Merchandise at the con

CarolD

CarolD

Registered User
Jul 15, 2006
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Hi all,

This is mainly for people who have attended cons in the past and are familiar with dealers' rooms, but I think anyone could venture an answer.

We (on the con committee) have been talking about our dealers' room and what it might offer. So...when you go to a con, what type of merchandise do you most eagerly look for? What do you definitely buy, and what has no interest for you?

Keep in mind, there's very little QL merchandise available. (There never was a ton of it, and most of that has Leaped outta here, LOL.) There are people who produce their own merchandise, but that's a very sticky area regarding copyrights and trademarks.

For those of you who've never attended a con, merchandise tends to be: 8x10 color photos [stills from TV shows and movies, and portraits of actors]; action figures and other "toy" type collectibles; books, comics and graphic novels; posters; t-shirts and sweatshirts; fantasy type stuff (dragons, fairies, and the like); costume jewelry; movie programs; fanzines; original art; DVDs; cups and mugs. In the case of something like Star Trek, which has a TON of licensed merchandise, there's a huge selection of things to buy. With regard to QL, there's pretty much zip-zilch-nada. (Sigh.)

What sounds interesting to you?

And then...with regard to other shows/movies (thinking specifically of those 8x10 color photos), who would you look for photos of?

Thanks, guys!!!
 
Stuff that sounds interesting to me:

8x10 photos
action figures/collectibles
books
posters
clothing/T-shirts
fanzines
jewelry

Hmmm... other shows/movies... I'd go for sci-fi-ish stuff like Sliders, Stargate, Dead Zone (which oft reminds me of QL with its "putting things right" premise), etc....

Here's an interesting merchandise page that many of us has used to get ourselves QL stuff (too bad it doesn't seem to have as much stuff as it used to); it may inspire some ideas (calendar anyone? ;)):

http://www.tvstuffandmore.com/qlpage.htm

:Love To All:
~ Joy ~
 
Fanzines are a good idea; there's never been trouble with them before, as far as I know, and there are enough fine authors out there that some good ones could be produced. 8x10 photos always seem to sell well, too, especially if the actors in question are available for autographs. As for merchandise from other shows, many of us here seem to be sci-fi fans, so that would go over well. And several of the actors from QL have appeared in other sci-fi shows, so that could tie in nicely.
 
LadyKayoss said:
8x10 photos always seem to sell well, too, especially if the actors in question are available for autographs.
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Yeah, these sound good i'd be prepared to pay a fair amount for some nice 8x10's to have signed by any guests who turn up, or alternately buy them off the site if you could get some to sell on to other members who could not attend the con - ie:me:(
 
Enterprise said:
Yeah, these sound good i'd be prepared to pay a fair amount for some nice 8x10's to have signed by any guests who turn up, or alternately buy them off the site if you could get some to sell on to other members who could not attend the con - ie:me:(
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These would be photos offered by a professional dealer (most of those folks own a store), or by the individual actors, not by the con itself -- so no (sorry), we wouldn't be selling them via Al's Place.

Your best bet might be to make an arrangement with a friend who is attending the con, to pick up photos for you and mail them to you.
 
LadyKayoss said:
Fanzines are a good idea; there's never been trouble with them before, as far as I know, and there are enough fine authors out there that some good ones could be produced.
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I wrote/edited/produced two series of QL zines over the course of about 5 years, and never had any trouble (no "cease and desist," that sort of thing). I'm recalling maybe 12-15 other QL zines that ran a number of issues, and never heard anything about their editors having a problem, either.

I'd very much like to see some brand-new zines premiere at the con. We've got a full two years to work on them. Fanfic authors, start your engines!
 
tina_als_girl said:
Here's an interesting merchandise page that many of us has used to get ourselves QL stuff (too bad it doesn't seem to have as much stuff as it used to); it may inspire some ideas (calendar anyone? ;)):

http://www.tvstuffandmore.com/qlpage.htm

:Love To All:
~ Joy ~
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I remember getting a couple of limited edition QL calendars through Quantum Quest, featuring wonderful illustrations of Sam and Al by one of the members, Joan Jobson. I still have them nearly 10 yrs on - they had pictures from a leap that took place in that month - so that January had Sam in 'the Wrong Stuff', (some of them referred to fanfiction episodes).
The Months had special days marked as normal calendars do, such as Christmas, New Year, Australia day etc. and also had the Leaps marked on the day they were set, with the year in brackets. In addition, Sam and Al, Scott and Dean's birthdays were marked, and other dates QL related, such as first air date and the date Donna stood Sam up!

They are treasured possessions, and I'm sure if you could get something similar they would be winners. We have lots of talented fanfic writers here, and I'm certain we have talented artists too.
 
I'm a girl with access to daddys credit card....

two words...

"oh boy"

bring it all on. however even though they have pleanty of licensed stuff. i usally find the most unique stuff to be unlicensed :)

thank fully paramount is calling off the legal dogs since Rod,Jr. won his lawsuit. now paramount is more afraid of people selling "artist interpretations" of their merchandise and being shut down because some lawyer at the big bad paramount has gotta beef, just because some dork sold a resin phaser, paramopunt tried to shut him down, and he got a jury to understand, it was his creation, an interpretation of an item in a movie and paramount lost 3 million plus court fees.

so i say BRING ON ALL THE ITEMS BABY!!!!! :)

(as long as i still have access to daddy's credit card of course :p )

Sammi
 
Sammi...Well...a few comments on that. Unlicensed material that uses copyrighted images is still a big no-no, although the rules seem to be a little bit flexible under certain circumstances. And whatever Paramount has decided along those lines has no bearing on us -- QL is a Universal property.

Helen, I remember those calendars. Joan did lovely work! Any artists out there in the group? A new calendar for 2009 or 2010 using original artwork I think would be welcomed, and would sell like hotcakes. It's too bad they only did an official calendar for one year (1993).
 
Wondering About Doing Something

Since the money is for charity...I was thinking perhaps whoever holds the licensing would allow some T'shirts to be made...

e.g.

Picture of Sam with voice cloud "Oh Boy"

Picture of Al (giving one of his looks) with voice cloud "Nozzle"

"WWSD (What Would Sam Do?)"

"WWAD (What Would Al Do?)"

"Ziggy say's it's only got a 1.2% probablity of happening" (or something like that)

Perhaps a few favorite banters (I personnally like the one from Genesis the one that's

Al: "Your best shot is freezing the brain, until all electrical activity has ceased."

Sam: "That's called death!"

Al: "I never said it would be easy!"


Anyone know if those kind of shirts could be made and profits go to charity? Who would need to be contacted?
 
I don't think that's going to happen, Helen. The con committees for 1995 and 1996 couldn't even use the words "Quantum Leap" on anything they produced for sale. Using a copyrighted image (a still or screencap from the show) would run into the same problem -- it's a violation of copyright. Whether or not some of the money (what's left after paying for the shirts) ultimately goes to charity doesn't matter. The shirt manufacturer would be making a profit. But thanks for the idea!
 
Still would like to ask

Who would own the rights to those things is what I'm asking. I wouldn't ever do something against copyright but it couldn't hurt to ask. If they said "no," so be it, but they might say yes. I'm not asking the con committee to do this, I'm saying I'd like to do this but I simply don't know who to ask.
 
asearcher said:
Who would own the rights to those things is what I'm asking. I wouldn't ever do something against copyright but it couldn't hurt to ask. If they said "no," so be it, but they might say yes. I'm not asking the con committee to do this, I'm saying I'd like to do this but I simply don't know who to ask.
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Universal owns the rights, and we are asking, just haven't recieved a reply yet. We're contacting them every week until we get an answer.

We do want to ask folks not to try and contact universal on their own about this. Let us do it please. We want to come across as professional and trustworthy and if lots of people outside the core committee start emailing, it might get a little out of hand.

Thanks though!
 
Ok

Ok Brian. From Carol's answer it didn't sound like it was being asked nor that the Con committee was wanting to take that on. I'm glad to see I was mistaken.

BTW...I wouldn't have done ANYTHING until things are finalized in anycase. Just wanted to be sure.

ALSO: If you are wanting to look professional and trustworthy, getting some printed letterhead and doing an actual snail mail letter is more professional than email. A small amount of letterhead with matching envelopes is not greatly expensive (I might be able to help fund a small amount depending...even though I'm still basically unemployed).

Also...in any charity event SOMEONE is making money (even if it's the weavers of the fabric which are used to manufacture the shirts or the renters of a hall)...the main thing is that no profit (e.q. anything over actual cost goes to charity) is made in selling the final product (and it is possible for people to donate their goods or services to make the profit or break-even point even better for a charity. I work with several non-profit organizations and know this to be true.
 
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The convention committee has everything in hand, so please don't worry. We all have experience with organising conventions/conferences, and three of us have actually been on the main committee of previous Quantum Leap conventions, so we all know what needs to be done.

Universal have been sent a proposal, and we are waiting to hear back from them, but I sincerely doubt that they will allow us to use their trademarked property (though they might surprise us!), even if it is for charity.

We also have a professional graphic designer working on the AMAZING logo she has produced for us, and once that is completed, she will be designing stationary for us also.
 
Helen,

What you're talking about re: the line of t-shirts would involve purchasing a license from Universal to market Quantum Leap merchandise (something similar to what Creation did in the early 1990s). Since this is a one-time event, while it would be lovely to have a whole selection of QL merchandise available for con-goers, the money simply isn't there for us to even attempt something like that.

Beyond that...ditto what Emma and Brian have said. There's a lot of work going on amongst the 5 of us (on the committee), so never fear, everything is well in hand. There simply are a few things that are beyond our reach money-wise.

Carol
 
Well, then, for T-shirts, could they be non-graphical shirts with lines like "I brake for Holograms" or something like that?

Does fan-art as t-shirt imagery also count under the whole copyright thing? I'm imagining it probably does (since it uses the company's intellectual property, even if the specific artist's composition is "original").

So, *would* something like "I brake for Holograms" work for T-shirts? Or one-liners along that same idea...

:Love To All:
~ Joy ~
 
We're planning to have an official con t-shirt with our logo on it, and some other really fun items with the con logo. (Wait till you see it -- as Emma said, it's fabulous! The artist who created it is working on some other items for us, too.) :hurray:

Beyond that, your best best is to contact someplace like Cafe Press and have a shirt made. Merchandising for a con is really kinda tricky -- you have to order a certain amount of things (often, hundreds) in order to get a decent price, and then hope you can sell them all. The women who worked on the 1996 con still have merchandise left from that con, sitting in somebody's garage, 10 years later! (It will probably show up at our con, LOL.)

I'm sorry to sound as if I'm pooh-poohing everyone's ideas about the shirts :cry -- they're very good ones, and I know stuff like that would be welcomed by a lot of fans. What I was aiming for originally was, "What sort of merchandise would you like to see, that an existing dealer would already have on hand?" There are shops in Hollywood that have huge stocks of 8x10s of actors, shows, and movies; other shops who have stocks of DVDs; others who have jewelry, toys, action figures, things like that. Unfortunately, we (the con committee) simply don't have the money to manufacture a special line of things for the con in hopes that we could sell all of them and recoup the cost. We're average fans, just like you guys. No independently wealthy folks here (sigh).

To answer your question simply, Joy, yes, as far as I know, a plain t-shirt with a small quote or slogan on it is probably OK, but we'd have to ask someone who's well-informed on copyright law to know for sure.
 
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Badali Jewelers does a lot of the LotR cons...they might be someone to consider contacting for a dealer's room. Really great bunch of people.

Also, anyone that does photos/stills/lobby cards/etc.
 
Apology

Although I never meant to upset the people on the committee, I may have inadvertantly done so based on the responses above. If so, please accept my apology.

I realize that the people on the committee have extensive experience in doing this. I never meant to imply otherwise. I'm sure you are all doing an excellent job at pulling this together. I do need to say though, in the absence of knowing, I was just bringing up what I hoped would be helpful suggestions. I'll just stop and wait until things get finalized. From now on, I won't provide any input since by doing so, it seems to cause more problems then they solve.

Again, please accept my apology.
 
Since the money is for charity...I was thinking perhaps whoever holds the licensing would allow some T'shirts to be made...
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me and caz were debating making customised ql badges in a similar light. for example, the "al-coholics stick together" thing in my avator was one idea we liked. . . jus some cool lil badges ^-^

- Tess
 
asearcher said:
Although I never meant to upset the people on the committee, I may have inadvertantly done so based on the responses above. If so, please accept my apology.
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Not necessary, and we aren't upset. Suggestions are always welcome! We just don't want a hundred fans to start emailing Universal about our convention when we haven't even heard back from them ourselves yet lol.

Suggestions and ideas are great! We want you to come to the con - and want to bring you things you want to see!
 
Ditto what Brian said - no apologies necessary. We just wanted to assure people that the committee are going to use their experiences to put on the very best convention possible. Ideas and thoughts are more than welcome; we need them to turn this into YOUR convention. This is a convention by fans, for fans, so we need your input!
 
I'll third all that! Michael Piller told me the day I started my writing internship, "There are no bad ideas." There are ideas that won't work for one reason or another, so they'll get shot down; I guess you'd say there are just inappropriate ideas. :) But definitely, all your input is valuable! Putting this event together is sort of like buying Christmas presents for somebody you've never met -- we don't know most of you personally, so we're doing our best to anticipate your wants and needs!

Tess, the badges sound like fun. Anything that's basically "general audience" (no bad language) should be fine. Little phrases like "Ziggy, center me on Sam" on a button or badge shouldn't cause any problem with anybody.
 
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