Anime Detour is a convention held every year at the beginning of Spring Break. It is a fan-run convention dedicated to Japanese media such as video games, webcomics, and TV shows. Fans celebrate their love by hosting panels and contests, dressing up as characters (also called cosplaying), and buying merchandise at either the company-run Dealer Room or the artist-run Artist Alley, where artists show- case and sell their merchandise.
This year, some friends and I set up a booth at Artist Alley. It was certainly a lot to prepare for, however in the end it was more than worth the work. In preparation, we first had to gather our artworks to sell. We needed to include a wide variety of choices to please many audiences. We included Japanese media such as Vocaloid and Hetalia, as well as other video games and TV shows such as Assassin’s Creed, Sherlock, Doctor Who, and Adventure Time. Additionally, we needed to have a choice of merchandise; besides prints, we sold buttons, bookmarks, original works, as well as on-the-spot commissions.
It was certainly a lot to keep track of. Buttons were the quickest to sell, and we often were scram- bling to give out money as well as put in replacements. There were times when we sold out of a certain print and had to speed down to the local Office Max to print new copies. Often times we skipped meals altogether since we were so immersed in doing our work. I had never sold any artwork before, and seeing the positive responses from people flipping through the print book and my friends’ print books really made me appreciate the con spirit. There were many wonderful cosplays that passed through our booth, and they were more than happy to let us take a picture.
The best part of the con was meeting our table neighbors and getting to know each other and trade prints and buttons. At first, we felt intimidated since they were fathoms past our art level, and we were extremely lucky and honored to have met and received art from these wonderful people.
All in all, running a booth at Anime Detour was extremely hectic, but the people I met and the experience of selling art was one of the most worthwhile things I’ve done.