SALES TO ASTONISH #37 - SEPTEMBER 2025
Whatever it takes.
There is an iconic scene in Avengers: Endgame when the heroes decide that they are going to embark on the mission to defeat Thanos. Whether they live or die doesn’t matter, they just need to do whatever it takes to be beat the mad titan.
September at Unreality Store HQ had a hint of Endgame about it with the mantra ‘Whatever it takes’ going round and round my head.
Over the last 18 months the number of sales per month has kind of plateaued. I get around 100-110 each month which seems like a good number but when you take into consideration a sale is a sale is a sale and you are not looking at the value of the sale it can be very misleading. 100 sales of one £3 comic doesn’t add up to much so it’s important not to get too hung up on the number of sales, but the actual value. My previous two jobs which involved working in property sales had a similar approach, they always looked at the number of sales and not the actual value. Therefore the sale of a £250,000 flat had just then same impact as a £1m penthouse. It was crazy really and I often felt it left the companies scrabbling around at financial year end to sell the more expensive properties to meet their targets as that’s where the bigger profit margins were. So I don’t get too hung up on the number of sales I make per month but I do keep an eye on their average value.
It would be no surprise to regular or first time readers to hear that the average order value has been slowly diminishing during 2025 no doubt in part to everyone’s finances becoming more squeezed. Even a good friend of mine surprised me when he commented how expensive a large supermarket’s own brand diluted orange squash had become! To throw salt into the wound everyone, myself included, has seen prices go up so postage, packing material and other items such as printing ink are all more expensive than they were this time last year. For me (and other small businesses) it means things are really squeezed.
Which kind of brings me back to the scene from Endgame. During my darkest moments this year there have been many times I have thought about giving up running The Unreality Store. The mental strain and worry caused by the financial squeeze has left me with many sleepless nights and genuine doubts over whether bills can be paid and food can be put on the table let alone the luxuries of new clothes, holidays etc etc. But the scene in Endgame kept playing on my mind and I kept thinking how I would feel if I decided to close the website after almost seven years of hard work. So the mantra in September and evermore is ‘Whatever It Takes’
Work seven days a week - whatever it takes
Work in the middle of the night - whatever it takes
Explore more sales outlets - whatever it takes
Sell some of my personal collection - whatever it takes
Run more online sales - whatever it takes
And so on. I have a vision for The Unreality Store which is not for it to be a fondly lamented online website amongst the comic collecting community, it’s to be the best in the UK. But for now it’s all about riding out this tough year. Whatever it takes.
September is one of those tricky months for sales, much like January. Both follow an established holiday period where people tend to spend more and as a result tighten their belts immediately afterwards. September also has the additional complication of kids returning to school and the financial outlay that entails. Yet oddly it didn’t really feel any different to August - good website activity, sporadic sales, numerous days where nothing is sold and Fridays remaining challenging. I wouldn’t say there were any real key sales in the month apart from #1 of Something Is Killing The Children in VFN condition for £150 and a brand new One Ring RPG supplement that sold at £100 when I ran a half price sale on RPG items. Over the space of the month I sold a bunch of Uncanny X-Men issues from the 80’s, some Green Lantern bits and other DC issues such as Flash and Superman. The one area where I have identified for significant growth is RPG stuff and yet despite increasing my inventory most weeks I’m still not attracting many new buyers. There are already established businesses selling RPG stuff like The Shop On The Borderlands and The Last Nazgûl so I’m confident an audience is out there and we just have to find each other
The genuine highlight of September was attending the Lake District Comic Art Festival in Bowness-On-Windermere as a trader. I’d been a few times before when it was based in Kendal but always as an attendee. As a trader, compared to other conventions I have done, it was an absolute joy. It was incredibly well organised from the moment we arrived to set up to packing down on Sunday evening. The atmosphere was relaxed and I actually sold a good deal of comics (on Saturday at least). I chatted to some really nice people and even had time on Saturday morning to sit and look out across Lake Windermere. It’s an event I would definitely do again next year.
I’ll leave things there this month as it feels good to end on a high note. And as the days start to get shorter and the end of the year looms I’ll be doing whatever it takes to get The Unreality Store into 2026 and beyond
Excelsior!
