The good, the bad and the dedicated: Comic Con’s impact on local businesses

Two businessmen in the Gaslamp District said they are economically impacted by Comic-Con — which begins Thursday and is sold out — but in very different ways.

Before last year’s Comic-Con, the city of San Diego estimated that around 135,000 attendees would spend $96.5 million over the weekend — with a broader economic impact of $160 million across the San Diego region.

Here’s how a couple of local businesses experience the Con – and how a native tries to help by introducing Comic-Con fans to more than just downtown.

The good

Oscar Chou manages his family’s restaurant two blocks from the San Diego Convention Center, Shisan Fan, which serves sushi and Chinese food.

Chou said Shisan Fan opened a month before Comic-Con last year, and that during the convention they saw an uptick in customers.

During the event, the restaurant was full all day, with some patrons wearing costumes.

“Every time someone walks by or comes in and dines in and is wearing a comic favorite, like Superman or the Joker — with makeup and all — it’s so, so cool,” Chou said.

According to Chou, his family worked extra long hours that week, and bought more fish for sushi than usual.

The bad

Omar Farah, who owns two novelty stores in the Gaslamp District and another in Seaport Village, said he receives steady business from tourists throughout the summer — except for Comic-Con and the two weeks beforehand, when he said fewer tourists are in town.

“We don’t benefit at all out of it,” Farah said.

Farah said that he sees sales slow before and during Comic-Con because his visitors tend not to be tourists. And Comic-Con patrons don’t, in his experience, spend their money at local shops.

“They purchase stuff inside the convention center — it’s not good for the retailers outside [in] San Diego,” Farah said. “The only people making money are hotels, restaurants and Uber, Lyft and cab drivers.”

Farah said he wishes that Comic-Con was scheduled in late fall or winter — as a 2021 special edition was during the COVID-19 pandemic. It took place in November.

According to Farah, there would be fewer local sightseers being replaced by convention attendees if Comic-Con was held during the off-season for tourism.

“Keep the summer for the tourists,” Farah said.

The dedicated

Alonso Nuñez, the executive director of Little Fish Comic Book Studio — which hosts comic book classes, camps and events at public libraries — is one of the judges of this year’s Comic Con Hall of Fame class. He said he has attended Comic-Con for more than 30 years.

He thinks that everyone needs to step away from the convention center during the event, which lasts four-and-a-half days.

“In my days as a young nerd, I was just in the convention center, on the floor of the exhibit hall all day, digging through quarter bins for cheap comics and maybe going to some panels with artists or writers that I knew,” Nunez said, adding that he now takes breaks when he’s not hosting events or participating in panels.

Nuñez said that he likes taking friends in town for Comic-Con to eat in nearby neighborhoods like Little Italy and Barrio Logan. He takes it as a challenge.

“A lot of people come into town for San Diego Comic-Con — that I know at least — and think San Diego is just the airport, San Diego Comic-Con and then some un-walkable areas around the city. And I feel like it’s my duty as someone born and raised [in San Diego] to disprove them of that.”