How do YOU find zines for your distro?

[Mab]

Hey everyone! Quick question...how do you discover zines you want to distro? Mad Hatter got a slow start this year, but now I'm working on getting it up and running before the New Year and I'm trying to find zines to distro. People are welcome to submit zines, but those have been few and far between. I think this will be less of a problem once the distro is more established, but for now I need to take a more active role in finding zines I want to carry. I think trading and purchasing more zines for myself to read might give me a good starting point. If I find a zine I really like, then I can contact the writer about buying some copies for the distro (I've changed it from a consignment distro to one that pays upfront...consignment was just way too confusing for me!).

 

But I was wondering if there were other ways you discover zines you want to carry in your distro...?

[Harley R. Pageot]

My arts collective just started a zine distro as an offshoot. I announced it on here and via our website but haven't had anyone submit anything yet.

At the same time I sent a couple batches of zines to different distros a few weeks ago hoping to increase my own circle of sales and haven't heard a thing back from any of them.

For now I'm just talking to my friends who make zines and telling them to give me some of theirs to sell and I'll give them money. If that doesn't work I don't know what will.

[Fluxxii]

Most of my current stock have been submissions to the site, but lately I've been keeping track of the mental health groups (I run a mental health distro) and contacting people whose zines I find interesting. I try not to do this too much as most people prefer wholesale but my budget for wholesale is extremely limited and the majority of my site runs on consignment. Hopefully soon I'll be able to buy more copies upfront!

[Satia Renee]

You might want to look at zine review sites and approach the individuals directly. It will take some time at first but most people who create zines know of one or two others who do the same and word-of-mouth can and will quickly spread.

[Erica S.]

What zines do you already enjoy? All of the titles I ran with originally were zines I had already read or seen excerpts of online, they weren't submitted to me. TBH, as a new distro it will be hard to convince many zinesters to do consignment, because of how often new distros disappear without a trace. But there's no rule that says you only have to carry what is submitted. I had around fifteen zines I knew I wanted to carry in my initial launch, and was able to carry around ten of them.

And how to find zines you like enough to carry? All the usual ways you find zines: buying/trading for them, orders from other distros, zine fests, libraries.... :)

[Mab]

I'm definitely trading lots of zines and I'm hoping to come home with a big stack of zines from Philly Zine Fest again this year! I think this will help a lot! Thanks for your input everyone.