By now it’s old news that the marketing geniuses at 20th Century Fox reconfigured a handful of high-traffic 7-11 convienience stores into Kwik-E-Marts to promote the upcoming Simpsons Movie. That doesn’t make it any less of an accomplishment.

As you know, I’m pretty sensitive to how I’m marketed to, but I felt this effort was very genuine and in keeping with the tone of The Simpsons. Frankly, it’s a bit of a no-brainer. I wonder why someone didn’t think of it sooner. But, you know… they kind of have all their eggs in a basket with this movie. So if you’re going to call attention to it, better pull out all the stops.

The fact of the matter is that Fox is keeping such a tight lid over The Simpsons Movie, there wouldn’t be anything else to talk about if we weren’t talking about their marketing efforts. No one knows for sure what it’s about and any potential spoilers are being kept under wraps.

Things have gotten to the point where fans are making THEIR OWN MERCHANDISE based only on what’s hinted at in the trailers. Spider-Pig, anyone? Now you can buy a t-shirt inspired by it!

Speaking of t-shirts, I thought you guys might get a kick out of this picture:

I’m getting ready for Wizard World Chicago August 9 – 12 and trying to take care as much as I can as early as I can so I’m not rushing out of the house having forgotten anything. I started folding up all of my shirts so they would take up less space in my Tupperwares and I thought this little layout was kind of interesting. (You can see the Spoiler I shirts stuffed into a Tupperware in the background)

I guess I never really mentioned that the Movie Law #948 shirts had been delivered to me. Everyone that pre-ordered one should have theirs in-hand by now. If you want to order one for yourself (or any other design, for that matter) feel free. I don’t know how much stock I’ll have left after Chicago. Hopefully none. So it would be a good idea to pick a shirt up now before they’re gone.

I’m really interested in burning off the inventory of shirts that I have. As you can see from the picture, they take up a lot of space. What I’ve captured there isn’t even all of my inventory. I still have a bunch of baby-doll t-shirts left over from back in the day that haven’t sold. There aren’t links for them on the site right now. I’m thinking of giving them away as freebies for people who buy maybe $25 or more. Most of the people who buy my stuff are guys, so I don’t know if that will be an incentive or not. But maybe they can pick up a weird shirt for their little sister or girlfriend or something.

I’m also going to have a stack of DVDs that I’m giving away to people who buy more than $75 worth of stuff – which is a tall order. But I have a few movies that have been given to me by promotion houses that I’m ready to unload and I figured Wizard World Chicago would be the place to do it.

What I’m really hoping for is to whittle down my inventory on the two books. I debuted Theater Hopper: Year One at Wizard World Chicago last summer and it sold really well. Well enough that it prompted me to fast-track Theater Hopper: Year Two for Wizard World Texas a few months later. What I want to have happen is to sell enough books that I can start production on Theater Hopper: Year Three and have it ready by Christmas. Having Henry kind of put the breaks on the whole book thing for a while. So if I can self-finance with the sales of the books I have, that’s really going to go a long way toward helping me with my goal.

In addition to all of this, I’ll be giving away buttons and sampler booklets that include the most popular strips based on YOUR votes from the Top 50 Comics page. So if you haven’t voted on your favorite strip, use the search function in the archive and let me know what you think is my best work! I appreciate the feedback!

So if you’re in the Chicago area around August 9 to 12, look me up. I’ll be on Artist’s Alley with my good friends Joe Dunn and Zach Miller. I look forward to this event all year. It’s going to be a lot of fun.