Matt freakin' Gwinn

[Paul Czege]

After four days at GenCon, this I gotta say. If you are ever in the position of planning for the sale of your game at a convention, Matt Gwinn is the one to talk to. He had a little card that fit behind the copies of Kayfabe in the rack, standing taller than the game itself, alerting you to its presence in a cluttered rack. He had business cards. He had fantastic character sheets for his demos, with illustrations of the characters on them. He had a glossary of wrestling terms to give away, perfect for if someone interested in a demo was with a friend unfamiliar with wrestling. He had photocopies of the game that he could give to reviewers, so he didn't have to give away his actual stock, which not only kept him from bleeding away his profits, but I think will surely sweep the reviewer up a bit and make him feel like part of the shoestring/tight margin/underdog indie spirit.

Paul

[Matt Gwinn]

Thanks Paul.  I was able to do all that stuff at work for free so I figured what the hell and did everything I could think of.

As long as we're handing out praise I need to say that everyone worked hard to help sell ALL of our games.  Ralph in particular worked his ass off to promote everyone's games and Ron could barely speak by the second day he had run so many demos (many of them for games that were not Sorcerer).  

I think the whole concept of teh Indie Booth worked better than any of us expected and all of our individual efforts helped promote, validate and sell the Indie movement.

,Matt

[Mike Holmes]

You left out the most telling fact about Matt's work, Paul; I think he outsold everyone at the booth! Nice work Matt, nice work.

Mike

[Paul Czege]

I think he outsold everyone at the booth!

Did he really outsell Riddle of Steel...in three days? Matt and Kayfabe weren't there on Sunday at all.

He was relentless though...tireless. He ran six demos a day, and still got up to talk to anyone who showed even a passing interest. My voice was going by the end of the My Life with Master playtest on Thursday night, and I only reconstituted it by taking time off from the booth to shop on Friday. Matt didn't do that, and somehow his voice was good for the whole of Thursday, Friday and Saturday. This is the kind of stuff people should be probing him about...what kind of lozenges were you using, Matt?

Paul

[Mike Holmes]

Did he really outsell Riddle of Steel...in three days?

Well, I can't say definitively, but they were flying off the rack. I saw friends each leaving with copies, more than once. And Dust Devils sold out early, so who knows there. But, all-in-all, Kayfabe had a hook that got to people, and with Matt's selling, they were constantly leaving the booth.

Mike

[Jake Norwood]

I actually handled the quantities, and TROS, Kayfabe, Dust Devils, and Octane (hope I'm not forgetting anything) all sold about the same number of copies, give or take 5. Universalis also sold well in the middle two days.

Either way, it was wierd with Kayfabe. The first day was about 8 copies, I think. But the next two days were crazy, and it outsold all the other indie stuff those two days. It probably would have done so the last day as well--5 of the photocopied reviewer books sold (Matt-I owe you $10).

Jake