You forgot about the bookstore market in Scenario 8. Your success to failure ratio sounds about the same, if not better, for an indie attempting to compete in the DM these days. May as well spare the overhead.
Oh wait, you didn't forget the book market you just erroneously conflated it with selling online PDFs for a fraction of the cost.
You're correct, I dropped a paragraph that was in my head.
My understanding (limited, imperfect) of Mainstream book publishing is that the overwhelming majority of prose authors don't earn back their advances, and that, in the end, very few make anything like even Minimum Wage. Comics, naturally, take longer to produce.
Further, I've been lead to believe that book wholesalers do not want to deal with small presses, or worse still, what we call self-publishers, and what they call "Vanity Press". Looking at stock on hand at B&T for a number of small presses, they're carrying a tiny fraction of what Diamond might have on hand.
-B
1. I'm glad you liked the essay.
2. I would never argue that every book deserves a chance at the marketplace.
3. I don't understand any of your analysis.
4. The reason I didn't offer any specific solutions of the type you seem to be shooting for is because I reject the standards by which those solutions would be measured. In fact, I'm suspicious of the entire idea of solutions here. The DM doesn't have a broken bone somewhere on its person that requires we find the fracture and build the correct splint. The DM seems to me more like a borderline diabetic that I feel could benefit greatly from a lifestyle change.
5. I'd start with killing the minimums policy, drafting a positive formulation of Diamond's mission statement, identifying the systemic values that support that mission and then working from there. Anything more specific or more involved, Diamond can pay my consulting fee.
When your best scenario has an equal chance of turning into unicorns that crap chocolate ice cream, I think we have a problem, Houston.
I think Heidi just had a stroke.
You lose me pretty quickly with blaming consumers for having the gall to be discerning and educated consumers.
Consumers shouldn't trade-wait (which is a practice that can serve them well financially, as well as in other areas) because, essentially, the comic book industry doesn't currently do a good enough job to make them aware of a new release they are interested in and drive them into the stores?
The consumers need to keep buying floppies because it gets them into your store so that they might purchase more than they would have otherwise?
That'd be like suggesting that more Americans should buy new cars even when their current car is still working fine because it is their part to play in saving the auto industry.
Blaming consumers for looking out for their own interests is something I rarely see outside of discussions about the DM.
Tom:
"I would never argue that every book deserves a chance at the marketplace."
How about "of merit"?
"drafting a positive formulation of Diamond's mission statement, identifying the systemic values that support that mission and then working from there."
I'm not certain that Diamond has a mission statement other than "make money for Geppi"?
-B
Kevin:
"Consumers shouldn't trade-wait (which is a practice that can serve them well financially, as well as in other areas) because, essentially, the comic book industry doesn't currently do a good enough job to make them aware of a new release they are interested in and drive them into the stores?"
No, because trade waiting leads to loss of circulation and traffic which yields poorer selling comics, which yields ultimately more expensive trades -- OGNs typically retail for $5+ more than a serialized collection would.
I'm happy to sell $20+ OGNs all day long, but the truth is that only the smallest wedge of the audience, numerically. is willing to pay that kind of price for new work in any appreciable quantity. I think it is healthier to have 100 people buy a serialization then 40 to buy the collection, even if the 40 makes that ever so slightly more profitable.
-B
Diamond is already taking profitable stuff out of Previews. The big publishers' backlists are gone. And since I preorder online all my comics (I don't live in the US and that's BY FAR the cheaper way to get stuff), I'm now pretty much unable to buy older stuff from my online retailer.
So, yeah, Diamond is effectively pushing me to Amazon.
Besides, lots of books from smaller publishers that DO sell decently on other venues (manga, Cinebook's eurocomics) are also being left out, meaning that soon regular bookstores (and, again, Amazon) will become better places to buy comics (TPBs, not periodicals) than direct market stores.
In France a "comic shop" is just a specialized bookstore that orders comics from regular book distributors. Much like other specialized bookstores you might have seen before. I think that will be the future for US comic stores.
Which will pretty much doom the periodicals (except for the very few Marvel/DC/Archie books that are able to survive on the newsstands).
Best,
Hunter (Pedro Bouça)
"No, because trade waiting leads to loss of circulation and traffic which yields poorer selling comics"
Of course it does, and the big four have done good work to teach their customers just that: wait for the trade, because this is the better deal. One would think that they would do everything imaginable to make the monthlies more attractive to their ever shrinking customer base.
And their newest answer is the 4 $ comic. Good move.
As a customer, I feel ever more ripped-off when I see my tiny stack of bought comics and compare it to the substantially bigger stack I got not that long ago. And I resent that feeling. I know, I know, everything gets more expensive, but especially comics is not exactly a must have merchandise.
In what possible sense are consumers "at fault"? I detect a sense of entitlement that distorts the analysis.
Brian, few comic creators make more than minimum wage these days, DM or no.
I'm still basically not following you, Brian.
I'm guessing my answer to the first one would be "not necessarily" and my answer to the second one would be that maximizing profit for Steve Geppi would be a better, clearer operating principle than how they function now.
Only a guess.
Also, I'm guessing that people who are harshing on Brian for "blaming the customer" are being over-sensitive. I would imagine he's just citing cause and effect, not laying blame and calling for a reform of that aberrant behavior.
Brian,
Since I don't fit into any of the categories you described except "consumer," I can only comment on that particular role, but I do take some umbrage about the "behavioral problems" you present. Obviously, you're coming at the argument from the point of view of the distributor, and a vocal one intent on bettering the business at that. So I can see how you can point at the consumer base and say, "You're killing the business," and from your point of view that's what's happening, but from this consumer's perspective, the majority of publishers are looking backwards and the majority of distributors are content with standing still.
I sometimes liken the gradual decline of the comic book business to the music business, which has suffered from an even sharper decline in sales in recent years. The music business looked at the digital movement at fought against it, unable to control the rampant downloading and unwilling to drop prices or work with the consumer instead of against them. Now, they have smartened up and produce both digital and "physical" representations of their music, but the damage has been done. Consumers no longer trust the music industry to anticipate their needs and wish to acquire their music through other means.
Additionally, the music industry failed to see the market move from "albums" to "singles." In the digital age, people were now able to go download that one song they heard without feeling the need or desire to purchase an entire album, which they had been previously forced to do. This not only makes for a different kind of measuring stick regarding sales, it makes the scene more competitive: people have to fight harder for attention, because it is more fleeting.
The comic industry is the same way. These days, people want things faster, smaller and disposable. The up-and-coming American generation does not necessarily want to own the media it experiences (see the booms in iTunes, Netflix.) They see the previous generation's excesses and want to separate themselves by owning less and for cheaper. And they want to be environmentally sound and take up less space and resources. All of these things are a strike against monthly comic books.
So what do the publishers do? Fail to anticipate delays, raise prices, and reinforce the collectibility aspect of comic books. Basically, they continue to act as a niche industry when they should be looking to expand as entertainment. They could actively move digital, while diminishing production on monthly books to make them more collectible.
And what do many of the distributors do? Fail to play nicely with both publishers and consumers by not anticipating demand, not helping the industry anticipate direction, and operating as if perceptions aren't changing around them. They could be improving the perceptions of the "comic book store" by becoming active participants and donors to the community around them. Even if they are hygenic, many stores could
use a sharp reduction in clutter, which is frightening to many outside purveyors. They could try to promote what is not necessarily good, but marketable, as these are two entirely different things. And they could offer less expensive alternatives to the books that will inevitably flounder under the weight or price increases ("Like Hulk but don't want to pay $4? Buy Incredible Hercules instead for $3!")
The consumer wants what it wants. You can tell them they're wrong and that their music and movies and comic books suck, but they are at the mercy of promotion and in the end will accept what is given to them provided it is to their tastes. In this consumer's opinion, it is not the job of the distributors to tell the consumer what is good for them; it is their job to convince the consumer that they need what is being offered to them and, most importantly in these times of crisis, that their purchases are worthwhile and come with a long-term focus on development so that the mediums they are presented in will be worthwhile in the future.
(Sorry for the extra-long rant.)
Hunter:
"The big publishers' backlists are gone. And since I preorder online all my comics (I don't live in the US and that's BY FAR the cheaper way to get stuff), I'm now pretty much unable to buy older stuff from my online retailer."
I'm not sure I understand that one: all of those books are still available; they're just not listed in PREVIEWS as a line item. Diamond has something like 18k items in stock at any time -- 3/4 of those aren't in the current PREVIEWS.
Your retailer won't order something that is in stock for you? Or are you saying that you don't KNOW to order it because it isn't in front of you?
"In France a "comic shop" is just a specialized bookstore that orders comics from regular book distributors. Much like other specialized bookstores you might have seen before. I think that will be the future for US comic stores."
I can't speak for anyone else, but if I had to lose 10% of my discount in using regular book distributors, I'd probably have to close. I'd also need to stock a much more narrow selection of product.
-B
Tom:
"I'm still basically not following you, Brian. "
The tl;dr version would be basically "If publishers can create enough demand for their work, there wouldn't be any question about meeting Diamond's minimums"
Or is that too "blame the victim"?
-B
Michael:
"The consumer wants what it wants. You can tell them they're wrong..."
Yeah, but they're not "wrong", whatsoever.
What I'm saying there is that if you don't support what the publisher's perceive to be a financially viable package, then don't be surprised if you don't get that content in the end.
One unspoken differences between, say, music and comics is that in music "success" is often defined by the millions of consumers (a "gold" record sells to half a million people, if I recall correctly?)
[Not that a "gold record" means much today, I guess? But then a few months ago Apple was crowing they'd passed a BILLION downloads]
Given the potential rewards of the Big Hits, that gives you more "play around" money to try other and more fringy things.
Like, if it wasn't for Superman and Batman, DC would never have tried Paradox, Helix, Minx, the upcoming Crime line, etc etc.
IF everything became "OGN", and had to pay its own way (as it were), the number of comics being produced would probably drop by 75% overnight.
Whether that's a good or bad thing would depend on which side of the remaining 25% you'd find yourself as an individual consumer.
-B
Tom, your interpretation of where Brian is coming from in attributing "fault" to consumers is quite possible. It just doesn't read that way to me.
Even if it is meant the way you're taking it, the fault rests on the publishers and retailers. The consumers can only buy the products you provide and make an educated decision based on the options available. If they're buying trades to the detriment of the industry (which I don't agree with; more to the detriment of the DM), it is the fault of the businesses involved with making trades the more attractive option when it carries such potential to hurt the business.
Which is why it reads more to me as a retailer blaming their problems on the stupid customer. 
"If publishers can create enough demand for their work, there wouldn't be any question about meeting Diamond's minimums"
I like the analogy someone put up here earlier. Basically, if GM and Chrysler had created enough demand for their cars, there wouldn't be any need for them to declare bankruptcy.
Brian,
What is it that makes you so sure that, if we moved to more of an OGN product rather than floppies, publishers wouldn't be able to help subsidize risk taking on new products with the profits from the popular, established franchises?
What makes you insist that OGNs will perform exactly the same in a new OGN-dominated market as they have in an overwhelmingly floppy market?
And you say the consumers aren't wrong, but you're still chiding them with "don't be surprised if your not-wrong behavior causes things to get worse".
Kevin, I don't have the slightest objection to anyone criticizing the line of logic Brian's employed, I just thought that the implication in the initial burst of language was a bit much.
I suspect we may be on the same page in terms of how we see the relationship between certain moves and certain outcomes.
Joe:
"Basically, if GM and Chrysler had created enough demand for their cars, there wouldn't be any need for them to declare bankruptcy."
Heh.
Basically, it's like I said in the mention of the link to the Beat -- the first comment is from a motivated buyer who actually DOES actively use the tools provided to make their wants known... and they still didn't know the book was being published. If that was replicated just a few more times, that could be the difference between hitting the threshold or not.
Is the problem then the system itself, or the inability of a content provider within that system to properly communicate to the consumer?
-B
Kevin:
"What is it that makes you so sure that, if we moved to more of an OGN product rather than floppies, publishers wouldn't be able to help subsidize risk taking on new products with the profits from the popular, established franchises?"
20+ years of selling comics, and watching consumer reaction/behavior?
"What makes you insist that OGNs will perform exactly the same in a new OGN-dominated market as they have in an overwhelmingly floppy market?"
Two things:
1) The percentage of OGNs-to-periodical releases hasn't substantially increased in the last five years as a total percentage of output. Further, it is a truly (truly!) rare OGN that has "legs"
2) I doubt there are more than, say, 8 ongoing properties for Marvel and DC each that could actually sustain sufficient sales to be published in any form in an OGN-only world.
-B
"Is the problem then the system itself, or the inability of a content provider within that system to properly communicate to the consumer?"
Yes.
"I'm not sure I understand that one: all of those books are still available; they're just not listed in PREVIEWS as a line item. Diamond has something like 18k items in stock at any time -- 3/4 of those aren't in the current PREVIEWS.
Your retailer won't order something that is in stock for you? Or are you saying that you don't KNOW to order it because it isn't in front of you?"
I have to preorder online my comics - and I can't preorder what isn't available for PREorder!
I DO can order directly from the store, but that has to be a separate order (meaning I lose my accumulated discounts from my monthly preorder - which are significant) and depends on on-store availability. Remember, I'm dealing with an automated online ordering service NOT a flesh and blood person.
"I can't speak for anyone else, but if I had to lose 10% of my discount in using regular book distributors, I'd probably have to close. I'd also need to stock a much more narrow selection of product."
Huh, can't specialized, medium- and small-sized bookstores survive on the USA? Even selling product to a captive, dedicated audience like comic book readers?
There are specialized comic shops all over the world, but only the US has a direct market, the others have to work with newsstand and/or bookstore distributors. Yet they seem to be viable, even in some third world countries. But they aren't on the world's richest country?
The french are able to do it, do the americans surrender without a fight?
Best,
Hunter (Pedro Bouça)
I went through Previews, and I saw the solicit and ad for James Turner's book. Someone else missed it. I'm not sure what that means, or what else SLG was supposed to do insofar as Previews is concerned. As an aside, we all know it's easy to miss things in Previews because after two minutes of looking through it, your heretofore unused Vulcan-like second eyelids slide over to protect your peepers from going white and bleeding like the undead in Horror Express. Perhaps the customer who missed it was simply passing out when he got to those pages, after reading some Image solicitations for Witchblade or what have you, and doesn't recall missing a few pages in the sucker section.
Anyway, argue all you like, but Diamond is Diamond, and there is only Diamond. We ants can yell and shout and stamp our ant feet, they're in business to make money with their upfront publishers, the rest is an annoyance, most likely. And as much as I actually do like comic shops, contrary to my reputation, perhaps, most of them, like most of everything, are lousy and run as personal clubhouses and fan fiefdoms, as is their right, for good or bad. And consumers want what they want and are used to, not what "we" wish they'd like or think they'd like if they'd only wake up, that's not behavior particular to comics, that's human nature. Go fight human nature, you'll do about as well as fighting the Diamond monopoly.
I realize that's not helpful, and cynical, but I tend to think it's realistic, and that all we can really do is do the best we can given the game we're stuck playing. That's why the web is so important, despite the fact that I don't utilize it myself in my work. Marvel and DC will do what they do, Diamond will do what it does, and the other publishers and creators will do what they have to do to stick around in some way, shape or form. Efforts on Dan Vado's part in the small press have shown that few indy outfits have the time, resources or desire to work together towards any common goal. From my own experiences in retailing I've found that most retailers don't want to share information or ideas. Creators keep business matters close to the vest, by and large. So, we conjecture, and argue, because that's what we do. And things move along as they were, after the internet dust settles, we rack the Obama comics and hope they get us through to the next short-term fix and we talk about the Wolverine movie and we jockey for position in our respective fields and bitch about Diamond and the audience and the publishers and the creators and the shops. And we are largely on our own to navigate, exploit, avoid, co-opt, manage, scramble, fail or succeed. That's how it goes, that's likely how it will always go, unless the web someday becomes a sort of best-scenario jetpack future for delivering content to folks. Or Geppi bankrupts himself doing whatever the hell he's doing these days.
I realize this means nothing, and solves nothing, and just
Brian:
"Basically, it's like I said in the mention of the link to the Beat -- the first comment is from a motivated buyer who actually DOES actively use the tools provided to make their wants known... and they still didn't know the book was being published. If that was replicated just a few more times, that could be the difference between hitting the threshold or not."
Maybe I'm just reading your words wrong, which is entirely possible, but I don't think your point is germane. You're still saying the problem is the publishers aren't trying hard enough to get consumers to see their wares in Previews. (That assumes the customer should be savvy enough to read Previews diligently. Someone who goes to buy a car doesn't necessarily have to know when a car they'd be interested is shipping.)
I mean, yeah, sure, if a publisher could figure out some whiz bang super promotion to attract interested eyeballs, then yes, we wouldn't have this problem. But that can be said of any business, can't it?
On the Consumer end:
"if LOVE & ROCKETS is produced only once a year …. If you're only looking once a year for something, then you're just as likely to only think of it every 18 months, 24 months, whatever."
I manage to have a shelf of unread (picture-free) books, to be constantly reading a book, and to buy more books as they interest me without Haruki Murakami or Neil Gaiman or whomever on a clockwork release schedule to remind me I like to buy and read books. Only thing slowing me down is enough time to read ’em.
I’ll show up for the next L&R. Maybe I’ll be a month late (but probably not). Last week I read the latest Fables trade, months after I bought it. Yesterday, another fawning BoingBoing review reminded me I’m a few volumes behind on DMZ and ought to maybe catch up. I am always reading comics, I have a shelf with stuff on it I bought last week and last year, that I continue to work through. There’s D&Q and Fantagraphics stuff waitin’ there next to DC and Dark Horse stuff. I no longer need to visit my comic shop every week, but I spend as much or more there, and on comics in general. So my money is still there for the taking. AND it’s being taken.
A “fair chunk of this issue” is not my fault. In fact, none of it is. I buy what I want to read, and what I can afford to spend. When did I stop buying floppies? When they stopped appealing to me. If they appeal to fewer and fewer people all the time, maybe we are not the actual problem.
Are periodicals vital to publishers’ strategies? Then goddamn make me some periodicals I want to buy, oh, and put them out on time. Maybe then I’d be reading more than five or six floppies a month, tops, and feeling the need to visit my beloved LCS more than every two, three, four weeks.
PS. I love Tom’s line way up above, “borderline diabetic in need of a lifestyle change.” I need to learn the magic of such brevity.
Having worked in a general bookstore, this situation reminds me of the Poetry section. Most titles in that section are the big names, published by established and well-known publishing houses. In between, there is the occasional thin paperback (with the occasional saddle-stitched binding) by a marginal, but established poet, published by an erstwhile but small publisher. These lesser-known poets sometimes win a Pulitzer or a National Book Award, but most just sell to those who know the category.
My suggestion: every non-periodical comicbook published should have a sturdy cover and an ISBN/EAN on the back. It doesn't have to be thick, but should be 96 pages or more in length.
Maya Angelou has a 32-page hardcover book (approximately digest sized) which retails for $9.95. (978140006601
Sure, that's Maya Angelou, but it's an example of what can be done.
I'm curious... Diamond Comics and Diamond Book both distribute trade paperbacks from many publishers.
(http://www.diamondbookdistributors.com/
clients.asp)
Do those titles automatically circumvent the minimums?
As for Slave Labor, I looked in the January - May 2009 Previews issues, and couldn't find ANY product listed in the green pages. Nothing in six months?
Did you look under Amaze Ink/SLG? That's how they've been listed for many, many a year now.
"I sometimes liken the gradual decline of the comic book business to the music business"
The comic book business is not in "gradual decline". It had a massive boom/bust cycle about a decade ago that ended up massively and radically altering every damn aspect of the industry.
Perhaps that boom/bust could not be avoided but if it had been, today's comic industry would almost certainly look very different. I can't really say if it would be "different good" or "different bad". Nor can I say if the current industry could someone recreate or regenerate itself into that non-boom/bust model.
However, the current state of comics is not the natural endproduct of decades of market forces. It's the result of a lot of people going crazy all at once, and then not have enough money left afterwards to fix everything that got broken.
Mike
Hunter:
"I DO can order directly from the store, but that has to be a separate order"
Wow, that's a goofy system!
"Huh, can't specialized, medium- and small-sized bookstores survive on the USA? "
Not so much, no.
-B
Joe,
"You're still saying the problem is the publishers aren't trying hard enough to get consumers to see their wares in Previews."
Mm, no, I'm saying that PREVIEWS is the barest of bare minimum that a publisher can possibly do, and if all they do is the barest of bare minimum, then they should not at all be surprised by minimal orders (or less)
We've passed the day that "Look: I published this" is a viable business plan for anyone -- not even DC or Marvel!
-B
Possible Scenario #9: Diamond suddenly collapses due to bad investments, tightened credit, and harsh economic conditions.
DC scrambles to take over Diamond, but Time-Warner is not in much of a spending mood, and fears throwing good money after bad. Marvel jumps ship, and starts a new distribution enterprise that makes the old time retailers yearn for the halcyon days of Hero's World.
The whole thing collapses, taking most of the Comic Book Store industry with it. Comics go the way of Silent Movies, and Old Time Radio. Marvel and DC are not making enough money on sales to afford to produce new issues, so their digital future does not come to pass either. Don't worry for them too much though, there will still be plenty of money to be made from Superhero Movies, T-Shirts, TV Shows, Toys, Candy and
Games. People LOVE comic book characters, they just don't need to read them.
A few brave or stubborn folks still put out the occasional independent comic. There is the occasional graphic novel from the respectable press, but not very many since the book market is going down in flames too, with the shuttering of Borders, most independent book stores, and the further erosion of the BEA.
Loosing most of the new product, that makes up 90% of their sales, comic stores start to fold up like the daily newspaper.
A tiny, but demented band of retailers remain, to feed like vultures off the bones of the once proud industry. They adapt and buy back issues for pennies on the dollar and by the truckload from failing retailers, publishers, and ex-collectors. They sell to the few remaining collectors, and those modern-day Luddites that like to read old-school style, on paper. Most of these retailers will operate exclusively through the internet, as vintage comics are now far too esoteric to justify a storefront. It takes a national audience, that the internet provides, to produce enough volume to survive.
Any remaining stores will be a very rare sight indeed. They will be cramped, cluttered and out of the way. They are like that tiny shop, with the windows obscured by trash and clutter, tucked away in the bad part of town, that provides sharpening service for men's electric razors, and is never open.
You know, like most comic book stores are like right now.
"ONCE YOU BREAK THAT PURCHASING HABIT, it is extremely hard to get it going again. If you're only looking once a year for something, then you're just as likely to only think of it every 18 months, 24 months, whatever."
You've just described the world in which "real books" have operated for at least two hundred years. (And which movies operate in. And music. And stage plays. And just about every other art form other than superhero comics and TV shows.) Most creative types, in most media, don't provide a steady product month after month. And yet Stephen King, Stephen Spielberg, and Stephen Sondheim all manage to have successful careers and fans who follow their work. The Wednesday Crowd might be your main current audience, but it's not the only possible audience out there -- and it's an audience that has been shrinking and getting ever more ossified for a generation now.
Yes, there is a need to make the buying public aware that a new project by one of their favorite creators (novelists/bands/directors/graphic storytellers/etc.) is available. We call this publicity and marketing, and other media have learned many lessons in doing this that comics could pick up very easily...if they only realized that they needed to.
There's nothing uniquely snowflake-special about the comics form that requires it to be delivered weekly in thirty-two page packets; that's just an accident of history. And the business model based purely on that weekly delivery is already damaged -- probably beyond repair -- by the actual preferences and behavior of current comics readers. Those consumers are not going to go back to buying a huge stack of cheap comics every week like they did in 1985, and wishing that they would is not a viable business strategy. Figuring out how to profitably provide them with stories they'll love in the formats they prefer is.
I'm not an expert on this subject (just a consumer), but I'd like to see Marvel and DC and every other company that can handle it start selling their comics in an iTunes format, with a code for downloading a digital copy with each paper "floppy" edition published. That way the 4 dollar price point is justified, and they open another revenue source.
I'd also like to see trade paperbacks put out in tandem with the conclusion of a story arc. Would it stop some people from buying the individual issues? Probably, but you'd get that steady revenue stream from people knowing they could get the whole arc right away, and there'd still be people buying the issues weekly in addition. Not to say every title should probably try that, but some of the bigger ones, like the Spider-Man titles, or Batman, or the Avengers, could do this without taking too great a dip in single issue sales (I know I'd probably follow certain books monthly even if this format was developed).
I thought up the tpb bit when reading the thread and thinking about how I decided to stop buying Secret Warriors with the third issue and wait for the collected edition. Unfortunately the collected edition won't be out until September (I know two months isn't much of a wait from when the arc wraps up, but when you're looking forward to something it's not the greatest), and it'll be a hardcover. The hardcovers are nice and all, but they should be reserved for higher profile and classic stories, instead of half of the line of ongoing titles.
Sorry this isn't the most well thought-out bit, but I hope it makes enough sense. Just stuff that came to mind as I worked my way through the comments.
Have a good day.
John Cage
Hibbs,
"Mm, no, I'm saying that PREVIEWS is the barest of bare minimum that a publisher can possibly do, and if all they do is the barest of bare minimum, then they should not at all be surprised by minimal orders (or less)
We've passed the day that 'Look: I published this' is a viable business plan for anyone -- not even DC or Marvel!"
This is exactly the point. Diamond changed its policies and publishers need to adapt to the new requirements.
The DM has been a place where self-promotion is vital for survival for nearly a decade now. Creators like Warren Ellis, Brian Wood and recently Jason Aaron and G. Willow Wilson have gone over-and-above to get their books known.
I'd like to see evidence of SLG's big promotional push for Turner's work. Where were the interviews and the preview pages? The only place that really talked about it was "Robot 6" and Jennifer de Guzman (Editor-in-Chief of SLG) is a contributor.
If you're not willing to go all out with promotion, how can you expect an audience to materialize and by your product?
Brian Azzarello is one of the biggest names in (mainstream) comics and wrote one of Vertigo's best-selling titles. His book, LOVELESS, was prematurely canceled due to low sales. He himself admitted that LOVELESS was ultimately a failure because he didn't do enough to self-promote.
Your name alone and just putting the book out for sale is not enough anymore, and really, it hasn't been for a while now.
"You've just described the world in which "real books" have operated for at least two hundred years."
Go talk to ANYONE in the "real book" industry and ask them what they would give to have an economically viable periodical format for prose fiction.
And could we stop comparing comics to "real books" and start comparing them to other collaborative visual media like TV and movies?
Mike
MBunge: "Go talk to ANYONE in the "real book" industry and ask them what they would give to have an economically viable periodical format for prose fiction."
Isn't the point we're discussing here that the periodical format for graphic fiction is less and less economically viable everyday?
Mr. Hibbs seems to be arguing that the comic book industry would become only a shell of its former self if it wound up becoming only collected works (new and old). That we wouldn't get nearly the variety we have today.
So pointing out that the book industry survives, thus far, with that format is the appropriate comparison. That large houses have smaller imprints where they take chances on new works seems a lot like the whole "popular franchises subsidizing new works" thing.
Mr. Hibbs: "'What is it that makes you so sure that, if we moved to more of an OGN product rather than floppies, publishers wouldn't be able to help subsidize risk taking on new products with the profits from the popular, established franchises?'
20+ years of selling comics, and watching consumer reaction/behavior?"
All due respect, sir, but your 20 years of experience aren't with the market that you're projecting we'll wind up with. Your past experience with OGNs is in a market where they've barely even been 1% of the product offered. In a market where the customers have to deal with the reality that OGNs are how they'll be receiving their sequential art.
Basing how customers would behave in an OGN-intensive industry on how they've behaved in the last 20 years just isn't logical. I'm sure, based on the behavior witnessed when collected materials just started coming out, you'd have never thought trade-waiting would become an issue.
Why? Because you hadn't experienced a market where almost every series gets traded and is often solicited before the last floppy's-worth of story from its pages has hit the shelves.
But we've experienced that now. And customers have adapted to it. Just as they would with an OGN-dominated market.
Yeah, but Kevin, it's not a binary situation: one day we were this, the next we were that -- it's an ongoing transformation that I pay a LOT of attention to, and listen very carefully to not only what my customers are SAYING, but also what they're DOING.
So, I feel reasonably confident in my analysis, as a working retailer.
There will be portions of it I get wrong, no doubt (wouldn't be fun, otherwise!), but I can easily track the 20+-year trend of quantity of customers served and see that, as a general rule, fewer serializations, the smaller the ultimate audience is likely to be.
-B
Just wanted to say how happy it makes me to see such a lengthy, and yet, for the most part, intelligent & civil, discussion on an internet message board. This doesn't happen very often, so I thought I'd mark it.
Possible Scenario #2a: Geppi's non-Diamond empire continues to do what it appears to be doing right now: collapse. The Pop Culture Museum, Gemstone, whatever else, and they collapse hard enough to "Take Diamond With Them", and DC *has* to play its "too big to fail" clause that is reportedly in their contract, buying Diamond outright.
In this scenario, Marvel pulls out as soon as they POSSIBLY can, because they don't want their fortunes tied to their #1 competitor (especially when said competitor has become just a fraction of their new comics sales). Marvel finds someone else to distribute their comics, and, assuming said company doesn't completely fuck everything up, sending hundreds or thousands of comics retailers directly out of business (Cf: Heroes World) -- and that's a REALLY BAD ASSUMPTION -- then maybe just maybe you can start a viable second national distribution option.
There's an alternative to the second half of this scenario you don't seem to consider - after buying Diamond because of (essentially) force majure, DC then turn around and offer half of it to Marvel (and possibly also smaller stakes to Image/DH/IDW). If they're buying it because they have to, rather than because they want to become a distributor, and DC buying it *would* cause Marvel to look for any alternative, thus weakening the business, it would make perfect sense.
Comics, for the most part, are not a weekly event. They are a monthly event. There are new comics on the stands every week, just as there are new cds and dvds every week.
"Isn't the point we're discussing here that the periodical format for graphic fiction is less and less economically viable everyday?"
If the periodical format disappears because it's no longer viable, that's life. What we're discussing here is the value of that format and whether anything should be done to try and maintain it, instead of ignoring it or sacrificing it for the betterment of other formats.
Mike
That's a very interesting scenario, John, though I think the #1 argument against it would be the fairly massive anti-trust concerns of what would amount to a cartel of the largest publishers having an effective stranglehold on the market.
But, sure, it could happen.
-B
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Margaret
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