NORTHAMPTON — For more than 15 years, Modern Myths Comic Books and Games has been a cultural fixture in the Pioneer Valley. At the same time, the company’s inclusive and professional guidelines have also become a model for other comic book and game stores around the country.
“Within the industry Jim is known as an innovator and the minimum standard creator,” said Melissa Lewis-Gentry, Modern Myths’ business manager and store manager at the Northampton location, speaking of Modern Myths’ founder, Jim Crocker.
Yet, the very model that has led to the store’s fame and success no longer looks to have a viable future, both Crocker and Lewis-Gentry say. So the decision was made this year to shutter both the Northampton store — on Bridge Street in the same shopping complex as Talbots — and its sister location in Mamaroneck, New York.
“I wanna be in a situation where people are upset that we are closing,” Crocker said. “Before we get to the point where they’re relieved that we’re closing.”
The store’s official last day is May 30. However, its big send-off will occur Saturday, on Free Comic Book Day, when the store will hold an informal retirement day party.
“I am going to miss this place terribly,” Lewis-Gentry said.
Leading up to Saturday, prices have been 20 percent off on all items in the store, and they will be 25 percent at the party. Post-party, however, the store will entertain offers on everything in Modern Myths, until all of its inventory and products have been liquidated.
The decision to close the store was not made lightly. Indeed, comics and games have been vital parts of both the lives of Crocker and Lewis-Gentry.
“It’s a hard choice,” Lewis-Gentry said. “It’s not one that was sudden.”
Crocker grew up in East Granby, Connecticut, which he described as being quintessentially suburban. He recalled bicycling around to different stores to pick up comics and Dungeons and Dragons modules as a youngster, as there wasn’t a single specialized location selling them.
One of these shops was called The Book Exchange, which sold everything from wood stoves to used books, head shop products, and porn, in addition to comics and role-playing games.
When he was in college for theater, Crocker met the daughter of the owners of The Book Exchange. Knowing that he used to be a regular customer, she told him that her dad would let her quit her job at his store if she could find a replacement. Crocker said yes, and then spent the next few years working at a branch of The Book Exchange as he pursued a theater career.
The work made Crocker realize that he liked running a store that sold comics and games more than theater.
“It was the thing I did to put myself through college that ended up being my career,” Crocker said.
Crocker would go on to work for Borders Books in Farmington, Connecticut, where he met his future wife. When she went to graduate school at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Crocker followed and took a job in Borders’ corporate office.
While there, he began frequenting a dedicated comics and games shop and, much like it had been with The Book Exchange, he was offered a job when the manager wanted to go to grad school, but needed someone to replace him.
As manager, Crocker applied the same methodology he’d learned at Borders, aggressively computerizing the shop’s inventory. He also heavily invested in graphic novels, just as that format began to boom.
“I looked like a genius because we were super lucky on the timing,” he said.
Once his wife completed her graduate program she and Crocker returned to the Northeast. Northampton was a place both of them had enjoyed visiting together when they were in New England.
“This is the closest actually interesting place to where I grew up,” he said.
Crocker recalls being inspired to open a comic book and game store in Paradise City after the closing of the Words & Pictures Museum.
Crocker noted the sweat equity he put into the business, detailing how he and his dad built Modern Myths’ wooden comic book racks and bookshelves in his father’s boat building workshop.
“I did a lot of staining,” said Crocker.
Modern Myths opened its doors in July of 2002. Among its customers that year was Lewis-Gentry who, although she had grown up reading comics, had never been to a comic shop before her sister took her to Modern Myths.
Lewis-Gentry moved to the Valley in 2006, and became a regular customer at Modern Myths. “I was a customer pretty much every week here,” she said.
Lewis-Gentry said one of the reasons she loves Modern Myths is its commitment to being an inclusive space for women, queer people and others who might not have felt comfortable in traditional “nerd spaces.”
“It’s been our mission to make everyone who walks through the door feel welcome,” Lewis-Gentry said.
Before becoming Modern Myths’ business manager, Lewis-Gentry worked in banking, leaving a job at UMassFive College Federal Credit Union.
“There has not been a moment that I’ve regretted it,” Lewis-Gentry said.
When she heard about the opening in 2014, she was also in year two of her 10-year plan to open her own game store, and she recalled thinking that going to work for Modern Myths would be a shortcut toward this goal.
Crocker said that what impressed him about Lewis-Gentry in her second interview for the job was the fleshed-out business plan she came to it with, complete with numbers.
“I’m a numbers girl,” said Lewis-Gentry.
Crocker said that when he set up Modern Myths, his goal was for it to meet the same standards as any other upscale specialty bookshop, only this shop would happen to sell comics and games. He said that for a long time, these standards made Modern Myths stand out, noting the praise it has received for brightness and cleanliness.
“Fifteen years ago it was a revelation,” said Crocker. “Now … it’s the standard.”
In 2011 Crocker and his wife relocated to New York. While he’d considered walking away from the game store business, he subsequently decided to open up the other Modern Myths location in Mamaroneck in 2012, which is set to close at the end of next month.
Modern Myths’ influence has also been felt by its presence at conventions, which have also served to bolster the company’s revenue.
The Northampton Modern Myths location is running in the black, while the Mamaroneck location is breaking even. However, both Lewis-Gentry and Crocker said the future doesn’t look good.
“We’re fighting a long-term battle against entropy here,” said Crocker.
A major factor affecting the store is Amazon, and people buying more items online. Another factor is the way comics are being purchased.
Lewis-Gentry said that while comics, which make up about 70 percent of Modern Myths’ business in Northampton, are more popular than they have ever been, less and less people, particularly young people, are buying single issues of comics.
“If we could be just a game store we could probably make a much better go of it,” said Crocker.
The state’s likely increasing of the minimum wage to $15 an hour over the next few years will also affect the store, though Lewis-Gentry and Crocker said that they support the increase. Indeed, Lewis-Gentry presented the issue as a math problem.
“We don’t have enough people in the Valley to support reasonable wages, ethical wages, and a work-ethic that’s reasonable,” she said. “We can do it now, but we know we won’t be able to do it in the future.”
In order to continue on, Lewis-Gentry said that the store would need to invest around $100,000 to change its business model and find a new space, possibly buying a building. This isn’t viable because Crocker is looking to retire and Lewis-Gentry doesn’t want to oversee such a transition alone.
“It’s been a really hard choice,” said Lewis-Gentry.
Crocker said that as a mid-sized shop, Modern Myths occupies an unenviable middle ground. He said that there was space for people owning small shops in low rent areas working 60 to 70 hours a week with part-time help. At the same time, large shops with multiple locations and a strong online presence are able to better adapt to industry changes.
By 2025, Crocker predicts local comic book shops will be extinct. Lewis-Gentry, meanwhile, said that she sees stores needing to move more toward putting on events to get people through the door.
“People who are millennials and younger are consumers of experiences,” said Lewis-Gentry.
She said that places with enough space to do events with 50 or more people will be successful going forward.
“You need a critical mass of people at an event,” she said.
Modern Myths is directing its local comics customers to Comics N’ More in Easthampton, another locally-owned comic book shop.
Crocker, who turns 50 this year, said he is not sure what he will do next, but it won’t involve operating a comics and game store.
“I’ve gotten it out of my system,” said Crocker.
As for Lewis-Gentry, she may or may not open up her own game store in the future. However, she said that if she were to open a space, it would be one where moms could take their children and that hipsters would find cool.
“The time for dingy basements where people feel uncomfortable I think is done,” she said. “As a culture, nerddome doesn’t need to hide. And we can be on display.”
Bera Dunau can be reached at bdunau@gazettenet.com.