|
|
Post by hondobrode on Jul 19, 2014 14:39:08 GMT -5
Hey, I agree, screw the Direct Market, but let's not pretend mainstream comics wouldn't take a gigantic dive if that happened. Fantagraphics would be okay, and I'm fine with that. The entire reason Fantagraphics would be okay is Diamond already all but pushed them out of the floppy market though. What's the last Fantagraphics floppy you saw at the LCS? to be fair fantagraphics was ok because of the sheer amount of porn they (used?) to publish which wouldnt get stocked in most LCS That's why they got into that market years ago. I thought then, and still think, it's a very smart move. That stuff will always sell, and mostly, no one else was in that segment. Gary Groth isn't a prude, and supports free speech, and knows what sells. Years ago he said he wouldn't do it otherwise, but felt he had to in order to keep the company afloat. Especially with the non-mainstream and more artistic items in his line up, I very much agree and am glad that he's been able to stay in business. I'd be brokenhearted if Fanta went under. |
|
|
|
Post by hondobrode on Jul 19, 2014 14:57:56 GMT -5
Does anyone remember these guys, that were trying to market to the Average Joe and circumvent Diamond ?  Obviously a fail, for many reasons, but they at least tried. I still think it can be done, but it would be best if it was a writer/artist who kept expenses minimally and printed small runs with some bonuses, like a scratch off card they'd include to win prizes like a free subscription, original art, or an autographed copy. Do minimum runs, I think 2,500, put a different cover on every time. Keep your day job though. I think that's what a lot of people don't do. They need an income stream not depending on this to pay the bills. |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 19, 2014 15:02:23 GMT -5
Here's a little sales perspective for you, some stats I got form Michael Stackpole in his seminar on breaking in the business as a writer at Origins last year... -98% of all self-published ebooks don't break double digits in sales, which is why book publishers rarely look to carry or pick up stuff that is too small for them, if it doesn't look like it will move a minimum number of units they want no part of it and those writers have to find alternate means to get their books to customer, which is an uphill battle -90% of all books printed won't reach 10K in sales in their lifetime -many publishers pay non-established writers on the back end, so those books don't end up costing them as much to produce if they don't sell, and if in the group of that year's offerings, one or two books strike gold and produce an author that will sell in the future, it's worth their investment for the year -the most consistent selling sector of the bookmarket is serials, and romance serials are tops among them, proven sellers, proven writers, telling proven stories with proven tropes. -fresh new innovative content doesn't pay the bills, because it rarely sells unless it picks up the right kind of critical buzz that creates a grassroots support movement, so publishers are looking for stuff that fits the mold of proven sellers not original or innovative stuff in other words, the book market looks a lot like the comic book direct market and Diamond behaves in a manner very similar to book publishers. Neither wants to deal with product that doesn't move a set number of units, both focus on proven sellers and highlight known commodities in their sales slates, etc. If small book publishers want to get into bookstores, they can, but they have to do a lot of the sales calls, marketing, and delivery of the books themselves. The same is true of small comics publishers. Our shop gets 15-20 e-mails, 4-5 snail mail letters, and maybe 6-8 cold phone calls each month from small publishers looking to place their books in our shop. They're too small for Diamond. Most often our answer is no, because the margins are slimmer for us than something we might get from Diamond and chances it will sell to our customer base is slim to none. Of course we say no to about 90% of the stuff in the Diamond catalog because it won't sell to our customer base too, so how it's distributed doesn't matter to us as much as if our customers will buy it. If we had a snowball's chance in hell of selling the stuff in the shop, we would bring it in, from Diamond or not. Small publishers don't have an inherent right to be distributed by Diamond. And most of those small book publishers you are talking about, they've gone out of business, or if they were successful, were bought out by one of the big 6 publishers. If comics worked like the book publishing industry, Image would have been bought out by Marvel or DC as soon as it became successful and become an imprint under their umbrella. Dark Horse too. IDW three. etc. etc. etc. Would comics be better off operating that way? For those who aren't familiar with book publishing-this is the big 6: Big Six (publishing)Hachette (publisher) Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group/Macmillan Penguin Group HarperCollins Random House Simon & Schuster almost every label in book publishing is an imprint under one of those 6 umbrellas. They dominate the book market even more than Marvel/DC dominate the comics direct sales market. -M I'm not talking about self published digital comics. I'm talking about actual physical comics. Long running series, sometimes decades long series. Diamond is nothing like book publishers, because they don't publish anything. They distribute, and they hold the ABSOLUTE monopoly on monthly floppy distribution, everywhere. You buy your comics at the LCS, they were distributied by Diamond. You buy your comics online, they were distributed by Diamond. You buy your comics anywhere, as long as they are floppy, they were distributed by Diamond. Excluding a handful of micropublishers you can buy direct from. If you're a comic book publisher and you have a falling out with Diamond, you're not going to be selling floppies anymore, to anyone, anywhere. Sure, you can still sell trades (And about half of those are distributed by Diamond) but the profit margins are a fraction of floppies and the sales are a fraction of floppies. While the highest selling TPB may be 7000 units, the highest selling floppy will be 100,000 units. The difference in price, about 100%. The difference in page count, about 1000%. This is different from Amazon because Amazon is not the absolute monopoly distributor of books. Sure, they're the largest, but the largest out of a more diverse pool of options. When you buy your books at the book store, they did not come from Amazon. When you buy your books from subscription book clubs, they did not come from Amazon. When you buy from the grocery store, the truck stop, the airport, and often times even when you buy from online retailers, the book did not come from Amazon. Amazon isn't even the only large online retailer of books. There's still B&N. Amazon is a profitable avenue for book sales. Diamond is the ONLY avenue for floppies. And Diamond is no stranger to bullying smaller publishers (and we're talking fifth largest publisher in books. The difference in first and fifth in book publishing is probably much closer than first and fifth in comic book publishing.) and even pushing them out of the direct market completely. Diamond is also no stranger to strongarm dictating the cost of digital content, only they are strongarming for more expensive digital content, not cheaper content. Either way, it's the same exact thing. If you buy comics at all, you're supporting at least one company as bad or worse than Amazon. |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 19, 2014 15:05:52 GMT -5
Does anyone remember these guys, that were trying to market to the Average Joe and circumvent Diamond ? Obviously a fail, for many reasons, but they at least tried. I still think it can be done, but it would be best if it was a writer/artist who kept expenses minimally and printed small runs with some bonuses, like a scratch off card they'd include to win prizes like a free subscription, original art, or an autographed copy. Do minimum runs, I think 2,500, put a different cover on every time. Keep your day job though. I think that's what a lot of people don't do. They need an income stream not depending on this to pay the bills. I think it can be done, and is going to happen. Just not overnight, and when it does happen it will probably be the end of the direct market as we know it. I think we're going to see a more direct path from publisher to consumer, if not direct sales to the consumer, then direct sales to the retailer from the publisher, with internal distribution. |
|
|
|
Post by hondobrode on Jul 19, 2014 15:22:48 GMT -5
I think so too. With the internet, it could be done, but not fanzine junk with negligible talent.
|
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 19, 2014 15:42:10 GMT -5
I'm not talking about self published digital comics. I'm talking about actual physical comics. Long running series, sometimes decades long series. Diamond is nothing like book publishers, because they don't publish anything. They distribute, and they hold the ABSOLUTE monopoly on monthly floppy distribution, everywhere. You buy your comics at the LCS, they were distributied by Diamond. You buy your comics online, they were distributed by Diamond. You buy your comics anywhere, as long as they are floppy, they were distributed by Diamond. I can subscribe direct to Marvel & DC and get floppies not distributed by Diamond. If I buy floppies to Barnes & Noble (what few they still carry) they are not distributed by Diamond. If you find comics at a grocery store newsstand, those aren't distributed by Diamond either. Diamond only has about 5000 accounts total in the US, and that includes accounts who don't sell comics but get comic related merchandise from Diamond. SO yes, the vast majority of floppies are distributed by Diamond, but not every one is, that's hyperbole, not fact. Also let's look at some economic realities of pricing for small publishers who want to get distributed by Diamond. For a Marvel book that has a cover price of $3.99, the retailer pays about $2 for and Diamond paid about $1 for. So Marvel gets a $1 for each copy. I've spent the last month getting price quotes from printers because lo and behold Our current printers just upped the minimum number of copies you have to get printed if you want to do business with them because low print runs weren't feasible for them any longer. So we were looking for alternatives. The best price quote for price per copy for a 24 page black and white comic with a color cover was between $2.17 and $2.71 an issue depending how large we went with our print run (and those print runs are nowhere near the Diamond minimums). If we tried to sell to Diamond at the mark ups that are standard for the industry, to cover just our printing cost & make any money for us, we would need to charge Diamond $3/copy. That means retailers would pay $6 a copy and have to charge customers $12 a copy...and who in their right mind is going to pay $12 for a 24 page B&W comic? If I wanted to have a $4 per issue cover price, I would need to charge Diamond a $1 per copy and lose over a $1 an issue just to get Diamond to distribute them (if they still did). Diamond doesn't distribute those small publishers because it is not economically feasible for either Diamond or those publishers to do so. Diamond is a business, they are in it to make money. Small press books like that are labor intensive to carry and unprofitable to sell. So why should they carry them? I dislike Diamond. Having dealt with them and their order form for most of the last 2 years, having seen the amount of damaged books we get each week, having experienced their idea of customer service, I am not a fan. I would love for their to be alternate means of distribution. But I get why they don't work with small publishers. And if someone had the start up capital and the will to create a competitor, there would be a lot of shops willing to ditch Diamond for sure, but it hasn't happened, and the few who have tried have failed, not because Diamond took them out, but because they didn't have adequate start up capital and an effective enough business plan Diamond stinks to high heaven, but they are not the evil empire you seem to want to make them out to be. All the woes of the comic industry do not lie at the feet of Diamond. Diamond certainly hasn't helped the situation, but they are not the root cause of those problems. -M |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 1:51:55 GMT -5
Warren Ellis in his Morning Computer journal on those reading devices... For more of Ellis' thoughts... Morning Computer
-M |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 2:33:30 GMT -5
I'm not talking about self published digital comics. I'm talking about actual physical comics. Long running series, sometimes decades long series. Diamond is nothing like book publishers, because they don't publish anything. They distribute, and they hold the ABSOLUTE monopoly on monthly floppy distribution, everywhere. You buy your comics at the LCS, they were distributied by Diamond. You buy your comics online, they were distributed by Diamond. You buy your comics anywhere, as long as they are floppy, they were distributed by Diamond. I can subscribe direct to Marvel & DC and get floppies not distributed by Diamond. If I buy floppies to Barnes & Noble (what few they still carry) they are not distributed by Diamond. If you find comics at a grocery store newsstand, those aren't distributed by Diamond either. Diamond only has about 5000 accounts total in the US, and that includes accounts who don't sell comics but get comic related merchandise from Diamond. SO yes, the vast majority of floppies are distributed by Diamond, but not every one is, that's hyperbole, not fact. My point about Diamond this entire time has been, what if you want something other than Marvel and DC? Bookstores stock about 30 floppies. I haven't seen floppies in a grocery store (besides MAD and Archie) in quite a while. I've never seen a newsstand in my life, we don't have them in California. |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 3:02:46 GMT -5
I can subscribe direct to Marvel & DC and get floppies not distributed by Diamond. If I buy floppies to Barnes & Noble (what few they still carry) they are not distributed by Diamond. If you find comics at a grocery store newsstand, those aren't distributed by Diamond either. Diamond only has about 5000 accounts total in the US, and that includes accounts who don't sell comics but get comic related merchandise from Diamond. SO yes, the vast majority of floppies are distributed by Diamond, but not every one is, that's hyperbole, not fact. My point about Diamond this entire time has been, what if you want something other than Marvel and DC? Bookstores stock about 30 floppies. I haven't seen floppies in a grocery store (besides MAD and Archie) in quite a while. I've never seen a newsstand in my life, we don't have them in California. I do what I do whenever I can find what I want at the store I am at or locally comics or just general merchandise, look for another store, shop online at an online retailer or ebay, or use the net to find someplace that does carry what I want. If distribution is spotty I go direct to the producer to see if I can get it through them, or I look for alternatives. In this case, i.e. comics, it's buying digital versions instead of print or buying trades instead of floppies. It's the same when I am looking for certain games from small indy game companies. Alliance the nmajor game distributor may not carry them because they are too small a concern for Alliance to deal with. I can't find these games in the toy aisle of the box stores. I can't find them in a lot of game stores. I can't find them in toy stores, so if I want them I have to find them...at cons, at shops who stock a good selection of indy games or will order them, or by going direct to the manufacturer. That's the way niche markets work. I can find Hasbro games just about anywhere though. Other publishers (Dark Horse, IDW, Image, Dynamite, Fantagraphics, or whoever) could choose to make their individual issues available outside Diamond and in places other than traditional comic shops if they wanted to. They don't because it is not economically feasible to do so, not because Diamond won't let them or is the bogey man preventing them from doing so, but because they are publishers and not distributors and don't have a cost-efficient infrastructure in place for doing so. That's not Diamond's fault. Diamond is not the reason those books are not available elsewhere, the fact it wasn't profitable enough for those places to carry books is the reason they no longer do. No retailer (comics, newsstand or furniture store) in their right mind fails to carry something they can sell and make a profit if they can help it. Comics weren't something they made a profit on selling, so they eventually stopped carrying them. Just because they were sold in a venue once doesn't mean that it is still profitable for them to be sold there now. The reason magazine sections in drug stores and grocery stores are smaller now is because sell as well. Comics are a part of that and hence they disappeared form newsstands. Direct distributors grew larger because newsstand sales were shrinking, the loss of newsstands was not the fault of the distributors. Heck Diamond wasn't even he top dog of distributors when it happened. Diamond didn't emerge as the top dog until the Heroes World Fiasco occurred and took a number of distributors down with it. Diamond was left in a position to pick up the pieces and last man standing to service the industry as distributor. You are correct that it is difficult to find floppies outside of places serviced by Diamond and even more so floppies from people other than Marvel/DC. but it's not that way because Diamond made it that way. Newsstands stopped ordering comics, periodical distributors stopped ordering comics for those places as a result, the direct market grew but the market for periodicals changed completely with the advent of the internet and web content. Periodicals used to be timely and relevant before the net, now they are behind the curve in terms of both. Comics were the least profitable of the entertainment periodicals most places carried because of their low cover price. When newsstands shrunk, there was only room for the most profitable periodicals to be sold, so even if someone wanted to distribute those comics to newsstands now, they would have trouble finding accounts that would take them. And amazingly, none of that has anything to do with Diamond and their minimum cut offs to carry books from publishers or their other questionable business practices. It is possible to create a new distribution system that does an end around the traditional direct market and Diamond, but to do so would require a vast capital investment to build up the infrastructure and operating capital to sustain until it grows to a viable size. No existing publisher is going to make that kind of investment, and there's not enough comics being sold to make it worth someone else's while. Marvel and DC are top dogs and are not going to shake up the status quo that has them on top. Innovation has to come from the bottom up in those situations, not the top down, and its just not economically feasible for one of the small fires or even a collective of the small fries to make that kind of investment. And again, none of that is Diamond's fault or the result of their business practices. Diamond has many faults and many poor practices, but they are often made to be the scapegoat for the woes of the entire industry, and those folks are barking up the wrong tree when it comes to that. They certainly aren't doing anything to make it better, that's for sure, but the mess was not of their making. They were just in the best position to capitalize on the situation to keep the chain of distribution moving when everything hit the fan. -M |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 13:29:20 GMT -5
But it is that way because Diamond made it that way. My favorite humor comic was literally put out of print when Diamond increased it's minimums. It was chronicled in this blog. ralphsnart.blogspot.com/What I'm wondering is, why can't Diamond distribute an indy comic that has under 6000 orders, but they can distribute a variant cover limited to 25? |
|
|
|
Post by thwhtguardian on Jul 20, 2014 15:53:01 GMT -5
But it is that way because Diamond made it that way. My favorite humor comic was literally put out of print when Diamond increased it's minimums. It was chronicled in this blog. ralphsnart.blogspot.com/What I'm wondering is, why can't Diamond distribute an indy comic that has under 6000 orders, but they can distribute a variant cover limited to 25? Because that 25 is in addition to x amount of copies they are already distributing to dealers who are willing to either pay a premium to have or have increased orders to meet the incentive amount because they believe there is a market for that particular variant. It's a completely different beast than the normal order threshold. Also it's not as if they increased that threshold for the dastardly reason of crushing indy comics, it likely increased because they decided it wasn't very profitable for them to distribute less than that. |
|
|
|
Post by Ish Kabbible on Jul 20, 2014 15:58:22 GMT -5
But it is that way because Diamond made it that way. My favorite humor comic was literally put out of print when Diamond increased it's minimums. It was chronicled in this blog. ralphsnart.blogspot.com/What I'm wondering is, why can't Diamond distribute an indy comic that has under 6000 orders, but they can distribute a variant cover limited to 25? Because that 25 is in addition to x amount of copies they are already distributing to dealers who are willing to either pay a premium to have or have increased orders to meet the incentive amount because they believe there is a market for that particular variant. It's a completely different beast than the normal order threshold. Correct.Or that exclusive edition has an extremely high retail price. I think MRP's multiple answers including the hard numbers have addressed these questions sufficiently |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 16:13:00 GMT -5
But it is that way because Diamond made it that way. My favorite humor comic was literally put out of print when Diamond increased it's minimums. It was chronicled in this blog. ralphsnart.blogspot.com/What I'm wondering is, why can't Diamond distribute an indy comic that has under 6000 orders, but they can distribute a variant cover limited to 25? Because that 25 is in addition to x amount of copies they are already distributing to dealers who are willing to either pay a premium to have or have increased orders to meet the incentive amount because they believe there is a market for that particular variant. It's a completely different beast than the normal order threshold. Also it's not as if they increased that threshold for the dastardly reason of crushing indy comics, it likely increased because they decided it wasn't very profitable for them to distribute less than that. The variant cover likely has a different diamond code, making it the same amount of effort to distribute as a completely different comic, right? |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 16:14:03 GMT -5
Because that 25 is in addition to x amount of copies they are already distributing to dealers who are willing to either pay a premium to have or have increased orders to meet the incentive amount because they believe there is a market for that particular variant. It's a completely different beast than the normal order threshold. Correct.Or that exclusive edition has an extremely high retail price. I think MRP's multiple answers including the hard numbers have addressed these questions sufficiently The Diamond minimums have no retail price factor as far as I can tell. Lets just say it like it is. They allow it because Marvel and DC are large clients, Marc Hansen is not. |
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 20, 2014 16:21:31 GMT -5
If it's a 1 in 25 variant they are getting the profits of 25 extra copies of the regular on top of the 1 variant sold to offset it. Are they getting sales for 25 extra books for that 1 copy of a small indy book?
-M
|
|
