Last year, a favorite artist of mine, Mitch Breitweiser, did an indiegogo campaign for a new comic/tpb called Red Rooster. I like his watercolor artwork and was intrigued by what I saw, so I went in at the $60 level which will include an artist sketch book. It was supposed to be done like in April or May of 2019. It still isn't done. But the reason why is kind of exciting. I'm patient, and more than a little intrigued, by this comic and the story developing around it. I just got this email from Mitch. Here is the story behind Red Rooster running late:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mitch
Mea Culpa / Future of Red Rooster
Hello Everyone.
Your book is late and I am deeply sorry. While this is in no way an excuse for the late delivery of these books, I want to provide some context for how I lost control of the production schedule. Here is the story—The WHOLE story.
2018. In the weeks before the launch of Red Rooster: Golden Age on Indiegogo, I began meetings with a successful Arkansas business leader about the unhealthy state of the comic book Industry as well as sharing my thoughts on how to repair the damage and win over new comic book fans. Elizabeth and I had our ears to the ground for some time listening to fans, retailers, creators, and commentators. The time for solutions and action had come. This great American art form should be accessible and discoverable in the wild again by curious and bright eyed fans.
Our idea was pretty straight forward: to place amazing new hero comics with unrivaled art and story, unspoiled by divisive politics, into convenient retail locations that serve communities where comic book shops cannot.
The great success of the RR campaign quickly proved that there was smoke and fire and we began to garner some interest from other business leaders in our community. I burned the candles at both ends for two months, exhaustively promoting our campaign, and we began laying the foundation for what would occur over the next many months.
Through the summer and into fall 2018, I worked on the first leg of Red Rooster as we began making presentations and laying the legal framework for a little startup that could potentially change the comic book landscape forever. The response was overwhelmingly positive and every door seemed to open a larger one until we were invited to give our largest presentation yet on October 26th. We pitched a major US retailer and their national newsstand distributor on putting comics from a start up company with premier creators into mass market retail. Elizabeth, myself, and our partner David took it as far as we could.
We worked and waited. A few days before Christmas, we got the "Yes" phone call. After all the details shook out, we were offered a purchase order for nearly 1 million comic books...4 titles (including RR) across six months as a pilot program in a nationwide rollout...and we had to build everything from scratch. Starting in January 2019 the fledgling Allegiance brand had to find startup capital, build the teams, create the titles, create the company, hire and train staff, scout talent, negotiate contracts, invent a marketing campaign, produce assets, and so much more. It's been insanely hard. I was immediately pulled in a thousand directions at once to make it all happen.
Our retail launch is February 4th in 4000+ mass market locations nationwide. We're planning to be found on the endcap of the books section at a retailer near you.
As you can imagine, the learning curve for a couple of artists has been colossal. This obviously created problems for the Red Rooster campaign. I spread myself way too thin for way too long. Elizabeth and I are heartsick over leaving backers in the dark—wretchedly heartsick. But now you have the truth. Maybe I should have just said all this sooner. But, under counsel, we kept silent about our spectacular deal. And as other creators and staff became intertwined with the Allegiance Arts initiative, we had a duty to protect their futures as well.
Elizabeth and I sincerely and humbly apologize to each of you. I accepted all of the above challenges with open but naive eyes. The blame of a late Red Rooster is on me. I couldn't do it all. I am sorry. And I’m sorry I couldn’t or didn’t tell you until now.
Providing existing fans with amazing entertainment and winning new fans to comics was, and still is, our driving passion. We put everything on the line to seize a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to place world-class comic books from premier talent into thousands of communities underserved by comic book shops. We pulled the sword from the stone and now we have to wield it. But I do not regret that.
I hope that Elizabeth and myself can find some empathy and grace after these revelations. This unburdening is already a huge relief. We will be working to address every comment and message from backers, but that is going to take us a few days as they have crescendoed over the past month.
We will be closing the RR campaign on Nov. 15th, and giving everyone firm fulfillment dates as soon as I can get solid data. This is a very high priority for us. The project is obviously behind, and I have to wall myself up in my studio and muscle through Red Rooster as our Allegiance staff march forward with all other duties.
I am committed to excellent craftsmanship, and that takes time. The overall page count for the book has increased to 68. That's 8 pages more than we promised, but this bird needs to stretch its wings. I will be doing some of the final phases of my RR work live on my Youtube channel. The chat is always a blast, and special guests pop in all the time. I want us to race to the finish together with an enthusiasm fitting for RR, Allegiance creators, and a bright future for comics. We'll be sharing art as well in updates, which will be occurring with more frequency now that the cat is out of the bag.
We will be sending you Act I of Red Rooster: Golden Age (the first 24 pages) as a digital download for backers in the weeks ahead.
In earlier updates I told backers that RR was leading us down some exciting roads. Now you know, though, I wish the circumstances were a little better and I could have accomplished everything with more deftness and efficiency. Still, It is important to us that Red Rooster backers know first. I hope you will choose to celebrate this news. It’s an amazing win for fans new and old, for the talented creators with us at Allegiance Arts, and for the future of great American comic book storytelling.
Thank you for reading this, and thank you for backing this very, very special comic book. We value your support tremendously.
Let’s make comic book history together.
Sincerely,
Mitch Breitweiser
Special thanks to my Elizabeth for walking into the fire with me. I could not do it without you at my side, and special thanks to all the helping hands (big or small) that lifted us up and helped us along the way.
I'm thinking that Allegiance Arts and Entertainment comics will be starting to show up at places other than your lcs. How many times have we said the distribution needs to be changed? Could this be a shift in that direction? It kind of sounds that way to me!!!! |
-Our Odin-
I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
Masculinity takes a holiday.