Which brings me to the second (and related) announcement – which is a fond farewell to Mk1 stalwart Scott (some knew him as Jack – other’s knew better!)  Scott clocked up close to ten years on the Mk1 counter – which makes him pretty much Mk1′s longest serving staff member (with the exception of Rach and I!)  When Scott started working here our stock system was pen and paper, we had no web presence and email was checked once a week.  It was Scott who gave me the Cavemonkey moniker – a nickname earned because I used to spend all my time stock managing out the back office juggling a paper trail miles long – whilst the counter monkeys did the sales work out the front.  It was Scott who dragged me kicking and screaming into the modern age (not to mention out to my current counter chained home), it was Scott who designed and built MK1′s first website, put simply the Mk1 you see today owes as much to Scott as anybody else who has kept this institution kicking along over it’s 22 year history (scratch that make it 30 year history – when you include it’s Auckland genesis).  The shop will not be the same without him – and I’m sure I won’t be the only one missing his presence behind the counter…. having said that he has promised to keep in touch and swing by to help out from time to time so don’t be to surprised if you see the unholy one lurking (tred carefully I won’t have the pay check to leverage best behavior out of him – he did relish the bad cop to my good cop role after all!)

Cheers Scott – once the World Cup is over we will adjoin to the  local for a proper send off – Chebble, Yebble, Norway and Timmy indeed!

If you want to keep in touch with Scott he promises to keep his @jackatacounter twitter feed updated…

Code word discount time:  Use the code word Yebble at the counter, in an email or on the website anytime up to and including this Sunday 9th of October and you can claim a 20% discount!  Offer is valid off anything in stock (on our website or in the shop) – yep including all those wonderful back issue comics that we have recently displayed down the back of the shop – you know the ones I haven’t told anybody about yet.  Yes that is 20% off our $7.00 or 2 for $12.00 or 5 for $24.00 back issue price!  And yes that is 20% off our graphic novel back wall deals ($29.00 each or 2 for $40.00 or 3 for $50.00!)   I think that’s everything…

See you in store!   Keep up to date with Mk1: online, via our feed, on twitter, Facebook and Google Buzz .

Lots of new releases on shelf this weekend – check out thefull list below – including the much requested Polish Train!

Full Shipment List:

• Flames of War German Box Set GBX36 Panzer IV/70 Platoon $82.00
• Flames of War German Small Box Set GBX42 Bunker Flak Platoon $42.00
• Flames of War Polish Small Box PBX01 Reconnaissance tank Platoon $60.00
• Flames of War Polish Extra Large Box PBX05 Polish Train $210.00
• Flames of War Polish Large Box PBX06 Mounted Kawalerii Regiment $82.00

Info sought:

Battlefront are  very pleased to announce that the re-release of the Vietnam range of products  starting April 2011.  Not only has the range been repacked into its own distinct green and black boxed set packaging but they have announced the first expansion as well (including the lethal Cobra attack helicopter).  The Vietnam range of products is a permanent addition to the Battlefront family of products and Mk1 needs your help to decide if we should add it to our family of offerings as well. Please use the comments section below to let me know if you are interested in this game – if I get enough of a groundswell of interest I’ll jump in with both combat boots on!

Background..

Our comic supplier closed the facility (Los Angeles)  that we ship our comics from on very short notice at the end of last year… the remaining facility has had a few teething problems handling the extra orders… One whole shipment went missing (now located – but not yet here) and last week’s comics arrived short half the expected boxes (all the new stuff too!)   The good news is it is all fixed up and I’m very much looking forward to unpacking a very large delivery at the start of next week – essentially 3 weeks of comics in one shipment!  There’s been some compounding problems (a mini cold war with US flight and safety regulators, a hissy fit between a couple of competing freight forwarders, a lack of “freight lift” out of the new facilitys closest international air port and delays in me being able to do anything about this because I rather inconsiderately took a holiday!)

Dilemma

The bad news is that I haven’t had any new comics to wake up and devour on Sunday mornings for a couple of weeks now (we all have our little pleasures to look forward to I’m sure).. add to that horror the inevitable difficulties that such a disruption has on the flow of cash into the business.. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying Mk1′s heading for financial destitution (after all the shop doesn’t carry any debt and the lean retail times we live in have shrunk our staff levels to an absolute minimum anyway).  It’s more that I don’t want any debt (nor do I want to trade on less than minimum staff!)

Fix!

I have reloaded the Sale Table with anything that we are overstocked on to clear it out before the end of financial year stocktake that’s looming on the calender – our recent SNAFU sale has certainly helped.. The Fix is very nearly here.  I’m expecting the first wave of catch up books Monday 7 Feb 2011 – another batch end of the week and finnally a new ontime delivery next Tuesday/Wednesday.  I’ve applied the tag word SNAFU to the cover galleries of the shipments effected by the … muck up… (so hard not to swear!) … Rest assured we will receive all these items – I am very much looking forward to removing the tag and code word SNAFU once .. situation returns to normal not all fudged up…

The first normal newsletter for the year is out end of this week (unless I’m really, really, really busy selling stuff!)  - make sure you are all signed up to receive it – reviews, previews, specials and malarky!

Happy New Year –  See you in store from Chris & the Mk1 team !