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Matt Hawes Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004 Location: United States Posts: 16407
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 4:34pm | IP Logged | 1
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Rob Liefeld is my hero... Do pigs now fly??
Here is something he wrote on Facebook:
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Diamond Comics is an absolute shit show. They lost an order of 1000 comics and have repeatedly mislead and misinformed as to their whereabouts. I’ve heard horror stories for years about how terrible Diamond treats customers and now I’ve experienced it first hand. Incompetence all around. I feel terrible for the abuses that Diamond puts on retailers. Your company is deplorable Steve Geppi. One lie after another. Get it together...."
Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. is notorious among retailers for its horrible service, and it's been that way virtually ever since the company got a virtual monopoly on comic book distribution in the U.S. after the Heroes World debacle of the late 1990s. Love him or loathe him, Liefeld's public reaction to Diamond's deplorable service practices may actually have some impact and shed some light on the matter so that Diamond might eventually take steps to improve its game.
Well... I can dream...
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Robbie Parry Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 June 2007 Location: United Kingdom Posts: 12186
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 4:43pm | IP Logged | 2
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Diamond and the direct market have always bewildered me. It'd make more sense to employ an alligator to clean windows on an apartment block.
Where can one begin with it? Our host has commented on it far better than I could, but I am actually surprised that criticisms of Diamond and the direct market are few and far between. It's the anti-Christ.
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James Woodcock Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 September 2007 Location: United Kingdom Posts: 7581
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 4:47pm | IP Logged | 3
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I really don’t understand how this is not anti-competitive.
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Matt Hawes Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004 Location: United States Posts: 16407
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 4:55pm | IP Logged | 4
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Robbie, there is good about the Direct Market, but Diamond doesn't help matters.
James, there was an investigation by the Department of Justice into the possible monopoly by Diamond in the late 1990s, but nothing came of it. I don't know if it was because the comic industry was too much "small potatoes" for the government to give a damn, or if it was because, strictly-speaking, there were other distributors that could carry comics. The thing is, Diamond had (and still has nearly 20 years later) exclusive agreements with Marvel, DC, Darkhorse, and Image (and maybe IDW these days, too).
As we in the industry know, though, when you have exclusive agreements with those publishers, you own the market.
Edited by Matt Hawes on 21 October 2017 at 4:56pm
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Adam Schulman Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 22 July 2017 Posts: 1717
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 5:44pm | IP Logged | 5
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Now if he'd only learn how to draw properly...
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Matt Hawes Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004 Location: United States Posts: 16407
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Posted: 21 October 2017 at 5:48pm | IP Logged | 6
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Adam, if that happened then pigs would truly have learned to fly!
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Shane Matlock Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 August 2012 Location: United States Posts: 1760
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Posted: 22 October 2017 at 4:24pm | IP Logged | 7
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From everything I've read about Liefeld over the years he's actually a great guy that rarely has a bad word to say about anyone, even people that have had mocked his lack of artistic skills (I have to admit I laughed at JB's Liefeldesque character in She-Hulk and have had plenty of my own cracks about his art over the years, because, well, look at it). So if he does have some bad things to say about Diamond, it's with good reason (and echoes what I've heard from retailers about this monopoly for years). Most of the Image founders were actually pretty nice dudes, from Liefeld to Lee to Valentino. I think Image's biggest problem from a PR standpoint was that Todd McFarlane wasn't and was the most outspoken one.
That said, I believe when Liefeld was riding high on his success he was pretty hard to deal with as evidenced by the fact the rest of the Image founders voted him out.
Edited by Shane Matlock on 22 October 2017 at 4:26pm
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Stephen Churay Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 March 2009 Location: United States Posts: 8369
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Posted: 22 October 2017 at 4:51pm | IP Logged | 8
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I've had high dollar items come up allocated, unshipped or just plain missing. This is money I'm willingly giving to my LCS, that they will never see.
I miss Capital. They rarely shipped damaged books, had a great customer service department and never lost my LCS's books.
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Shane Matlock Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 August 2012 Location: United States Posts: 1760
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Posted: 22 October 2017 at 5:31pm | IP Logged | 9
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I've noticed at my own comic shop a lot of books get damaged by Diamond in shipping. And instead of sending them back for replacements, they usually just put them out for sale and most of the time it's the ones they pull for the pull lists while putting the undamaged ones on the shelf. Just about every week I have to put the damaged books on the shelf that they pulled and grab one that isn't damaged. I used to think it was coincidental but it's happened so many times at this point that it's obviously intentionally done. Though sometimes it's a case of every single comic of a certain title showing up damaged. I'd buy from another comic shop, but much like Diamond, they are the only game in town.
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