A couple weeks ago I attended Chupacabra Con 2026 in San Marcos, Texas. And not only attend, but I vended there! "Wait!" you exclaim, “Aren’t you famously a Milwaukee based ttrpg creator?! Texas is so far away from Wisconsin!” And you are right. I had the bright idea last year to sign up for Chupacabracon. At the time I made the decision I knew the con was pretty small and I was almost assured to lose a lot of cash in the process based on hotel and gas prices. And guess what? Gas prices got tremendously worse that I had anticipated!
But I went based on a few reasons:
1. Chupacabracon is a pretty big con for Savage Worlds and since I have a Savage Worlds setting/product line it seemed like a pretty good place to try to drum up some more interest.
2. My friend Mike Todd lives in Austin, which is way closer to San Marcos than Milwaukee is. Even though I had never officially met Mike in person we’ve gotten along really well online for a long time now. I basically bullied Mike into doing art for Street Wolves and the cover of Monster Truckers, so not only would we be able to hang out, but it was an extremely rare opportunity for anyone who digs my games to meet up with more than one person who has worked on the books.
3. I knew some creators would be going there that I know online and while I didn't expect that we'd hang out or anything, I wanted to meet them at least once.
4. My con schedule for 2026 is fairly light. I didn't get into a couple that I keep trying to get into, so why not try Chupacabracon?
Booth Adventures
After a grueling two day drive (about ten hours per day) I met up with Mike and we set up the booth. It was fairly slow on Friday though we did talk to a number of nice people. A funny thing that happened on Friday was when Kenneth Hite, writer on many great TTRPGS including Fall of Delta Green, stopped by my booth. He mentioned that we were on a panel together. That was the first time I learned that! I was happy to meet him in person and get the heads up on the panel. Thankfully I hadn’t missed it, it was set for the next day so I had plenty of time to mentally prepare.
Things picked up on Saturday and Sunday had a surprising amount of foot traffic and sales. There were folks I met in the industry and I was happy to see some folks that I've met before. There were a lot of good conversations with con goers too. I really like when someone is enthusiastic and engages me in conversation, it doesn’t even have to be about my games.
The Panel
The panel was pretty loose and my only real complaint is that it was only an hour. The topic was “making games” and that topic is so complex, you could easily segment it into several different panels. As mentioned before Kenneth Hite was on the panel and that was very cool for me as a Delta Green fan. Mark Carroll was also on the panel and I’ve enjoyed Mark’s work too, but I was more familiar with Hite's CoC and Delta Green stuff.
As a relative nobody in the world of TTRPGs it was a little intimidating, but fun. I got to add a few things in and I was concise. I had done a panel before, but this one had more people in attendance and had industry folks on it.
A Short Anti AI Rant
I’ll keep this one short. There weren’t a whole lot of vendors at the con, so it was pretty disappointing that a bunch of them were using LLM generated logos, cover art, and banners. Those of us who don’t use AI are going to have to push that we don't use that stuff more and more, to rise above the slop.
In the post con vendor survey I voiced my displeasure with there being vendors that use AI and suggested they either outright ban it or find some way to reward vendors who do not use it. Hopefully they'll consider doing something.
Sales
Sales were pretty dang good and the con would have been GREAT had it taken place in Wisconsin or even a neighboring state! For the attendance and the amount of vendors I did really well. There were a few factors that I think lead to this:
Savage Worlds fans: The fact that there are a lot of Savage Worlds fans really helped me at Chupacabracon.
Mike: I'm going to give Mike some credit. Not only did he do a few sketches that raised our sales numbers, but I feel like having someone do something creative like that at the booth helps catch the eye of a passerby. The other aspect of this is he helped create a more fun and loose environment. Sure, there were sales pitches, but the fact that me and him were just chilling and casually talking to anyone that stopped by created a nice and loose atmosphere that is different than just me at the booth.
Top Sales
I like to note my top selling items at each con. It's good for me to keep these notes and maybe it'll lead to some interesting insights.
Street Wolves: I'm lumping the Street Wolves core book and the adventures together into this one. This is one of the first times Street Wolves has performed so well at a convention, primarily due to those Savage Worlds fans that go to Chupacabracon.
Dice: Good ole dice. I had them on a side table and they helped carry me through the convention. I think the only time I won't carry dice is when I can't per con rules, like if I can only show stuff that I make.
Monster Truckers: I got a few more copies of Monster Truckers out there, which makes me happy.
Marketing
I tried a new thing at the con where I gave out a free sticker if a person signed up for the email list. I would have them scan a QR code that went to the email collection form on this website. Aside from a couple technical glitches I noticed a fairly big problem: I didn't ACTUALLY get the amount of email sign ups I should have gotten.
I believe this is due to the double opt in. Someone could "sign up" but then not elect to opt into the email and they've already gotten their sticker. I don't think this was malicious or anything, I should have emphasized the process a bit more. I think in the future I'll have to collect email addresses and input them myself, so they actually go into the system.
One other thing I'll note is there were a number of people who had stopped by the booth that mentioned that they thought they had heard of Monster Truckers or Street Wolves before. Something is working!
Would I do it again?
Well… probably not. Despite making a decent amount in sales, the cost of getting there and back (both monetarily and physically) makes Chupacabracon non profitable and too exhausting.
To make my drive back worse I caught con crud and was feeling it when I left the con. It made a grueling multi day many hour drive even more grueling. I'm just glad it was a minor head cold and not something worse.
Anyway, I don't think I'd come back as a vendor and I probably wouldn't make a flight to Chupacabracon as an attendee. The people were great, the hotel was awesome, and there are a lot of good factors going for it, but for me personally I only have so much time and money and I will likely focus on other vacation destinations or cons like Gencon.
However, I encourage people who live in that region to check it out! It was a good time. If you make Savage Worlds stuff, OSR, or more trad type games you could potentially do well.