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Post by coke & comics on May 31, 2015 12:00:41 GMT -5
But it IS in their best interest to attract new customers, and keep the ones they already have. Their numbering eccentricities aren't the only think working against those two goals, but they aren't helping either. You're right. Marvel and DC don't have to do a damn things comic fans like. What they get from not doing that is a continued loss of marketshare and stagnant sales during steady growth in the industry. Bad things. Retaining new customers and keeping old ones don't necessarily correspond vis-a-vis the numbering issue, however. In my experience, and this is purely anecdotal, old customers are concerned about the "legacy" and want those high numbers. New consumers want to get in on the ground floor...or the perceived ground floor. This really corresponds to the rise to the series novel. Most people don't start Harry Potter with volume 4. You read the first one and move on. Ultimately where this makes a difference is with trade collections. If you have a single continuous story-line, like say, Walking Dead, it's easy to number those volumes sequentially and easy for the consumer to pick up the single story in order. However, if you have 50, 60, 70+ years of a character, over dozens of titles who has gone through hundreds of creators and a dozen fairly distinct incarnations...not so much. It definitely seems right and just that Waid's Daredevil has a "volume 1" attached to the first trade. Rather than "Volume 93". |
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 13:36:40 GMT -5
I don't think 1970's Marvel and DC would be happy with today's sales figures. That's because the bulk of readers in the 70s weren't collectors, but readers who never set foot in a comic shop or cared about numbering continuity, or what not, today's sales figures are mostly to "collectors" for whom things like legacy numbering matter. The readers weren't chased away (or kept away) by numbering issues, they were chased away by loss of access outside of comic shops, marketing gimmicks replacing quality storytelling in the 90s, books becoming more self-referential and mired in their own morass of continuity rather than entertaining storytelling, increasing prices that rose at a faster rate than other goods on the market, and the rise of other entertainment options that offered more bang for the buck. But that's part of what is included when I said the market and distribution models have changed. Creating comics may be an artform, but comics publishing is a business pure and simple, and they will make whatever decisons they need to to sell as much as they can in the current market. The current market is not the 70s so you cannot sell comics the same way you did then. It's also not the 20 otts either, so tactics from even then have had to evolve to meet the needs of the changing marketplace and changing preferences of the current customer base ad potential customer base. The biggest bar to new readers is not numbering issues, or continuity, it is access and price point via-vis value for your dollar. Until those obstacles are overcome, there will not be significant growth in the market. Until then they will just be reslicing the same pie different ways as they sell to the same ole same ole and a smattering of new folks much smaller than it could be. If you ask people who are prime candidates to become new readers why they don't the most common answers are not I don't know where to start or what order to read them in, or there's too much backstory, it's I am not sure where to find them to buy and when I do find them, boy are they expensive compared to what I get and in relation to what I can get in other forms of entertainment for the same buy in cost. One intro volume of an Image trade that sells for $9.99 (which is about the best value you can get in comics) is still as much as an entire month of Netflix, or I can buy 2 maybe 3 floppies for that price, if I know where to go to get them that is. That is the bar to growth, not confusion over numbering, sales gimmicks, or what have you. -M The numbering is a marketing gimmick, and it has chased away readers, if posts on message boards can be believed. And it's the collectors who like the renumbering, all those people lining up to buy everything with a #1 on it but absent for #2, those aren't readers. But it doesn't matter if they cater to readers or collectors, as long as they cater to somebody, and it really seems like they're failing to do that. They're still sharing the largest chunk of market share between them, but that chunk is getting smaller annually. |
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 14:30:01 GMT -5
That's because the bulk of readers in the 70s weren't collectors, but readers who never set foot in a comic shop or cared about numbering continuity, or what not, today's sales figures are mostly to "collectors" for whom things like legacy numbering matter. The readers weren't chased away (or kept away) by numbering issues, they were chased away by loss of access outside of comic shops, marketing gimmicks replacing quality storytelling in the 90s, books becoming more self-referential and mired in their own morass of continuity rather than entertaining storytelling, increasing prices that rose at a faster rate than other goods on the market, and the rise of other entertainment options that offered more bang for the buck. But that's part of what is included when I said the market and distribution models have changed. Creating comics may be an artform, but comics publishing is a business pure and simple, and they will make whatever decisons they need to to sell as much as they can in the current market. The current market is not the 70s so you cannot sell comics the same way you did then. It's also not the 20 otts either, so tactics from even then have had to evolve to meet the needs of the changing marketplace and changing preferences of the current customer base ad potential customer base. The biggest bar to new readers is not numbering issues, or continuity, it is access and price point via-vis value for your dollar. Until those obstacles are overcome, there will not be significant growth in the market. Until then they will just be reslicing the same pie different ways as they sell to the same ole same ole and a smattering of new folks much smaller than it could be. If you ask people who are prime candidates to become new readers why they don't the most common answers are not I don't know where to start or what order to read them in, or there's too much backstory, it's I am not sure where to find them to buy and when I do find them, boy are they expensive compared to what I get and in relation to what I can get in other forms of entertainment for the same buy in cost. One intro volume of an Image trade that sells for $9.99 (which is about the best value you can get in comics) is still as much as an entire month of Netflix, or I can buy 2 maybe 3 floppies for that price, if I know where to go to get them that is. That is the bar to growth, not confusion over numbering, sales gimmicks, or what have you. -M The numbering is a marketing gimmick, and it has chased away readers, if posts on message boards can be believed. And it's the collectors who like the renumbering, all those people lining up to buy everything with a #1 on it but absent for #2, those aren't readers. But it doesn't matter if they cater to readers or collectors, as long as they cater to somebody, and it really seems like they're failing to do that. They're still sharing the largest chunk of market share between them, but that chunk is getting smaller annually. But you can't believe what you see on message boards about comics, that stuff comes from a vocal minority who complain, not the bulk of the customers who buy, read and enjoy the stuff but don't take the time to kvetch about it online. If someone is ignoring quality content they like because of the number on the trade dress when it means about as much to the story as the ad on the back cover, then they get what they deserve. And really, who's more foolish, the people who put out the books or the people who buy them? People get what they deserve if they shell out money or refuse to shell out money for reasons without real meaning such as a number that is part of the trade dress and not anything meaningful in the content. -M |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 31, 2015 14:35:06 GMT -5
But we all know that the people who post on the internet are better businessmen than the people who run the businesses.
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 16:09:30 GMT -5
But you can't believe what you see on message boards about comics, that stuff comes from a vocal minority who complain, not the bulk of the customers who buy, read and enjoy the stuff but don't take the time to kvetch about it online. If it were regarding pretty much anything other than comics I'd agree. But comics readers have become such a small insular group, weekly floppy readers specifically, that I think two or three of the largest comic book message forums combined is a decent sample size of the demographic. Marketing studies would rely on much smaller sample sizes. It's true, not everyone who complains is going to drop the comic. Some will habitually buy a product they don't like as long as it exists because they need their collection to be complete. But is that the market Marvel and DC really need to cater to? In nearly any other market, when the majority of the feedback is negative, they'd try to fix the problem. Comics is different though. The publishers say "My way or the highway" and about 30k people will reliably choose their way, while the million or so potential readers who chose the highway are written off as not true fans, casual readers, a market they don't need. I'm not convinced Marvel of the 1970's would write off the majority of the market as a chunk they didn't need. And while the number of people who actually left Marvel and DC comics over the renumbering is small, it's adding to a bigger pool of people who left over one modern age eccentricity or another that pretty much zero fans actually enjoy. |
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Post by The Cheat on May 31, 2015 16:09:46 GMT -5
I'm glad, it's a massive step towards making things seem more accessible to new readers, and the industry definitely needs all the new readers it can get. It's getting the companies more readers and more money, I just wish they'd go the whole hog and stick the month/year on the front and leave the sequential numbering solely for the current story line/creative team. Of course, doesn't mean they still don't occasionally do blatantly stupid things, like having a 3 part mini-series and naming the issues: Uncanny Avengers - Ultron Forever #1, New Avengers - Ultron Forever #1, Mighty Avengers - Ultron Forever #1. Anyone care to guess the correct reading order?
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 16:12:23 GMT -5
But we all know that the people who post on the internet are better businessmen than the people who run the businesses. If their market share wasn't steadily declining, if they weren't basically snubbed in the NYT bestsellers list, or any list outside the direct market, and if the direct market weren't dying, if the two companies who were responsible for 70% of the market weren't being beaten at the Eisners by companies responsible for 5% of the market, I'd agree. That's not the case though. |
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Post by Reptisaurus! on May 31, 2015 16:16:32 GMT -5
But we all know that the people who post on the internet are better businessmen than the people who run the businesses. I'm sure most of them are better businessmen than the folks who ran Atlas comics ('70s version.) |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 31, 2015 18:57:55 GMT -5
But we all know that the people who post on the internet are better businessmen than the people who run the businesses. I'm sure most of them are better businessmen than the folks who ran Atlas comics ('70s version.) Chip Goodman yes. But there were a ton of issues with Atlas that weren't just Chip Goodman. Martin Goodman, on the other hand, had a forty year history as a successful businessman. |
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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 31, 2015 19:10:44 GMT -5
But we all know that the people who post on the internet are better businessmen than the people who run the businesses. If their market share wasn't steadily declining, if they weren't basically snubbed in the NYT bestsellers list, or any list outside the direct market, and if the direct market weren't dying, if the two companies who were responsible for 70% of the market weren't being beaten at the Eisners by companies responsible for 5% of the market, I'd agree. That's not the case though. Where's your proof? Honestly. I just Googled and picked two months...but...Jan 2014 and Jan. 2015 I don't see a steadily declining market share. www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=144835www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=159847NYT Bestseller list? Ummmm...I have to assume you're talking trades/graphic novels. Because periodicals aren't eligible. If so...there's a separate list for paperback graphic novels and hardcover graphic novels. DC has three of the top four spots on the hardcover list. All periodicals markets are dying. Bookstores are going out of business in droves. I'm sure you're a better businessman than all those bookmongers as well. I'm not even going to begin to get into an argument over awards and whether they have any meaning vs. sales. |
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 19:30:35 GMT -5
But you can't believe what you see on message boards about comics, that stuff comes from a vocal minority who complain, not the bulk of the customers who buy, read and enjoy the stuff but don't take the time to kvetch about it online. If it were regarding pretty much anything other than comics I'd agree. But comics readers have become such a small insular group, weekly floppy readers specifically, that I think two or three of the largest comic book message forums combined is a decent sample size of the demographic. Marketing studies would rely on much smaller sample sizes. It's true, not everyone who complains is going to drop the comic. Some will habitually buy a product they don't like as long as it exists because they need their collection to be complete. But is that the market Marvel and DC really need to cater to? In nearly any other market, when the majority of the feedback is negative, they'd try to fix the problem. Comics is different though. The publishers say "My way or the highway" and about 30k people will reliably choose their way, while the million or so potential readers who chose the highway are written off as not true fans, casual readers, a market they don't need. I'm not convinced Marvel of the 1970's would write off the majority of the market as a chunk they didn't need. And while the number of people who actually left Marvel and DC comics over the renumbering is small, it's adding to a bigger pool of people who left over one modern age eccentricity or another that pretty much zero fans actually enjoy. Random anecdotal number at the lcs here in town when I was helping out, of 100+ subscribers, 3 were active on any kind of message boards/facebook groups, etc. dealing with comics. The vast majority of them never posted anything regarding comics online, or even looked for news or what not about comics online. They just bough the comics they liked, read them and kept on keeping on. Active message board and facebook group users among the comics community is really a small handful of the total comics community. The responses online to stuff is really atypical to the baseline customer response because it is being framed by the people who are most dissatisfied and most active on line, and one breeds the other because there is a really big mob mentality in comic posting on a lot of sites. In fact I am inclined to suspect that the most active posters in comics communities are most likely to acquire their comics through mail order services (like DCBS) or digitally and not be among the group who frequent the comic shops any longer, which is really a subset of the community, but that is just a theory and I don't have any hard date to back that one up. However of the 6-8 local shops in the area of which the one here in town is the smallest in terms of pull list base, I've yet to run into any of their customers when I did store signings, con appearances, etc. that were active message board posters in comics communities. The closest I've come is people from Columbus which is 45 minutes away. It really is a small minority making a big noise on the message boards. -M |
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 22:14:21 GMT -5
If their market share wasn't steadily declining, if they weren't basically snubbed in the NYT bestsellers list, or any list outside the direct market, and if the direct market weren't dying, if the two companies who were responsible for 70% of the market weren't being beaten at the Eisners by companies responsible for 5% of the market, I'd agree. That's not the case though. Where's your proof? Honestly. I just Googled and picked two months...but...Jan 2014 and Jan. 2015 I don't see a steadily declining market share. www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=144835www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=159847NYT Bestseller list? Ummmm...I have to assume you're talking trades/graphic novels. Because periodicals aren't eligible. If so...there's a separate list for paperback graphic novels and hardcover graphic novels. DC has three of the top four spots on the hardcover list. All periodicals markets are dying. Bookstores are going out of business in droves. I'm sure you're a better businessman than all those bookmongers as well. I'm not even going to begin to get into an argument over awards and whether they have any meaning vs. sales. Diamond isn't the overall market. It only represents the direct market, which is not where the major growth is. And yes, I was talking trades. Awards seem to have meaning to something, since the NYT Bestsellers list tends to lean toward award winners. And since 30 years ago when Marvel and DC were pretty much the entire market at Gary Groth had nothing but a fanzine, compared to today, where Groth's publishing empire has grown from one periodical to a comic publishing empire with retail outlets, self distribution, and representing hundreds of the most renown comics creators in history, from the Golden Age to today and both domestic and international. Marvel and DC seem to not be selling as well as they did thirty years ago though. The common explanation is the market is shrinking, but it didn't for Gary Groth. Why is that? You're looking at Jan 2014 and Jan 2015. Look at Jan 2000, or Jan 1985. Right now the two publishers share about 65% of the direct market. Marvel is almost completely lacking representation outside the direct market, and DC holds maybe 10%. Look at the NYT top ten over the course of a couple years. Notice which comics last a month on the list, and which ones last five consecutive years on the list? DC may have a temporary spot in the HC list, how about the softcovers? One out of ten is a super hero comic. Bookstores may be closing, but the TPB market is growing. Print isn't dead yet, and even if it were dying, the unit sales on TPB's has been increasing annually, as well as the TPB section in remaining book stores. Not all that uncommon for a comic TPB to make the real bestsellers list on NYT or B&N or Amazon these days. If there is a future to comics, it's there, not in comic shops. |
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 22:18:55 GMT -5
I'd be satisfied if they put Volume 2,3,4 etc somewhere on the cover, especially when a new series follows on immediately from the prior one.
I didn't keep up with Daredevil (2011) and its subsequent series (2014) so I'd have a hard time putting correct runs together if they're all mixed in a box especially since every issue also has at least one variant.
I'm better off with runs like Punisher...but most of my comic reading friends would get Garth Ennis runs mixed up if they had to pull them from a disorganised longbox.
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 22:48:52 GMT -5
It would work if they made runs more insular and creator driven. Sign on a creative team for 24 issues or so, split it up into a couple arcs, name it "Daredevil and the blah blah blah" and then collect it in a couple trades. Repeat with a new team, a new series, and a new title.
They're afraid to do it though probably for the same reason they're afraid to put too much effort into a new character that isn't derivative of their a list characters (A new symbiote costume or claw and healing factor character is fine, a new character completely unique and not related to Spiderman or Wolverine, not so much) or even a classic character that isn't on the A list. They like what they like and that's comics having the same title for 50 years even if the numbering is wacky, and EVERYONE shooting webs.
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2015 22:49:09 GMT -5
Where's your proof? Honestly. I just Googled and picked two months...but...Jan 2014 and Jan. 2015 I don't see a steadily declining market share. www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=144835www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/237?articleID=159847NYT Bestseller list? Ummmm...I have to assume you're talking trades/graphic novels. Because periodicals aren't eligible. If so...there's a separate list for paperback graphic novels and hardcover graphic novels. DC has three of the top four spots on the hardcover list. All periodicals markets are dying. Bookstores are going out of business in droves. I'm sure you're a better businessman than all those bookmongers as well. I'm not even going to begin to get into an argument over awards and whether they have any meaning vs. sales. Diamond isn't the overall market. It only represents the direct market, which is not where the major growth is. And yes, I was talking trades. Awards seem to have meaning to something, since the NYT Bestsellers list tends to lean toward award winners. And since 30 years ago when Marvel and DC were pretty much the entire market at Gary Groth had nothing but a fanzine, compared to today, where Groth's publishing empire has grown from one periodical to a comic publishing empire with retail outlets, self distribution, and representing hundreds of the most renown comics creators in history, from the Golden Age to today and both domestic and international. Marvel and DC seem to not be selling as well as they did thirty years ago though. The common explanation is the market is shrinking, but it didn't for Gary Groth. Why is that? You're looking at Jan 2014 and Jan 2015. Look at Jan 2000, or Jan 1985. Right now the two publishers share about 65% of the direct market. Marvel is almost completely lacking representation outside the direct market, and DC holds maybe 10%. Look at the NYT top ten over the course of a couple years. Notice which comics last a month on the list, and which ones last five consecutive years on the list? DC may have a temporary spot in the HC list, how about the softcovers? One out of ten is a super hero comic. Bookstores may be closing, but the TPB market is growing. Print isn't dead yet, and even if it were dying, the unit sales on TPB's has been increasing annually, as well as the TPB section in remaining book stores. Not all that uncommon for a comic TPB to make the real bestsellers list on NYT or B&N or Amazon these days. If there is a future to comics, it's there, not in comic shops. Floppies have print runs of tens of thousands, trades (unless it's something that catches the zeitgeist like Walking Dead, rarely break 10K print runs for Diamond and the book trade combined. They are not enough to sustain the industry or a shop. They are a supplementary piece of the industry. Brian Hibbs compiles the Book Scan numbers every year for trades sold in the book market (i.e. non-Diamond sales) in his Tilting at Windmills column and the Diamond numbers are available. Trade sales overall are shrinking not growing. That includes the spike in sales from Walking Dead and encompasses manga sold in bookstores as well. Floppies are growing marginally, but trades are shrinking, particularly manga which is down a significant percentage in sales from its peak a decade ago. The data is out there if you want to check numbers before you make assertions about what sectors of the market are growing and shrinking. I am not sure what data you are using to put forward the idea trade sales are increasing because available data doesn't bear that out. As for NEw York Times bestsellers and how they affect the market. The first softcover trade of new52 I, Vampire was a NYT bestseller, and the book was cancelled a few months later because those sales were not enough for the book to make a profit and keep getting published as a floppy. The floppies didn't sell. Trades sell a fraction of what the title does in floppies, and in the American market, if the floppy doesn't earn its keep with its own sales, trade sales are not enough to sustain it. It is part of the reason why the bigger America publishers tend to avoid OGNs with only a few exceptions. Most OGN lines they have tried have not been viable to continue sales wise. Marvel and DC do trot out attempts every year, but the market for them is not sustainable like it is in Europe. Also one major factor you seem to not take into account when looking at sales of comics between your 1985 period and current-prices of comics in that time have increased at a higher rate than inflation. Price affects sales a whole lot more than quality when the price increases higher than other goods on the market. That price increase rate has nothing to do with trades vs. floppies or legacy numbering, but it is one of the primary reasons sales on comics are down and shrinking relative to past levels of sales. These things matter and without considering them, comparing current sales and sales from past decades is just comparing apples and oranges. There is no correlation between the two. -M |
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