Not much really happens in Rossendale, where we live. And the population, isn’t even big enough to warrant a cinema, ten pin bowling or even a KFC.
The only reason we have a Costa Coffee, is because it’s in the local Tesco. And Tesco, as we all know, will open anywhere there’s a pound or two to be made.
So, imagine my surprise when I woke up on Saturday morning, with the wife excitedly shouting in my ear. “You’ll never guess what?”
“What?” I said, half joking. “Comic-Con is on in Blackburn today, and what a great treat it would be for the boys, if you’d take them” she remarked.
Blackburn is only a few miles from us and not a big town. So it was a surprise that an event, such as Comic-Con, would come to town. Normally it would only be on in big places like Manchester, Birmingham or London.
Comic-Con (for those who don’t know) is a comic book convention and celebrates everything to do with comics, related movies and science fiction.
I’d never been to one before, but me and boys had heard about them from a friend of a friend, and had always fancied going to have a look. The boys are big superhero fans (I’ll admit it, me too), and couldn’t wait to get going.
Well, what a spectacle, I’ve never quite witnessed anything so unique. It wasn’t just the stalls upon stalls selling t-shirts, memorabilia, comics and drawings. It was more the uniqueness of a very large percentage of the attendees.
Surprisingly, about 95% of attendees were adults (ranging from 16 up to 60), with very few children dotted about, including our two.
And, out of the adults, I would say 50% of them were dressed up. Not dressed up to go out, but dressed up as their favourite super hero or science fiction character. When I say dressed up, I really mean it, they weren’t playing at it, they obviously take it extremely serious. It was like a competition.
They would walk round the event and compare their outfits against each other. Then they would discuss what movie or time period their outfit represented. Obviously, very proud, passionate and to me extremely unique. Doing something and wearing something that made them clearly stand out from the rest of the crowd. Like it was a competition.
After returning home and reflecting on the event and the people. I really think, in business terms, we can learn something from them, their uniqueness.
If you want to stand out against your competition, find something unique about you, dress it up and shout it from the roof tops.
In our business we have some very unique to us, printing services, that we have developed to save our customers lots of money, whilst guaranteeing great service and guaranteeing that the price won’t increase.
But, what we haven’t done that well, is really dressed them up and shouted about them, so our customers can see there uniqueness and hear how they can benefit from them. And how we are different to our competition.
Following our trip to Blackburn and Comic-Con, this is going to change. Thank you Blackburn and thank you Comic-Con.
