I think it was him I read in an interview saying that audiences didn’t like shorter trades and they would lose interest in a comic if there were more than 6 months between trades, so he felt that 6 issues was the optimum.

Personally I’d be happier if they settled around the 8-12 issue range.

Since when has a six issue arc been ‘traditional’?

Wait, I know the answer to this one! …since Bendis started writing comics?!??!!?

¡SCORE!

But if they then price it higher than I feel like paying, I don’t buy a copy and it goes unsold.

I suspect that books generally have a certain amount of people who’ll buy it whatever the cost and then a load more who’ll buy it if the price is good. Obviously what DC have to work out is what point the ratio of those two is and therefore whether they’d get more money by decreasing the price to get more sales or increasing the price and just getting the hardcore fans.

If I remember correctly, they rushed out the first GC trade only to drag their feet on the second. I guess they thought I was going to rush out to pick up the monthly. They thought wrong. Instead, I didn’t buy anything past the first trade.

If they rushed it out, they probably had to wait for more issues to be made to collect in the second.
Or the trade didn’t sell to well, as the series never did, and so they waited until they thought they could sell more.

Either way, trades for every arc in the series are out now.

So that’s why the stories have gone from your traditional 6 issue arc, down to 5 and in some cases 4!

Since when has a six issue arc been ‘traditional’?

Does no one here take advantage of buying online? When I pre-order one of these HCs from my online shop, they’re usually 40-50% off.

Similar prices if you go to Amazon.

I find it hard to complain about these prices when after I do the math, I sometimes get a better deal than if I bought single issues. I think the Sinestro War HCs ended up being about 12 bucks a piece. Same thing with Justice.

I’m not sure you haven’t got that backwards (or at least partly). Sometimes, I think their thinking is “The demand for this book is going to be small so the only way we can make the TPB profitable is to up the price”, which suggests that maybe the alternative in those cases is no TPB at all.

I don’t know about the comics world, but when I worked for a small retailer in another sector there was a lot of research that showed people were more likely to spend in certain amounts. As such our pricing changed to reflect those amounts, in an attempt to gain extra sales. DC may have hit on the same process here–people may just be drawn to the $19.99 price point.

As well as Justice

And don’t start me with the Kirby Omnibus. 50 bucks for souped-up NEWSPRINT?!?

Best,
Hunter (Pedro Bouça)