Wizard-watchers will find mostly familiar territory in the ICv2 interview with Wizard’s CEO Gareb Shamus. Key words: “exciing” and “incredible.” But it does include what may be the most awesome interview question ever:
Q: The assets of the shows were recently acquired by a publicly traded company in a reverse merger. Why did you do that?
A: We went that route because we now have access to the public markets. It’s a world that I’m very comfortable in, I’ve done it before. It gives us the ability to grow the way we want it to grow. It takes a long time to put yourself into a position to take advantage of that. And we’ve spent a couple years working on putting ourselves in a position to take advantage of the public markets and bring some amazing people into the company. We’ve been able to do that very successfully.
In the second part of the interview, Shamus echoes his previously stated worries about the industry’s lack of leadership:
But I actually feel very bad for the retailers right now. They have a very difficult situation ahead of them. I read a lot of their newsletters in terms of their struggling, their crises, having their worst sales ever. The problem is the comics industry has not taken a leadership position in helping these guys. Their sales continue to fall, they’ve been falling for a long time, and nobody’s taken a leadership position in helping these stores pay their bills. And I feel bad for them.
Clearly Gareb has fired whoever’s job it was to keep him away from the press, because not only have there been so many deliciously cringe worthy, insert-foot-in-mouth quotes lately, but now fans are seeing what his past employees have known all along — the boy just ain’t that bright. Seriously, can anyone explain what he’s trying to say here?
“Just because Bruce Springsteen is playing and we’re Bruce Springsteen, if some little band is playing across the street, then nothing’s going to stop them from coming to see us in concert.”
@Lunchbox — I think it probably makes more sense read aloud and thinking of it as stream of consciousness than anything else. Does it make *complete* sense? No.
I thought ComicsPro was the group whose mission is to advocate for retailers.
And, continuing the ‘brand confusion’ that powers the Wizard empire, I like how he uses the term ‘public markets’ as opposed to ‘penny stocks’ or ‘pink sheets’ — which is where they are. Make the public think they are at Nasdaq or NYSE rather than where they are really traded. Technically he hasn’t said anything untrue, but it isn’t full disclosure either.