Christopher Burns reports:

"The Book Rack has been in business for only nine months, but made a big splash with Free Comic Book Day. We knew that promotion for the event was the key to get new customers to find us. To promote the event, we sent the provided press release to the number 1 rated morning news show in Rochester, NY WOKR TV 13. Darren Mark, the station's Human Interest reporter came to our store the morning of July 1st to broadcast live for 2 1/2 hours! We also had a local cartoonist, David Boyer, on hand to talk about the history of cartooning and to do caricatures of the staff on the air. We talked in detail about FCBD and the reasons why people should consider comics as a form of reading. We stressed the educational benefits of comics.

"Boyer was also on hand Saturday to do caricatures for our customers. Part of the proceeds went to the Monroe County Special Olympics.

"Many customers said they had seen the television and newspaper articles about the event as well as seeing our listing on the FCDB website. We were impressed with the number of families that came to the store. Most customers asked several questions regarding comics and what is ‘good’ for them or their children to read. There were very few people that came in only for the free comic and nothing else.

"We saw immediate results from FCBD.

"We closed the store for the holiday on Sunday and reopened Monday, July 5th. Several customers from Saturday came back in on Monday to buy additional books (Ultimate Spider-Man trades were hot!) as well as people were unable to attend the event on Saturday.

"We were very pleased with the FCBD program and look forward to serving our new customers as well as planning next year’s event."