THE BUSINESS OF COMICS

THE NIGERIAN COMIC INDUSTRY:
A Candid Diagnosis by Ayodele Elegba

THE BUSINESS OF COMICS

Did you ever believe that the Church (talking figuratively now) is now the financial talk of town today because the pastor only preaches powerful messages (although that’s part of the content I discussed earlier)? No, the church has become what it is today because the church at one point in its life cycle looked beyond just fancy messages preached on Sundays and to the business behind church. I’m always surprised at the gaping whenever I tell people that church is a business. Believe it or not its Gods business and if you wont get into a frenzy just yet I’d tell you that the big guy up there believes in interests and dividends but that’s an article for a religious column on another medium. Let me cut to the chase, the term “as poor as a church rat” became obsolete some years back because the church began to pay attention to the business behind church. Our comic industry will transform from what it is today if we as comic people get beyond the emotion of reading our own scripts and glazing our own artworks and begin to ask ourselves the honest but painful truths. Like Spiff Agbama (hope that’s right) keeps talking about the importance of the business sides of sports, I’d like to keep talking about the business side of comics because there is the business angle to it. Let me enumerate on a few.

A SYSTEM: Correct me if I am wrong but most of our so called comic companies don’t have a system. Like Kenway of the Euphorya once told me in an interview, he said (I’m trying to quote now if my memory doesn’t fail me)“we don’t have comic companies, all we have are individuals who do comics”. At first I was taken aback, just like any true champion of something he truly believes in and has a passion for, but later when I got home and thought about it I realized he was actually right. Now don’t misunderstand me here (like I initially did with Knway), I know that Bill gates was an individual who later built a large corporation and became the worlds richest man, I also know that you don’t need an office to begin a business but what I am actually talking about is having a system that works. I hope you know what I’m trying to get at now. Okay let me be candid and break it down in simple terms we can all understand, “One man cant be called the process or the system. He cant do everything and expect that he would get the best at what he does”, even the guy who sells stuff at Idumota at one point in his business begins to flesh out a business system where things can run irrespective of weather he’s around or not. He has enough sense to go back to the village and pick up a younger cousin who would be willing to be trained to come over to Lagos and fit into a system that he has built. So that in the advent that he is deleted from the face of the earth, the “business” can still continue. Exactly, you can only and truly say you own a business (and not the business owning you) when you can stand aside and watch the business continue without you.

What I’m saying is that having a system helps in eliminating anarchy or mistakes caused as a result of you having a process for the way you do your things. At first you might be everything in your business but this does not mean you should not have a process or system put in place for the way you do thing so that as you progress you begin to hire the right kind of staff to occupy position. You know, I’ve come to believe that when you have a system planned out, you naturally attract people to fit into such positions, and sometimes they could even be willing to do it for free. This reminds of when I came back into Lagos in 2006 manage ICStiudios as the Studio Head, one of the things I saw was great possibility and potential. However ICStudios lacked greatly the vital key that could actually make or break any company. There was no system, just a bunch of creative guys who could draw, write and have great ideas (to be candid, some years back I was actually part of the mess). When I came back one of my first priorities was to set up a working system which I did and in about 6 months, ICStudios started to take shape and anything I say now is just story. I still offer consulting on system development for comics if anyone reading this is interested. Alright let me wrap this up here. For us to build a strong comic industry we need to have strong companies. To have strong companies, we need very good systems. I want you to remember as I close this section that people don’t invest money into good artworks and lovely writing (at least we all know by now that banks don’t), they invest in a credible tested system that works, is predictable and (for banks) that can reproduce or at least make back enough money for you to settle your loans.

DIVISION IN LABOUR: this is some what embedded somewhere in The System thing but unlike The Sytem which dwells more on a predictable process of doing things, Division of labour has to do with specialization and being professional and excellent at what we do. If you are good at marketing, do marketing and leave distribution to the guy who can do that. If its project management you don’t understand call some one in who can do it and stop lying to yourself that it’s no big deal. A little Naira you spend getting the right hands to handle a particular aspect in your business may just give you the edge you need. The case is just that we are usually so Kobo wise Naira foolish or we are just too arrogant to ask for help. Anyway I guess you get the picture. Divide the Labour whith others, lets get some more hands into this industry, lets solicite for proffesiional help. If there’s someone you know can do what you want done, pick up the phone and call him. Lets organize.

BOOK KEEPING: Ha! Excuse my French but “this one na issue o”. Creative people are really a no brainer’s (sorry o) when it comes to keeping financial records, but that’s actually what makes them creative people. My adviceis this, either you drop your pencils or pen or whatever you use and take an evening course in accounting and book keeping or just hire someone full time or on Sundays to come in and look over your books. This part right here is why banks don’t want to see our back sides. A good accounting record will amaze you and help you to project on what and what you can do in the future. Interestingly it can also help you to know where your Cash flow is coming from and how to maintain it. Let me leave it at that.

DATA GATHERIING: We need to gather data. We need to know how many people actually read comics. We need to know the demography of our readers. In short form, we need big time research in this industry. Until we have a platform that can do that, we may still continue to sell sand to the Arabians (abeg forget that packaging theory).

LEGAL: Sometime creative people can get carried away with giving quality work and forgetting that there is somethingcalled a deadline. The legal aspect of things apart from helping to check both publishers andcreative persons, is also important when it comes to ideas protection and blah, blah, blah. You also need to legally register your company and your ideas and stuff etc. I’ll prefer to get a more concise article on this on a much later date. But the whole idea I’m sure you have gotten.

Wow, I have to shut this session down, there's still so much more about the business of comics that i cant exhaust here, please post a question and i'll be glad to answer it. Hope I was able to pass a couple of points in this ration. See you next time when I talk about one of the areas I am so passionate about when it comes to comics…yeah, MARKETING AND PR. See you then.