Wasted Ink helped popularize zines in metro Phoenix. What it means to the founder after 10 years

About 10 years ago, there weren’t too many people around town making zines. The little, self-published booklets have a long history. But, in the last decade here in the Valley, they’ve started popping up all over the place — from zine fests to zine libraries and print shops.

There’s a whole network of resources for creatives who want to publish a zine. And a lot of that has to do with our next guest. Charissa Lucille founded Wasted Ink Zine Distro in 2015, not too long after they made their own first zine. Now, they’re celebrating its 10th birthday.

The Show spoke with them more about it.

Full conversation

CHARISSA LUCILLE: So I first started making zines in my last semester of journalism college. It was 2014, and I felt like I needed another place to put all my writing that didn't really have a home. I wanted to be my own editor. I wanted to be my own magazine layout and designer and I used all the things that I was learning in journalism college to kind of funnel into making my own zine.

So, the first one came out in 2014 and kind of had photography, writing, poetry about you know, different feminist ideas and at that time, it felt very revolutionary for me.

LAUREN GILGER: OK. So that was the first zine you ever made. You hid it all over town, is that right?

LUCILLE: That's correct. Yeah. So initially, I looked into places where I could stock it on the shelf and, and you know, set up a business arrangement, but I was still so new into the business world and the creative world that I just didn't have any of that set up.

So I felt like, OK, well, you know, even if someone finds this, zine hidden between two books or on the bulletin board and throws it away, they still have to look at it. They have to look at it. One of my most proud moments was when someone came to me and said, "hey, I picked up this feminist propaganda for you and then handed me my own zine."

GILGER: Does that kind of, I mean, like, does that kind of hearken back to the history of zines as well? Like, that's kind of how they were distributed originally, too.

LUCILLE: Yeah, I think so. I think zines have always been hidden in backs of stores or in coffee shops. You can find them taped to signs. And it's almost like an Easter egg hunt a lot of times.

And wherever I go, I'm looking for zines. and kind of trying to find where they're hidden in a city, maybe blatantly hidden or just stocked on a shelf, you know, in a comic shop or a bookstore.

GILGER: Where is the kind of oddest place you've ever found a zine?

LUCILLE: I think I got lucky on a bus one time and sometimes I find them taped to street signs and things like that, which is just like, that's like very — guerilla distribution.

GILGER: Yeah, that's right. That's right. But you started a less guerilla distribution source for zines, right? Tell us about starting Wasted Ink and and why.

LUCILLE: Well, after distributing my zines all over the city for about a year and and kind of popping up a little folding table at any event that would have me, from roller derby to little book fairs, art shows anywhere that I could have a table I set up when sold my zines.

After doing that for a while, I said, well, why can't we have a place to all get together and have the zines on shelves and have a little creative corner where people can make them? Like, you know, it doesn't seem that outrageous of an idea.

GILGER: Was it hard to get it going, though?

LUCILLE: You know, to get it going felt a lot easier than maintaining. But you know, we had a little tiny room. We took over a lease for a room that was maybe 100 square feet in a strip mall in Tempe. And you know, the shelves were full of zines quite quickly, and we were representing about 30 makers. And that felt like a lot. That felt like an accomplishment back then.

And it was just a big idea. I don't have a business degree. We didn't take out business loans or anything like that. But it was just an idea. It was like, OK, let's start something different. Let's just try it. Yeah. And here we are 10 years later.

GILGER: 10 years later, right. I mean, so tell us about that. Like, why do you think it's lasted this long? Why do you think you've stuck with it this long?

LUCILLE: Oh, I mean, I'm quite stubborn and I want, I want things to last in Phoenix. So many wonderful things will pop up and run into more natural roadblocks and and and close and and fade out. And I really want wonderful things to last in Phoenix.

And I think one of the benefits of this smaller business is that, you know, it never had to pay anyone's salaries, including mine, and was more of a passion project. So it didn't need to grow monetarily, you know, exponentially. It didn't need to be this huge money making force. So it's always kind of been tucked in little bedroom-size storefronts throughout Phoenix. It's had to be very flexible.

There are periods of time where it had to be closed up and in boxes, especially in more challenging years, like 2020. But overall, I think being flexible, keeping it kind of smaller as it's grown has been helpful in longevity.

GILGER: So, I mean, how would you define a zine for someone who's never heard of this or doesn't really know this world? Like, would you call these art, journalism, literature, something in between?

LUCILLE: I might call them all of those. You know, a zine is, it's a self-published, self-produced, little booklet thingy. And it can contain any type of content, whether it's photography, poetry, journalism, articles, recipes, comics, art, prose; it can be anything under the sun, and also a mashup of all types of different mediums. It can be by one person or a collective of people that have decided to publish together. Some of them are black and white, some are in color. They come in different sizes. There's really a huge variety under the zine umbrella, which is very exciting.

And also, I just want to read all of them, and that's just impossible.

GILGER: Yeah, I bet, I bet. So, I mean, you mentioned how kind of brand new the zine scene, I guess, for lack of a better phrase, was in Phoenix when you started this, like just kind of figuring out how to do it on your own and hiding them places.

It's 10 years in. I mean, it sounds like this has become quite a big world in the Valley.

LUCILLE: I think so. And you know, that's not to say there wasn't anything zine-related in Phoenix early on, but I had a real hard time finding it. And I didn't really have anyone who took me under their wing and said, this is how you do your layout, this is who you should print with, this is how you assemble them, this is how you distribute them, this is how you price them. I didn't really have that.

And so our main goal with Wasted Ink and the Phoenix Zine Fest and Paper Jam is to really break down the barriers that people experience when it comes to making a zine so that they can more quickly create and distribute and be a part of a larger community.

GILGER: Yeah. All right. Well, congratulations on 10 years. That is Charissa Lucille, owner of Wasted Ink Zine Distro joining us. Charissa, thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it.

LUCILLE: Thank you. I appreciate it, too.