Comic Book Resources

I wonder how much of these lost sales are attributed to people moving from single issues to TPBs?

That sucks.

Oh, and it should be '...selling fewer copies...' not '...selling less copies...'.

It's a fine question. I dunno - did TPB sales go up since the beginning of the year?

Also, I just wish to note that I don't mean this as some "woe is the comic industry" thing - just more as a request for people to be fair with their rhetoric.

I'd be curious to know about the levels of comic book piracy. I'm sure, as there is with music piracy, there are people pirating books they wouldn't even buy normally, but how many former buyers are now just pirates?

It's called "gas and food prices are really high right now and no one wants to pay $3 for a 2 min read that ignores past stories and changes 30 years with "it's magic". For $10 i could get 3 comics or i could buy a dvd or used video game. Plus all comics are crossover stories. No book can stand on it's own anymore. I feel sorry for todays comic readers and miss the days when comic crossovers were once a year and you can read a book every month without having to buy 4 other books every month that complete's the story. All this is killing the comic market and marvel and dc are both to blame.

I don't know if anyone can pinpoint the reason exactly - whatever the reason is, the important part (well, the important part of this piece, at least ) is that it is affecting EVERY title - and it irks me when I see "Creator X is losing sales!"

EVERYone is losing sales!

I've bought fewer comics this year than I have in about a decade. I'm pretty sure it's all my fault.

I think Mat nailed most of the problem: cost, "bang for buck," too many crossovers, bad writing. I'll add competition from different media, and manga. The 5th graders in my school don't care about Batman or Spider-Man, but many of them read Shonen Jump. All those factors are keeping new readers out, while current readers are staying away.

Brian, you need to bear in mind that the general trend for YEARS has been that the overwhelming majority of books drop month-to-month. The key point is that a healthy book will replenish those lost sales from time to time with a successful relaunch, or an attention-grabbing story, or a new creative team. So the picture of a "healthy" superhero comic, for the most part, is one which drifts gently down from month to month, and then bounces up again every couple of years to start the whole cycle over again. A book like that is holding steady in the long run.

Now, that said, quite a few second-tier books this year have started falling more quickly than usual; many of them seem to have levelled out again over the last few months. Those are unusual sales patterns and they're probably true drops.

Nonetheless, if you compare sales with the previous three or four months, then you'll almost invariably find that the vast majority of books are going down. You need to look further back to get a clearer picture.

I think the causes are obvious enough: tighter budgets and $3 per issue. While a comic fan might not cut themselves off entirely it's an easy place to save a few bucks. People are looking at their order list long and hard right now and dropping things.

You don't even have to look at the standard market problems that have put comics in decline for decades; they're still there and even when the economy turns around most of the factors mentioned above will still be in place.

How did Fell do through all of this? $2 book with some solid writing by Ellis. I think it's just hurt by not coming out often.

But . . . but . . . adding context means those numbers no longer appear to empirically confirm my prejudices!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

It's all Chuck Dixon's fault.

@DanLarkin: but I've bought more comics this year than in probably the last decade, so I've got your back.

I for one am shocked, SHOCKED, that Creator X is selling less..er...fewer copies.

I was under the impression that X-books were like printing your own money.

Tells you how much I know.

I'm buying less comics because milk is six dollars a gallon now in my area. Comics, like all entertainment, are a discretionary purchase. If I can't afford the staples and necessities of life, then the luxuries go.

It'll take something more exciting than the umpteenth Grant Morrison New Gods riff or Mockingbird possibly being alive to change my mind.

But if you can't afford the staples then all the pages will fall apart.

http://www.instantrimshot.com/

Gasoline and food costs have gone up so much that people are cutting back. I am a long time reader, and I'm only getting 10-15 books a week. There was a time when I'd get 25-30 each week.

Hey Brian,
Where are you getting your numbers? i'm always interested in what the numbers of specific comic books are, but i don't know where to get the info. Any place you can point me to? Thanks & thanks for all the great stuff you put out!

Check out the Beat's sales charts. They also go back quite a ways and track trends over yearly and six-month periods, so you can get a very good picture of what's going on with sales by reading them regularly and occasionally going back to old columns.

I think Mat hit most of it on the head I mean if 20-40 are basically the ones holding the big 2 together..well we have a lot less disposable income this year. Im curious to know how much other forms of entertainment are doing....Are games and dvds down too?

oops supposed to be 20-40 year olds

Video game sales performance is way, way up. Some writing on the subject suggests that people view video games as a value even at $50 or $60 on top of the cost of a console, since even a "short" game can easily be played for 15+ hours if it has online multiplayer (and some games can easily support 100+ hours of play). Nintendo's low-cost Wii has tripled the company's profits, Microsoft's 360 is also performing well, and sales are even strengthening on Sony's misbegotten PS3 thanks to Blu-Ray winning the format war and MGS4 finally shipping. Portable systems (especially the Nintendo DS) are also selling really well, since they let you play some amazingly full-featured and lengthy titles for a $20-$40 price point. Certain PC genres are also doing really well, too-- mostly MMOs, which tend to be able to run on lower-end computers and can offer years of gameplay in return for monthly fees that can be quite modest when you consider people playing for 40 or more hours per month.

I wonder how much of this is also due to the long tail phenomenon. This is huge in other media (music, books) and I can say that I'm personally buying a wider range of things, so who knows.

The numbers that would be interesting would be the totals for Diamond - are those going down, or are they staying pretty steady, and just getting spread out more thinly?

Now, that said, quite a few second-tier books this year have started falling more quickly than usual; many of them seem to have levelled out again over the last few months. Those are unusual sales patterns and they’re probably true drops.

I disagree - I think the sales figures right now are aberrant, making books APPEAR to be having true drops, but I don't think they are, as it is far too widespread.

Brian - I have a teensy request. Can you give us the hard numbers on how Marvel's Digital Comics Unlimited has done since it's launch several months ago? I bring this up because Lynxara makes a great argument: the biggest determining factor in a medium's ability to transcend an established fanbase and gain a large audience is bang-to-buck ratio.

If comics sales are drooping, it probably has a lot to do with lack of discretionary money on the part of consumers. People only want to pay for stuff if they can get A LOT of use out of it. Video games offer more entertainment-per-dollar than comics, so all other concerns are moot.

This leads me to believe that Marvel's DCU should be doing well... although you can't download anything, you can READ more comics for your dollar than at any other time in history. I know the diehard fanboys have their usual complaints with it (no downloads so you can't own what you read, they prefer paper to digital, they hate flash, etc.) but it seems like a good vehicle for reaching new readers.

Any stats? Any word from Marvel on the future of DCU? Is DC planning anything like that?

The economy is tanking. Unemployment rates are up. Gas and food prices are at record highs. People don't have the money to spend on comics like they did last year. I don't need to get all political but almost 8 years of bad management have driven the country into a record debt on an individual and national scale.

Janus is right, our economy is pretty bad right now, worse still, the people most affected by it don't realize it.

I'm in the same boat with tk, as in I'm buying more comics and TPBs now than I have in years. The big change for me from before is that few of them are from the Big Two -- I think my pull has three or four DC/Vertigo titles, and no Marvel. I just find myself a lot more willing to pony up for a book when I don't have to worry that the wheel is going to be yanked away from the creative team because of the next big company thing or that the book I'm enjoying is going to become completely unrecognizable when the new writer comes on.

It really bums me out when people say they're reading less books "cuz everything is a crossover event" or "they ignored continuity." Seriously..buy an INDIE BOOK. There's plenty of great superhero and other genre books available. PUH-LENTY. Don't be lazy!
TIM

I'm cutting back on my titles due to rising cost of kids...

Whereas a few years ago I would look at a new series (particularly minis or Event offshoots), now I generally wait for the TPB... And get it at ~30% off RRP bybuying it on Amazon...

Where I do double-up though are on some of the ongoing series that I cannot wait for... Prime examples being Fables and (until a few months ago) Y-The Last Man... I get the individual comics AND the TPBs!!

I can't believe pirating is that much of an issue... Not that we will ever get the real numbers, but I just can't see people ONLY downloading comics and NEVER buying an issue or TPB off the back of it... what I'm trying to say (badly) is some people feel (like in the days of taping CDs) that they are trying something out for free, and if they really like it, they will go out and buy back issues, trades, or something by the same artist/writer/publisher...

Oh and I utterly agree with Tim Seeley...