A Louisiana summer shower forced superhero t-shirt clad fans to continue their sidewalk sale inside Crescent City Comics, starting a rush that lasted well into the night.
A dedicated pack of comic fanatics and close friends flocked to the flagship Crescent City Comics Calhoun store, located on 3135 Calhoun St., on Aug. 13th to partake in a day-long celebration sale and welcome back an old friend and employee, Zachary Evans.
Crescent City Comics began the festivities by hosting a sale at 11 a.m. that offered some out-of-print and slightly damaged graphic novels at low prices, as well as discontinued and back-issue comics at fifty cents. In addition, the store offered 10 percent off everything in the store at 6 p.m.
The sale helped to put a sizable dent in the store’s dense backlog of storage, and customers walked out with stacks of forgotten issues and rare finds. One customer showed his support by purchasing over six hundred back issues for himself and his children.
Crescent City Comics owner Les Arceneaux said that the day sale was not difficult to organize and was very exciting to see come together. Former employee Zachary Evans used to manage the store’s Twitter page.
“Zach told us he was coming back into town, and he joked that we should throw him a party so we decided why not? We haven’t had an event like that in a while, so it made perfect sense and came at the right time,” he said.
Upon entering the shop, it’s staggering to see how many different genres and stories are available under the umbrella of comic books, encompassing far more than just Marvel and DC Comics’ latest. Superhero lore today shares equal shelf space in the store with a fandom that finds a crossroads between all manner of science fiction, serialized dramas, merchandise and licensed adaptations.
Employee Richard O’ Brien A’16 explained that the relatively new Calhoun St. location acts as a sister shop to the one found on Freret St, and both storefronts offer different things to comic fans.
“Moving to a new location has given us much more room to archive releases, so a dedicated, hardcore audience can come to Calhoun St. to find their latest issues and trade paperbacks, while still being able to find a range of collectibles and memorabilia at the Freret store,” O’Brien said.
When explaining the objective of Crescent City Comics, Arceneaux noted that it’s essential for their employees to engage long-time fans and offer suggestions while being helpful and judgment-free when helping someone with maybe no interest in comics to find something suited for them.
“We’re trying to cultivate a readership, we want our customers to feel like they can come back to us and find anything in our selection that interests them.” Arceneaux said.
Arceneaux confirmed that comic books are in a very good place, nationally and locally.
“I’m a child of the eighties, where reading comics was a very niche, male-driven pastime,” Arceneaux said. “Today, I might see a wife dragging her husband along to buy the newest X-Men. More artists are working harder than ever to write and illustrate compelling original stories; it is, by all means, a Golden Age for the medium.”
