ADV Survives Hurricane Ike

By Kai-Ming Cha -- Publishers Weekly, 9/24/2008 7:57:00 AM

Overshadowed by the financial crisis on Wall Street, Hurricane Ike's touchdown in Texas has had a tremendous effect on companies like the Houston anime and manga producer ADV Films. The company, which translates, produces and distributes Japanese anime and manga titles for the U.S. market, was without power last week and largely cutoff from the rest of the country.

"We're following the news of Lehman Bros. and the rest with a strange detachment,” said ADV’s Chriss Oarr. “Our immediate concerns are functional and practical. Ike has really overwhelmed all else." We just got our servers back up Sunday,” Oarr said. "Houston is a sprawling city and this section of town only just came back to life. Not all the traffic lights work." While none of ADV's employees were hurt in the storm, Oarr said that in light of a week of "forced vacation," ADV employees have lots of catching up to do.

“The sales cycle for anime DVDs is very different from books—it’s very fast and loose,” Oarr said. "We're behind getting some titles out there and we have some new titles to add to our schedule. The timing couldn't be worse. On promotion, we have a lot of work ahead of us." Nevertheless, Oarr is quick to add that "we're going to make it through. Everybody's been very understanding and that's really nice."

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