There’s something for everyone at The Comics Place. My Little Pony comics are interspersed with Mad Max and Marvel. Six shelves are dedicated to both tabletop and board games, and an island in the center of the entryway provides the familiar and cacophonous scrape and clatter of the many-sided dice required to play tabletop games.
And even though the store has moved, it’s still the same, beloved store, just repackaged in a bigger, more beneficial space.
Django Bohren, the Professor X (with at least slightly more hair) of the shop. He’s earned the respect of his employees (even if they still poke fun at him). For him, the move wasn’t a matter of desire, but one of obligation. The patrons of the store deserved a bigger, better space.
The transition didn’t come easy. Employees put in 16-hour days, wrapping up at near 5 A.M., only to begin again a few hours later. Despite the outrageous hours put in, employee Justin Cassatt still described it as times of fun, albeit slightly hysterical. By the end of it, he found he was running on backup sanity. But in the end, the heroes delivered, and lived to tell the tale.
What was once a small store barely large enough for comic fans on the corner of West Holly and Bay Street is now a two story space, room enough for comic readers and tabletop players to come together and not have to compete for room. The first floor provides shelf upon shelf, table after table, of comics from DC to Marvel, IDW to Dark Horse. Upstairs is a sanctuary for those that prefer to create and experience their own adventures.
While the shop is now mostly stable, Cassatt described the store as being in a state of perpetual tweaking. The staff will continue to figure out how to plan events, or better ways to utilize the space. Each week seems tobring a new arrangement to the store, from a shifting island to the usual new products that release on comic book Wednesdays.
But the one thing that hasn’t changed is the store’s devotion to its customers. As a new face enters, superheroes like Bohren and his employees, Jeff Figley and Cassatt assemble, devoted as ever.
The store serves as Figley’s own personal arc reactor, finding that on his bad days, it manages to lift his spirits. Cassatt, on the other hand, started off as a fan, a patron of the store who sought its shelter upon moving to Bellingham. Now he’s the one guiding and sheltering fans.
Both men, not to mention every other employee, are devoted to the people who walk through the door. That much hasn’t changed.
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