I frequently keep myself up to date on the latest in comics news (no crap, says the person listening to the 40 minute episode right now) I even have my google reader and google alerts set to go off with bells and whistles when ever something new and comic related gets posted to the intarwub. And it never fails that once a week at least, I get a story like this, Local Man Opens Comic Shop. Shock!

Today, amazingly enough, I got two. And While I think it’s awesome that more comic stores are opening. (I never get the story of local comic shop closing, though. I wonder how many of those I would get a week)
Is this a sign that comic shops are growing, that more and more people are taking notice? I’m hoping that’s the reason. Comics ruling the box office, despite dragging graphic novel sales, have grown and now demand to be noticed; on page 4D of the entertainment section.

Maybe there’s some even more altruistic reason for it. The periodical in general seems to be one of the most flagging entertainment industries of all, more than the crashing cd sales, and movie theater sales, and blah blah. So these newspapers feel some level of kinship with the burgeoning businesses, especially considering the artifact of the news stand, which is all but relegated to a rusted metal coin box outside your local Mart of preference.

Or maybe it’s just a reaction to said Mart stores. As they come through and decimate the local businesses, the one are where their craggy cororate fingers haven’t seemed to reach has been into the local Comic store. I can go to the local Super-Mart and get a haircut, rent a movie, order a pizza, do my grocery shopping and pick up that fresh cardboard tasting pizza before I leave the building, but if I want a Graphic Novel I still have to go to a dedicated book store and that’s not even an option when I want my weekly Wednesday pile.
And in my local paper, they do have pieces occasionally on new businesses opening. But it’s usually either here’s a hot new restaurant where you have to order your foie gras a year and a half in advance so they can raise the duck to your specification before they rip out the liver and trash the rest, OR it’s a complaint about the newest fizer construction and how it is destroying the Everglades this week.

Or maybe it’s just part of the cultural zeitgeist, I was reading a recent study that the majority of people who read and consistently follow the newspaper comics are over 60, with a healthy majority of that being over 80s. They approximate the average comic reader is 25-30. And recently, book stores are seeing an upswing in sales among young adults, mostly in the graphic novels section, so as much as we think the comic industry is dying in its variety of methods it’s still touching most people in america. So, why not, keep it going, tell me every new comic store opening and sing it loud.

And, At least they didn’t use a “Bif! Pow!” headline.