The Art of Independent Comic Book Publishing with Unshaven Comics - Interview 31

Show Transcript

Chris Saunders (00:01.486)
Testing, testing, I am good.

Frank (00:03.411)
Yeah, one, two, three.

Chris Saunders (00:06.062)
That grumble came through loud and clear, Mark?

Frank (00:08.644)
Excellent. Love it.

Marc Alan Fishman (00:11.537)
Yeah, same. Hello? All right.

Chris Saunders (00:12.995)
All right, sounding good, sounding good. All right, excellent.

Chris Saunders (00:22.854)
Welcome to Nerdpreneur, where we have fun conversations with people making money with their nerdy passion. As always, I'm joined by my co-host, Mr. And today, we have a very special guest. His name is Mark, and he is from Un-Shaven Comics. Mark, welcome to the show.

Frank (00:32.231)
Hello.

Marc Alan Fishman (00:41.992)
Glad to be here.

Chris Saunders (00:43.64)
We're excited to have you on here. So Mark, what is your nerdy passion?

Marc Alan Fishman (00:49.969)
Independent Comic Book Publishing.

Chris Saunders (00:53.806)
That I didn't. OK, so you make your own comic books. Is that kind of that?

Frank (00:55.28)
Alright.

Marc Alan Fishman (00:58.001)
Yes, yes, I am an artist, author and the business guy out of the three of us.

Chris Saunders (01:04.119)
So there's three of you in this partnership, this unshaven comics.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:08.017)
Yes, depending on how we sit at cons, we are either a Venn diagram or an addition problem. So there is one dedicated writer, one dedicated artist, and then I do both and then also do kind of the marketing businessy stuff. And then the other two guys, like we're all equal partners, we're best friends, have been for 30 years. So they just know that I'm a control freak and I wouldn't allow them to make any decisions.

Frank (01:15.023)
You

Frank (01:37.327)
On their own, at least.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:39.068)
why they're not here.

Chris Saunders (01:39.214)
Yeah, yeah, I was gonna say, I think we got the right of the the trifecta there, the right side of the triforce to talk to you about the business stuff. So so you're saying this comic book business, it's possible as an aspiring nerdpreneur to actually do it and have it be successful, because I've heard that building and creating your own comic book is pretty hard to do and find it be successful. So you're saying, yes, there's a way to do it. Awesome. Do you think it's transferable to other people?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:44.616)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (02:03.836)
Absolutely there is.

Chris Saunders (02:08.086)
Is this something we can dig into with you and find out if people can actually learn this and and it's a skill.

Marc Alan Fishman (02:14.675)
100%. Yeah, absolutely. And that's a weird, we are among many. And I think back of the 15 years that we've been doing this, would say solid 80 % of them are still doing it with us at the same time that we started or in some form or fashion. So absolutely.

Chris Saunders (02:35.47)
I wanted to ask because I think some people might think this but like how important is being a good artist versus being a good business person like versus being like a writer, you know, like there's got to be all these different hats to making a successful comic if you were to break it down into like well, it's about 50 50 between the artistic side and then the business side or is it more like I can make a crappy comic but if I market it great, it'll

go really well. What do you what do you think?

Marc Alan Fishman (03:05.297)
Well, without shooting myself in the foot, right? I can put it this way. If your goal is to make money and whether that means that you are sustaining an actual career or if it's like a side hustle, whatever your financial goals are, better quality is fantastic. But I have seen people whose style far outweighed the product. I've definitely purchased my fair share of independent books where

I've gotten home, read them and really wished I could have got my money back. But then you have to respect the hustle of how they actually sold me because I'm pretty tough to purchase on stuff. And several times that I've made those, it's been based on a promise that did not hit the page. And, you know, conversely, I've also purchased books or know of people whose talent probably

outweigh their business acumen a hundredfold. for those people, like you kind of wish that you could do something for them or, you know, you'd love to see them take off, but I genuinely feel like eventually that catches up to them positively. It really just depends. I've never seen someone like talent themselves out of working in comics, but that's to say, it's a pretty, it's a pretty narrow pie to begin with.

Chris Saunders (04:18.211)
Right.

Chris Saunders (04:22.52)
Well, that's the dream.

Frank (04:22.587)
Yeah, we often see people, know, nerdpreneurs that are struggling to get the word out there. that's one of the core aspects and principles of what we're doing this for, of course. So let's rewind a little bit, though, and talk about how unshaven comics got started with you and your two friends.

Marc Alan Fishman (04:40.403)
Sure. So first of all, like I said, we've been friends for 30 years. So I met Matt in sixth grade. We're from a small South suburb here in Chicago. And the way our school system had worked is every kid, depending on where you lived, went to a specific elementary school, K through five. And then sixth grade, we all meet at the junior high school. And then we meet with the other junior high, the neighboring town for the high school.

Well, sixth grade starts and I'm in my new homeroom and I noticed that I don't know any kids in the class really. Like a couple of them were in my elementary school, but most of them were not. And one of those kids was this guy, Matt, and I walked past him on the first day and the teacher had kind of like a introduce yourself questionnaire. And I noticed that he had flipped his over to the back and he was drawing this absolutely sick Viking that had like a one-handed ax with blood.

And I fancied myself an artist and I looked at him like, he is a much better artist than me. I think I need to be his friend. So it turns out he wasn't even a Willow kid from the other side of town. He was actually from a whole different part of the, the, was in Chicago. I was in suburbs. His mom moved down here and he was a new kid. So he needed friends quick. And I jumped at that chance. I was like, well, hi, I am your new best friend. And then literally two weeks later, he's like, this is Kyle. I met Kyle in health class. He is also our best friend.

And they're like, okay. And their love of comics kind of hit my tepid love of the space. Like I knew the cartoons. I just never had any inclination to go to a shop or buy a book. But now I did because, your friends, you you do what they do. Their hobbies become your hobbies and vice versa. So we were kind of known as comic book guys all the way through high school. went, please.

Chris Saunders (06:09.283)
haha

Chris Saunders (06:35.31)
Well, I'm curious because on that question, what was the first comic book you actually went out and purchased? Because it sounds like you were introduced to it through friends. What was the first comic book that got you into it? You're like, I like comics.

Marc Alan Fishman (06:44.369)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (06:47.771)
Okay, so twofold. The first one that I purchased, and this is tragic, is I purchased an adaptation of the X-Men cartoon. I bought a book that was basically just the cartoon readapted back into a comic, which is a type of inception that one shouldn't traverse. But then Matt, for my birthday that year, he and I both have December birthdays, so I met him basically in August, December. He drives his bike over to my house and he gifts me

Chris Saunders (06:56.502)
Marc Alan Fishman (07:17.523)
Prime and The Strangers, both number one issues for Malibu Comics. Malibu Comics would have gone out of business, I think, three months later. But that did not stop me from collecting an entire box worth of Malibu books. And those two I would consider to be my firsts, like real ones.

Frank (07:37.693)
Wow.

Chris Saunders (07:38.062)
I'm actually not even sure. I'm not a huge comic book nerd. I had original X-Men comics, but not the ones you were reading, the real ones. The other ones, yeah. The ones that are a little darker, a little more gritty. But that was the only comic book that I ever really read because I found them in my basement. It was my older brother's. was hand-me-down comics from a different generation. But I think everyone has those early comics where you're like,

Marc Alan Fishman (07:46.226)
Yes.

Chris Saunders (08:07.032)
This is awesome. I really like this. So what grabbed you about comics? Was there anything specific that you're like, man, I love this.

Marc Alan Fishman (08:14.291)
I I think, I mean, I love the cartoons and then by proxy because like, especially with the X-Men, prior to meeting Matt and Kyle, there was a friend of mine in fourth grade, Pat, I remember was heavy into the X-Men lore in the universe. And I would pester him because I wanted to know every character and every superpower. That's like all I cared about. So I knew all the members of X-Force and X-Factor and the first X-Men and then the uncanny X-Men. And I knew their powers.

And then obviously with the Batman, the animated series dropping, I fell in love with that whole universe. know early on, without knowing the super friends or who they were, eventually came back around to figure out, I love Green Lantern. And I actually ended up in between summers from sixth grade to seventh, I did an overnight camp and my bunk mate had comics and he ended up getting kicked out of camp and he left me all his comics.

So as he was being dragged out of the bunk, he's like, okay, I gotta go. So he's like, Mark, here, take my comics. So I read like this whole run of Kyle Rayner, Green Lantern books. And I was like, well, that's my guy. And if you know Kyle Rayner, like he was Spider-Man for DC when they didn't have one. And I still to this day think he's the best Green Lantern they've ever had. And I don't like Hal Jordan, so.

Frank (09:13.512)
Boom.

Chris Saunders (09:21.975)
Wow.

Frank (09:28.4)
Yes.

Frank (09:32.444)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (09:41.947)
seeing that he gets all that love.

Frank (09:42.159)
I think Kyle made Hal popular. That's my take, at least.

Marc Alan Fishman (09:47.187)
Well, it's, you know, it's all those Dan Dodio. mean, we know this guy and like he had such a love for the silver age that he was never not going to make Hal Jordan, Arthur Curry and Wally West matter or a Barry Allen, I should say. And Wally West, Kyle Rayner, like those were my guys because they were younger. They were depicted as being newer into the, I love it when superheroes do that. Like the one, then the young ward gets that like.

gets a shot at the apple, right? One of my favorite Batman book runs was when Dick Grayson took over the mantle of Batman. It wasn't long, but he was such a different version of that character. And I would say better in some cases, because he's somehow a little bit more adjusted. It was really, it was super entertaining. We know he was going to keep it, but you know.

Frank (10:30.277)
Yeah, bit more of a heart.

Chris Saunders (10:35.726)
So before we dive off into the very deep end of endless superhero comics that we could be... But before we do that, you guys started in 2006, I think. What happened in 2006 for you guys to create a comic book company together?

Frank (10:39.673)
Yeah, we got close there. We got right up to the ledge. I gotta say. I was ready to jump into that green lantern pool with you,

Marc Alan Fishman (10:55.763)
Thank you for steering the train back on the tracks. So really what had happened is I went to college in 2000, graduated in 2004, and Matt and Kyle followed me down to Indianapolis. And we were just living in Indy, working. We all had girlfriends. We all had adult money for the first time. So of course it was all going into comics. And this is back when Facebook was still like the Facebook, a mutual friend of ours from high school.

Chris Saunders (10:57.55)
you

Marc Alan Fishman (11:24.763)
reached out to me absolutely randomly out of the blue and said, hey, Mark, my mom is a comic book publisher, or I should say my mom is a publisher, and they translate graphic novels from the United States and then they sell them in Mexico. But they want to do it going the other way this time, and they actually want to do an original book. And I knew this gal, Alexis, from art class. And she's like, my mom asked me to do it. And I tried, and I do not want to do this. I do not like.

I tried it, it is not for me, but I remember you and Matt, and I remember you guys are the comic book guys. So like, you guys must be making comics, right? And I did what you're supposed to do in that situation. I lied and said, we make them all the time. So she said, great, could you guys come up to Chicago and meet with my mom and my uncle and they'll tell you about the project. So, you know, we put on our best sweaters, drove up and met her mother and her uncle who remains the

Frank (12:05.171)
Yeah, we're pros.

Marc Alan Fishman (12:22.675)
scariest human being I've ever met. We met at the bar. Again, we're not old enough to drink or anything, but yeah, we should have been. Anyway, we got to the bar and her uncle sits down and orders as his drink, water and bitters.

Frank (12:39.875)
boy, one of them. Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (12:40.925)
The power move. So we sit down with them, they tell us about the project and then the uncle just kind of leans forward. He looks us in the eye, goes, you guys have never made a comic in your life, have you? And we're like, no, sir, we have not, but we went to school for this. You know, like I got my degree in general fine arts, got his degree in illustration. Kyle and I each had emphasis in writing. I'm like, trust me, I think between the three of us, we can make this work.

Frank (12:52.37)
Ha

Marc Alan Fishman (13:09.297)
So they agreed and we signed just a very lucrative contract. I'm glad you guys are sitting. We got $500 and one box of books to make our first comic and it only took us 18 months. 54.

Frank (13:20.968)
What?

Frank (13:25.831)
How many pages? Okay, all color? gosh.

Chris Saunders (13:28.718)
you

Marc Alan Fishman (13:30.557)
Yes, yes. Now, hilariously, I will point out the miraculous building of this book is that they told us they wanted the book to be silent, no speech balloons. They just wanted a visual story so that they could publish it and sell it in Mexico, in the United States, and no one would have to read or translate anything. So we did write the story, they did approve the script, we did render that whole book, and I'm not kidding.

two days before it was due, Sylvia, the publisher called me and she's like, something, I feel like something's missing. And I blurted out, it has no words. And she's like, great, could you just throw some in there? So we bought a case of Mountain Dew in Red Bull and I spent all night lettering the whole thing in my basement with Matt and Kyle taking shifts.

Chris Saunders (14:12.567)
Mm-hmm.

Frank (14:15.961)
my god.

Marc Alan Fishman (14:29.499)
making sure I was awake. After one round of editing, the book was done. Yeah, that got us to 2008. We got our box of books, we got our 500 bucks, and we got to our first con to attempt to sell it.

Chris Saunders (14:31.886)
Bye.

Frank (14:43.547)
So, I gotta ask, I mean, are so many, there's gotta be so many lessons in that. What are just a couple of them that you guys collectively say, hey, you know, well, at least we learned this.

Marc Alan Fishman (14:57.435)
Well, first of all, we learned how to collaborate as not just friends, but as professionals. So this is where we started to figure out who had what talents and what. Now I started off saying, I don't want to draw anything. just want to, I know graphic design. That's what I went to school for and obviously writing. like I can help write it. I can letter it. I can color it. I can do all the stuff around the edges, but Matt, you're going to draw.

And he said, yeah, no problem. And Kyle and I helped and we did the scripting and we learned through the process, like how to make comics from scratch. So how to scan, how to professionally color things. We learned about color flatting. I actually trained Kyle to flat, which to this day he will never do again. Because somehow we found a job that we're like, this doesn't require any talent. And then Kyle turned in his first batch and we're like, Nope, that was a lie.

Frank (15:46.759)
Yeah

Marc Alan Fishman (15:56.093)
To this day, we still give him crap because now it doesn't matter when you do color flatting in comic books, means like black and white artwork and you treat it like a coloring book and you just put flat tone on each shape so that a real colorist can kind of come in and do their thing. Well, Kyle literally took that and said, well, whatever random color I can click, I will put into the box. So we had like brown houses with blue roofs, blue houses with brown roofs. And I would stare at these things and just make fun of them incessantly for it.

Frank (16:07.827)
Mmm

Frank (16:21.957)
Marc Alan Fishman (16:26.429)
Can't you just pick a color that appears in nature? It's like you'd.

Frank (16:30.023)
So you guys hadn't, sorry to interrupt you, I just was curious that you guys, you said that this was the first time you all learned of how to really work together and you'd been friends for so long. This couldn't have been the first group project that you'd done together, was it? Really?

Marc Alan Fishman (16:33.639)
Please.

Marc Alan Fishman (16:48.479)
it definitely was. Yeah. mean, Matt and I, obviously, like we went to art classes together, but there was never any like collaborative piece or anything. And, you know, we were just best friends. And it's not to say like, I think it's just in my own personal nature that I'm never not working. So even like before we had Unshavin' Comics, I was still doing freelance work for friends and...

designing stuff and like we would just hang out on Friday nights and we would play versus the card game and we'd watch movies or talk about what was going on in comics or whatever. this just seemed to be that weird missing piece of the puzzle, you know, however many years of friendship we already had up until that point, like this kind of opened up that like, this, this is right. So like when we got out of that 18 months and the book was done after we finished that first

Comic-Con, we realized two very important things. Number one, we absolutely wanted to continue to make comics. But more importantly, number two, they had to be ours. We liked doing the march. That was the book, The March Crossing Bridges in America. We enjoyed doing that book, but it didn't have any of the things that we wanted to do. It was a tasteful, creative, non-fiction book about an immigration march that happened in Chicago. It was very nice.

But we were all in our 20s. We had a lot of four-letter words and blood and violence to get out of the system. We kept joking that if they didn't want the book at the end, like when we finished it, that we were just going to recolor it and just make it like a zombie thing. Because there's nothing but crowd shots. luckily, they liked it.

Frank (18:17.747)
You

Chris Saunders (18:25.71)
Nice.

Frank (18:26.535)
nice.

Chris Saunders (18:29.238)
Right, right. Well, I'm curious because you've since then worked with these two individuals for 16 years to build out many comics, right? And your roles, it sounds like, are fairly siloed in some ways, right? Like, OK, you got an artist, you got writer, and you do more of the business stuff. You kind of do both. I'm curious from a creative perspective, working creatively with other people, do you

Marc Alan Fishman (18:40.605)
Yes.

Chris Saunders (18:58.796)
all just sort of trust, where's the line of like, I trust this person to do it, but I'm going to fight for certain ideas or I'm going to like, how do you give feedback in an example or in a, an environment like that, that allows it to be healthy, just speaking from, you know, working in partnerships, even ours and also other partnerships we've interviewed, there tends to be some sort of balance that needs to happen and being able to fight for what's really important for the company.

the future or the product and then on the other side to just make sure things get done and not be like arguing with each other. So how do you guys navigate that?

Marc Alan Fishman (19:37.617)
Well, I would say like first of all, probably the first 10 or 12 years worth of friendship actually made it easier because we already know going into something that I'm not going to say something derogatory to Matt about his artwork that I know he can't take. And I would expect the same back from him. If he draws a lousy panel, I'll call him out on it the same way I expect him to do to me. And in fact, the reason why I even do interiors is because he goaded me. You know, he made fun of me and basically said like,

You went to school the same as I did, pal. Learn to draw." And I was like, okay, well, I'll take that criticism because he's my best friend. From our writing perspective, when we're coming up with ideas and things like that, it's a little bit of improv comedy. It's yes and. And the way we fell into that basically is by creating the silos to begin with. So we made books originally where Kyle did the whole script.

And I am not contributing to that other than to be kind of a quasi editor, just to say like, your idea is your idea and I'm going to help where I can, like tighten up your script. And Kyle fell into that role where he's like, I don't, I don't care, edit away, like change the word, change the thing. I'm not going to be hurt by it. Just don't change where the story's going. And again, did the same for me when we started working on the Samornauts where now we're doing something together.

We still figured out a way to silo it. like I have my part of the book. Kyle has his part of the book in terms of scripting. And we in these, when we go to Comic-Cons, we're in the car for 10, 15 hours. You know, there's time to talk. So we, get through these plot things, we hammer it out and it's usually some of the most fun we have. Cause then you get to play that improv game of like, okay, well who are they fighting in this book and how can we make that tie into Canon and.

You know, there's a lot of that. I think like when we reach that idea, when all three of us are laughing, we're like, okay, there it is. You know, and we'll, collectively fight for things that we want, but I think we've all kind of realized, especially after doing it for as long as we have now, if we have a niche to scratch on our own, we're going to let that happen in its own place. Like I'm doing Sam or not to the max right now. And Matt and Kyle have nothing to do with it other than they read it.

Chris Saunders (21:36.974)
Mmm.

Frank (21:37.255)
Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (21:58.663)
When I'm done, given them the editing copy to take a look at and they know where I'm going with it. Similarly, Matt's working on a book right now, La Noche de los Luchanots. He's doing that a little bit to troll me, by the way. I'm the guy into professional wrestling and he's doing the luchador samanots. Kind of a dick move, but whatever. I know he's going to build that book by himself and I don't have-

Chris Saunders (22:17.01)
Marc Alan Fishman (22:25.277)
I don't get to criticize. don't get to say, hey, I don't like this DDT. It's like, nope, that's what you're doing. I'm going to trust it. Because again, like I think you said it, it's me hemming and hawing over a panel. Like my day job, I'm a marketing director by day. I can't do that to somebody else. I just won't.

Frank (22:45.669)
Right, there is a level of trust also that I'm hearing at least in what you all, you all trust that each of you is going to further the Samornauts. Is that Samornauts? I said that right? Okay, awesome.

Marc Alan Fishman (23:00.637)
Yes.

Chris Saunders (23:01.454)
They're like astronaut samurais, correct? That are also monkeys?

Marc Alan Fishman (23:04.147)
Correct. They are led by a single immortal kung fu monkey.

Chris Saunders (23:09.41)
Got you, okay, I wondered about that. I've seen the kung fu monkey on a lot of, on the front of the comics. It looked very bad ass, so.

Marc Alan Fishman (23:12.381)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (23:15.891)
We know where we get our money from.

Chris Saunders (23:18.872)
Yeah, right. Well, that's that's what is where where do you get money in as a comic book company? Like, where does that actually come from?

Frank (23:20.531)
So I want.

Marc Alan Fishman (23:26.355)
That's a good question. Now, very specifically to unshaven comics, we are 99.9 % convention-based and we do that for a very good reason. The independent comic book marketplace sucks. For those who are uninitiated, there is one distributor of comics globally, effectively. If you are an independent comic book maker and you intend to get into the local comic book shop that is

Chris Saunders (23:39.659)
Okay.

Marc Alan Fishman (23:55.891)
10, 12 states away, there's one catalog, the Diamond catalog. And Diamond has a couple of rules where you can see very quickly where the problems spark. Number one, you have to pre-sell $5,000 worth of merchandise to get into the catalog. Number two, you have to be able to take 100 % returns. So if I get Samornauts by hook or crook into the Diamond catalog,

And somebody in Walla Walla, Washington buys a Samoranaut copy and I ship it out to them. They put it on the shelf and they forget about it. Three months later, they go, what the heck is this thing? I don't actually want it. They're going to send it back to me. Good luck on how that's going to ship by the way. And I got to take it back. You tell me how to make money in that and I will gladly follow it. But we've, we never really figured that was a good way to do it.

Frank (24:45.384)
Hmm.

Marc Alan Fishman (24:52.541)
to be fair to ourselves, like what may separate us from others in our genres, we're really good at selling at the Comic-Cons. So we are able to sustain. Now, this is not a job for the three of us. And part of that is because there's three of us. We learned very early on there's no full-time jobs in comics for a group like this to just come in. And none of us had desire to splinter off or try to

make it by ourselves. And that was just not in the cards. So we are all convention-based up until this year, and things have kind of changed. And I'm sure we'll get into that a little bit more, but effectively now we're into the licensing side of this and where can Samoranauts go that we ourselves can't handle, but people are now willing to help us. So we're extremely excited about all that happening and we're taking nothing for granted when it comes to that side of

Frank (25:51.281)
You had talked a little bit. mean, yeah, definitely we're to dive into the convention side of things. And maybe this does tie into that in a way, but the three of you and your vibe on your website is unique. It's refreshing in a way that I get a strong sense of your personalities. You're friendly, you're approachable. And I'm wondering if any of that ties in and what else ties in that makes the secret sauce.

of unshaven comics when you guys are at a con and you're wheeling and dealing, what do you think is your team's secret sauce?

Marc Alan Fishman (26:29.971)
Well, I'll tell you tragically, there is one secret above all else. And I may not actually have it on me. You know what? I don't, but I'll describe it. The real secret sauce is a stupid eight and a half by 11 laminated sign that says, can I tell you about our comic book? This literally by happenstance and this is not overnight. This is just one year at a con we were across from a booth that had speakers.

And they were thumping EDM music into the aisles. And our up to that point way of stopping people to talk to us was just to stop them and yell. Kyle's voice was going and he turned to me and Matt and he goes, can you guys scribble on a sheet of paper? Can I tell you about my comic book? And he just held up just a little sheet of paper that said it. And just that alone stopped people because they see it, they read it, they laugh. And then.

We have worked extremely hard to perfect that elevator pitch to the point that we run a panel on it now, how to pitch your comics. It's the combination of something stupid to stop people. We all acknowledge you are in a row of literal legends to the left of you, other people selling crafts to the right. You've got to stop them somehow. Just holding up a word balloon sometimes is all you need to do.

but being able to back that up with something of substance. To your point, I'm just being modest about this. I think we've always carried dad energy, no matter our age. I think people just stop because we are easy to talk to, we're having a good time. Clearly, people see that we're having a good time at the show, and then it really is that pitch because we've pitched a bunch of different projects over the course of 15 years.

Samoranats is where there was a hard pivot when it went from, that sounds cool to shut up and take my money. So, yes.

Frank (28:34.971)
Really? What is the pitch, if you wouldn't mind?

Chris Saunders (28:35.886)
Cool. Yeah. Can I, so you got me with a, first off, can I just say, I love the sign thing that is so, so cool and so smart. And I think that even if anyone who was just like listening and thinking about how to get more people to show up at their con or to do that, like having some visual like that takes away so much awkwardness to between interacting with nerds who aren't always the most outgoing and excited to chat to strangers. You can have them self select.

Marc Alan Fishman (28:38.163)
So.

Chris Saunders (29:05.772)
from a big group. I just wanted to point out that that is such a cool and smart way to do it and clearly seems to work. So you got me with that. I'm walking up. What do you say to me after that?

Marc Alan Fishman (29:18.035)
So after, mean, literally Kyle will repeat it. And by the way, he is the salesman that like of all the special skills we have, we all bow down to Kyle. That man is the machine. And I'll get into it in a sec, but effectively you come by the table, you see the sign and he goes, Hey, sir, can I tell you about my comic? You say, yeah, sure. And he goes, okay. And he picks up the book, he hands it to you and he goes, it's called the Samoranauts. It's about a team of samurai astronauts led by an immortal Kung Fu monkey.

defending the earth from zombie cyborg space pirates. Now, as you can see, it is a full color print book, over 200 pages of content. Normally it is $25, but here at the show we actually have a special. We're selling it today for $20. Would like to give it a try?

Chris Saunders (30:02.158)
So the eyebrow rays after samurai astronaut led by an immortal monkey, is it always the same? Like, is it always like, you got my attention, sir.

Marc Alan Fishman (30:13.779)
We know it's, we always get into it. Samurai astronaut, I've sat here and monitored people's faces. They hear samurai astronaut and now it's starting to churn. Led by an immortal kung fu monkey. wait, now what? And now it's, okay, I think you have me now, now close it. And we say, depending on the book, of course, they fight zombie cyborg space pirates or transforming demon dinosaurs from another dimension or.

Frank (30:13.807)
You got it from both of us just now.

Frank (30:27.975)
Marc Alan Fishman (30:43.551)
a cadre of evil mutant hive mind socialists. Whatever they happen to be, we have all of these phrases. Kyle's got them all memorized. I don't. But it's that combination of samurai astronauts, immortal kung fu monkey, crazy villain descriptor that seals it because we know that we don't have to get into the semantics. We don't have to talk about anything deeper because they're also flipping through the book.

Chris Saunders (30:48.718)
Hahaha.

Chris Saunders (31:11.31)
and you don't want to give it away.

Marc Alan Fishman (31:12.881)
Well, some people do and we choose not to, but the artwork speaks for itself in this case. And from there, we do make a point to get into like what we're actually handing you. So we let you know, this is a book, this is how many pages there are. We do highlight that it's full color, even though I think that's kind of silly because everything kind of is now, but whatever. And then we always, we tell them the price. And the most important thing that people

do not do is we ask for the sale. We learned our lesson for many years. We used to ask, what do you think? Which is the worst question you can ask because what do you think will give you an infinite number of responses from people who think this is now their time to give you an ad hoc book review to an ecumenical debate about comic books in general.

Chris Saunders (31:45.72)
Yes.

Frank (32:05.788)
Right.

Marc Alan Fishman (32:10.771)
to telling us how they know that they're smarter than we are and that this is clearly just Hanuman. Gotcha. we're like, well, yes, it's inspired by, but there's been a lot of different versions of that monkey and ours is not that. Two people saying, yeah, absolutely. How much is it? And now we have actually got to like do something about it. When we just changed the phrase to would you like to give it a try? It changed the closing ratio.

Insanely well. That's the other thing I'll point out that we do that other people don't. Another good nugget. No data, no decision. We track everything. So when we pitch, Kyle has a clicker. When they say, yes, I have a tally sheet. So at the end of every con, we know how many people we pitched to versus how many purchased. And that is usually the signifier for us. Good show or bad.

Frank (33:03.617)
wow.

Chris Saunders (33:04.778)
Yeah, that's awesome. mean, and so important for people to hear that you got to ask for the order, ask for the sale and being in sales for a long time. Sometimes I can take that for granted. That was my bread and butter for still is in many ways in my day job. I'm doing a lot of just generally sales. That's how I met Steven actually, the person who connected us to you, Mark. And it was,

Frank (33:12.646)
Yeah, directly.

Chris Saunders (33:29.274)
such an important lesson in my early days when I was I think 20 or something like that, selling my first ever set of knives like long, long time ago. And you can kind of forget that people who maybe are brand new to sales feel awkward in that moment of asking for the money, asking, which is really what you're doing to say, Hey, would you like to give this a try is a clear yes or no distinction is will you give me $20 for this? Like essentially, right? Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (33:56.499)
And it's Kyle's superpower. I've said it before and I'll lean into it again. He has a decided lack of empathy when we're selling that I don't. The problem is there's been times where Kyle is not there and it's Matt and I selling and we're terrible. We can hold up the sign, we can give you the pitch, we can almost mimic Kyle word for word, cadence for cadence, but it gets to that would you like to give it a try and.

My brain will stop me from saying it because I'll read something in their face that goes, they don't have money or they don't really like this. And I just forget to ask or I get embarrassed and like, I'll let them tell me they want it. Kyle doesn't have any of that, which is great. and it's been.

Chris Saunders (34:39.596)
Yeah, if you're, I've been accused of having lower empathy than Frank here, I think sometimes because of that. I'm just repeating, I'm holding the mirror up to nature here. This is a, but, but, but, but it's, it's what works in sales. You do get out. It just becomes a numbers game, right? Like of, you know, the way I always looked at it was if I am, if I asked 10 people and five of them are saying yes, I'm still getting paid for those five nos.

Frank (34:46.097)
Who said that? That would never.

Marc Alan Fishman (34:53.021)
But, next thing.

Chris Saunders (35:08.684)
I just have to get through those nos to be able to get to the yeses. And so there is no harm. And was also taught there's no harm in asking. And I think that when we have something we believe in that maybe is our thing, but we maybe don't really believe in it, right? It's different when you're selling something that is, you know, the best knives in the world. Like I was selling is easy to say, it's totally confident. Everything's great. I might as well ask for it. But sometimes something we create our own products can be the hardest things for us to be wanting to ask for the sale.

And can you maybe speak to that a little bit about how, I mean, obviously you can hire a sociopath or whatever to sell your books if that's what you want to do. Not saying he's still the path, but, like, could you speak to just even like believing in your product enough to be willing to ask for the order a bit?

Marc Alan Fishman (35:47.005)
Good.

Marc Alan Fishman (35:54.867)
Of course. I mean, this is something that we learned at the very first Comic-Con we did. So when we got to that first Comic-Con with the march and we put it out on the table and, you know, decidedly we are guys in our early twenties selling a creative nonfiction book about an immigration march at Comic-Con. And this is still when DC and Marvel had booths at these shows and that you were in with the hardcore, the hardcore. is 2008. So this is.

when X-Men and Batman were in theaters, but they were not the zeitgeist by any means. So you were still heading to the hardcore. We, the first day, sat on our hands. We put the book on the table and we prayed that someone would stop and look. Yeah, a couple of people did and we told them about it for far too long. We forgot to ask for the sale and sometimes someone would be really nice and ask you. Great. The next day, we came in and our

booth neighbor, the very nice gentleman, turned to us and he's like, would you guys take some advice? And we're like, we'll take all the advice, please. And he was a writer. He was selling his book. He had just optioned it to be a screenplay. So he was super excited. And he just told us the most important phrase I think we ever heard early in our career. What's the worst that are going to say? No. And like that sort of opened the door. like, Kyle heard those words and he immediately leveled up and he was like, I get it.

Frank (37:13.853)
Right.

Marc Alan Fishman (37:20.779)
And like we had no problem at that point. That's when he started just getting into the aisle effectively and saying, sir, can I tell you about my comic? Miss, can I tell you about my comic? Because he knew the worst they could say is no. When it comes to the belief in our product, I would say, especially in comics, you get really lucky in that depending on who you're handing that book to, most people tend to look at it positively, even if it's not their style. You know, they say, I'm not really into the books that look like this or.

whatever, it's been rare that we've been, I'd say, smacked on the chin by a review here and there, and it's happened. And you can't even disagree with what people say. It's yeah, it's subjective, right? We just know now, especially like with Samorinots, people kind of know what they're getting when they buy it, and we've never heard an ill word for it. And when you say mortal kung fu monkey and someone like tells you literally shut up, how much is it? You're like, okay, well, that's all the ego boost I'll ever need.

Chris Saunders (38:14.486)
Yeah, right.

Frank (38:18.086)
Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (38:18.774)
We'll take that.

Chris Saunders (38:18.894)
Well, yeah, I guess once you get well, that's the state like once you get a sail or two, your confidence goes to the roof, right? And then and then it becomes it's like, sometimes you just have to really convince yourself before you get that first sale that it's worth. It's worth what you're asking and just get it, you know, like go out and ask and try because if you just get those first few yeses and then when you get the testimonials back from people who really liked it or come back after.

Marc Alan Fishman (38:25.331)
100%.

Frank (38:28.657)
becomes fun at that point.

Chris Saunders (38:45.868)
Like you see them at the next convention and they're like, I loved it. When are you coming out with more? Like, what does that do for you to be able to, get excited about selling your product? Right. And

Marc Alan Fishman (38:56.285)
I mean, it's always there. And for us, mean, it's also a matter of like, you know, from a creator standpoint, like this is what drives us. Like we have a story that we're trying to tell and we won't stop, like we say, until it's no longer fun and it's never not been fun. So as much as we love people's feedback to it, I also know like I'm only one issue in out of three on Samorats to the Max. I have to finish this story. I have to get it out there.

I would never want to be on the other side of that table. I've been that fan that doesn't get the complete story and you get pissed. I don't want that to happen. So yeah, it's a little bit of push and pull for sure.

Frank (39:36.323)
I was wondering, one of the things we talk about is leveled up. actually, it's funny. We talk about it. And it's your level of problems, essentially. What is it when you've gotten to this stage in your career and with the team, when you have gotten past the hurdle of how do I sell, what is the next hurdle that you have to deal with?

you know, for someone that's listening, for example, like, you know, they they understand how to sell. But what is the next thing that they may need to prepare for?

Marc Alan Fishman (40:09.683)
For us, it was always about the show data, because we knew that's where we're selling. So now we have to figure out, to a degree, how are we keeping the doors open? Unshaving Comics doesn't need a lot to operate now, but we've had to fight to get to that point. When we started out, minimal purchase orders for printing suck. And if you have to spend $3.85 for a book you're charging $5 for,

And you try to do the math of how many books I need to sell to actually profit here. my God. Then you realize, well, this is a zero sum game until I have enough content to feed a graphic novel and only then do the scales flip. And now I can make actual profit. Now that I have actual profit, what determines a good show? How many books do I need to sell at this show for it to matter? And for us, I mean, that's pretty basic stuff. It's how much did this table cost me to be at this Comic-Con?

Up until now, we've never factored our travel. It's just sort of there. Now that things have kind of changed for us financially, potentially, it could be something we care about and say, hey, like, can the company start paying us back for going to these things? Or can it cover itself? And then for us too, the next level up problem is we want to make more content than we have the ability time-wise to invest.

Are we willing to take on other people to help us make these books? And to what degree do we allow them to be here? Because Unshaven Comics has always been three. To add another name to that group, are they a part of us? Are they name on a book? Are they Unshaven Comics? And we're making those decisions kind of like as I'm talking to you guys right now. So that's been the next step.

Frank (41:49.874)
Right.

Frank (41:56.691)
I would like to dive into that a little bit. You talk about the data, kind of talked a bit about balancing expenses and revenue. How did you learn that?

Marc Alan Fishman (42:07.175)
Baptism by fire? So, I mean, like I said, my day job, I was a graphic designer turned marketer. So I knew about getting vendors. I knew about how to print and how to contact printers. It also helped that for a while Matt worked at a print shop and was a printer. So we had some friends in the business or at least understood specs. But when you have to make that first book, you got to learn as you're there. We also learned incredibly hard to learn lessons about friendship.

Frank (42:09.124)
Okay.

Frank (42:23.069)
Nice.

Marc Alan Fishman (42:35.141)
and networking and how that can bite you in the butt. If you are not smart about this stuff and we made bad decisions, we had friends literally attempt to stab us in the back. I'm sorry, not literally, figuratively, with some, hey guys, come over here. Let me help you. And moments before we hit the trigger, something in my head popped on saying, hey, before you just write this guy a big old check, maybe you should find out if you're about to waste a bunch of money and then find out you are.

And go, crap, okay, pump the brakes. Let's figure out the problem. Let's work from there. So a lot of us, mean, again, comics, we're very lucky in that this is a really simple business. We make X amount of books. We make X amount of profit. We know that we've done the math long enough to say 20 books a day at a con is a good day. So how do we reverse engineer that? When do we know that a show is bad and we're not going to go back to it? And for us specifically, it also goes around the fact that,

Chris Saunders (43:05.079)
Hmm.

Frank (43:05.139)
Hmm.

Marc Alan Fishman (43:32.413)
We all have day jobs. have kids, we have wives. So getting out to do these shows, we can only do so many now. Like when we didn't have kids, I looked at the data. We did one year, 17 shows. And I mean, that includes like one day shows that are local in town and stuff, but you know, we traveled for a lot of those. Now we do four to six, six to eight, give or take. Just what's available, where we want to go.

Luckily for us right now, we're kind of in that mode where it's like, hey, we haven't been to New York in a while, so we could go back. And luckily there's enough churn in the fan base that we can still sell Samornauts, curse of the Dreadnaughts to a whole new group of people that have never heard us or seen us or anything. So we're lucky in that case. But in all these cases, like you learn either by doing it yourself and failing, or you get some trusted mentors. And we've had some of those that kind of lead you if you know how to ask the right questions.

Chris Saunders (44:29.848)
What's the biggest convention you guys have done?

Marc Alan Fishman (44:32.987)
New York Comic-Con in terms of like number of people in the building. Yes.

Chris Saunders (44:35.212)
And yeah, yeah, just bigger. And is it always bigger is better or do you have just like other cons that are little gems you look forward to every year?

Marc Alan Fishman (44:45.815)
I mean, there's little gems we look forward to as much as there are just great shows that I could care less if we sell well at or not. We did Baltimore this year. I love Baltimore Comic-Con. And in fact, without trying, this year we actually did kind of the year of the non-big show, like not connected to a major. There's only two people that put out shows that have names. So the independent shows out there, they're ones that we did this year. Love them.

But like New York Comic-Con is bigger, better. Yes, for us it is. know because more butts in the building mean more an opportunity to sell our best shows ever. We're New York Comic-Con and Fan Expo Canada, which is why we ended up doing it two years in a row because the first year we went was the year after they opened after COVID where we were warned coming in only 20 % was allowed to buy tickets because they wanted to keep fandom to a limit.

And that still ended up being our best show ever. So we're like, okay, well, we got to do this show again, because next year they're going to like let the flood gates open. And yeah, two years in a row, it was the best show ever for us. Now, I don't know in terms of butts in the building. I think New York is still more than Fan Expo Toronto, but I mean, from the book sale standpoint, they were great for us. So I can't say that in New York for us very specifically.

We did not get into Artist Alley, which is kind of into the minutia of how Comic-Cons are constructed, but we had to buy up into the next level, which is called Small Press, which is more expensive, but that puts you, let's say, in the bigger heart of the show floor. So it's a different, the fans come you at a different time than when they're in Artist Alley, which is where we're typically. So I don't know if our numbers in New York have always been inflated because we've always had to be.

not with the people we want to be. But again, it's hard to argue because we made a lot of money when we did those shows. you know, I just don't like small press.

Chris Saunders (46:48.27)
What are, outside of the, you know, knowing your sales pitch, essentially what we already covered and bringing people to be able to, you know, execute on that pitch really well as people come up to the table, what would be like, you know, three to five keys to success of a good con? Cause you guys have done quite a few as a comic book artist, right? Or being able to go to a con. Cause you're right, artist allies.

are very common in a lot of different cons. They have them all over the country in different places. And, you know, I know there are artists that are going there that aren't making their money back. And could they, how would you change what they're doing to help them?

Marc Alan Fishman (47:33.511)
Well, first off, depending on how they structure what they're selling, forgive me, price point still matters to me. I feel like everyone sort of silently inflated their prices up because they felt like everyone else could. We've stayed where we're at, where we feel like, and this is maybe the Midwestern in us, but we're like, stay competitive in the pricing. We make so much profit on the trade that we still kind of feel guilty about selling them.

And we discount them. So we're like, well, even discounted, we're making incredible money on this. So cool, I guess. And then we run it from there. Outside of that, you know, and I see a lot of like independent guys, like loan creator at their table by themselves with kind of their stuff behind them. And they, sort of, you know, head down and I'm going to draw commissions. You really want to shake them up and be like, Hey, you got to grab people. You got to do something now. That's not for everybody. I'm going to.

play an old man moment here and I apologize, but at the last cons we were at, you got to stay at your booth. Our neighbor left his booth so often that I had to tell people, I don't know when he's coming back. And that happened repeatedly. And you know, when he came back and I kind of asked him like, Hey man, you seem to be like taking a trip around. And he was like, yeah, like, when am going to have a chance to like see all these people and like,

you know, network and do these things. was like, I mean, you're not wrong, but like you're also missing sales. So if you can't afford to bring help, then you can't afford to leave your booth. There's time, you know, there's bar con afterwards. You can, you can still talk to the people that you want to talk to. That's important. Good old fashioned marketing. Like do you have your social media?

Ready to go? it inviting? you like, do you have an off ramp for your customers? Being customer-proof is something that we've learned. You just have to be like, did you bring enough change? Are you scraping? Can you take forms of payment? Big important thing now. Now, obviously people have caught up to it, but like we were one of the first to adopt it to be able to take a credit card or PayPal or whatever. Now this year we learned that you have to tap. You have to accept phone tap payments. So you got to learn how to do that quickly.

Marc Alan Fishman (49:52.859)
Yeah, staying competitive, making sure that you have your marketing. For me personally, I like having the, can't buy, but I still want that customer. Is there something I can make you do before you leave my table that would still provide value? Now we've never done a newsletter up until literally two months ago, so now that can be a thing. Hey, if you don't want to do this, please scan this QR code, at least join my newsletter. You're not going to be spammed. It's just me, and I'm just going to tell you about the thing.

that might be a good off ramp to like, like us on Facebook or when we have a podcast, go like our podcast, follow it, whatever that might be. Those tend to be, look at what your neighbor's doing and I'll steal a phrase from my boss right now. Get heavy into R &D, rip off and duplicate.

Frank (50:40.083)
You know, it's funny.

Chris Saunders (50:41.409)
We used to say in our sales organization, steal from the best with pride is how we always said it.

Frank (50:47.931)
Yeah, that that's a good R and D acronym for that. I yeah, similarly. So my day job is I make videos and I also do product photography. And in that space, when I was first learning, it was a lot of, hey, let's see who's making product videos that kick ass and then let's copy it in our own way just so we can learn that technique because.

Marc Alan Fishman (50:48.019)
sucks, but it works.

Frank (51:12.285)
I mean, we're not going to be doing the same video as them. yeah, exactly. Like learning what they're doing and learning how to duplicate it and make it happen. I wanted to circle back to something you said a little while ago about the bad cons you don't go back to what's, what's some criteria for your team that you, you now like, Hey, you know what? That con wasn't good because of X, Y, and Z. What are some of those variables?

Marc Alan Fishman (51:35.795)
Traditionally, it's butts in the building, first and foremost. If the fans aren't there, if the show is not well organized, if they put you in a bad spot, if there's a bad spot on the show floor, that's bad planning and you don't have control over that. If you're our size, I don't get to demand where my table is. So if they put us in the back row and we don't get the fans, then I know that the people who made that show did not know how to direct the fans to enjoy the whole show.

and I've seen the ones that make it, they try too hard, you know, like take this scavenger hunt and now you've got to go and you've got to see everybody. Yeah. But then you're getting people that come in and stamp my thing. I don't want to hear you. You know, I'm just here for my stamp. That doesn't work either. for us, it really is just base calculus. How much, how many books did we sell? How much did this table cost us? And, you know, for us personally, I, know, it's like, Hey, did we, did we find a cool restaurant?

afterwards, like did we eat someplace cool? Did we do something in the city that worked? And I'll say like we've had bad shows or just shows that we wouldn't do again just because of like, hey, we took a chance by going out into Muncie, Indiana. Okay, well, how many people are going to get in the building in Muncie? Are we going to get every fan that is in Muncie? Does that really work for us? Maybe once. Do we have to come back year after year? Probably not.

You know, I feel bad enough if we do C2E2 here in Chicago two years in a row, and if we don't have something new on the table, we're going to hit the same people. you're like, well, yeah, it's still me. Nothing's changed, but you didn't get that poster last year. So you want that?

Frank (53:14.259)
What?

Chris Saunders (53:15.694)
What diversity of products? Obviously you have new comic books and new publications. Those are the hot sellers, the big things, but they are also the longest and biggest investment to create, I imagine. What about diversity of products? You mentioned posters. Are there other things that you guys have bled into and what were the first ones that actually started selling?

Marc Alan Fishman (53:30.353)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (53:40.359)
Well, we did posters because everyone did posters. Now, we ended up finding a love of doing mashups just because we're like, again, I just thought it was weird. I don't need to sell a pinup of the Samoranauts if you're buying the Samoranauts book. It's cool, but if you don't know the Samoranauts, now I have to sell it twice. And the cool thing about posters is that you don't have to pitch a poster. They see it, they laugh, or they think it's a cool image and they buy it if it's competitively priced.

For me, a piece of paper, I can't charge what other people charge for their posters, and I'm still wowed at the fact that some people will charge $25 for a sheet of paper. I don't care how cool it is. I would buy a $25 poster from Brian Bolland, and he is absolutely my favorite artist of all time. But he also didn't sell those, so I don't have to worry. Aside from posters, we've tried stickers, we've tried buttons, we've tried pins, we've...

We've tried little action, figurey type things. None of it, none of them worked. They might be fine if you, if you found a way to bundle it, but that it felt like you're an infomercial like by now and you get this sticker and this poster and this thing. We stuck to posters. Those work. I will admit, depending on how much research you guys did, I also have a side hustle to the side hustle, which is Matt's fault. So Matt always did commissions at the show.

Chris Saunders (54:40.654)
when you're shaking your head. So no.

Marc Alan Fishman (55:07.343)
and to stay busy, you know, that used to be a big thing. It's not so big anymore. And we're still trying to figure that part out because in addition to unshaven comics selling well, for Matt and myself, there's always been kind of this quote dinner money. Like, can I sell something at the table enough to buy my dinner tonight? That would be cool because I don't have to spend. So Matt would do commissions and sometimes he would be so bogged down with commissions that he would literally be working at the board all con long.

Those are some of our favorites for him, especially he turned to me and he's like, why aren't you doing that? You know, you're not selling like Kyle and you're not drawing like me, Mr. Marketing, what are you doing? And I was like, stuff. So I did do some of the commission work with him. my style there was a little bit more cartoony, a little bit more simple. and then I realized I'm like, I'm a graphic designer. Like I could figure this stuff out. So right around the time the Avengers started, I made a small set of.

Frank (55:46.579)
Hehehe.

Marc Alan Fishman (56:05.075)
Pokemon mashups, Pokemon plus Avengers, put them together, call them the Poke Avengers. And I made little four by six, so bigger than a trading card, but still collectible in my mind. And I maybe made 25 a piece of these postcards and I sold them cheaply. I sold out that weekend out of those cards. And that became a problem because now I have four racks worth of them.

So Pokemon, Pokemon mashups has actually grown enough to become its own table if we wanted it to be. I've since decided after this year that I think maybe that it's kind of run its course. Also, it's a, it's a big to do to set it up and put it down. Like it takes me all hour to set up 96 cards right now. And it does make money. It definitely covers the dinner money, but now it outshines Matt.

Chris Saunders (56:33.358)
So that's all.

Chris Saunders (56:40.174)
Wow.

Marc Alan Fishman (57:00.415)
And it's good, but it's not. So I'm going to reduce it back down, figure out a way to like still show off all those designs, but maybe not in these giant spinner rack things. So yeah, those other products, they're there, but I want to say like, we don't judge a show based on anything else other than book sales because we're not a craft company.

Chris Saunders (57:20.642)
Is there?

Chris Saunders (57:24.044)
Right, right. Well, what about this? Do you guys do anything that would be equivalent to like, we call them like diamond level or Sparta level offers in our business. It would be like where I could pay a large sum of money to you, but I would get everything that you guys have published, for example, or maybe I get some like signed, you know, rarer version of your of your comic books and

Do you have like diamond level for like super fans or people who really dig this kind of thing?

Marc Alan Fishman (57:55.197)
When we're at the show, depending on the vibe, we really try to get away with selling the book. And then if they yes and that, if they're like, my God, yes. And after we tell them it's 20 bucks and they got that out and then they see there's other books on the rack, because we make it a point to not be like, and if you think that's great, you need this book and you need that, we don't touch it. If you want the book, here's your $20, get lost and let's get the next person in.

But if they stay or they're like, well, what's this other book and what's this one, Kyle will pitch that one quickly. And then we will tell them like, by the way, you know, there's no like discount, but if you get like the trade and another one of those books, we'll throw in a poster. Or if you get all three of them, we'll throw in two posters because paper's cheap. So we'll do that. I don't think we've ever made it a point to do it. I think we're about to make a pivot because we've got a video game coming out. Watch me float that in the conversation.

So next year we know if they buy more books, they get more incentives in the video game. we're trying to create that little like, by the way, well, if you're really into this because there's a game, well, buy the book and the other two books and now you get more stuff. So we're calling that a little bit of an experiment to see. I think it's, again, the Midwestern part of us that goes, I don't want to take every last dollar out of these people's pocket at the show because there's so much cool stuff. So it's like,

If you like the Samornauts, I trust that if you like it enough, you'll come back to the website and buy another one. I also know well enough by the data, they won't. So like, let's get that trade off. Let's make them excited. And like, so I were publishing issues just to get back to that trade. Cause again, that's where the economy of scale goes. Now, when I have two trades on my table, boy, howdy, it'll change. And we do have other books. So Kyle has his own dinner money.

trades that he's running through Unhaven Comics, which is great because it's allowed us to diversify who we pitch to. That's the other thing that I know I didn't touch on. We pitch to everybody. Anyone who will stop, you will get to hear the pitch and we'll pitch Sam or not to everybody, we don't care. But I will say there are certain types of people that come by the table that clearly will like Kyle's other books. We can just make that judgment call based on any number of things that goes.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:00:13.319)
They may like the Samoranauts, but we know they're gonna like this book. We've got one called Blooms. And it's like, I know that if you have like half a buzz cut here and rainbow hair on top, you're going to love Blooms. I just know it. And I'm more apt to have Kyle. Kyle will just pitch that, know, maybe because he knows that Matt and I won't say anything.

Chris Saunders (01:00:25.774)
You

Chris Saunders (01:00:30.312)
Yeah.

Chris Saunders (01:00:37.85)
Do you guys collect emails? I know you mentioned you have a newsletter you just started doing that but the idea of like, you know Pitching that to someone who doesn't buy makes less sense to me than like pushing to someone who does buy right and if they do buy Do you have a process to kind of say hey to so you don't so you get discounts or you get? the you know, notificated Notificated notification about the upcoming releases

Would you want to sign up for is that something that's part of your pitch now or?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:01:08.797)
We always tell people after they buy a book or whether they buy or not to please like, you know, follow us on social media. we always ask them to do that. If they do, think for us, part of the fun is that we don't try too hard to own the customer because we are con based. I'd almost wish to forget everybody in a city so that every time we come back, it's fresh. and that may change now as we get Samorinots into other medium, and that will change.

how we think about it, but can't really talk on that until we've actually done it. like I said, we have a lot of failing to do in the next couple of years to figure out how to correct that. So I'm looking forward to that part, especially.

Frank (01:01:53.085)
So I think now is the time where we ask you about the video game.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:01:56.595)
Are we doing a video game? cool.

Chris Saunders (01:01:56.77)
Yes. Well, yeah, you kind of raise that in the conversation very casually.

Frank (01:01:58.343)
Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:02:02.151)
Yeah, that's exactly should have word a pin.

Frank (01:02:04.059)
What's the video—yeah, what's the video game focus on?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:02:08.221)
So we are going to be doing a game on the Roblox platform. It is a tycoon style combat game. So if you're into Roblox, that will make sense to you. I don't, but I'm learning. I'm learning. So.

Frank (01:02:22.512)
I don't either. So can you please explain it to me like I don't know? Thank you.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:02:26.183)
Absolutely. My 12-year-old is super into Roblox, so I've been schooled. Now, if you don't know, I'll help you out. Roblox is a platform where there are millions of games that you can play for free. It's mostly a mobile thing. I didn't know that because my kids play it on Xbox. You can do it on Xbox, you can do it on your PC, can do it on your phone or tablet. Inside Roblox will be a Samorinauts game.

The point of that game is you choose your favorite Samoranaut or Al the Immortal Kung Fu Monkey and you train them inside your own little personal dojo. You level up their strength and how much Samor Force they have and you can spend the Samor Force on new moves, new costumes, and other upgrades to your character. And then at all times, there's a center square that is populated by villains.

You can go out and fight the villains and every now and again, a giant villain will come down and all Samoranauts in the arena, because you can have up to six, can all attack that villain and survive. And the whole point is survive, keep leveling up, get all the cool stuff. And then I'm sure have your parents yell at you and come to dinner and then do it all over the next day by gaining up a new character. Cause like I said, there's to start with six playable characters.

we're going to drop new skins and new special moves and new stuff as we go. Hopefully, you'll start playing as your favorite Samoranaut from the 2500s, but you could come back in a couple of weeks and play as one of the steampunk Samoranauts or play as 1980s double Polo Al. We're going to all those.

Chris Saunders (01:04:10.254)
So that sounds cool

Frank (01:04:11.313)
Yeah, I notice on your website, yeah, you have the different eras of Samornauts. And I was wondering, because we hadn't really talked about that, so that explains that element to me. And what I also really like about this is you're thinking long term. You're thinking about what other moves, costumes, the different eras. It's not just I made a game, I'm done. Because this is a great way to generate not only buzz, but also

Marc Alan Fishman (01:04:16.936)
Yes.

Frank (01:04:40.487)
new viewers to your books.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:04:43.575)
I that is, it's twofold. to double back on like maybe how we did this and I'll shorten this down as best I can. This year we took a huge gamble, legit. We had stumbled over a licensing expo that's in Las Vegas every year. And by happenstance of me filling out the wrong lead intake form, they called me and I told them very politely that I talked to them 10 years ago and their show was unaffordable. Like there was no way we could afford a booth.

It's in Las Vegas, so we can't drive there. We'd have to fly flight times three people plus a hotel and everything else. like, that's ungodly expensive. Well, they said, hold up. We have a small booth that we didn't tell you about. And the small booth price made it so that if we dumped out the bank account, we could go. And I pitched this to Matt and Kyle completely neutrally. I was like, look, I'm just going to tell you that we have the ability to do this without my opinion because.

I kind of figured Kyle, who's the most curmudgeonly of us would be like, no, let's just keep making money. And maybe one year when we have a bunch of money, can go. of all people, Kyle turned around and he said, eh, we're getting old. What's the worst that could happen? Let's go.

So we pivoted and we worked the, we swear on this podcast? Okay. I worked my fucking ass off trying to make this show work. So as soon as we dumped out that money and they said, here is your backstage, you can request meetings every day for four months. I via email, please come meet us.

Frank (01:06:04.487)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:06:23.319)
Let us pitch you the Samoranauts because there are three things that our fans have always asked for that we cannot possibly provide an animated series of video game and toys. We don't know the first thing about any of those things other than being consumers. So if you think that the Samoranauts would be worthy of that, we want to pitch you why. So we built the deck and this is where my marketing degree helps or my marketing experience and I would agree in it, but we built the PowerPoint.

We built the materials and we went to the show. We had 27 meetings scheduled and by virtue of that stupid sign, we got another 30 people to stop. And by virtue of that, followed by my religious follow-up after that show, got us into the right realm so that the people who are making these games came to us and said,

Frank (01:07:02.547)
Mmm.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:07:17.147)
We're thinking of doing something that you guys would be perfect for. We actually have a game that's 90 % done and the only thing it needs is like a brand and we want to like help a brand do that. So we're going to do like this 50-50 revenue split and all it's going to cost you is more money than you, than you have. And I was like, well, that's great to know. And you know, because we had done this show and I had made all these contacts and I talked to all these people, it happened to be that one of the guys I was talking to.

having a completely separate conversation with me about buying our books and selling them in his network of stores, because he's off of diamond and he can do something separate. And I was like, well, on a small scale, it was actually going to be really huge. And he happens to mention to me, by the way, I've got this other friend of mine, he's an investor. He needs help. Like he's making comics and I think you can help him. So I was like, great. Okay. I'll talk to him. So I'm talking to this guy and he and I realized I can't help him do anything.

Like I thought he needed a printer. He's like, I got a printer. I was like, I don't know what you need. Like, you know, do you like your books? He's like, yeah, I'm like, well, I literally don't know why this guy talked to me. So like we're joking about it. And then I remember he told me this guy's got money. So I was like, Hey, completely devoid of any of that. I'm like, by the way, you know, if you, you're the investing type, here's this group and here's what they're saying. And then I gave him the pitch and he was like, yeah, sold. I'll be your investor. So he put up the money.

Frank (01:08:41.042)
Whoa!

Marc Alan Fishman (01:08:44.383)
And we negotiated terms very quickly, hilariously, because I told him like, look, our stake in this is we just want the game. We want to make a little bit of money. Yes. But we want you to be paid and happy. So like, we're going to work our ass off to make sure that happens. And then, you know, if we happen to profit after that, fantastic. But the fact that the Samoranauts could actually be something outside of that comic means we could potentially go back to a licensing show and say the Samoranauts is more.

than just a independent comic book. And we touted it, over 20,000 issues sold by hand with a closing ratio of 38 % lifetime. So better than one in three people that hear that pitch cold by the book. That's what got us the people that were interested. That's what led to this video game happening. It's gonna come out in the next month, give or take. So all of next year, we get to see like, what can we do to like...

make that happen. And on top of that, we're also working behind the scenes with some other people from that licensing show to see what else might be happening. I can't really say anything other than that, other than say like, it's super exciting that we weren't laughed off that floor.

Frank (01:09:56.293)
You took a big gamble, but not just the gamble of going to this event and emptying the bank account. You also took the prep, the hard work, and the months of prep that you did for it. And on top of that, you had the data, like real hard data that you guys have been tracking that you've told us about, and you threw that into the mix. So people knew you weren't just goofing around.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:10:20.441)
I knew like, look, it's a gamble to go on that show because we didn't know the industry. So we could have got there with anything and they could have just said, you know, and this is 10 years ago when I was interested in the show, the guy I was talking to then he's like, do you have 10,000 fans? said, no. He goes, well, don't call me until you do. And I thought our whole game had to be, how do I buy my way to 10,000 fans? And then I kept realizing like, that seems worthless because

Number of fans on Facebook does not equate to number of books sold in my industry. So what's the point? And I even went so far as to talking to a guru who told me that I needed to post instigating questions every day, seven days a week and get the community talking. I did it for four years and we never had more than the same two dozen people giving their inane

answers to my inane questions and none of it equated to book sales. I'm like, the best thing that ever happened is someone licensed my content away from me for 50 bucks. Cause I was like, he came asking him like, you could have it. He's like, I got to give you something for it. like, buy me two pizzas. I don't know. But like it was that mindset. And I said, well, now if we know that we're going to the show, this is where I have to, you know, of each unshaven's got their own special talent. Kyle's a salesman.

Chris Saunders (01:11:21.549)
Ha

Marc Alan Fishman (01:11:40.101)
Matt is artist extraordinaire and he can handle all the alcohol that we can't. And my thing is the marketing, the business end. I'm like, okay, well, superpowers ignite. can I do? And that's all I realize. Like we have to have a story. We have to be able to tell somebody in the same way we sell this book in 30 seconds. I now have to sell the company, the book and the IP in 30 seconds. All I've got is data. So let's just give them that. And you know, the worst they can tell us is no.

We heard plenty of no's. We also heard a, can help you, but do you have money? Well, I don't. Not now, but it's the kind thing where you can go, if we ever do, does that make sense? One of these guys was like, you need an eight-foot tall monkey statue. We're like, yes, we do. We don't have money for it. But yeah, if one day the coffers are full and we find need for a giant fiberglass kung fu monkey, we'll be calling you.

Until such time, it's good to know.

Frank (01:12:41.457)
It would be tough to travel with that 8 foot tall monkey.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:12:45.107)
I mean, the way the guy was describing it at all, breaks down into pack into boxes. But when I told him like, I only have a mini van and we're not getting a box truck. So.

Chris Saunders (01:12:53.282)
Yeah, good for future investors to know exactly where their money's going, though.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:12:57.235)
It's their money. If we get people to want to start doing that, God bless, we'll just show up and sell the book.

Chris Saunders (01:13:04.27)
We can kickstart that for you. Get the fans behind it and maybe they'll help fund it. It's awesome.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:13:06.514)
Mm-hmm.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:13:11.218)
Exactly.

Frank (01:13:12.243)
That's so exciting though that you have these conversations. mean, you, it sounds like that event really leveled up things for Unshave and Comics.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:13:21.437)
Yeah, we went to that show and said, like, with all fairness and honesty to ourselves, we walked off that plane and said, if nothing else, we're going to try In-N-Out Burger, because we were told we had to. We were going to enjoy what little nightlife strip. Like I said, I wanted to go to Fremont. I wanted to see downtown Vegas, because I hadn't seen it. So like, let's go do that. And, you know, if we get laughed off the show floor, at least we tried and we can walk away with a story.

Chris Saunders (01:13:31.726)
you.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:13:48.947)
Because we can always go back and sell more books and make our money back. Like that wasn't a problem. Nothing would take that away from us. So we went in with that attitude and realized very quickly, like this translates. There weren't any other independent comic book people there. There were some book people, some kids book people, and they had their thing running and were like, well, we have something unique to sell here. We just have to find the right way, the right words to like get those people. And I think we have a better idea of it now.

than we did before. I'm not saying we're rushing back out to a licensing expo anytime soon, but again, like now we actually have something that could be a revenue generator for us to whatever end and we'll kind of see where that takes us. And then if there is more to do, like we're not that old. So we got, we got time enough to make this happen. And like the cool thing is Samornaz goes forever.

Frank (01:14:42.437)
last thing I want to say about that event that I love about it is that opportunity came knocking and you guys really answered it. That person called and said, well, hang on now. We have this booth, it's possibility, and you guys really talked about it and thought about it and you didn't just show up, you really showed up.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:15:03.027)
You have to. Again, it's a permanent side hustle thing, but anybody, we know that's what unshaven comics is. For anybody who's doing this for their day job or anything else like that, or who want to make this their living, that's the mindset, right? Is don't half-ass anything. And if you're going to gamble, make it a calculated one. Do the best you can to stack the deck before you walk in. It would be stupid for unshaven comics as an example to dump the coffers out to go to San Diego Comic-Con.

Why? We'll sell books, but we'll never break even. If you know anything about San Diego Comic Con, it is ungodly expensive. If you're independent, I've been told by our friends who do that show, they're like, you guys would make a killing. I was like, yeah, but how much is a hotel? They're like, well, it's 350 a night. It was like, we pay 100 and we feel bad. So, I don't know how I'd live like that, but sure. Now we can say, hey,

Frank (01:15:55.111)
You

Marc Alan Fishman (01:16:00.775)
potential people who are interested in unshaven comics getting out to a broader audience, you send me to San Diego. We'll sell books and your video game and anything else you want us to, but we're not paying for it.

Frank (01:16:13.061)
Yeah, we have heard about that in some cases. Someone got flown out to they were like, yeah, we can't go to it was Star Trek Vegas. And they're like, yeah, you know, I'd love to go. can't go. It's kind of out of the budget. And they said, we'll fly you out. It was like, well, that changes everything.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:16:28.691)
I thought one of the people I was talking to that was attempting, may still be attempting to help on Shaman Comics out, had hit me with the weirdest question I'd ever heard and I've answered weird questions. He heard the whole spiel, same thing I've told you guys. He's like, so the only problem is money? You guys just need money and then you'd make more books? I was like, well, money and time. Yeah, he's like, okay, so let's say I just write you a check. How much money do you need to make more comics? I was like...

I couldn't even fathom to tell you that. was like, the three of us have day jobs, pal. can't, I'm not going to tell you to pay the salary and benefits of three full-time people. That's, I wouldn't make that investment. Are you nuts? And he's like, well, you don't know what I know. And I was like, that's true, but I'm, I couldn't sleep at night if I took your money doing that. No.

Frank (01:17:16.829)
from the future. They've seen what you can do and they just want to be that kick to get it all started.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:17:22.355)
We laugh, we're like, look, we know where our bread's butters. Samornauts are great, they ain't that great. Just like, let it happen at its own pace. And if we're very lucky, the show and the toys are in our future too, but one step at a time.

Chris Saunders (01:17:27.854)
You

Frank (01:17:36.827)
Yeah. Well, let's go ahead. Chris, I can see the look in your eyes. You're ready to move to the random rolls. I said that funny, but random rolls. Yes.

Chris Saunders (01:17:37.057)
That's all.

Chris Saunders (01:17:45.408)
Yes, yes, I'm just I'm hearing the wind on our side and it's very, very strong. So I am actually worried we're going to lose power imminently. So.

Frank (01:17:53.223)
I've been freaking out this entire interview. It's been loud.

Chris Saunders (01:17:58.392)
So yeah, if we can move on to the, hitting our zone right now. We can move on to random rules. think that'll be great.

Frank (01:18:05.723)
Yeah, so these you're going to roll the D100 a few times. We're going to ask you a couple of questions based on the numbers. These are less serious, less about business, more fun, more about hobbies.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:18:05.747)
You got it.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:18:15.955)
Sweet. Okay, that would be 64.

Frank (01:18:21.971)
64

Do you play Dungeons and Dragons and do you have a favorite class that you play?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:18:30.993)
have played it before in single night kind of campainy things and I was told to never do it again. I took it too seriously in the character creation because I didn't know Dungeons and Dragons but I know role playing. I purposefully chose a barbarian and I purposefully made his intelligence as low as possible and I very purposefully swung my axe at anything the DM mentioned.

Chris Saunders (01:19:00.824)
Nice.

Frank (01:19:01.927)
I, okay, yeah, okay.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:19:04.605)
So they're like, you're doing this right, but leave.

Chris Saunders (01:19:04.844)
The original Murderhobo.

Frank (01:19:07.283)
You're doing this right, but this is making my job difficult.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:19:11.045)
Right. I just remember like I kept telling him I was like gonna bash down a door. They're like, you can't do that. I'm like, my character is dumb as rocks. He, he doesn't like that door. You said it was glowing. He ain't like, he don't like glows. That's tell me I'm wrong. They're like, nope, just leave.

Frank (01:19:28.253)
Go ahead and roll again.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:19:29.287)
You got it. That would be 56.

Chris Saunders (01:19:37.972)
If you were to be a wizard or someone who uses magic, what animal would you want as a familiar?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:19:47.827)
Uhhhh

Marc Alan Fishman (01:19:51.783)
Man, that is a good question. Not Mu Dang. You know, honestly, I think I would want a Sphinx cat.

Frank (01:19:57.223)
Hehehe

Chris Saunders (01:19:57.325)
Don't.

Chris Saunders (01:20:06.05)
Ooh, the hairless cats, right? The ones without any hair? Yes. Yeah. Never looks happy just staring at you.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:20:08.039)
Yeah, the one that looks like a like a chicken breast and a scowl. Yes. Yes, I want I want those who stand across from me from the field to be thoroughly confused at the weird mummy kitten that's just like sitting on my shoulder with a hoodie. Yes.

Frank (01:20:11.443)
A plucked chicken cat.

Chris Saunders (01:20:27.065)
Awesome. Awesome.

Frank (01:20:28.445)
Go ahead and roll again.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:20:29.395)
You got it.

okay, that's 90.

Frank (01:20:35.385)
What ice cream flavor do you think best describes your life?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:20:42.853)
Espresso Chip

Chris Saunders (01:20:45.518)
Nice so you got lots of energy and your chipper is that what that is? Yeah

Frank (01:20:47.185)
Nice.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:20:52.689)
always just yeah, chaos incarnate. You just need to have the power of a dying sun to stay awake. I should mention, I have four kids, so yeah, that'll do it. Uh-huh, yeah, yeah, so espresso chip. And I do occasional podcasts, it's crazy. I can't even tell you, and I also have several other hobbies.

Chris Saunders (01:20:59.896)
Nice. yeah. And a day job and a comic book company. So and you occasionally do podcasts. That's pretty cool.

Frank (01:21:02.291)
Whoa! Lot to keep up.

Frank (01:21:15.857)
How do you keep up with it all, you know?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:21:18.683)
mainly espresso chip. No, it's a joke, but it's not a joke. I tell people that I basically glued to a computer 18 hours a day. Some people rent me for the first eight hours and I do have to cart my kids around to break up that time, but otherwise I'm pretty much always working until midnight. Then I get my 30 minutes of video game time, followed by 30 minutes of AEW, then immediately crash out.

Chris Saunders (01:21:20.098)
Presso, right? Yeah, we just talked about this, Frank.

Frank (01:21:21.093)
Okay. My bad.

Chris Saunders (01:21:32.12)
Ha

Frank (01:21:47.612)
Wow.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:21:48.957)
So it's pretty well scheduled, so have to.

Frank (01:21:51.12)
Yeah, you got it down.

Chris Saunders (01:21:52.504)
You've mastered life. This is perfect.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:21:56.221)
short again.

Chris Saunders (01:21:57.166)
Yeah, one more.

Frank (01:21:58.802)
Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:21:59.761)
Awesome. Okay, 92.

Chris Saunders (01:22:06.678)
If your life were a movie right now, what would you title it?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:22:12.829)
American Splendor II. Splendor Harder.

Chris Saunders (01:22:19.278)
I was wondering what the tagline would be.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:22:22.801)
Yeah, it was either that or Electric Boogaloo. I'll definitely take that cop out. I loved American Splendor and I would love to continue that Harvey P. Carr-esque real life is plenty dramatic if you let it be. My life is a living comic book. I'm sure after this, you guys can give me your home addresses. You'll get my holiday card and you'll understand why I even do that as a comic book.

Chris Saunders (01:22:49.998)
that's awesome. That sounds very cool to be on your Christmas card list.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:22:55.143)
Hey, heard one of you is in Canada and I have to send more. I have to get into Canada. This is all part of the.

Chris Saunders (01:23:01.152)
I am in Canada. can help you with that. Absolutely. the America just to comment on American Splendor. So would you say that was a good cut? Because there aren't that many movies about comic book artists. And that one is Paul Giamatti pretty awesomely played. Is that a pretty good one? Would you say accurate life depiction?

Frank (01:23:01.779)
part of the networking. You you take go ahead Chris.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:23:03.08)
Yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:23:19.885)
I mean, yeah, Harvey P. Carr had a lot to do with, I mean, the movie itself is an adaptation of his book, My Cancer Year, and they stayed pretty true to what that was. that in and of itself was a biographical comic. Harvey P. Carr himself as a writer was this cantankerous, old, angry dude who just by virtue of who he was, he ended up on Letterman. And he became like what little tiny famous you can be being a regular guy on

Chris Saunders (01:23:33.899)
Okay

Marc Alan Fishman (01:23:49.511)
David Letterman because he was so tickled by what a curmudgeon he was. The version of that movie to me, I personally just love everything about that movie. Paul Giamatti is amazing. The way they were able to integrate, do a little bit of the animation and stuff from the book itself. It is a great depiction and I don't really know of very many other movies that are about comic book production aside from like Kevin Smith giving you a little hint with Chasing Amy, but put it this way.

No one is ready for the actual biography of Stan Lee and not in a good way.

So we can't tell his story. And the problem is that you would tell the story of the other people and you don't want to know their stories either.

Frank (01:24:32.755)
Really? Huh. Well, on that, yeah, I'd imagine.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:24:33.427)
Sad, it's sad, but I don't know. I'm end on a down note. I mean, I could like turn a pack of, I was gonna say, can I just give a shout out to Tim Hortons? Tim Hortons is awesome. Yes.

Chris Saunders (01:24:44.824)
Please do, please do. We like them up here. That's in Canada, Canadian coffee, yeah.

Frank (01:24:46.397)
Tim Hortons, Canadian Tire. What else? I'm gonna name all the Canadian brands I can think of right here, right now. Yeah, No Frills is a good one. Save On Foods. There we go.

Chris Saunders (01:24:54.658)
No frills.

Chris Saunders (01:25:01.454)
Chopper's Drug Mart, the most socialist drug mart you could ever have, just like...

Marc Alan Fishman (01:25:04.795)
wine gums. give me the wine gums. By the way, you are a Canadian, so you can tell me whether or not this is just myth or something they do to make fun of us in the States. Does your hundred dollar bill smell like a maple syrup?

Frank (01:25:06.472)
Nah.

Chris Saunders (01:25:23.934)
if it's brand new, I think so. Yeah. Yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:25:27.601)
Yeah, that's what they told us. like, we did that thing where like, yeah, this is come on. No, it really does. Try this. Also, we love your money because it's color coded. when we first did that show in Canada, Kyle was like, get a purple, give a green, get a purple, give a green.

Chris Saunders (01:25:33.516)
Yeah, no.

It's like monopoly money.

Frank (01:25:44.251)
Hahaha

Chris Saunders (01:25:45.1)
I guess so. I just came back from Vegas and I was trying, you know, you could feel rich in America and he got like $25. You know what I mean? Like it's, it's just ridiculous how many of the same color bills you guys allow. It's crazy.

Frank (01:25:55.411)
And the other way around, you can have a heavy pouch of coins and it turns out to be $80. Yeah. No, no, here it would be 80 cents.

Chris Saunders (01:26:02.208)
In Canada, yes, absolutely. no.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:26:03.335)
Yes, not here. Not here. But in America though, we do something different with our coins. We roll them up and use them for fist punching. That's not as good. Also, shout out to Letter Kenny, which I accidentally showed off to my children before. For some how, I forgot that Letter Kenny is absolutely filthy.

Frank (01:26:12.947)
You

Chris Saunders (01:26:13.291)
No.

Frank (01:26:16.669)
Yes.

Chris Saunders (01:26:22.41)
It's so not appropriate, but very funny. I'm actually from that similar area in Ontario. Listowall is the small town that they based Letter Kenyon on. And yeah, I know it very well.

Frank (01:26:24.403)
You

Marc Alan Fishman (01:26:25.853)
It is.

Frank (01:26:37.913)
You didn't inherit the deadpan, though.

Chris Saunders (01:26:40.628)
No, no, I know people like not in my family, but I dated a girl from list wall. Her entire family was like letter Kenny. It was funny. I mean, yeah, on one side on her mom's side, they were all from list wall and it was like you go to Christmas and it was like, I mean, the funny thing about it is that you don't really want to call them hillbillies because like hillbilly comes with this sort of like uneducated, you know,

Frank (01:26:49.331)
Whoa.

Chris Saunders (01:27:04.462)
connotation and that's not what they are. They're usually very smart people, but they just have this cadence to the way they talk that is that is so deadpan and drawly and like, you're like, yeah, very Southwestern Ontario farmer. That's just it.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:27:18.835)
To be fair, yes, that's what they do.

Chris Saunders (01:27:21.678)
Should we do rapid fire?

Frank (01:27:26.225)
Yeah, let's move on into rapid fire. So this is the third, the final stage, the boss fight. These are quick and silly questions that you may or may not get correct. And the first one is Star Trek or Star Wars.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:27:43.123)
Star Trek.

Frank (01:27:44.595)
Thank you.

Chris Saunders (01:27:46.082)
That is correct, I'd say. Who's the best Spider-Man actor?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:27:52.207)
Actor? Tom Holland.

Chris Saunders (01:27:56.59)
All right, that's a solid answer. We'll give that to you.

Frank (01:27:58.803)
There's been a lot of Tobey Maguire's on this show. I don't understand why, but Chris likes it.

Chris Saunders (01:28:07.49)
very, very few Andrew Garfields, which is what I really want to point out.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:28:12.211)
mean, look, he really is a close second and I would say that it wasn't his fault. It was the quality of movie.

Frank (01:28:12.755)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Saunders (01:28:17.526)
No, I agree. I agree. I think the actors in that one are great. mean, Willem Dafoe as Green Goblin is amazing. Like, anyway.

Frank (01:28:18.535)
Yes.

Frank (01:28:24.327)
Yeah. Okay, this one we don't actually get to ask very often. Fuck, marry, kill, Iron Man, four, Captain America.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:28:34.707)
mean. Okay, I'm gonna, tough. Okay, well, I'm gonna marry Iron Man because I wanna be like set for life. And I mean, cool. I'm gonna kill Thor because I feel like he's gonna come back elsewhere anyway. And...

Frank (01:28:41.821)
Go as, yeah, go for it.

Chris Saunders (01:28:48.632)
Rich.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:28:59.557)
Is it okay for me to gift my fucking of Captain America to my wife because she really loves Captain America? So I think put it this way. I don't think my marriage could really hold up if I didn't allow her to do that.

Frank (01:29:05.021)
That's America's ass.

Chris Saunders (01:29:06.498)
I would let that happen, yes.

Frank (01:29:12.531)
The jealousy on a whole new level.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:16.775)
Yeah, she herself could Hulk out and just, that would be the end of me, so no.

Frank (01:29:20.925)
Yeah.

Chris Saunders (01:29:22.848)
All right, so in the superhero vein, what superpower would you want?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:26.781)
Green Lantern Ring.

Frank (01:29:29.543)
Yes. Which of the other Lantern, I believe they're called Lantern Cores would you be a member of?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:30.813)
Too easy on that one.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:39.097)
nil. Screw the other lantern cores.

Frank (01:29:42.491)
Which color is that? forget.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:44.527)
None, none. I don't like any of other ones. If I had to choose, I would choose the greed one because I could just be by myself. Screw it.

Frank (01:29:55.625)
Yeah

Marc Alan Fishman (01:29:56.945)
I'm sorry, Jeff Johns' whole de-indeification of the Greenlander universe. Bad decision.

Chris Saunders (01:29:57.272)
Do you?

Frank (01:30:03.387)
Really? You think so?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:30:05.349)
Ultimately, hindsight is 20-20. In the thick of it, absolutely loved it, bought all of it, thought it was insanely great. Then it became immediately too convoluted.

Frank (01:30:13.276)
I see.

Yes, I totally agree with that. I, yes.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:30:18.439)
Like, can you tell me who's in what core anymore?

Frank (01:30:21.817)
No, yeah, every, yeah, and then Batman getting picked up at one point, it was a bit much.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:30:23.507)
Also, fairly sure that Hal Jordan got to be one of everything, which to me should just be really problematic. And then Kyle was the white lantern.

Frank (01:30:34.737)
He was the Messiah, yeah, yeah.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:30:36.901)
Like I'm, all for empowering Kyle. Not that way. You know, it was sorry. I D rapid fired that one.

Frank (01:30:41.459)
Thank you guys bit much.

Chris Saunders (01:30:46.094)
All right. Well, what is your go-to karaoke song?

Frank (01:30:46.279)
No, that was good.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:30:51.187)
I don't have one, so whatever they have, load it up from the Bare Naked Ladies.

Chris Saunders (01:30:56.462)
Good answer. If I Had a Million Dollars is a great karaoke song. will just say it.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:31:00.325)
It's solid, I would be that a hole that would look for the deep cut that no one knows. Be like, you guys don't want to. You guys don't want to hear box set. Come on.

Chris Saunders (01:31:05.258)
be like you can buy you can be my yoko ono

Frank (01:31:12.965)
Yoda or Obi-Wan?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:31:15.685)
Obi-Wan.

Chris Saunders (01:31:17.966)
Three favorite pizza toppings.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:31:21.219)
I'm gonna get in trouble.

ground beef, ham and pineapple.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:31:39.539)
Five words, money, knowledge.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:31:46.131)
Can it just be iterations of money and knowledge? Money, knowledge, minutia.

passion.

And, I mean, just spin the wheel and whatever they particularly like. So battering.

Chris Saunders (01:32:03.406)
predator or aliens

Marc Alan Fishman (01:32:07.277)
Predator. Cooler weapons.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:32:13.351)
I think Frank is.

Chris Saunders (01:32:15.106)
we might've lost him. We might've lost him.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:32:17.691)
Or he really likes my answer a lot.

Chris Saunders (01:32:21.902)
Let's see what happened here. lost power. That's what he's saying.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:32:26.414)
okay.

Chris Saunders (01:32:27.842)
Well, this has been great. And I might actually just finish up with one of our last questions here.

Chris Saunders (01:32:40.622)
I'm just gonna let him know we're gonna.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:32:44.019)
That'd work. We did hit the hour 32, so.

Chris Saunders (01:32:46.85)
Yeah, same. I'm feeling

Chris Saunders (01:32:52.984)
So, you know, Mark, this has been so great and I appreciate you spending the time to share all of your wisdom and inner working strategy and knowledge on really building a comic book company from the ground up. And I think there are people out there that are really find some value in this. We always like to finish our episodes by asking our nerdpreneurs that come on the show.

You know, what advice would you give to aspiring nerdpreneurs and is this something that they should go for if they're thinking about going into and starting their own nerdy business, whether it be comic books or any other type of business?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:33:32.061)
First of all, absolutely do it. I would say learn from me. Think of it first as a permanent side hustle. If you have the passion and desire to go at it for something greater than that, then by all means go all in. But I think it's okay to dip your toe into the water intelligently. So do your research for sure. Commit to the grind. Get yourself to a point where you're actually satisfied for sure.

with your end product, but do so in a manner that allows you to test the waters. So always be testing, no data, no decision, right? So go out there, see what the audience, see how receptive they are to you and learn the soft skills necessary to thrive in your business. So whether that's negotiation, salesmanship, vendor relations, whatever those things might be, take the time to master them, network your ass off.

Find the people that are willing to give you that information and tap them dry and don't be afraid to do it.

Chris Saunders (01:34:41.004)
love that. Well, where can people find you support you buy some more comics? there it is. Look at that. Can I love that? I love it because it's actually a voice bubble too, right? So where can people go and get some get some comic books for me or support what you guys are doing?

Marc Alan Fishman (01:34:49.235)
It was underneath my monitor the whole time.

Of course. my first rodeo.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:35:01.159)
You can always come out and see us at a show if we're coming to your neighborhood. If you're in New Orleans and you're hanging around in January, we'll see you. But you can always check us out at unshavencomics.com. You can also go to Facebook or Instagram. We're also unshaven comics there. Just search for us. We're going to be on TikTok eventually. And if you play Roblox in the next month,

Look for the Samornaughts game there, but I'd say if you want to know when the game's coming out, just go to unshavencomics.com, sign up for our newsletter, and you'll get one from me telling you when it's actually out. Or stop me on the street. I'm not really hard to find. I'm like one of the most famous people in Homewood. find the beard. I'm always dropping my kids off somewhere, so just shake me down.

Chris Saunders (01:35:41.966)
Amazing, amazing.

Chris Saunders (01:35:46.53)
Love it. Love it. Well, nerdpreneurs, listeners, thank you for listening. And as always, keep it nerdy.

Marc Alan Fishman (01:35:56.507)
hilarious because that's how we end our podcast is as always, and we say stay unshaven.