the evening free to haul out the guitar and jam with my musician buds, OR the chance of being hauled out of the music room every half hour for some nonsense and spending until the wee morning hours patrolling the convention and ensuring that is smooth, sacrificing my sleep and no small amount of pain in my feet...I said yes, I#m honoured that you asked me and I#ll be glad to help out both you and the con...WHAT AM I DOING TO MYSELF, AM I NUTS...(sigh)
ReplyDeleteI would like to post a recent and extremely positive encounter I had during a transaction with John Speelman. A few months prior I had spotted John's impressive book list on Kijiji wherein I noted several cyberpunk and sci-fi novels I was needing for my book habit(heavy user). Upon further investigation I learned that John also has a knack for locating rare and exotic books. I immediately thought back to a conversation with a dear friend from Estonia regarding my absolute favorite book 'Slaughterhouse 5' from the genius mind of Vonnegut jr. Of course finding books translated into Estee was challenging to say the least, so we had written off being able to ever find this version of the masterpiece in a format that my dear Liina could hold close to her heart as well. So there it stood, a gauntlet to be thrown down at the feet of Mr.Speelman's mighty claim. After issuing the quest to him, John quickly and politely accepted, to my surprise. I then thought, "okay that's the last I'll hear from this 'bookman'...." when within minutes he replied back that he had located my 'white whale\ and was in the midst of haggling down the price. I was stunned,(and still am to be frank) so I gave him carte blanche to secure the prize, bringing an impossible dream into reality. John obtained the book, which I skeptically foresaw as being some ratty old dog eared copy found in the basement of some Estonian hippy that needed money for patchouli upgrades because up until that moment I was still thinking that this was too good to be true, waiting for the punch line to clobber me over the head. John called when the book was in his hand and succinctly set up a rendezvous point of my convenience and the die was cast! I met up with Mr. Speelman, dressed rather sharply and tastefully considering the establishment I had brought him to. He handed over a MINT copy of Slaughterhouse 5 or 'Tapamaja, Korpus Viis' as the Estonians prefer, in hardback glory, wrapped neatly in cellophane protection. I couldn't believe it was finally happening...my dear Liina would be able to find out what all my hype was about, and thus learning more about how my brain worked and my heart loved. John was also gentlemanly in charging a very modest fee, stating that the challenge was well worth it alone. Needless to say, I can hardly wait to set Mr. Speelman- book champion of Estee, to another campaign. I highly recommend John's service to anyhone with a hard to find book they desperately need.
ReplyDeleteThank you for reading this rambling review and run on sentence from my heart.
sincerely,
Darcy Strutt