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The Book Closes on Rocketship Comics

Categories: Streetlevel

rocketship-comic-smith-072710.jpg
There's been some uncertainty brewing about the future of Rocketship Comics at 208 Smith Street, with a reader even posting something about it on the Forum recently. The store first closed its doors about a week ago, and then opened back up with much of the inventory marked down. Yesterday when we biked by a sign on the window read, "Last Day." Sad to see this place go. GMAP



By EmilyNonko at July 28, 2010 9:31 AM | Comments (21)

21 Comments

By Johnny on July 28, 2010 9:40 AM

Damn. Yeah, me too. Nice place/folks.

By Petebklyn on July 28, 2010 9:46 AM

if not selling booze or doing nails, can't afford rents.
Makes very banal retail mix.

By Heather on July 28, 2010 9:55 AM

Damn, that was one of our weekend outings.

By more4less on July 28, 2010 9:56 AM

Pete, how about some more real estate brokerage offices?

By Petebklyn on July 28, 2010 10:05 AM

ugh, the real estate offices. One just opened on Court...Ideal or something like that.
The one that has all those ads on craigslist. I think most lifted from other realtors. I wouldn't trust them.

By trago on July 28, 2010 10:26 AM

it's my fault. I moved to south slope and don't go much anymore. Maybe Rocketship should open up in cheaper south slope and I'll be there to support them. Definitely sad.

By Carol Gardens on July 28, 2010 10:34 AM

I don't think they will be reopening. I believe they want to do something different after five years (AND the lease was up). For now, support Bergen Street Comics and Desert Island if you like these kind of comic book stores!

By Boerumresident on July 28, 2010 10:38 AM

Where's Desert Island?

By 11217 on July 28, 2010 10:45 AM

Pete,

Ideal Properties is probably the best (or one of the best) small real estate brokerages in Brooklyn. They are a new start up and opened two offices last year in Park Slope and now this is their 3rd. In only a year. And they did an amazing renovation on the space they use as their office on 7th Avenue and I've had MANY people use them to find apartments and all had terrific experiences. They also have an entire wall of "no fee" listings outside their window.

They do a great job with retail leases and rentals...they don't seem to do as much in the way of residential sales.

By Carol Gardens on July 28, 2010 10:51 AM

Desert Island is at 540 Metropolitan Avenue. Very cool place with lots of signings and events like Rocketship used to do.

http://www.desertislandbrooklyn.com/

By lifer on July 28, 2010 11:18 AM

These guys seemed to be doing good, maybe the rent went up? I wish Alex and mary the best

By Heather on July 28, 2010 11:25 AM

Did Desert Island decide to carry mainstream comics or not?

By Petebklyn on July 28, 2010 11:31 AM

maybe so, 11217.
I guess I just see the tons and tons of ads on craigslist from them .... and don't seem so real/autehntic and not very detailed and hard for me to believe that all those ads are their listings.

By dannyhellman on July 28, 2010 11:36 AM

Alex is a prince among comic shop owners. In a better world, Rocketship would be expanding, not closing.

By novanglus on July 28, 2010 11:38 AM

Sad to see them go, but never had a reason to buy anything there either.

By grand army on July 28, 2010 12:56 PM

Very sad news. But these days, unless your uncle owns the building and is giving you for a peppercorn rent, I don't see how comic book stores, bookstores, newsstands, art galleries, furniture stores, art supply stores, etc etc can possibly make it. I get mad watching commercial landlords leave their shopfronts empty because they refuse to lower the rents. Many are old-timers who have owned their properties withour mortgages for years.

By 11217 on July 28, 2010 1:11 PM

That comic store on Bergen between 5th and Flatbush seems to do pretty good business. A handsome looking store (even though I'm not into comics at all).

By desertisland on July 28, 2010 1:24 PM

I'm also disappointed to see them close, but when I spoke to Alex he seemed ecstatic to get out of retail. So I guess I have mixed feelings.

@Heather: our shop has always carried some mainstream comics, hand-picked for maximum awesomeness. But honestly, in the current climate, we're more interested in carrying weird handmade stuff, foreign comics, and work that you can't buy on amazon or the ipad. Know what I mean?

By EnglishKills on July 29, 2010 12:39 PM

These types of stores can only survive in a few select locations, anywhere in the world. Someone mentioned there's one in Williamsburg. An obvious choice. Enough 30-something slacker inbred middlewestern hiptards who still read comics in that area to support a place like this. Fortunately enough normal people with real jobs live around Smith and Court streets these days - the types who don't have time for this fantasy world BS.

Children mostly don't even buy comics as they don't have the disposable income for the 4-5 a pop funny mags.

It's a sad, sad industry, the comic universe. Oh well.

By lifer on July 29, 2010 3:05 PM

As the below quote from the owner states, they didn't close because they couldn't survive in this neighborhood. They chose not to sign another lease.There are plenty of non "30-something slacker inbred middlewestern hiptards " who not only buy comics in this neighborhood, but make them as a living (as seen in their 'local artist' section of the shop). If you look at any movie listing these days and notice the effect the comics industry has on the movie industry, it doesn't seem so sad. Some would say being normal with a "real " job is the stuff sadness (and BS) is made of, but to each their own.

From the owner:

“Our lease came up and we realized that we were either going to do this another five to 10 years, at which point it becomes a CAREER, in big letters, or not sign on again and do something different. That’s basically it. Of course, there are a thousand variables in there, all of which would be very boring and involved. In the end, the store was great to do for five years, but not something we wanted to be doing until we retired. So it was time to move on.”

By grand army on July 29, 2010 5:45 PM

"It's a sad, sad industry, the comic universe."

English Kills, you're kidding right? I mean, I'm not a serious comics fan (though I do work in publishing) but I'm still aware that over 100,000 people just attended San Diego Comic Con! From superheroes to manga & anime to graphic novels to SF, Rocketship was a cool place with some very interesting material available. The creativity and (often radical) politics of today's graphic novels and cartoons is pretty impressive.

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