Michigan Comic Con 2019
Michigan Comic Con is one of the family of conventions run by the Imaginarium Agency, which also runs Indiana Comic Con and Tampa Bay Comic Con. This year it was held at the COBO Center in downtown Detroit over the weekend of August 16-18, 2019. Because it was their second year and they'd done decently the previous year, they decided to double the size of the exhibit hall, renting Hall B as well as Hall C.
In order to be ready to load in on Thursday, we drove up on Wednesday. We left early, eating breakfast on the road so we could get moving more quickly. When we got to Toledo, we had an extra stop because I hadn't had a chance to get to the bank and buy change to replenish what we'd used at Tampa two weeks earlier. That stop was further complicated by the bank's parking lot being full, so that I had to park in the lot for a neighboring business and walk over. When we got to the Detroit area, we had to stop in Livonia to go to Vitamin World, which meant going all the way up to I-96, then backtracking to our hotel, which was just south of I-94. All of this added extra time, which meant that we arrived right at suppertime.
When we checked in, we discovered that this hotel was yet another of those with the annoying policy that if you check in with a credit card, the money has to stay on the card at check-out. No, they will not accept cash and take the money off your card -- if you want to pay in cash, you have to have it in hand at check-in, which in our case would require the use of a time machine. It annoyed my husband enough that he decided to cancel our November reservation for Youmacon and go back to the hotel up north, hoping our bad experience last November was just them having a bad weekend, coupled with the stress of having vehicle problems.
Once we got our personal belongings carried in, we settled in to have supper and do some work on the Internet. I put three of my indie books free on Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing platform, in honor of the Worldcon in Dublin, which we rather obviously hadn't been able to attend. I also got a little writing done before we turned in for the night.
On Thursday we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast, then headed downtown to get in line to get into the COBO Center loading dock. In theory we should've been able to take I-94 to M-10 and go right to the COBO Center, with only a little driving on surface streets in downtown Detroit. However, the I-94 to M-10 interchange was under construction and closed, so we had to get off I-94 early and take US 12 the rest of the way in. The first sign that this was not good was the titty bar we saw just a block from the interchange. A little later we saw an adult bookstore, then a second titty bar, which had pretensions of being upscale (they had valet parking!). The neighborhood got better as we got closer to downtown, apparently as a result of gentrification, but I still kept our doors locked all the way to the loading dock gate.
Last year, the dock crew had let us drive into the loading dock and start unloading onto carts or pallets, but didn't let us actually carry anything into the exhibit hall floor until it was actually 2PM. This year they must've gotten stricter orders, because we were kept standing in line all the way until 2PM. I was going to read an e-book, but another vendor came by and struck up a conversation, and before we knew it, the time was gone.
Once the gates opened, we were directed to park under the overhang, fairly close to one of the big doors, so we didn't have a huge amount of walking to do with every trip. However, I noticed that some of the vendors were allowed to drive onto the show floor and load directly into their booths, like we do at Youmacon. I was a little annoyed that some people seemed to be Special, but later I found that those people had paid the union buyout to be allowed to provide their own labor on the show floor.
We were supposed to remove our vehicles to parking as soon as we got them unloaded, but by the time I had everything out of our van (at least fifteen trips, although I lost count near the end), we were bricked in by other vendors parked in front of us. Since the dock crew wasn't making a huge issue of it, I just dug in on building our structures and periodically checked to see whether we could get out. Not being able to move to parking would save us the money and me the time of hiking back, when we really needed to be able to push as far as we could on getting ready.
I had three of the small display structures ready and was about to start on the fourth when it was getting late enough we decided to call it quits for the night rather than push through to the bitter end. By that time, the other vehicles had moved out of the way and we were able to drive out with no hassle except pausing at the gate for the security guard to open it for us.
However, the sketchy part of town that had been uncomfortable going in daylight was much more unnerving in the dark. I was very glad when I saw the two titty bars and the adult bookstore and knew I-94 was right ahead -- and sad that we should be using such things as landmarks to know our trip through the bad area was almost done.
When we finally got to the hotel, we had the problem of finding a parking spot. Everything in the front of the hotel was full, and the back was an unnerving area of narrow places where the van could get hung up, or clip someone else's vehicle. My husband finally got me directed into a spot backed up against the fence around a neighboring park-and-fly lot, so that I could just pull out in the morning. However, I then had to drag the luggage cart all the way to the front, which proved a toilsome and exhausting task for someone who had already done a lot of hauling already.
Once we finally got in, I got a little writing done (we'd eaten supper while setting up), and then we turned in for the night.
On Friday we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast before heading back downtown to finish setting up. This time we went ahead and parked on the COBO rooftop, since finding other parking had proven such a ginormous hassle. As a result, I was able to get back down to the exhibit hall quickly instead of after a long hike. I immediately set to work, and at first it seemed like we were making good progress. But then it was time for the doors to open and we still had a bunch of boxes in the aisles. So we had to just stop and grab them, then unpack all of them from within our space.
Once we were truly ready, the sales started flowing in. However, they were definitely more intermittent -- we even had a break long enough to get signs put up -- but all of them were our own merchandise. On the other hand, our consignor was down on merchandise as a result of two very successful shows, and had almost nothing to send us. Still, we were definitely down from where we had been the previous year, and I noticed that a large proportion of our sales had been small things like emoji masks.
Shortly before the exhibit hall was scheduled to close, I decided it might be prudent to go to the restroom. However, when I got in, I discovered it flooded, with a nasty puddle of unknown origin spread halfway across the floor. I tried to work around it, but could tell it was all over the stalls. By that time, it was too late to walk all the way to the other restroom at the back of the hall, so I figured I'd just hang on until we got everything covered and use the one in the hall.
However, finding it proved easier said than done, and we lost some time to my search. As a result, we were later than planned getting back to the hotel, and then I had to find a parking place. Fortunately I didn't bump anyone's car, but it wasn't an easy task, and I wasn't looking forward to extracting in the morning. We had supper, and then I got a little writing time before I turned in for the night.
On Saturday we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast, then got the van safely out of parking and headed downtown to the COBO Center. We had a little trouble when the ramp we needed was closed, but we found a workaround and got there early enough that I could take some photos for Ohayocon's jurying committee and still have time to look around a little.
Then the doors opened and the crowd started flowing in. However, it was still a smaller crowd, and there really wasn't any time we were overwhelmed with business. In fact there were several times when we had no one at all, and restroom breaks were never a huge problem for us.
By evening I was wondering whether we'd even manage to reach our break-even point. We covered everything and headed back to the hotel. This time we hit a backup due to roadwork and ended up getting off I-94 early and taking surface streets the rest of the way. At least this time we were able to find a parking spot in the front of the hotel and get in more easily. I fixed supper, and then I got the photos sent off to Ohayocon's jurying committee, explaining that we couldn't send them an overview shot of the setup we'd be using because it would be unique to their show, so I was showing segments that created an approximation of what we'd be doing. I also got a little writing done before turning in for the night.
On Sunday we had the hotel's complimentary breakfast, then went out to find someone had made their own parking space for a very nice classic car almost directly behind us. My husband spotted me to get safely backed up enough that we could get turned toward the back entrance of the parking lot, and we headed downtown for the last time. Because of the road construction, we took surface streets the entire way, although it was something of a hassle to do so and we went through even more sketchy areas. Even so, we arrived at the COBO Center in time to get open and still do some looking around.
Sales did seem to pick up a little, since people now had settled up with their hotels and knew how much money they had left to spend. However, it remained slow enough that I didn't have a huge problem about getting bathroom visits when I needed them. And with the low traffic volume, I felt less bad about starting to pack, since that always causes sales to drop.
More worrisome, the hour to close was approaching and none of the people who'd said they'd help us were making their appearance. Yet again we'd been ghosted, which is particularly frustrating because we'd recruited more help than we thought we'd need specifically to allow for no-shows. It seems like no matter how many people you have lined up to help you get out in a timely fashion, you can still be left high and dry by every single one of them. Which means there's nothing to do but struggle through by your own devices, and hope you can get out before the deadline.
Once we had the big gridwall down and the t-shirts boxed, so my husband could continue with the rest of the packing process, I went up to the rooftop parking lot and retrieved the van. I noticed that the air had that heavy feel to it that often presages a storm, so I figured the sooner I could get our merchandise loaded and get out, the better off we'd be.
When I was first allowed onto the loading dock, I assumed that we'd be required to park outside and schlepp everything out to the vehicle the way we had during load-in. However, when I wheeled our cart in to start the process, my husband told me that other dealers told him they were able to drive onto the show floor without needing to pay a union buyout -- apparently on Sunday it doesn't matter like it does on a business day.
So I left the cart and went back out to drive the van in. For the first few loads, I was far enough away that I had to use the cart -- although it was a whole lot shorter than all the way out onto the loading dock. However, as more and more vendors finished loading their merchandise and left, I was able to bring our van closer and closer to our tables until I was able to load straight into the vehicle without hauling cartloads over. So I was able to load the cart itself and the various boxes that go around it.
As a result, we were able to get finished and out of the COBO Center at a far more reasonable hour than the midnight nightmare of getting out at Tampa. On the other hand, as we drove out the big exit door, I was immediately greeted by rain and lightning flashing across the sky, backlighting the Detroit skyline in brilliant purple.
Because I-94 had been such a colossal mess on the way in, we drove on surface streets all the way back to the hotel. It meant going through the sketchy parts of town, and it took a long time, but at least we got back safely and I was actually able to get a parking spot in the front, a handicap-accessible one with an area by the side door for van access. It made it easier to set up our luggage cart and wheel in our personal belongings, and it would make things easier when it came to load our personal stuff out of the hotel room.
Safely back in our room, we had a very late supper, then did a little wind-down activity. I discovered that the WiFi was down when I set up my computer, so I had to use my iPhone to do all my online stuff. However, I did get a little writing done before turning in for the night.
On Monday we got up and had the hotel's complimentary breakfast. Then I checked my computer while I was doing my hair and discovered that yes, the WiFi was still down for the count. So I just went ahead and broke down my computer and started packing everything as rapidly as I could so we could get out of that crummy hotel. It still took me two cartloads to get everything back out, but it seemed to go somewhat faster, even with sleeping in an extra hour.
However, the mess on I-94 meant we had to take surface roads all the way out past I-275, which did mean driving more slowly. I was very glad to finally get to US 23 and start heading down to Toledo, where we got gas and made a decent-sized deposit, if not as big as we'd been hoping for.
From there it was just a matter of staying awake as we crossed Ohio on US 24, then picked up I-469 to I-69 at Fort Wayne. We did run into some more construction as we got closer to Pendleton, and I was very glad to get off the Interstate and onto SR 67 to go the rest of the way home. Because of those delays, we got home right as the family member who'd been housesitting was taking off for the free community meal, and I ended up having to drive us separately. At least it was just down the street rather than all the way to Greenwood, but when we got back home for good, I only took in the essentials and then took a nap. Only after I'd recovered my energy did I finally carry in all our personal belongings and consider the trip truly finished.
Copyright 2019 by Leigh Kimmel
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Last updated September 11, 2019.