[Anon cosplay] Girl band: Victorious Wrap-Up from Running a Booth at ANYC

A victorious wrap-up for Running a booth at ANYC! This was the very first time in my life Running a booth—something I had been wanting to try for so long, and I finally made it happen.

P3 is our joint booth with Sensei 9; our doujinshi was also a collaborative anthology. Sales went much better than expected, with almost half the stock sold out. Unfortunately, we miscalculated the quantities and ended up selling even the sample copies, leaving us without a single archive copy for ourselves. Since it was our first time running a table, we were a bit flustered in every aspect—our posters weren't well organized, making searching for them pure chaos. Our inventory forecasting was slightly off too; some franchises we thought would sell well didn't move as much, so we plan to sell the remaining stock slowly over time. But beyond all expectations, the Girl band merchandise turned out to be our best seller! I honestly assumed this IP was only popular within niche circles and was fully prepared for it not selling at all, yet our doujin book basically sold out by Day 2, which was a huge encouragement for me.

P4 captures finally reuniting with four creators at ANYC whom I hadn't seen since graduation. Seeing everyone chat about table-running in group chats every day made me so envious, and now I've finally done it myself. I also exchanged gorgeous merch goods with Sensei Mu San and Sensei S_Shanshan.

P5 shows meeting up in person with the all-around beauty Sensei Yipen Jialancai, who can both play music and draw! She is truly gorgeous in person, and we successfully traded items I prepared—I will cherish these goodies forever.

P6 is one of the few other booths offering Girl band merch at this event. That artist cosplayed a Girl band character every day. On Day 3, we coincidentally did an Anon cosplay and a Soyo cosplay respectively. We enthusiastically bought $100 worth of items from each other's tables, and she even gifted me a shikishi board featuring Anon and Soyo together, which touched me deeply. How did I get so lucky to meet such a sweet creator? Her X account is tagged in the photo.

P7: Met Sensei 46 again, who gifted us two fans. I also took the opportunity to include the doujinshi and clear cards I snagged last time at Fanime—Sensei 46's art is truly godly, and I was thoroughly well-fed this time.

P8: The artwork by this creator was just breathtaking! After my passionate purchase, she even gave me some Haruhi stickers as freebies, and we followed each other on socials afterward—I was over the moon.

My takeaways from Running a booth this time: posters must be sorted and categorized beforehand instead of shoved in haphazardly; we can be more confident in forecasting popular IPs; and it's best to reserve a buffer for stock—selling out even the display sample feels rewarding, but leaving no archive copy for myself is a bit of a bummer. I met so many friends who support and love my work; as a doujin creator, this kind of offline interaction with fellow fans at an Anime convention is genuinely meaningful.