Golden Apple on the other hand isn't having as big events, sure they'll blow out the doors for Free Comic Book Day May 5th, but the events leading up to it have been far an in between. A few months back the store was also up for sale, yes, the owners were trying to sell the stores comics and all, but nobody bit, maybe Hollywood needs is one prominent comic book shop. They're so close together they might be eating each others business.
What isn't digesting well is customer service. On a recent trip to both with a friend, who hadn't been in either for over a year, both failed to be helpful or generally nice. I looked on Yelp for ratings and there was no real drop, it only suggested that sometimes you deal with the employee who sucks and sometimes you don't. When I asked my friend about the experience as I was irritated by both places being generally dismissive and almost seemingly not noticing us, he agreed. Adding one employee at Golden Apple realized he was doing poorly and tried to save face by trying to strike a conversation, but getting bored and giving up with him on it.
Golden Apple has generally always been crappy service, but Meltdown, I guess, maybe getting so many shows/podcasts might be going to their heads.
This was our expereince recently at the stores, maybe yours are different, all I know is I wish I lived closer to Comics Factory in Pasadena, but that's Pasadena.