Well, this weekend was an eventful thing for me, as well as the general business of Japanese the Game, as we attended the 2023 NekoCon convention out in Hampton, Virginia.
NekoCon is a much smaller gathering than we usually go to, and sadly enough our sales were not very good at the convention. However, we did have a great amount of fun getting to meet the NekoCon team, and the Hampton area is quite lovely this time of year. The weather was much warmer than I had anticipated it would be, but this was not really a problem as it wasn’t that overwhelming oppressive heat we see so often during the summer.
With my own personal experience being PAX West as the last convention that I attended, I have to say that NekoCon was a little bit of a culture shock for me. The building was much smaller than those I’ve been in for past conventions. However, this also meant that I didn’t have to walk all over God’s creation to find things, which was definitely a welcome change. However, this also means that there were not many people there, and we had somehow been placed in the vendor hall instead of in the gaming hall. I think we may have done better in sales if we’d been closer to the gaming area, where people would be looking for games.
One of the biggest bonuses to this convention was that Wild Bill’s was there; which means I obviously had to buy a new mug! And then, enjoy their delicious craft beverages all weekend. I’m super excited we had them there, they truly make conventions worth attending on a personal level!
Although the weekend was not the most successful event I’ve ever been to, I did learn some very important lessons. The entirety of planning this convention for the sales team and myself was very educational. I have learned several ways to not do things in the future, including trusting the USPS to get inventory delivered in a timely manner. Although we did have inventory shipped in that should’ve arrived on Thursday at the hotel, we didn’t receive the inventory at all the whole weekend. It arrived on Monday after we had already checked out and headed to the airport!
These valuable lessons that I am learning in how things need to be planned and executed are invaluable for my future career goals. The best way for me to learn how to do things is to jump in and do them, so having the bandwidth to actually do the things while in the process of learning the process is an excellent amount of freedom for me to have.
