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John Richard
Byrne Robotics Member
Membership Canceled
Joined: 20 March 2008
Posts: 59
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 12:02pm | IP Logged | 1
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Given that comics were starting to disappear from newsstands and
conventional outlets at that time, and hence overall readership was
declining, it is likely that speculation was a factor in any comic that had a significant sales increase during that time.
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Try to stay in the ballpark, that is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard.
Then where are the comics, where is the glut of unwanted comics from 1980 to 1990?
Edited by John Richard on 04 May 2008 at 12:04pm
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 12:43pm | IP Logged | 2
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You don't seem to have much, if any, grasp of the arcane processes by
which comics were sold before the Direct Sales Market became virtually
the sole venue.
First, there was the matter of printing and distribution. Because the
methods employed for both were so antiquated, Publishers had to
produce huge over-runs in order to be sure the number of comics
necessary would actually reach the marketplace. This was one of the
reasons success of a title used to be judged not on the number of issues
sold, but on the percentage of print-run sold. If that number dropped
below 50%, it really didn't much matter how big the number appeared to
be, the book was usually axed. (X-MEN was cancelled selling about
double what an average issue of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN sells these
days.) Spoilage, non-shipment and other such loses accounted for a lot
of books that didn't find a way into the marketplace, too, with the result
that the a title usually had to print close to twice as many as were actually
expected to be sold, just to be sure the desired number would reach the
customers.
Then there were returns. If books didn't sell, every month the vendors
would scoop 'em off the rack, tear off their titles, and send these back to
the distributor (the title banner, not the books). These vendors then got
their money back on the unsold books, and the unsold books (those they
were not bagged and sold illegally in after-markets like Mom&Pop
grocery stores) were destroyed or ended up in landfill.
One of the reasons old comics used to be "valuable" was that they were
rare. I have been told that, due to time, returns, and WW2 paper
drives, there are only six copies of ACTION COMICS 1 known to exist.
Until the arrival of the Speculator Mentality and the DSM, this was true of
many books. There was no "glut" because it was really, really hard to get
the books out into the market, and those that didn't make it were
destroyed. Of those that did, many came back and were also destroyed.
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Michael Huber
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 August 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 3338
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 3:05pm | IP Logged | 3
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I remember TMNT's #1 coming out and going stupid ( err up in price astronomically ). I think it was due to a tiny print run and low advertising to the shops. But wasn't that around 81-83ish? It seems to me that people were starting to buy "extra" copies right around/after that issue went nuts. I sold my copy at that time for roughly $70.00. Another issue I remember going high was X-men #94. I still have it and my #2 of the Turtles, 1rst printing.
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 3:45pm | IP Logged | 4
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Michael wrote:
| ...I remember TMNT's #1 coming out and going stupid ( err up in price astronomically ). I think it was due to a tiny print run and low advertising to the shops... |
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It was also fueled by the news that much of the first printings were destroyed. I forget the details. Anybody else recall what I am talking about?
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Paul Greer
Byrne Robotics Security
Joined: 18 August 2004
Posts: 14190
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 3:56pm | IP Logged | 5
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I've never read a copy of TMNT. When I heard all the hub-bub that issue one was worth a bunch of money, I thought why buy a comic I couldn't afford. I didn't have a comic shop close by and knew that when I got there the next issue would be overpriced as well. I skipped out on the whole mania that was the Ninja Turtles.
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Michael Huber
Byrne Robotics Member
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Location: United States
Posts: 3338
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 4:11pm | IP Logged | 6
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I think the rumor was a truck carrying issues was in an accident and they were destroyed. I twas a long time ago, but that pops to mind. True? I haven't any idea.
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John Richard
Byrne Robotics Member
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 9:06pm | IP Logged | 7
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The hoarding of individual event comics did happen in the 80's, but to influence the annual sales report, by 20,000 issues, would mean that 240,000 comics would be bought, at .50 cents an issue, that would be $120,000.
A comic does not have an average increase of 35% for an entire year because of speculators, that is just foolish.
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4649
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| Posted: 04 May 2008 at 10:00pm | IP Logged | 8
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John Richard wrote:
| A comic does not have an average increase of 35% for an entire year because of speculators, that is just foolish. |
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If you'll go back and read my earlier post more slowly, you may notice that I did not say speculation accounted for the entire sales increase in question. I said that speculation was a factor in the sales increase.
Was there speculation going on in the early 80s? I saw it at my LCS. I read about it happening elsewhere in the fan press. Again, it was nothing like the magnitude of the early 90's, but many fans were buying double or triple copies of "hot" titles. Every month, not just occasionally.
We know that overall comics readership was going down in the 80's. Given the fact there were less total comic buyers and speculation was occurring, does it seem far-fetched to conclude that sales increases might partly be due to speculation?
Why is there no huge glut of unwanted copies of these early-80's X-Men issues? It doesn't inevitably follow that everything that is speculated upon will lose value. Remember the speculation was on a smaller scale (2-3 issue buyers as opposed to 10-20 issue buyers). And remember that back then a significant portion of the overall sales were to casual readers who threw away their copies, thus thinning the supply (as opposed to the 90s when pretty much all the sales were to fans who hoarded them). And the X-Men have retained their popularity in a way tinfoil Liefeld covers have not. In this case speculation might have worked out to provide a modest return for the speculators.
Edited by Jason Czeskleba on 04 May 2008 at 10:06pm
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