Indi, IN Come to C3, its better today , friday April 22 2005

they are organizing the line for the celebration 3 room where you buy the souveniers you can onlky by at C3, be there at 9am for fan club members only, or 10 am for everyone else

 

Hello, well I've been keeping a close eye on the Indy Knights and one of the people at the booth prompted me to post on the forum, so, uh, here I am! I must say that CIII was most enjoyable for me today, but that's only because I got my shopping done at around 9:50am this morning. I truly believe, though, that the store organization is truly the worst part of the convention, especially for those who only have a one day pass and are forced to wait hours to receive their exclusive action figure. I say it will truly only get worse as Saturday approaches and school isn't in session. After waiting in line for about 2 1/2 hours on Thursday, they finally announced the line was clsoed and I receive a purple wrist band which admitted me into the convention center this morning at 8:30am. The store was suppose to open early at 8:30, but did not open until approx. 9:10am and even then we waiting approx. another hour before being helped, and I was near the front of the line. I realize the people running the registers are volunteers, but to truly operate a convention where people spend hundreds and thousands of dollars, they should really have paid staff handling all transactions AND be trained to operate time efficiently. If a volunteer is reading this, please don't take it personally, because I believe Gen-Con really hasn't gone through the steps to properly train you. It's rediculous to have a line extend to a 7-hour waiting period; that's pretty much the whole day, wasted waiting in line! I suggest people write down their thoughts on the convention and drop it in the SW Celebration feedback box located in-between the Fan Club Lounge and Hall F (Celebration Store), on the left hand side of the hall. Well, there goes my first post - don't worry, they'll be shorter next time.

 

it was great today , saturday, had a great experience.

 

Since I never waited in line for the store, I didn't have any issues with that line, other than complete feelings of "OH MY GOD!!!" when I saw how long the line was. They need to do a couple of things different in the future.

1: DON'T have the figure in the same store as the other souvenirs.

2: 7 hour wait?? C'mon. You can do better than that as far as organization goes! Nobody wants to waste a day of the convention for a dumb figure!

3: Offer the option of pre-pay for the figures on the website along with ticket ordering. when the badge is mailed, send a voucher for the number of figures purchased, to be redeemed at the distribution site. Punch holes in badge as before.

4. BAN DEALERS who are buying figures at the convention! This leads to scalping of fans. Beyond immoral, this is!


ok, there's some thoughts. Return to your normal surfing.

 

I totally agree on the figure. I think they should pre-sell them, or drop the idea altogether. The dealers are the worst, and I have a feeling that a good percentage of people there went ONLY for the merchandise.

 

"I have a feeling that a good percentage of people there went ONLY for the merchandise."

Given all the people complaining (and what they are specifically complaining about) that would be one of the truest statements about C3 in my book.

 

Well, it's true that one reason I went there was for merchandise, and I admit I waited approx. 4 hours for an action figure, t-shirt, water-bottle, and CIII program, but it was really to get some things that were only available at the convetion for memory-sake and not fore reslling. My favorite part of the convention, and the main reason I attended, was learning about Behind-the-Scenes of Star Wars and learning about those people. I was even glad I got to see McCallum and Lucas (and EIII footage). Star Wars, for me, is more about the films, but about the process of making those films! I love making movies and McCallum always has insights on the latest technology, cameras, and editing systems that consumers and the industry uses that is reliable. I am upset, though, that Darth Vader (CIII version) was available at www.starwarsshop.com along with CIII coasters (which I didn't see at the convention). It ruins the experience and makes me feel that standing in line really wasn't worth my time. I don't know if any other merchandise was available online, but it was all sold out on April 26 around 4:30pm (Indy central time). The figure used to be located at http://shop.starwars.com/catalog/product.xml?product_id=3416 and the Celebration III category is still active on the site.

 

I'm still trying to figure out how people were walking around with sealed, full cases of the "limited" figures.

 

As best I could tell, they weren't enforcing the 8 figures per purchase limit, so if you had enough badges or kids with you, you could order a case worth of figures and tell them to just leave them in the box.

 

Yeah, I witnessed several people who bought multiple badges, and then had all of them punched, even though they were "one" person. I also know of a few people that bought single figures that didn't have their badges punched, so there was obviously some confusion by they workers at the store, but what can you do?

I managed to get the few things I wanted and had a good time all weekend, I'm sure that next time the major issues will be resolved.

(I had a blast! )

 

"I'm sure that next time the major issues will be resolved."

That's what they said last time. ...still, as bad as the store was, it was an improvement...I mean, last time the lines weren't as long, but it was a frustratingly chaotic mess...this time it was more organized, it just took 5 times as long.

 

You know, since Target was a sponsor, they should have just sent some employees over!

 

--this time it was more organized, it just took 5 times as long.


that's the kind of organization that causes revolutions to happen. Hopefully, the Powers will look at the debacle and review their methods.

 

BAN DEALERS who are buying figures at the convention! This leads to scalping of fans. Beyond immoral, this is!
I think that's a great idea, except that for every "dealer" you remove from the convention...you'll get 2-3 "friends" or "family" buying them. Then magically, they wind up in the convention hall? These guys remind me of the kids at my teen center, when something happens...everyone claim the culprit is a "cousin" yet when you try and get a name or address on them...somehow NOBODY seems to admit knowing anything.

I think the best thing to do, is to either mail the exclusive figure with the badges...or simply have them waiting (1 badge - 1 figure) at will call when people arrive. I saw alot of people carrying 2-3 badges, plus the one they were wearing. Given the ebay/black market street value these things are getting...some people were willing to buy multiple 4-day passes, just to get the 4X per badge figures (the markup covers the cost of the badge). THAT's where the problem with the store was...too many shady toy dealers, clogging the lines in the store, so they could turn around and scalp figures at outragous prices.

One of the reasons I think it was a smart move (by C3store) to put Vader figures online for a reasonable price (wan't it $19...vs the $15 if you'd been there) AFTER C3. This way, few can say they didn't have an opportunity to get at least 1.

George...what day did you wear the jedi costume? I got some good pics of you (loading on our gallery) andI'm trying to help sort them by dates.

 

The Store was much improved from C2. At C2 they were running out of some merchandise the first day. Also, at least there was an attempt to curb the figure issue.

Where GenCon went wrong was training. They didn't have the volunteers come in to trian. They just dumped them into the fire and let them burn. With 20yrs in retail I can tell you that they were on the right track with the store. But the training and numbers of people fell short. When I was in there in saturday it looked like they were finally gettin the hang of it after two days of sales plus the wednesday night thing. So if the store people had been in there on say monday and there would have been three runners per register then perhaps the store would have been smoother.

From the many folks that I have talked to, if you take the store out of the equation, they didn't think the lines were that bad.