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Post by Roquefort Raider on Nov 2, 2017 13:55:56 GMT -5
It was a little different when comics were ubiquitous. Where kids could be introduced to comics at friends' houses, at the local barbershop, at drug stores, newsstands, in the Sunday papers, etc. etc. Comics were everywhere and many people interacted with them on some level or other, so the enculturation of comics literacy could come form many different sources. Agreed! Being dirt cheap, they could easily be found in the dentist's waiting room, at the barber shop, in the reading corner at school, basically everywhere you find old and worthless magazines. Now they are mostly treated like precious artifacts and hidden away in temperature-controlled rooms, far from the damaging hands, snotty noses and purple crayons of children. |
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Post by Icctrombone on Nov 4, 2017 13:56:51 GMT -5
How about selling reprints for a dollar each at the movie theater when a superhero movie comes out ?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2017 13:14:47 GMT -5
Interesting article on Franco-Belgian comics market vis-a-vis the American market from Pipeline Comics run by former CBR contributor Augie de Blieck Jr. Some quick offshoots, women buy more comics in France (53% of comics bought are by women) though 64% of these are for gifts (usually for children which means a robust number of kids are getting comics in the market). Typical comic customer is 41 year old woman of better than average income. And almost as many women in France by comics as buy prose novels in a year. Men however buy more "comics" which refers to material form the American market, primarily super-heroes). The French spend more than twice what Americans do on a per capita basis on comics (America spends more overall, but has a population of over 5X France-325 Million vs. 67 million-so that's not a surprise). Super-hero comics are actually rising in sales in France fueled by the popularity of the movies. The American market is estimated at a billion dollars in sales per year, 60% of which comes from the direct market, France generates $468 million per year in sales. Just an interesting comparison of how the comic industry shakes out to its audience there vs. here in the US. -M |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2017 13:31:46 GMT -5
Meanwhile IcV2 reports Comics sales resumed double digit decline in OctoberSales were down 11.2% form October of last year, and October is a month fueled by the Halloween Comicfest giveaway, a mini Free Comic Book Day at the end of the month. One point of interest from the article... So GN/tpb sales are up but sales loss is focused on the monthly pamphlet format. Here were the top 10 selling comics...all super-hero but half part of the Dark Metal event... Top 10 Comics – October 2017 Dark Nights: Metal #3 (est sales 158,698) The Mighty Thor #700 (115,662, but $5.99 price tag) Amazing Spider-Man #789 (110,349) Batman #32 (108,345) Batman #33 (97, 839 pretty sharp decline from issue to issue within the same month) The Despicable Deadpool #287 (everything else under 100K) Batman: The Drowned #1 Batman: The Dawnbreaker #1 Batman: The Merciless #1 Batman: White Knight #1 I wonder what happens to sales when the event is over. Meanwhile, the top 10 GN/tpb in the direct market (mind you this is only trades sold through Diamond, not the book trade market) The Walking Dead: Here’s Negan Batman/The Flash: The Button Deluxe Ed. Seven to Eternity Vol. 2 Rat Queens Vol. 4 Super Sons Vol. 1 I Hate Fairyland Vol. 3 Redneck Vol. 1 Star Wars: The Screaming Citadel Batman: Detective Comics Vol. 3 Low Vol. 4 a little more diversity of content, but still super-hero heavy. -M |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2017 17:22:12 GMT -5
Thinking about what David Petersen said in his keynote speech at the Ringo awards about recommending good comics to people based on what their interests are, and with it being the holiday gift giving season, I started compiling a list of comics to recommend to people to introduce them to what comics have to offer (specifically avoiding "mainstream" corporate super-hero comics for the most part, and those I include are standalone self-contained series/stories) and trying (albeit I would guess unsuccessfully) to also limit it to books in print and available to order easily. I may not like every comic on the list (Preacher for instance) but what I like doesn't really matter here, what matters is finding comics people who read them will like because they appeal to things they already like and are a quality product that offers a story (or stories in some cases of series) with beginnings, middles and endings. I have also tried to limit it things I have sampled at least some of (though haven't read all of some of these) so I can at least be comfortable with knowing the nature of it to recommend it.
Here's my list so far (and it's just a list no comments) roughly in alphabetical order by title...
21: The Story of Roberto Clemente by Wilfred Santiago
A Contract with God (and other Tenement Stories) by Will Eisner
A Distant Soil by Colleen Doran
The Adventures of Luther Arkwright by Bryan Talbot
The Adventures of Tintin by Herge
Age of Bronze by Eric Shanower
Akira by Ktsuhiro Otomo
American Flagg! by Howard Chaykin
American Gods adaptationof Gaiman novel by P. Craig Russell & others
Berlin by Jason Lutes
Blacksad by Juan Diaz Canales & Juanjo Guarnido
Bone by Jeff Smith
BPRD by Mike Mignola, John Arcudi, Guy Davis & company
Castle Waiting by Linda Medley
Cerebus by Dave Sim
Chicagoland Detective agency by Trinna Robbins & others
Concrete by Paul Chadwick
Coraline adaptation of Gaiman novel by P. Craig Russell
Corto Maltese by Hugo Pratt
Criminal by Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips
DC: The New Frontier by Darwyn Cooke
Descender by Jeff Lemire & Dustin Nguyen
Dignifying Science by Jim Ottavani & company
Dong Xoia, Vietnam 1965 by Joe Kubert
Elfquest by Wendy & Richard Pini
Fables by Bill Willingham & others
The Fade Out by Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips
Fatale by Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips
Fax from Sarajevo by Joe Kubert
FEAR Agent by Rick Remender & company
Finder by Carla Speed McNeil
Graveyard Book adaptation of Gaiman novel by P. Craig Russell
Hellboy by Mike Mignola & others
The Incal by Jodorowsky & Moebius
Injection by Warren Ellis & Declan Shalvey
Joe Kubert Presents by Joe Kubert & others
King by Ho Che Anderson
Last Day in Vietnam by Will Eisner
Lazarus by Greg Rucka & Michael Lark
Locke & Key by Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodriguez
Lone Sloane by Druillet
Lone Wolf & Cub by Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima
Love and Rockets by Los Brothers Hernandez
March Books I-III by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin & Nate Powell
Maus by art spiegleman
Mice Templar by J. L. Glass & Mike Avon Oeming
Mouseguard by David Peterson
Parker adaptions by Darwyn Cooke
Planetary by Warren Ellis & John Cassaday
Powers by Brian Michael Bendis & Michael Avon Oeming
Preacher by Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon
Punk Rock Jesus by Sean Murphy
Queen & Country by Greg Rucka & company
Rachel Rising by Terry Moore
RASL by Jeff Smith
The Ring of the Nibelung by P. Craig Russell
The Rocketeer by Dave Stevens
Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco
Saga by Brain K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples
Sandman by Neil Gaiman & company
Sin City by Frank Miller
The Sixth Gun by Cullen Bunn & Brian Hurtt
Southern Bastards by Jason Aaron & Jason Latour
The Sundiata by Will Eisner
Strangehaven by Gary Spencer Millidge
Strangers in Paradise by Terry Moore
Sundiata: A Legend of Africa by Will Eisner
Sweet Tooth by Jeff Lemire
Tale of One Bad Rat by Bryan Talbot
Transmetropolitan by Warren Ellis & Darick Robertson
Trees by Warren Ellis & Jason Howard
Trillium by Jeff Lemire
Two-Fisted Science by Jim Ottavani & company
Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud
Usagi Yojimbo by Stan Sakai
Valerian & Laureline by Pierre Christin & Jean Claude Mezieres
V for Vendetta by Alan Moore & David Lloyd
Velvet by Ed Brubaker & Steve Epting
Voodoo Child: The Illustrated Legend of Jimi Hendrix by Martin Green & Bill Sienkewicz
The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore & Charlie Adlard
Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
Will Eisner's The Spirit: A Celebration of 75 Years by Will Eisner
Yossel: April 19, 1943 by Joe Kubert
Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan & company
Zot! By Scott McCloud
it's by no means complete, there's a lot to add still and at some point I would like to break it into groups by topic.
-M
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Post by The Captain on Dec 12, 2017 11:44:04 GMT -5
Had an interesting conversation with a 12 year-old on Saturday. He's a kid on my daughter's swim team, and I've seen him carrying around TPBs at meets and practices. I was serving as a timer at their meet on Saturday and was on deck with him, and I asked him who his favorite characters were. He answered, and then my daughter said that she'd told him all about my collection, to which he responded "I don't read comic books. I just read graphic novels that I can get at Half-Price Books cheap."
That blew me away. Here is a kid who actively separates the source material (the floppie) from the collected edition. It makes sense to me, as he doesn't have to shell out $4 per month over six months to get a story arc when he could just go to HPB and pick up a used collection for $8 total. He isn't worried about shipping schedules or getting to the LCS to pick up his books, but rather he gets things that interest him on his terms.
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Post by brutalis on Dec 12, 2017 13:44:32 GMT -5
Had an interesting conversation with a 12 year-old on Saturday. He's a kid on my daughter's swim team, and I've seen him carrying around TPBs at meets and practices. I was serving as a timer at their meet on Saturday and was on deck with him, and I asked him who his favorite characters were. He answered, and then my daughter said that she'd told him all about my collection, to which he responded "I don't read comic books. I just read graphic novels that I can get at Half-Price Books cheap." That blew me away. Here is a kid who actively separates the source material (the floppie) from the collected edition. It makes sense to me, as he doesn't have to shell out $4 per month over six months to get a story arc when he could just go to HPB and pick up a used collection for $8 total. He isn't worried about shipping schedules or getting to the LCS to pick up his books, but rather he gets things that interest him on his terms. I have more or less taken this route as well over the last few years. With most of the Archie/Marvel/DC writer/artist changes and shipping delays of "monthly" titles (becoming more of a it will arrive whenever so and so has time to finish it) it is much more cost effective and easier to enjoy the stories when you have a full TPB of continuing story lines to read consecutively versus having lost interest or trying to remember what has happened in previous issues. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 12, 2017 16:38:13 GMT -5
Had an interesting conversation with a 12 year-old on Saturday. He's a kid on my daughter's swim team, and I've seen him carrying around TPBs at meets and practices. I was serving as a timer at their meet on Saturday and was on deck with him, and I asked him who his favorite characters were. He answered, and then my daughter said that she'd told him all about my collection, to which he responded "I don't read comic books. I just read graphic novels that I can get at Half-Price Books cheap." That blew me away. Here is a kid who actively separates the source material (the floppie) from the collected edition. It makes sense to me, as he doesn't have to shell out $4 per month over six months to get a story arc when he could just go to HPB and pick up a used collection for $8 total. He isn't worried about shipping schedules or getting to the LCS to pick up his books, but rather he gets things that interest him on his terms. That is essentially what a casual reader would do and the market that the industry stepped away from over the last 30 years. It's the market they need to recapture if they are going to find any new growth. -M |
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Post by wildfire2099 on Dec 29, 2017 8:52:04 GMT -5
I think price point is a major issue... it's a huge barrier to younger fans, especially since those fans are used to getting things for free on the internet.
Getting back to the format thing (we were discussing in an Usagi thread, but I didn't want to derail there)...
Do people out there really care so much that a slight change would make them upset? I get not liking digital.. it's a completely different experience. I've been giving it a shot some lately, and honestly, I don't really like it, but for the Marvel Unlimited price point, it's reasonable for new stuff I don't care about owning but have mild interesting in keep up with.
OTOH, something like singles vs. trades, or my suggestion of Marvel and DC doing Japanese-style cheap anthologies.. would that be so different? If Marvel had one for each line (X-Men, Avengers, Defenders, something like Midnight Sons, etc) where you could get 5-6 comics worth of stories for, say $9.99... wouldn't that be great? It would allow them to more easily try new characters, too.. it's alot less risk to give a character an 8 page solo in an anthology than trying to get people to shell out $4.99 for a new number one.
Clearly, for that to be viable, some new distribution would have to happen.. I'm thinking check out racks in the grocery story (archie is there now and then, after all) and actual magazine stands in drug stores like CVS and Walgreens.
MRP thinks that's too big a change for the direct market crowd.. what do y'all think? Hate it? Love it?
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Post by brutalis on Dec 29, 2017 10:16:36 GMT -5
I want to see an end to the "direct market crowd" idea. That is a dead end street in this day and age. Anything that can only be purchased at ONE location is doomed to collect dust and die a painful death. Once upon a time the idea was to get your items out to the largest group possible: WHICH MEANS EVERYBODY!!!! When you focus completely upon only the "collector" then your sales are going to dry up and go away. The collector only collects EXACTLY what the collector likes and wants to the exclusion of all else.
New and used comic books and magazines used to be at any and every type of storefront from grocery stores and in the convenience stores and book stores and used book stores and collector stores and Salvation Army and the likes. Now you can't find a new comic book anywhere other than in a LCS there is no incentive to stop and look at what is out or any impulse purchases. Used to be you could convince your parents to let you grab an issue or three because you were only spending a few cents or dollars in "left over change" from a store purchase when now you go to a specific store to spend all your dollars buying.
All print types of products have become so expensive in general and are considered "old folks" purchases and not geared towards the younger consumer. The comic book companies would rather sell 5 expensive color Omnibus with guaranteed sales than 500 black and white lesser selling TPB's because they follow only the almighty Dollar Sign not understanding that for every high end purchase there may be more low end purchases within the long run. People are much more likely to invest $5-10 against a $40 purchase.
So Comic books need to become more affordable in comparison to the reality of what they are up against in other forms of entertainment. $8-10 for a 2 hour movie is fine. $5-10 for a 20 page less than 5 minute read of a comic book is NOT fine. Make them cost effective and increase their availability to be found!
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Post by Deleted on Jan 2, 2018 13:39:30 GMT -5
It seems every time I pull up Bleeding Cool to read a story that I received an interesting headline for in my newsfeed there's at least one article about a comic shop closing. Today there were two (one in Pittsburgh, one in the Phillipines) plus another about a Chicago shop that was down $21K in Marvel sales alone in 2017. I don't think it's quite as bad as the shop closures circa '96 or '97 when the speculator bubble burst, but it is getting bad out these for comic shops and the market is definitely shrinking in terms of number of retail outlets operating.
-M
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Post by impulse on Jan 2, 2018 15:44:39 GMT -5
I was just discussing something similar, so I am glad I found this thread. I have had many opinions on this topic over the years, and I agree with a lot of points made here. They are too expensive, way too hard to find, poor value of $/hr. of entertainment compared to other options today, and fairly inaccessible* Aside from these points, I think there are a couple major factors to contend with: changing market/consumer preferences, and not capitalizing on the value of the IP.
For the first - people largely aren't buying physical media anymore. CDs? DVD/Blu-Ray? Pfft. Stream it. Spotify, Netflix, Hulu, whatever. Digital books, audiobooks, apps, etc. Some people still do and always will, but that's not really a great thing to start now. Second one, Marvel is owned by DISNEY. Marvel's entire comics budget is a drop in the bucket to them. They should be throwing comics at moviegoers for nothing. Hand out free issues at premiers. Give everyone EASY access to digital comics or trials to Marvel Unlimited with their purchase of a Marvel movie ticket. Make it easy to scan a thing or put in a simple code and boom, 3 months free. Or give them an ENTIRE STORY, not one issue. Physical or digital, who cares. Both. Just get it in their hands. Make it free and easy. Include coupons redeemable at local comic stores. Use the app to find where the nearest store is and encourage them to go in. And for the love of God, Marvel especially, streamline your books if you want there to be a snowball's chance in hell of retaining anyone who walks in the door.
Maybe even make cheap mail/subscription easy. It can be digital, app-based, or good old floppies in the mail, but make it cheap and easy to follow and get it to people to get them reading. Maybe if its effortless to sign up for a year's worth of stories on cheap newsprint mailed to them for $10 they might want to go into a store and get into higher end stuff. Who knows.
Speaking only for me, I don't have time to read them, money to buy them now, or anywhere to put them. I want to try Marvel Unlimited eventually, but i don't have time now. If they made that thing STUPID EASY to use with a killer UI that was as easy to navigate and find stories as Netflix, they might capture a new audience with this content.
*When I dropped Marvel, there were like 10 major X-Family titles, and I couldn't tell you what the major point of each one was, who the exclusive core cast was, or what the major overarching plot line was. Wolverine was in nearly all of them. In the tail end of Claremont-era/before the splitting got out of control, you had Uncanny for the main traditional style story, Adjectiveless for the hipper action strike team kind of book, and New Mutants/X-Force for the students/next class. Excalibur was British version doing British things in Britain, and for a while X-Factor was its own thing. There were a handful of titles, but it was clear what the theme was in each, who was in each, and you could follow as your interests and wallet saw fit. They had their own plots and stories, and you didn't need to read all of them to follow what was going on. When I quit? I don't know what any one book was about, nor why there were so many pointless tie in mini series, why they all had the same characters, but none of them went anywhere. This could be an entirely separate topic on its own, and it may be more a factor of declining direct market as opposed to be a barrier to new entrants because I don't know if there ARE any new entrants, but man, there are WAY TOO MANY BOOKS with WAY TOO DECOMPRESSED STORYLINES with WAY TOO LITTLE focus, and they all cost too much. But I digress.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 3, 2018 0:03:14 GMT -5
Another visit to Bleeding Cool, another shop closed, this time in Des Moines, IA.
-M
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Post by Deleted on Jan 3, 2018 0:26:07 GMT -5
From Terry Moore's Twiiter feed...
and this points out why most books have a zero chance to grow an audience. Even in comics shops you can't find them to buy them if you don't preorder them. Shops don;t carry shelf copies of a lot of books, even the return of critically acclaimed book tha thas sold well enough in trades to be an evergreen book available in multiple formats by an award-winning creator. If you are not already in the know about books, you can't find them to buy them. You can't browse shelves even at the niche shops dedicated to carrying this medium's products to see what's out there. You have to buy the Previews or scour the internet or social media to find titles you are interested in 3 months or more before they ever come out to ask the retailer to order it pretty much sight unseen and hope he does and gets enough undamaged copies form Diamond to fill his preorders in order for you to get the book. So exactly how is this going to gain new readers? I mean unless you arr already a hardcore comic fan, how can you get a copy of previews, how do you know how to look for a book you might be interested in if you don;t already know it exists? And even if a book gets good buzz and word of mouth after it comes out, where can you get a copy of it when even going to that specialty destination niche specialty shop devoted to comics doesn't have shelf copies in stock more than a few days after it is released. Digital and trades can fill that need again if the potential customer knows where to look for them, but again how do they know about them and even if they do know about them, how can they acquire a copy of a book retailers aren't stocking for sale to anyone but the chosen few in the know.
This isn't a marketing problem. This isn't an accessibility issue. This isn't a price issue. This is a fundamental flaw in the business model of the direct market where the retailer has to order on a non-returnable basis and shoulder the entirety of the risk for the product if it doesn't sell and ties up his operating capital at the same time the major publishers are flooding the market with too many titles in a desperate attempt to capture a bigger piece of the shrinking market share pie without actually selling more units of each product they sell. It's not a sustainable model. The direct market rose to fulfill a need because the newsstand distribution model had ceased to serve the needs of the customer, the retailers, and the publishers. Now the market has evolved to the point where the direct market is now failing the needs of the potential customers, the retailers and only serves the perceived needs (but not he actual needs) of the publishers and their distribution chain (i.e. Diamond) because they reap whatever revenue is available without shouldering any risk or creating any growth potential. A new model needs to emerge again, but I am not sure what it is.
Moore is trying to incentivize stores carrying shelf copies (and I applaud him for it), but this (carrying shelf copies of the books you are in business to sell) should be an attainable norm if the industry wants to grow its readership, not something the creators have to take upon themselves to make happen.
-M
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Post by wildfire2099 on Jan 3, 2018 9:04:07 GMT -5
Hey MRP, do you know what disc. % diamond gives to shops on trades? Because I'm wondering if they would be better off ordering from a wholesale bookseller (like Ingram or Baker and Taylor) I know Ingram gives 40% on most trades (maybe not small press, but definitely Marvel, DC and Image), and they do allow returns (up to 10% of your total purchases, after that there's a 10% fee) I suspect B&T is similar.
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