Business notebook: Toy Bomb fills niche for comic book, fantasy fans

With wall-to-wall figurines, Matthew Rodden has constructed his own fans' fantasy in Downtown Cape Girardeau.

His new business, the Toy Bomb, offers a range of collectibles.

Rodden, a Texas native who settled in the Cape Girardeau area with his wife and children about four years ago, previously managed retail operations for several mall-type companies.

He said that helped him develop the retail acumen necessary to start his own business. His schedule taught him work ethic, he said, but he always harbored a more enjoyable aspiration.

"Just kind of got tired of the grind," he said.

A collection of comic books is on display inside The Toy Bomb on Wednesday at 521 Broadway in Cape Girardeau.Andrew J. Whitaker

The daily grind, he figured, would be much more bearable if he were tracking down choice collectibles. After all, that was something he said he was doing in his down time anyway.

So when the Hastings store in Cape Girardeau closed last year after the retail chain filed for bankruptcy, Rodden said the timing was right.

His passion for collectibles and memorabilia, he said, was enough for him to "put all the chips in and go for it."

He said he deals in an array of fandoms, from vintage to modern-day. He's stocked items from the big names such as Star Wars, Marvel Comics and his personal favorite, DC Comics.

He also offers items geared more toward local tastes, such as a "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" lunchbox or a life-sized Chucky doll.

"The horror crowd is huge here. I'm definitely surprised," he said, tapping the box of a roughly 2-foot-tall Freddy Krueger figurine from "Nightmare on Elm Street." "I had four of these. I sold three of them in the first two hours I had them."

And Pop! figurines. So many Pop! figurines.

"I sell Pops on the daily," he said. "The Pop! collecting community is ginormous."

And though he has a copy of the first issue of the "Swamp Thing" comic book and a copy of "Death of Superman" in the vault at the back of his shop -- which used to be a bank, he said -- his focus isn't on comic books. He doesn't want to step on the toes of the comic store up the street, Comix Strip.

"I'm not competing with them at all," he said. "He's got the books. I've got the toys."

He said he already has started building relationships in the collectible community, and his downtown location boosts foot traffic and curiosity.

"We've got a lot of repeat clientele so far," he said. "It's been a whole lot of fun."

Ross Furniture to expand

Ross Furniture plans to build a new expanded showroom that also will house Missouri Mattress.

"We need to expand just to display more product, make it easier to move around display stuff better. Mainly, our growth has skyrocketed," general manager Adam Ross said.

Ross said the construction will will take place in the coming months and will add 10,500 square feet, with about a third of that for Missouri Mattress.

"Our main showroom is staying; we're just going to be adding on to it in the next couple months," Ross said. "It's just our growth. We're actually too busy for the size of our store now."

tgraef@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3627