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Written by Erin Jameson Monday, 16 January 2012 20:10

A pair of less than stellar shopping trips in Omaha have our Lovefool pining for the warm embrace of St. Louis' finest comic shops.

[Editor's Note: The opinions expressed here are strictly those of Lovefool and do not reflect those of PLAYBACK:stl, because around these parts, we love all of our local comic book specialty stores equally. -- Jason Green, Fearless Editor]

Ugh. Today, I went out and about with the specific and totally noble purpose of finding something interesting to write about and had an outright terrible experience at one comic book store that left me furious and empty-handed and a better experience at another store that still left me empty-handed. It was, to say the least, a bit of a reminder that we're not in the STL anymore because the comic shops I frequented in St. Louis were excellent. And why was that? I've been thinking about it (seething over it) all day and I have to wonder—was it because Star Clipper kept everyone in line? I, to be fair, didn't last terribly long after their transition to the Loop, but I had also moved to out of town and then to Belleville and didn't make it into the neighborhood often enough to justify keeping my pulls there. Did Star Clipper just set such a great standard for customer service that every shop in the area had to be awesome to keep up? Even Fantasy Books, the smaller store I started going to in Belleville, had amazing customer service, a decent selection on hand, a great ordering system and, sometimes, cookies. Was it the presence of a retail legend in the 'hood that made everyone in St. Louis give us a better shopping experience?

Because, nerdlings, Omaha doesn't have a Fantasy Books, let alone something like Star Clipper. Not even close. Oh, there's a store that fancies itself in that league but doesn't have the selection or staff or...well, any of the things that boost Star Clipper into that stratospheric level of shopping experience. It doesn't have an Eisner, it doesn't have rows and rows of gleaming, well-sorted trade paperbacks and it certainly doesn't have A.J. Trujillo, who I've always sworn is Star Clipper's secret weapon, in the office. Sure, A.J. has to be a nerd to do what she does but she's also a woman and, therefore, probably understands what makes for a good comics experience for her fellow ladies and I've always wondered if that's why Star Clipper was such a good environment.