Those articles are measuring revenue (i.e. dollars sold) not units. SO comics now at $4-$5 a pop are just starting to match the revenue generated from 20-25 years ago when comics were $1-$2 s pop. So how many more actual comics do you have to sell at $1 to $2 dollar to make the same amount as a product priced twice as much? It's spin to make the market look healthy. They're selling half as many comics 25 years later but their prices twice as much so they're making the same amount of revenue as they did 20-25 years ago-how many other industries would paint a rosy picture and celebrate finally getting their revenue back up to the level of 25 years ago (not even adjusted for inflation) and moving half as many products?

30 years ago Power Man and Iron Fist had sales of about 80-90K a month and was demoted to bi-monthly and eventually cancelled. Now it would be a top 3 seller in the Diamond charts. But it was 65 cent comic when it was cancelled and the new PM and IF book might sell 60K on it's launch at $4.99-so it will generate more revenue than they did then-but is it a better seller? Does the greater revenue indicate more people are buying/reading the book? Nope, not at all.

-M

MRP, are you talking about just superhero comics or comics in general? I buy the argument that says the superhero market is not growing the pie and is merely slicing it up differently. But if you're talking about comics in general, at least by anecdotal evidence there does seem to be indications that the market is attracting new readers. Lots of LCS owners have mentioned seeing a large increase in the number of female customers, and this seems to comport with my own observations at conventions and visits to LCSs. Whether or not these new readers are offsetting the attrition from the part 20 years is hard to say. So if you want to say the pie is not getting any bigger, I'll grant that, but to press the analogy it doesn't seem like we're getting the same apple pie we've always been getting.

And there's the other shoe dropping. A lot of comic sales these days depend on variant covers and it's much easier to make a lot of them for a #1 than issue #45. Without the retailers ordering extra copies to get those variants, I wonder how much worse comic sales would be. It's sort of a hidden speculator bubble.

A couple of things-books sold through the book trade not Diamond (i.e. the stuff you see on bookstore shelves, Amazon, etc. not in comic shops) are sold on a returnable basis-if they are still sitting on a booksellers shelf they are remaindered or returned, so seeing them there doesn't necessarily mean they are selling to the end customers-those selling on the Diamond distribution channels are sold on a non-returnable basis, but outside of Walking Dead and a few other Image series, typical trades collecting super-hero material form the big 2 typically move less than 5K units through Diamond in their initial sales window (i.e. the month they are solicited) and that number is usually 80-90% of their total sales for the life of the book through Diamond. Comic store retailers are much more conservative ordering these because they are stuck with unsold copies, and it you look at Brian Hibbs annual analysis of the book trad e(i.e. stuff sold outside Diamond) super-hero trades are a tiny tiny fraction of books sold through the book trade and collected editions of current monthly stuff and reprints of non-evergreen material a tiny part of that small piece. DC has decent book trade numbers, but it is their evergreen trades-Sandman, Watchmen, Dark Knight, Year One, Preacher, etc. that comprise the bulk of what they are actually moving through the book trade, not new material, with possibly new52 Batmnan by Snyder and Capullo being the exception (though main title only not Tec, or any of the other family titles). Marvel doesn't do evergreen trades-they don't keep anything constantly in print-it seems to placate the Diamond retaile rcomplaints and advance collectibility of some of their stuff (see Esential Thor Vol. 4 or some of the omibus and hc they let go out of print even though there is still demand)and don't do quite as well in the book trade.

Is there new blood coming in to the comic market?-yes. Is it coming for traditional monthly super-hero comics that the slew of new #1s is supposed to attract-No. The new readers are acquiring comics mostly outside Diamond distribution-trades from Amazon, digital, etc. but those articles Confessor talked about are talking about Diamond numbers and revenue reaching the levels of 25 or so years ago again and celebrating it as a sign that the industry is thriving and growing.

The growth in the market is not in super-hero monthlies reboots or no. The constant parade of relaunches, new #1s etc. which is said to be providing jumping on points for new readers is not actually doing that and publishers know that. New readers aren't walking through the door of niche specialty shops to buy comics-they are buying them elsewhere through other means and in other formats that monthly printed pamphlets. The relaunches re-slice the existing pie of the specialty market to make market share look favorable for publishers.

They have to answer to corporate bookkeepers, they have to tell them hey revenue is flat, production costs are up, overall circulation is down-all bad news, but in the good news department our marketshare is up 5-10% form last quarter so we must be doing soemthign right (even if our dollar market share is padded because we raised cover prices and our unit share is inflated by a flux of #1s and variant covers, and next quarter we need to show growth again in market share-so launch another event and more #1s and the quarter after that...

But if you track the actual sales numbers of base units (factoring the variant variable) and track the sales of books through the course of their publication life month after month the attrition rates do not decrease. They either plateau around issue 3-4 or continue to increase the longer the series runs, and each successive relaunch and new #1 seems to have diminishing returns in many cases unless something else spikes sales-hey let's do 68 variants this time, or hey we got a Loot Crate bump to spike sales).

If you look at the numbers, the trends, the hard data (from Comichron, form Hobbs annual book trade analysis, compare sales numbers from issue to issue from launch to launch (i.e. how did #1 sell for the last relaunch of ASM vs. how this one sells, then look a issue #2 vs. the new #2 across the board, look at DC's sales hierarchy in that about 5-10 titles comprise about 60% of their monthly sales through Diamond of a line of 50+ books, and then look at the stuff actually showing growth-books like Walking Dead and Saga, and the sales number son that type of stuff, the picture painted is not one of new readers coming to monthly super-hero comics and that the quest for new readers jumping on point rationale for these relaunches is a smoke screen spin.

I really don't care what number is on the cover. Personally Vol. 2016 #1 would be fine for me or Season x #x, or what not or eliminate issue number altogether. But all the hullaboo over renumbering, people bitching about cover issue numbers rather than content, the tangible proof that issue numbers affect actual sales shows that this is not about attracting sales from new readers, but to rearrange the sales patterns among existing covers to which these things obviously matter.

-M

Also-Diamond and other measures of physical copies sold don't take into account digital sales, which seems to be where most of the growth is coming from. People no longer have to go to specific kinds of stores to get their favorite comics.

Unless there has been a huge surge, the last glimpse we got of digital sales is that they measure about 10% of physical sales for the line as a whole (though this is an infobit that is a few years old) though that can vary title by title (the first issue of Ms. Marvel allegedly outsold print in digital for example) and for the most part the ranking of sales by title mirrors the print sales i.e. the best selling print books are the best selling digital books.

Actual digital sales are not revealed, but last I talked to the owners of a handful of comic shops that had digital storefronts via Comixology (so that they get a % of the digital sales for bringing customers to Comixology)- the ratio of print to digital was much less the 10:1 we hear anecdotally overall, but it's a grain of salt. We also don't know if the amount of copies moved in digital "sales" numbers include people redeeming the codes from their Marvel print purchases and DC combo packs either, which could inflate the digital sales numbers if they are included in copes sold.

Whatever the actual numbers are though, the consensus from all accounts seems to be that digital sales had a short sharp period of growth but have plateaued over the last 18 months (based on comments from both of the big 2 sales reps/editorial when they have been asked about it and transcripts I have seen from panels about digital comics at a few major cons or where creators of successful creator-owned books from Image and other publishers commented on it).

Marvel Unlimited may have contributed to that plateau for Marvel, but we don't know subscription totals for that either.

What I have been told by several genre writers in the prose field at various writer's workshops I have attended (Michael Stackpole in particular runs a very informative panel during the Writer's track at Origins every year, Timothy Zahn offers a lot of insight into the matter as well, and their views are echoed by a lot of writers working in the genre field that intersects comic fandom a bit) is that there is a lot more price resistance by customers in digital sales than in physical sales for genre books (and even consumers of physical books expect a discount off of msrp on print products because of the prevalence of Amazon in the marketplace). Genre consumers expect to pay a lot less for a digital copy than a print copy, and that attitude holds even more for casual readers, so the fact that comics publishers sell their new releases at the same price point as print copies may be a contributing factor to the sales plateau digital sales have experienced.

Everyone points to Image as a model for growth especially with titles like Saga and Walking Dead, but look at how they grew sales on those books with trades-affordable introductory volumes -$9.99 for the first volume- $10 is an impulse purchase these days, but $14.99 is not. Books that have growth have a clear and easily accessible entry point-which is what the publishers say these relaunches and #1s are for, but really go to a GN shelf in a bookstore and look for the first volume of Avengers or Spider-Man, or do a search on Amazon for Vol. 1 of Spider-Man or Avengers. You don't get a single option. For Avengers you get Omnibus Volume 1, Masterworks Vol. 1 Epic Collection Vol. 1 and Essential Vol. 1-that's kind of okay as they are all the same material and book buyers are used to different formats for the same material. But you also get Avengers by Bendis Vol. 1 Avengers by Hickman Vol. 1, Avengers Assemble Vol. 1, New Avengers by Bendis Vol. 1 New Avengers by Hickman Vol. 1 Secret Avengers Vol. 1 (2 different ones by 2 different creative teams) etc. etc. etc. None of which are priced as a lead in and none of which is clear where you should start, added to all the editions of collections for Avengers Vol. 1 it is still a morass of confusion for the "new reader" to get in on the ground floor if they liked the movies or cartoon or what not.

I think Marvel could have been on the right track with the $5 trades they offered at Wal Mart when the Amazing Spider-Man blue-ray/DVD went on sales-there were 4 Brubaker Cap Vol. 1 Bendis Avengers Vol. 1, Bendis Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 and Spider-Man Big Time trades. All priced at $5 for 4-7 issues of content. But they never followed up on them and made more available at Wal Mart or other retailers because the lcs owners complained about lost sales and that they couldn't get those volumes. They were also running radio ads (much cheaper than television) highlighting big events (one was basically the solicit copy of an upcoming Iron Man-Gillen's secret origin arc I think-another solicit copy of the upcoming issue of Spider-Man) then giving a list of other Marvel titles (Guardians was highlighted) and then giving the website info for Marvel.com (but not the comic shop locator service), which I thought was on the right track, but they ran for a month than stopped, so I am guessing it didn't get the hoped for results. They were run on the station that plays at work-which is how I heard them-that is part of the IheartRadio network, so I assume they played on other stations on that network nationally. But overall, this was a very limited and short attempt to actually gain new readers-and since they were abandoned I would guess the results were less than hoped for.

If I were Marvel and serious about expanding the pie of readership and bringing in new readers, I would offer a redeemable code in every trade or DVD sold outside of Diamond (because that services existing fans/customers) for a 2 week or 1 month free trial of Marvel Unlimited. Let people have access to the content you offer both old and new-basically the equivalent to the free trials Netflix and Hulu offer or the free HBO/Cinemax weekends they offer when they are about to launch a big season premiere or series premiere-show people what you got, first hit free, then offer a good intro offer for Unlimited subs or print subs. Aim for the readers outside the pie in a way that will entice them to come back for more. Require a zip code to redeem the free offer and send them a link to the Comic shop locater page or the results of the search on their zip code so they can see where the comic shops in their area are if they want to explore more comic options, etc. etc. If you want to get new readers you have to go where they live and bring them in, not put out another new #1 as a jumping on point and sell it in places new readers don't frequent-and digital may be available anywhere but only if the potential new reader knows to go looking for it, which they won't unless they are an existing reader aware of how the market works and where comics are available. Look at where comic publishers spend their marketing budgets-banner ads on CBR, Bleeding Cool and other sites comic purchasers already go to-it's not new readers they are courting.

If they want to grow the market, they need to do things that will actually reach people who are not already their customers. New #1s is not that outreach program, it will only rearrange the existing market share.

The reason why there is a new ASM #1 is so Marvel can win the market share battle for a month or two against DC (or extend their lead as they typically are #1 in marketshare)and stave off the growing marketshare by Image and a few of the other publishers. They need to keep spiking sales with these things because they are not expanding the pie-so in their eyes, yes there really needs to be Amazing Spider-Man #1 (V.4) as the op asked.

But again, take what I think with a grain of salt, I'm just armchair jockeying with what info I can get my hands on, and trying to extrapolate from that data.

-M