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Stephen Churay
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 March 2009
Location: United States
Posts: 8369
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 12:35pm | IP Logged | 1
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The birth of the tablet was the biggest blow to print. But, the desire to
read from print as opposed to a screen, I don't think will completely go
away. When talking comics, the argument for print becomes stronger
due to the collector market.
I really don't understand the mentality that feeding the newsstand
market would hurt your hold on the direct market.
I think the publishers just don't want to deal with returnables. Even
funnier is that it's my understanding that publishers not wanting to deal
with returnables is what led to the direct market. Magazine distributors
would send in a form on there return books and then were supposed
to destroy the books themselves. Instead, they were selling then out
the backdoor for pennies. Those that bought the books would then
turn around and sell the better books for decent cash, creating a
secondary market.
Before the distributors had a form to fill out, they were tearing off the
covers and sending them to the publishers. Before that, they were
sending complete issues. It's amazing that comics only means of
distribution today was born out of a black market created by there
laziness.
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16463
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 1:31pm | IP Logged | 2
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John Byrne wrote:
| ...And that, right there, is why Matt Hawes is one of the GOOD ones!! ... |
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Thanks, JB!
John Byrne wrote:
| ...When they left the newsstand they did so voluntarily, and with sneers on their faces. Greed was the driving force... |
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It's sad that the publishers couldn't realize how they needed the newsstand more than the newsstand needed them (not at all, mostly).
Stephen Churay wrote:
...I think the publishers just don't want to deal with returnables. Even
funnier is that it's my understanding that publishers not wanting to deal
with returnables is what led to the direct market. ... |
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It's not what led to it, but it is why the publishers went along with Phil Seuling's plan for a direct market system.
Before the Direct Market, early comics retailers would have to order through a newsstand distributor to get new books. Ordering that way, the costs were higher, a retailer couldn't choose what comics he or she received, they would be a bundle with a mix of titles with no guarantee on what was in that mix.
With the direct market system, retailers got a better discount and got to choose what titles they received, and how many of each title, BUT the comics were non-returnable. What didn't sell, the retailer would "eat". Publishers loved the idea because, excepting for damages or late titles, the product couldn't be returned, meaning when it sold, it sold. Retailers, especially back in the 1970s' and 1980s' were usually able to sell a good number of back issues, so not being able to sell all the comics as they hit the shelves wasn't always a big hit. The books might eventually sell as a back issue, sometimes increasing in value/price.
Things have changed.
I think that the Direct Market needs to offer comics on a returnable basis, anymore. This isn't 1977, and back issues don't sell like they once did, unless it's a "key" issue, usually selling due to news about a movie coming out based on a character in the comic.
Comic shops, naturally, are one of the few outlets that still bothers to carry comics. The costs are more, proportionally, for comics these days and the risks of ordering for a retailer is higher than it was a couple of decades ago.
Too many retailers order for subscribers to pull-and-hold, and hardly (if anything) for the shelves. Most comics when not selling in the first few weeks become dead weight that has to be discounted to sell. The internet has mega-stores that offer discounts the average brick-and-mortar shops can't afford to compete with these days. So in order to get retailers to take a chance on ordering titles, I believe that even the Direct Market has to allow returns.
As I note in my other post above, there is a LOT of things that need to be changed in this industry to make it more vital. Yes, some things affecting the industry is the result of changing times, but a lot of it is problems created by short-sighted, greedy, stuck-in-the-past mindsets. BOLD decisions and actions need to be taken.
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Brian J Nelson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 26 August 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 365
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 1:41pm | IP Logged | 3
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"When they left the newsstand they did so voluntarily, and with sneers on their faces."
I believe that...you were right...though, still, how many years ago was that? The point still stands that going back to the newsstands now is an exercise in futility.
"The birth of the tablet was the biggest blow to print"
I don't think print and digital should be thought of as competing forces. They are both sides of the same comics sales expression.
In 2011, digital sales were at $25 million, which was 3.5% of the overall comics sales that year.
By 2012, that number jumped to $70 million and to 8.7% of the overall sales. What is also interesting, the comic market itself increased in sales by $90 million.
In 2013, digital sales increased to $90 million. And the print market increased to $870 million. So, while digital increased to represents a little over 10% of the comics sales for $2013, print still accounted for nearly 70% of the increase from previous year sales.
As you said, the desire to read print comics will likely never disappear from this planet. But the strategic goal should not be to get people to read more print or more digital. The goal should be to get people to read more comics.
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16463
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 1:52pm | IP Logged | 4
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Stephen Churay wrote:
...Magazine distributors
would send in a form on there return books and then were supposed to destroy the books themselves. Instead, they were selling then out the backdoor for pennies. Those that bought the books would then turn around and sell the better books for decent cash, creating a secondary market. ... |
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Not quite. Some retailers (in this instance meaning those places selling comics and magazines they ordered through the newsstand, like grocery stores) that had to strip the covers would sometimes sell the coverless comics (and magazines) that were supposed to be destroyed to those readers that didn't mind reading a damaged copy. Back in an era before most people considered comics collectible, most readers were fine paying 2 cents to save 8 cents and read a "Superman" comic.
I don't recall ever hearing that the retailers didn't have to return at least some part of the magazine/comic to get a credit for a non-sale.
The way it went was like this (kind of like you were mentioning in your post): Early on, publishers might require that the retailer send the whole comic back. Later, because returns were at the expense of the publisher, they required only that the retailer send back the stripped cover, and eventually, just stripping the logo to a comic was enough for the publisher.
But retailers being able to keep a whole, un-mutilated comic and still get full credit for a non-sale? I never heard of that.
Stephen wrote:
| ...Before the distributors had a form to fill out... |
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The retailer had to fill out a form AND send it back with the stripped covers. The form is for the publisher and distributor records, the stripped covers were the proof that the books were supposedly being destroyed.
Stephen wrote:
...It's amazing that comics only means of
distribution today was born out of a black market created by there laziness.... |
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It wasn't "laziness", it was to reduce cost to the publishers and distributors. It was the publishers/distributors making the decisions behind returns and what was required to prove the books were unsold.
The back issue market didn't come from the sale of stripped comics, it came from organized fandom trading among itself. Fans found other fans to sell some of their comics to, and sometimes a fan wanted a comic bad enough that he would pay the other fan more to get it. Other fans saw this and realized there was a market for older comics, and that it could even be profitable. Still other fans saw this and documented sales in a "price guide", and the era of comic book collecting was born.
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16463
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 1:55pm | IP Logged | 5
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Brian J Nelson wrote:
| ...As you said, the desire to read print comics will likely never disappear from this planet. But the strategic goal should not be to get people to read more print or more digital. The goal should be to get people to read more comics... |
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I agree with this point. Digital comics aren't going away. Retailers need to work with the internet, not against it.
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Stephen Churay
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 March 2009
Location: United States
Posts: 8369
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 8:42pm | IP Logged | 6
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Matt, my info came from a Neal Adams interview. I actually listened to
it last night so, maybe Neil is mis-remembering. What he outlined was
that returnables at the newsstand distributor level, originally had to
send the actual comics back in to the publishers in order to receive
credit on returns.
Publishers got tired of dealing with the left over books so they started
asking for the covers and expected the distributors to destroy the
comics.
According to Neal, that system also got tiresome and newsstand
distributors were left on the honor system and just filled out some
paperwork. It was at this point that some guys started hitting the
distributor warehouses buy up these books for 5 to 8 cents a piece.
They would then turn around and sell key issues to friends and comic
fans for a couple of bucks a piece. They weren't selling them as new
books, they were creating what has become direct market back stock.
At this point, the brick and mortar comic shop wasn't really an idea at
this point.
Again this was Neil's recollections.
As to why back issues today don't sell as well...
The problem with what most comic shops today carry, is that a good
chunk of it doesn't go earlier than 1990. Sure there are some high
dollar books on the wall but not usually in the longboxes. Well, since
today's reader/ collector is older, they have all they want from that.
A lot of times I won't hit on a series until three or four issues in. Well,
I'd dive through back issues to try and catch up. I'd much rather have
the individual issues and since stories are six issues or more, you
need them all to understand what's going on. Unfortunately, shops
have or order pretty lean and mean so many times, a shop won't have
all the issues needed to get to the latest. Well, as a reader, what do
you do? You can take the issues they have and hope a shop in the
next town has the one or two issues needed or put the issues they
have back and wait three months for the trade collection. It sucks
because I enjoy the hunt for back issues, but in many cases it
becomes a futile search. So, I take the guarantee and wait for the
trade.
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4557
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 9:10pm | IP Logged | 7
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Stephen is correct. At some point (in the late 60s or early 70s, I believe) the major comic publishers adopted a system of "affidavit returns." This meant that instead of returning all or part of the unsold comics, the distributor simply sent the publisher an affidavit attesting to how many comics were unsold. They were supposed to destroy the unsold copies, but once they became aware there was a secondary market for them, abuses started to occur.
According to Adams, what happened next was that comic dealers began approaching the distributors and buying up hundreds of copies of "hot" books before they even made it to the newsstand. The distributor would sell to the dealers under the table, and report those copies as unsold even though they'd never even made it to retail outlets. As a result, many fan favorite books had reported sales that were inaccurate, because a significant amount of the books sold were reported as unsold. And there were a few instances of books becoming instant collector's items. A notable example is Howard the Duck #1, which was heavily bought up from the distributor by speculators, to the point that very few copies actually made it to the newsstand, and the book became instantly "valuable."
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16463
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 9:22pm | IP Logged | 8
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I had forgotten about "affidavit returns". I "Googled" the subject for more information and came across Jim Shooter's blog where he discusses the history of returns, and comics distribution in general:
Comic book distribution.
I know I read that before, too. Gah! My memory is slipping.
But even while some unethical retailers took advantage of the system, it wasn't that situation that created the back issue market. It seems the other way 'round, as it was the collector's market that motivated those more scummy dealers to play tricks with the distribution.
I know Neal Adams has claimed that he has signed more copies of "Green Lantern" issues than supposedly were sold in past interviews.
Thanks for the added info, guys.
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Brian Hague
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 14 November 2006
Posts: 8515
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| Posted: 03 December 2014 at 9:48pm | IP Logged | 9
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As I understand it, another drawback to affidavit returns was that it cost money to actually ship and deliver books and then later, pick up unsold copies and take them to the shredder. At times, the distributor would simply skip the middleman and shred the comics as they received them, fill out a high affidavit and be happy with that profit.
Any time there's a potential shortcut, you can be relatively sure someone's going to take it.
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4557
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| Posted: 04 December 2014 at 12:50am | IP Logged | 10
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Indeed. If I'm understanding correctly, the distributor's profit was not tied to how many books were sold, unlike that of the publisher or retailer. So when the return system that held them accountable was removed, they had no strong motivation to try very hard to distribute the books. And they had no motivation whatsoever to be honest.
In 1979 I moved from Minnesota to Washington, and I was surprised to find that DC's dollar comics were not available anywhere in my new town. I hit every store in town that sold comics, but none of them stocked dollar comics. A few months later I discovered a used bookstore that sold back issues of old comics and became a regular customer there. The owner then started selling new issues too, and one day he had several new dollar comics for sale among the new books. He told me the distributor had them sitting there in a box and in the back room, and didn't even bother trying to distribute them to stores around town, I guess because they didn't think they would sell. They just accepted the box each month, and let it sit there.
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Darin Henry
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 September 2013
Location: United States
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| Posted: 04 December 2014 at 1:03am | IP Logged | 11
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Just wanted to reply to some of what's been written here, particularly Stephen's comments and Matt's "Shape of the Future" thread:
I grew up reading and buying comics via drug stores and I've explored newsstand and drug store distribution for the comic books I'm publishing next year. It's a tempting prospect because of nostalgia but as others have pointed out, newsstands are almost as niche as comic book stores now. And drug stores may still have magazine sections but you rarely see anyone actually in them. And honestly, very few parents in 2014 would ever let their kids wander off by themselves to look at comics while they do their shopping.
Walk into a comic store on any given Wednesday and the shelves are lined with dozens of new titles, all fighting for the same four bucks. As daunting as it is to release a new comic into that ultra-competitive environment, the comic store is still the best way to find an audience for your non-digital comic.
As for the idea of increasing readership by lowering the cover price, a few weeks ago, a movie called Ouija opened in the US. It's based on a game or something but it's hardly a trendy brand and the movie got universally terrible reviews. Even though movie tickets cost as much as 15 bucks, tens of thousands of people paid it and Ouija raked in 19 million dollars its opening weekend, enough to rank number one at the box office on its way to making 50 million dollars.
Now imagine asking those same paying Ouija moviegoers to get in their cars and drive across town in order to see the first third of Ouija for five dollars. A month later, they can see the next third for five more dollars and then the final third, 30 days after that. Do you really think anyone paying five bucks for any of those thirds would feel like they got their money's worth? Of course not. Yet comic book publishers charge four dollars to tell 1/4th or even 1/6th of a story and they can't figure out why their sales go down every month. It's ludicrous. People want to buy monthly comics but time and time again the comics keep disappointing them.
Marvel, DC and especially Indie publishers are obsessed with making their books feel like movies but they ignore the fundamental thing that makes even terrible movies like Ouija successful - in exchange for money, studios give their customers a complete piece of entertainment! I truly believe the whole 'waiting for the trade' phenomenon is less because people want to save money and more because they want their money to buy them a beginning, middle and end.
As I mentioned, I will be publishing my own line of comics next year. If the company fails, it sure as heck won't be because I'm making the same mistakes everyone else is. Each quarterly book will be 64 pages and cost $5.99. Yes, that's two dollars more than what the average comic costs but at least every customer who pays for one of my books will be guaranteed a complete, satisfying, all-ages story by a team of experienced, professional creators. I may not stick around long but hopefully it'll be long enough to shake things up a bit.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 04 December 2014 at 1:27am | IP Logged | 12
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"When they left the newsstand they did so voluntarily, and with sneers on their faces."I believe that...you were right...though, still, how many years ago was that? The point still stands that going back to the newsstands now is an exercise in futility. •• No debate! Thru the Eighties and Nineties, the industry was like a car careening down a cliff road in a thunderstorm. I sat in the back seat saying "Don't you think we should slow down?" while others laughed and whooped and said there was nothing to worry about, enjoy the wild ride! Inevitably, the car went off the cliff, and then those same people turned to me and said "Okay, smart guy! You're so full of ideas! Tell us what to do now!" And I could only point back to the road and say "Back there I knew what to do."
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