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Cartoonist Rick London: Marketing Wiz Kid Grown Up

The way that Rick London crafted and organized Londons Times Cartoons and it's peripheral shops was a brilliant move in my mind, as a marketing major. Though Rick was not formally educated at the time of launching the venture, he had an instinctive sixth sense of knowing what was missing in the cartoon world.

Rather than simply create a lot of cartoons, on any topic that came to mind, as so many cartoonists do, he wrote down a number of professions, societal issues, and current events and put them all into categories. He then researched the Internet to find trade journals, websites, and such that in which the publishers might have an interest in adding humor to their publications, websites or both and pitched them.

Rick knew it would be no bed of roses. He prepared himself for a hard time and a hard time it was. For awhile he was virtually homeless working out of an abandoned warehouse where he had a phone line, and cold running water out of a sink in which to bathe. He did not let these invconveiences stop him. He was like a tank. He made calls to publishers and sold cartoons. If the publisher had no budget, Rick would create a win-win barter. He traded cartoons for everything from clothing to nutrition. I've never seen such survivor instinct.

Rick had not fished in years though he always loved fishing. His maternal grandfather Marcus London taught him to fish when he was four. He had stopped as an adult, but when he learned he could barter his fishing-related cartoons for tackle, he was at it again. He has a great many cartoons that are related to fishing. They appear on websites and in fishing journals worldwide. He had started this project in the late 1990's. He was then a "nobody" as he liked to say. The fishing tackle he bartered for, this time, was not for fun, but to eat. He would dig for worms and catch grasshoppers and go to a nearby pond or river and not return home until he had enough for a meal. He reminded me of Henry David Thoreau.

Though he still enjoys the negotiation process of bartering, he does so less than when he started. He started out of need. Now he is the one solicited by publishers and authors who need his work. He had vision when he created his cartoons into categories that would fit into trade journals and business websites. He knew what he was doing when others thought he was a little "mad".

Rick started his cartoon in the days before Google, social networking, blogging, ppc, and all the other goodies that make it much easier to get one's project known. When those entities hit the Internet, he was right up there with the big-dogs learning and absorbing all that he could.

I sometimes feel like if I look up "commitment"in Webster's, Rick's pic will be there. He wakes up and he is drinking coffee and working. It is habit. He does not drive to an office. He does it all in his living room, yet every move he makes creates jobs for people all over the world from manufacturers to artists to affiliate marketers to publishers. He has a mind that is very creative and unique. I have learned a great deal from him.

Rick London was born and raised in south Ms, not the delta, which is the northern area of Mississippi that brought us such talent as the delta which brought us William Faulkner, Elvis, Grisham, Eudora Welty, Willie Morris, Morgan Freeman, B.B. King, and others. Rick is an enigma from that part of the state. He has invented and reinvented himself a number of times until he says "I finally got it right, I think". I'll never forget working with Rick. He is one special soul.

I am only in touch with him these days by email. We have both moved to separate states. But I still know him as that "grown up wiz kid" who showed me the ropes. I visit his main cartoon website and numerous webstores and think back to the time when it was just a gleam in his eye. Nobody in his hometown knew he had it in him. I don't know why I did, it was just a feeling. I admit, that though I did, I had no idea he would make it this big. I continue to buy items from his many web stores which are fanastic and contain his cartoons; from mousepads to hoodies. I even buy regular casual wear from him. His products are fantastic. I really miss that man and hope to see him again on one day.

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