[Photos courtesy of Greg Means/Tugboat Press]

A couple hours into the first day of the San Francisco Zine Fest and The Natural World cartoonist and recent Ignatz nominee Damien Jay realized, without much fanfare, “Well, I’ve already beat my MoCCA sales.”

It’s not that it’s all about those sales, especially when a full table costs $90 for the weekend, but the near-universal lucrative scene at the ‘fest, that easy spending even in slim times, speaks to the success of a show that meshes so well with its host city. It’s really no surprise it’s blowing the fuck up.

Ambitious and passionate organizers have taken a show with 600 attendees just three years ago and attracted hefty press from Boing Boing and The San Francisco Chronicle. This year’s SF Zine Fest boasted about 100 exhibitors, just shy of selling out the space, and upwards of 2,500 visitors through the door.

Nearly everyone I spoke to claimed without any prodding that the Zine Fest was one of if not their favorite show of the year, and that sales matched or exceeded APE. And as more individual creators are priced out of big small-press shows, the SFZF set-up, with its vastly lower overhead and similar profits, is certainly more attractive. Not to mention the prospect of sitting in one place for eight hours. (Something cartoonists are used to, sure, but usually with pants-optional luxury.)

“The County Fair BLDG, its just far more open, airy, and well lit then most venues for shows like the Zine Fest,” says organizer François Vigneault. “At the BLDG, you’re surrounded by a beautiful park, there’s sky lights and big windows…” The space also speaks to the fest’s future goals, and its exponential growth. Says Vigneault, “It’s also nice that we have lots of space to grow into, there is a whole separate space where we could have more vendors, if the need arose, and more rooms for workshops and panels, too.”

Perhaps the core of the fest’s success is that it aims to include rather than exclude. “I would like to bring all sorts of disparate groups together,” says Vigneault. Mixing comics, zines, crafters and fine artists, the SFZF broadens its scope where other shows often narrow it, drawing new interested parties in to discover something else they might like. School librarians, ’60s underground comix enthusiasts and families with strollers were well-represented alongside the stock skinny jeans and All-Stars. Entrance is free, greasing the wheels with a few extra bucks of spending cash in everyone’s wallet, while strategic events at the Cartoon Art Museum and a Saturday after-party and a $1 raffle with donated prizes from nearly a dozen sponsors help round-out the fundraising.

In a cash-strapped year when table prices at every convention went up by hefty chunks, the SF Zine Fest stands out as an exceptional bang for an exhibitor’s buck, and a seamless integration into the community, aimed at encouraging walk-by traffic and newcomers to small press. It’s still only a small regional show, but it’s one handled with competence, grace and respect for its exhibitors–all of which have come to seem like convention luxuries.

–Susie Cagle