INTERVIEW

This was a very lengthy interview that I did with an online site that was featuring entrepreneurial subjects and apparently they thought I would be of interest.  The interview was conducted mostly over the phone although part of it was at the San Diego Convention (don't remember the year).  I was sent this transcript and asked to check for errors which I did.  I returned it but never heard back and I don't think the edited version ever ran.  Probably yet another online company gone belly up.

 So, here's the interview...unedited.  Its very long and I don't know how much interest it would hold but no one says you have to read it.

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 What was your childhood like?  Urban or rural?  Religious or non-religious?  Nuclear family or dysfunctional?  Things like that.
Well, I was born and raised in Detroit.  When I was born, it was a couple years after my dad had returned from Korea.  He was a big hero in Korea with lots of medals and was front page news when he returned but he couldn't get a good job.  He had one for a few years and then the company folded so he was always scrambling.  He taught himself carpentry and finally got a job with the City of Detroit and eventually became Master Carpenter.  Let's see...before that he was a repo man for a Rent-A-Car company as he was very good at stealing cars.

 So, the early years were rough.  We lived in the projects for a few years and then moved to a dumpy house.  We were the welfare family of the block and people would drop off their used clothes for me and my five brothers.  After my dad started working for the city, we moved into the house where I spent my teenage years in a section called Brightmoor.  Very poor area and now its probably one of the worst areas in Detroit which is saying something.  But it didn't seem that bad to me growing up and it certainly wasn't dangerous.  The only problem we had was that the house we had was small so all of us shared one bedroom.  Luckily, we were all boys.

We weren't religious although my mom was brought up Protestant.  She'd take us to church on occasion so it wasn't something totally foreign but it wasn't regular either.  It was left up to us if we wanted to pursue it.  My brothers and I joined some church groups but mainly it was to use their Boy's Club facilities. 

So, did you get in lots of trouble as a kid?
Just the normal stuff...shoplifting, vandalism of school property, some other stuff.  One of the things we did quite often was to go on top of buildings and throw water balloons at people when they were coming out of the show.  I remember our favorite spot was on top of a furniture store across from the First Psychic Church of Brightmoor.  We used to peg those people and scream that if they were psychic, they should've seen it coming.  But we grew out of that in our mid to late teens.

Were your parents strict?
No, not at all.  We grew up with an incredible amount of freedom.  I had very little restriction but I think that made my brothers and me very independent.  I could pretty much do what I wanted in my teen years and didn't have a real curfew or anything.  By the time I was 18, I had a lot of experience in many things so I think I was quite mature for my age.  I didn't have to go through a lot of stuff young adults do because I had done it as a teenager.

What about working?  Did you work as teens as obviously, you must had some source of money to enjoy your independence?
All of us, my brothers, had good work ethics so that certainly helped.  As kids we would mow lawns, shovel snow, whatever, to earn money.  They don't do it now but at Christmas time, we use to do a lot of Christmas caroling where you go up to houses and sing and people would give you money.

I only see that on commercials.
Well, it was common back then.  You could make a lot of money.  My singing voice is so bad, I have to think that they gave us money to stop singing.

I got my first job in the seventh grade.  I had to walk about a mile to my Junior High School and it was on a major road.  I stopped in this auto repair shop and asked how much I could make if I swept the floors.  I forget what I was paid but I'd stop in for a few minutes after school every day and sweep the floors.  Then when the Detroit newspapers went on strike, the Polish daily paper started printing in English and it became the primary paper of Detroit.  I started a paper route with them and had the largest route in the city.  I think I was 12, maybe 13 at the time.  It would take me hours to deliver the paper every day but I made really good money.  I forget how many customers I had but there were 100's.  When the papers came off strike, my customer based dropped down to four or five.  So much for that. 

 It was right after the paper route that my dad started a side job at night.  It was remodeling a chain of supermarkets in the Detroit area.  He'd work all day, come home and eat and sleep, then go to work all night.  When he got home, he'd have enough time to eat before going back to his day job.  It was rough for him.  My brothers and I would take turns working with him so I'd work two nights a week.  We were paid really, really well and I always had a lot of money for my age.  That lasted about four years.

What did you spend it on?  Or did you save it?
Didn't save a penny.  We'd go out to eat, buy records, clothes, whatever.  I remember when I went into the 8th grade, it was right when my dad started earning good money by working for the city and his side job.  He took us all shopping at a department store, something like a K-Marts.  He bought us all new clothes...I mean everything from socks, underwear, belts, you name it.  I was never so happy as I could finally go to school without wearing old clothes or pants without patches on them.  Then he informed us that since we were now working, we could buy our own clothes.  But it still seemed like a good deal to us, as clothes didn't take up all of our money.

Wasn't that rough, working all night and then going to school?
Yeah, but again, it was worth it.  I don't remember ever really being tired except for on the way home from school.  Guess that was about the time it caught up.  But my parents didn't have a lot of regard for schooling.  It was just the time period back then.  School wasn't really that important and college wasn't even an option.  The goal was to get out of high school and land a job at a factory or get into a trade like being a boiler room operator or electrician.  If you could do that without graduating form high school, all the better.  It was a lot different then.  Things have really changed.

But you did go to college.
Yeah, which was a surprise to everyone, including me.  I was just going through the motions of high school although I had done well in junior high school.  I think what got me turned around was meeting Jennifer who I ended up marrying.  It sort of introduced me to a whole new world.  She was expected to go to college, there was no other consideration.  We got together when I was a just entering 12th grade and debating whether I wanted to continue or not.  If I quit, that meant I had to get a full time job and school seemed a bit easier.  So, I went to summer school to get caught up and worked hard in my senior year and graduated...barely.

Once I got out of school, though, I didn't really know what to do.  I had spent my last three summers doing landscaping which was mainly mowing lawns from dawn to dusk and I knew I didn't want to do that any more.  I got a job at a printing plant which published the real estate books, the ones with the pictures of all the houses for sale.  I worked the midnight shift.  I tell you, no matter how much you work the midnight shift, you never get truly adapted to that time schedule.  That was a great experience for me, though and I learned a lot.  After about six months there, I was made the midnight supervisor.  That didn't go over well with all the people there as there was a crew of 6-7 and here I was, a kid of 18 and their boss.  Some of them had been there for 10 years.  It was rough for me.  I remember I told the plant manager that I wanted a raise and gave him two weeks notice if I didn't get the raise.  My dad gave me a good lesson on that threat.  He told me that they were there before I came and they would be there after I left.  He was right.  The two weeks came and went and no raise.  But I made good on my threat and quit.  And then it was off to the only job I ever got fired from...a bank teller.  What a horrible job.  It was at that time, I learned about office politics and I had been an unwitting victim of it.

That was about the time I decided I would explore college.  My wife to be was still in high school and she was evaluating some colleges and some were out of state.  I felt that I wasn't much of a catch, bouncing from job to job and I had no desire to go into the trades, so I started college. I worked at some different jobs, delivering paint to auto repair shops, hauling carpeting around, hanging drapes for new apartment buildings, all kinds of fun stuff.   I got a job as a vacuum cleaner service manager, repairing vacuum cleaners and I did that for a few years while I went to college.  It was a good job, not a career job, but a good one.  It allowed me to get my own apartment and go to school at night.

When did you get married?
It was during the time I was the Service Manger.  I'm sure my wife's parents weren't too thrilled but I think we were pretty mature about the whole thing and even though I was a "Brightmoor Rat", I think maybe they saw something in me.  I don't know if they really had much of a choice but they were supportive. But I had shifted to knowing that college would provide something for me and the Service Manager was just temporary.  Of course, I had no idea what I was going to college for but I was going.  My boss at the time was really desperate for salesmen to go door to door as that was always their focus and he kept trying to get me to do that.  I had no desire to do that but I knew the first month or so, all of the calls would be on leads so I finally agreed and did quite well my first month.  But I knew I had to do something else and so I landed a job at an alarm company and started in the warehouse doing shipping and receiving.

 That was another job that I learned a lot at.  I moved up through the company fairly quick as I became an order puller then an order taker and finally up to sales where I would deal with installers around the country and guide them to installing alarms.   I remember always going out to dinner and staying out to all hours of the night discussing the business.  At the time, I felt it was really important but I soon realized that the Sales Manager was just lonely so he had the sales crew go out with him to keep him company.

 When my wife graduated, I decided to go full time and get my Bachelors.  The alarm company offered me a great deal.  It was a substantial raise but I would have to quit school and sign an agreement with them.  I was really tempted but my wife was making really good money so I turned it down and went to school.  That was lucky for me as the alarm company soon folded.

 So, now you were a full time student?
Yeah and it was a completely different experience for me.  Going to school full time in the day was drastically different than going to school part time at night.  At night, it was serious business but in the day, it was less intense.  Not for me, but for many of the students.  I went to Eastern Michigan University and found that I had an aptitude for science, so I ended up in Biology.  I don't remember a bulb or something going off in my head that this was something I was destined to do, it just sort of happened. 

So, after your graduation, what made you decide to go into your own business?
It was actually while I was still in school.  I had a great love of books and always thought about opening a bookstore.  I liked the idea of used books because you didn't have to concern yourself with carrying the best sellers and you were dealing with more people who had a great sense of books rather than just reading what the latest buzz was about.  An opportunity came along and a friend of mine, Terry Lewis, and I decided to open a used bookstore.  It was named Reader's Exchange so obviously the emphasis was on the buying and trading of books. We added comics as something that might attract a different audience.  I'm not sure but we both might have still been at the alarm company then.

Was the store an instant success?
It did okay.  Good enough to keep at it but not well enough that I dropped my plans for school.  We soon opened a second one in Dearborn called Comics Plus that specialized only in comics and related material.  That was mainly because it was too small to carry used books.  That was an immediate success as we tapped into the Detroit area which had very few stores.  When my wife and I were looking for a location, we picked a very busy street and our decision was made because of a bus stop right in front of the store.  That decision really paid off well as that became a major part of our success.  We later added two additional stores but neither did that well.  It became a matter of deciding after a couple of years on whether I wanted to enter into long term leases and I felt the growth just wasn't strong enough.

 And while you were operating the stores, you were still attending school?
Yes, and I had decided to continue to get my Masters.  It was a rather hectic time as I was also teaching at Eastern Michigan, part of the graduate assistant duties.  It was about this time that I also started putting on conventions and hosting a radio show.  But I scaled down considerably once my wife got pregnant with our first daughter. 

And what did you scale down to?
Just the stores.  I had my degree and decided not to pursue education any further.  I had a couple opportunities to go for my P.H.D. but I was tired of the politics of higher education.  And I had been going to school, part time and full time, for about ten years.  It was enough.  Again, I didn't really have that strong of a passion for it anyway.  So, I just concentrated on the stores and it allowed me to stay home with our first two daughters quite a bit.  My wife worked 12 hour shifts so we'd alternate on staying home.  It was a good arrangement.

 But then the entrepreneurial spirit hit you again?
Well, I wouldn't say I had a bug to do something.  I felt like I was always more of a situation entrepreneur.  A situation arises and I just go into it.  I think the common conception of an entrepreneur is someone that's going to get involved in something for the risk and action and it doesn't really matter what kind of business it is.  The whole thing of getting involved is for the game, not the business.  I looked at the business first.  I don't think I really thought of myself as a true entrepreneur that floated from one thing to another.  I wanted to stay involved and build it up.  It's rather odd about my family.  I've been involved in my own business, one of my brothers run his own financial planning company, another owned a couple of muffler shops, and another is an independent contractor.  Must be something in the family that we don't like to be told what to do.

How did you get involved in the publishing and the toys?
Well, at the stores, I had many guest appearances and there was a local comics publisher, Arrow Comics that were releasing a number of titles.  Because of market conditions, they folded.  However, they owed some money to the artists of Realm and Deadworld, so in lieu of payment, they turned the rights over to them.  The artists asked me to help find a new publisher since I was attending a lot of conventions and trade shows.  After thinking about it, I decided to become a publisher.  Their two titles gave me a good base to work from.  I added an anthology title, Caliber Presents, and a local film company wanted to have an adaptation of their movie, Moontrap, so I signed that up.  Then I had a customer who painted t-shirts and he had a comic book he was working on and that was Jim O'Barr and The Crow.  Guy Davis who owned the Realm was anxious to do something different so he and I created Baker Street and thus, I had my initial publishing lineup.

How did you finance the new company?  Did you bring in investors?
No, it was always financed through the stores.  It was all one entity and most of the store employees also helped out with the comics.  Kathy, one of our cashiers also did most of the bookwork and she handled the lettering of the comics that needed handwriting.  Another clerk, Nate, would work on some of the paste-ups.  Chet, my store manager at the time, would serve as editor on some of the stuff.  In fact, the Caliber offices were in the back of the main store for the first two years.

When was the publishing company launched?
That was in 1989 but for the most part, the titles started shipping in 1990.  It was an exciting time as most of the creators working on the comics were locals so we had a lot of meetings at the store.  There were a lot of late nights sitting around drinking beer and playing video games and deciding what titles to do, what formats, promotions and stuff like that.  Later, as the company got larger and I started using writers and artists from around the country, things became a bit more distant.  But that's to be expected.

The company grew and then you merged with Stabur.  Was that before or after the toy company with Todd McFarlane?
I had known Paul Burke, the president of Stabur, from when I was putting on conventions in the early 1980's as he would attend the shows.  He was locally based and my wife and became friends with him and his wife, Gretchen.  Great people.  Paul was involved with Lou Adler and Fox regarding the 15th Anniversary of Rocky Horror Picture Show and so he approached me about doing a comic book series on it.  I pretty much gave it over to Kevin VanHook who I brought in to help me with the production of the comics.  Kevin, by the way, went on to become Executive Editor of Acclaim and then quit to work out in Hollywood.  Very successful and had his first film, Frost, released theatrically and on DVD.  My kids enjoyed when they got to see him thanking me at the beginning of the film. But Paul had started to expand Stabur and was involved with Disney, Penthouse, Miss America, and the Stan Lee videos.  He discussed acquiring Caliber and to get me involved.  We negotiated and although he did give me some money, I always looked at it as a merger since both companies operated independently.  Paul got involved in some other projects and I assumed control of both Caliber and Stabur.

In 1993, Paul was talking with Todd McFarlane as Todd was getting offers from toy companies.  Todd wasn't interested in the best deal, he just wanted a deal where he could have the toys designed the way he wanted them to and didn't really care about the financial aspect of it.  Paul suggested that the only way Todd could control everything was to make his own toys.  A corporation was set up with Todd and Paul owning it, Todd of course, with majority ownership.  He financed with his own money although some money was borrowed based on his assets which included money and his stature in the marketplace.  Another friend of Paul’'s, Bill Martin had a printing background and he was brought in.  So, when McFarlane Toys started, it was Todd, Paul, Bill, and me.  Todd brought in some of his people in Arizona to handle that side of things and we hired Bob LoMonoco for sales and Rick Beer for the financial aspects.  With the assistance of a "toy guy",  we also hooked up with the design team in New Jersey which was Tony Billotto and Ed Frank.

So, the design team was in New Jersey and all the business offices were in Michigan and then Todd was in Arizona making all the final decisions. But it worked and the company grew rapidly.  Sure, we had some mistakes but most of the time it was following the standard way of doing things.  When we deviated from the norm, that's when things did better.

What was your role with the company?
Early on, everything was jointly decided.  Of course, Todd and Paul made all the major decisions but most activities involved group meetings.  Later, it began to become more specialized.  I was sort of the office manager in Michigan and I handled much of the advertising and promotion of the toy company.  I would use buyers of advertising space for TV ads, do press releases, and other related stuff.  At first, there wasn’t a lot of clear delineation on duties from everyone.  We grew really fast and started hiring a lot of people and I probably interviewed and hired most of them. 

 

Why did you leave?
In the middle of 1996, the toy company was growing very fast.  I was involved with that besides still handling everything to do with Caliber and Stabur.  And I was still writing quite a few comics and books plus I still had my two stores.  It was a juggling act.  Todd thought I was handling too much and we had a long talk and essentially, he wanted me to devote full time to the toy company and he would assume control of Caliber and Stabur.  I think Paul was pushing for that as well.  I guess they were more visionary than I was.  I know Paul saw that the properties of Caliber could be pushed quite a bit in Hollywood and games with the muscle of Todd's name behind it.  It came down to a choice.  Give up Caliber and concentrate on the toy company or forego the toy company totally.  Stabur wasn't really part of the equation either way as pretty much all the activity had shut down with it.  The comics market was doing well and I felt that Caliber had positioned itself well with the addition of Jim and Joe Pruett handling the editorial side.  So, I decided to focus on Caliber.  I moved into new offices and took most of the people involved in Caliber with me.


How did that work out?
At first, it was great. Things were going real smooth and then the crash hit.  There was consolidation with the distributor and publishers and then retail outlets began to close quickly.  The drop in the market was unbelievable.  One of the major problems we had was with a game system we had developed, something along the lines of Magic, and the printer screwed up the whole production.  It costs us enormous amount of money and even more potential sales.  We couldn't recover from that.  We won a lawsuit that took years to settle but it was far too little and far too late.  The printing company had gone bankrupt.  A total depressing time.

Did Caliber end with the printing disaster?
No, it limped along for a while.  No one could predict the market would continue its decline but it just kept going down and down.  It went to levels that were considered inconceivable and then beyond that.  Looking back, I should've bailed out much earlier but who knew? So, Caliber never officially ended, it just sort of faded away over time.

Any regrets or anything you might have done differently?
No, no regrets.  I'm not one that looks back and wishes for things that might have been because you never know how things would've played out.  Differently?  I think I would have structured the company in a different direction.  I had always focused on creator owned projects and Caliber couldn't have started off otherwise.  But I think when things were going well, I should have created more properties that Caliber owned.  We ended up serving as a starting point for a lot of people but not for ourselves.  Then again, who knows if that would've worked, either.  So, just can't look back.

Addendum
Added on in 2004.
Since the time of the interview, Caliber has completely closed down all operations.  The stores were sold off.  I started teaching in 2001 to see if I would enjoy it and I do,  so I teach full time at different campuses and do quite a bit of freelance writings.  I am still involved in some possible start up companies but continue to just keep all the options open.  Writing and teaching are very satisfying for me right now, so I have no complaints.