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Emerald City Comic Con (ECCC), which kicks off Thursday, March 6 in Seattle, traditionally marks the beginning of the big comic convention season, which runs through October. There are plenty of shows outside that window, but ECCC, with ticket sales expected to hit 90,000 this year, is the first of the big ones, running for four days and featuring top nerdlebrities from Star Trek, Star Wars, Buffy and other franchises on the marquee.

ECCC is a bellwether in the world of geek culture events. It began in the early 2000s as an independent, heavily comics-oriented show in the days before fan cons exploded as a live event category and developed organically into one of North America’s biggest conventions before being acquired by fan-con giant ReedPOP in 2015. It serves a vibrant region known for its tech, music and cultural scenes, and has always embraced its local roots. As such, it has walked the line between a traditional comic convention, centered primarily on the medium of comics and its various offshoots, and the massive media spectacles that aspire to the agenda-setting prominence and record-setting crowds of San Diego Comic-Con.

This year organizers are acknowledging openly what’s been obvious for a while. Geek culture alone, never mind humble comic books and their community of fans, isn’t enough to power these massive commercial extravaganzas and bring in the kind of crowds that fill both of Seattle’s convention centers for a four-day bash. And with the traditional pillars of the geek culture economy – comics publishing, videogames, streaming, and superhero movie franchises – all facing headwinds, diversification helps on the business side as well, by broadening the pool of potential partners and exhibitors.

“We’re competing with Coachella, we’re competing with spring break and with all kinds of other big events,” says Kristina Rogers, VP, ReedPOP comics portfolio in an interview in the trade publication ICv2 earlier this week. “For us, that means expanding what pop culture means – everything from Renaissance Faires to comedy to music. Our idea is to take every cool festival you’ve gone to and bring it indoors. It’s a bit more of a ‘World’s Fair’ approach.”

Rogers says ReedPOP’s strategy is to lean in to areas and activities that have proven popular with fans and let that drive the shape of the events. “Every year we cut 15% of what’s not working to make room for new kinds of programs,” she says. This year’s ECCC program leans heavily on workshops and participative events, including an expansion of space for gaming, crafting, tattoos and fan meetups.

That inevitably leads to programs with more niche appeal falling under the axe, leading exhibitors who cater to those more specialized fandoms realizing that this kind of show is no longer the best place to sell, given the high costs of setup and labor. Eventually the “comic con” (that’s what the CC stands for) becomes an “everything con,” with something for fans of all aspects of pop culture, plus the added bonus of celebrity photo ops, a slightly nerdy vibe, and lots of glorious costumes.

That doesn’t mean comics and the traditional accoutrements of a comic convention are completely absent. ECCC features one of the largest Artist Alleys of any show in North America, with hundreds of illustrators selling original artwork, prints and commissioned pieces. Vintage comic dealers and some independent publishers like Mad Cave Studios and Bad Idea will be in the massive exhibit hall, alongside purveyors of all kinds of crafts, apparel and collectibles. Notable comic creators like James Tynion IV, Amy Chu, David Walker, Darick Robinson and others are featured guests and will be appearing on panels and programs during the weekend.

However, the focus of the con is noticeably widening. Rogers says local rock radio station 107.7 The End is a featured partner, coordinating musical acts appearing at the show and ReedPOP-sponsored parties. Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP) is opening a new exhibit on Japanese comic art with ECCC weekend, and lots of local Seattle and northwest businesses are part of the festivities.

“It’s really all about the local partners,” says Rogers, herself a former Seattleite who helped run ECCC in its independent days. “Our LGBTQ group, our cosplay team that comes in to help repair costumes, a lot of the people providing the content, it’s all local. The only thing we bring from out of town are the guests.”

Whatever Emerald City is getting from the local community, it also appears to be giving back. This year’s show is projected to generate $24.6 million in economic impact for the city, according to tourism advocacy group Visit Seattle. ECCC also creates a showcase for Seattle’s new convention center which opened in 2023 (that year’s ECCC was one of the first big events held there), filling all six floors of the block-long structure and holding additional programming, main stage and autograph events at the old convention center a block away.

For Rogers and the team at ReedPOP, an arm of the global media and analytics conglomerate RELX (formerly Reed Elsevier), maintaining that level of scale is the key to keeping fan events viable. After a period of expansion in the 2010s that saw ReedPOP acquiring and running nearly two dozen shows around the world, the pandemic slammed on the breaks, leading to downsizing and divestiture.

“We’re definitely back in growth mode,” says Rogers, who notes the company’s portfolio currently includes New York Comic-Con, C2E2 in Chicago, Supercon in Florida, Star Wars Celebration (this year in Tokyo), the PAX East and PAX West videogame shows, several conventions in the UK, and other specialty events aimed at geek culture generally. “I think the big question for every organizer is figuring out what fan cons are going to become. If you do the same show every year, if you don’t expand what you’re doing, it’s going to become boring, and fans don’t want that. Our team doesn’t want that.”

A quick rundown of the guest list and program schedule at this year’s ECCC suggests there will be plenty to do and lots of opportunities for the kind of crosspollination of fan subcultures that Rogers envisions. It is also a test of how much you can dilute the vibrant essence of fandom so that, like a watercolor wash, there is enough to cover the subject while still having a bit of color.