- As a reader of both floppies and trades, In general I find floppies to be too expensive for what I get. I will read a first issue, possibly two then wait for the trade because comics at $2.99 a pop doesn’t make sense to my budget-minded brain.

- If I were a new reader I would want the floppies to be cheap and plentiful so I could spread my money around buy a lot of different experiences. That’s why I’ve supported FELL and CASANOVA (beyond the terrific tales within).

- By observation, I don’t see the industry encouraging new readers through either format or content. I read a couple of issues of 100 BULLETS and thought it was great - I would wait for the trade. Then I saw the price of the trade and yet again, my budget-mindedbrain said, “no.” 100 BULLETS is the perfect example of a book that should come out in the ESSENTIAL / PHONE BOOK format. Imagine a row of those sized books in the mystery-thriller section of the bookstore. Priced reasonably and always in print.

Mystery-thriller readers would flock to these books — THEN get the more costly color versions if they so chose. But when a series goes to trade and that trade is more expensive than the combined cost of the floppies…

It gets stupid.

I realize that you can’t do thissort of thing for every book, but there’s far better ways to encourage bigger and more diverse readership than the plan they have going. There are fans that would love a B/W MASTER OF KUNG FU ESSENTIAL with the work of Gulacy and Day, et al. It’s also a genre that pushes out past the superhero reader, and has press potential to sell books.

I realize I’m stating the obvious here, but if it’s so obvious then why hasn’t it been done? What part of the comics business model am I missing where you don’t grow your customer base with afordable products of value?

Just felt that it might be of very minimal value to state that, as a 15% superhero reader (that is, approx. 15% of my comics purchased are Marvel/DCU), I certainly wait for the trade. Every time. Haven’t followed a monthly series since… 2001, I think. Perhaps 2000.

Does this mean I’ve contributed to the cancellation of American Virgin? Perhaps. I did read the first two trades, thought them decent enough, but probably wasn’t going to get vol. 3. Decent enough isn’t really sufficient to justify indefinite purchases.

(I’m not really a fan of reading comics on the web. I find they’re often not formatted properly for a screen, loading the next page often slogs down the reading (even with cable), and frankly, I just like the tactile experience of holding the book. FYI, for those espousing that format. Then again, I’m in the techno-dark age. Why do I need a phone that can go online?!)

As far as the whole issue of launching new characters, etc. in the marketplace… it’s far too complicated for me to get into, and probably for me to understand.
Purely from a personal perspective, there are dozens of factors that play into my choices. AMERICAN VIRGIN got a trade because the subject matter seemed interesting, and the writer and artist were both creators whose work I usually find decent, and occasionally exceptional. This book I found decent. SIMON DARK (doesn’t have a trade out, which I noted earlier eliminates it from consideration anyway) has a writer I’ve never really enjoyed, has received very little to no positive word of mouth that I’ve heard, and honestly, has to compete with the rest of the DCU line for my attention. For me, there’s definitely a limit to how much I’d prefer to spend on Marvel or DCU properties. They’re a hell of a lot of fun in their place, but it’s not necessarily my bag. I hated HATED SuperFriends when I was six, after all.

So there you go — my purely anecdotal, completely personal validation of the “non-superhero readers” don’t read floppies/monthly/serials argument, with a dash of “where are the readers for new stuff” rambling thrown in.

Because they are stupid. That’s the only answer I can come up with.

There is still a lot of resistance in schools and libraries, but not as much as a lot of people think. Elementary school teachers especially are already used to books that use art and words to tell stories. The problem is usually getting them to understand that comics can be as elegant and literary as picture books, not that art doesn’t ever belong in kids books.

Scholastic and Tokyopop have already done a lot of the persuading of teachers and librarians for Marvel and DC. So they don’t even need to do that, they just need to bother to put the damn books on the shelves in bookstores. And yet, while the kids’ manga/comics section at the BN I work at now takes up a bay in half (the section itself is barely a year old) there are a grand total of four titles in the entire section by DC and Marvel combined. One copy each.

The kid’s graphic novel section at the library I work at is practically empty most days because the books are almost always checked out. And there aren’t any DC or Marvel titles there.

“Another thought, for those who think supperheros are past their day. How many kids do you think will grow up to be avid book readers, because of Harry Potter and Liminy (SP?) Snicket? ”

No, Superheroes they aren’t past their day. Superheros are really popular among kids. Heroes and magic and gadgets and special powers always have been, and always will be. (What is Harry Potter but a superhero in another guise?) Marvel and DC superheroes are still very popular among kids - they want to play at being Spiderman or Batman all the time. They even want to read about them all the time. We sell tons of kids books about DC and Marvel characters. They just aren’t comics/graphic novels. They aren’t even the kind of high quality picture book/easy reader that one could say is practically a one panel a page graphic novel -like Mo Willems easy readers. The pics are always there to give the kids something to look at while the parent reads, they almost never help tell the story.

Marvel and DC’s problem is that it’s already out there, they just aren’t the ones making it. Bone, Babymouse, Artemis Fowl, The Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Kat and Mouse, Phonics Comics, Amelia Rules, Amelia (different amelia) and ten kabillion cinemanga of everything from Spongebob to High School Musical. I even now have parents coming in asking for Bone for their kids.

Granted, not all of these comics are superhero comics, and a lot of the superheros ones aren’t “traditional” superheros. But, well, there’s a reason why Captain Underpants is insanely popular, and it’s only partly because Dav Pilkey is a comic genius.

Oh, and it’s Lemony. As in lemons.

And re: serialization, the best audience for serialization is kids. The younger, the more they want series. Kids just learning to read books with chapters practically refuse to read anything but series. Reading is still hard and kinda scary, they are often afraid of failing or being disappointed, so they want something they know they can handle and will like. Plus, little kids crave routine and repetition. Part of the trick, though, is that the younger the kid, the more definite an ending each chapter and book needs. It takes a lot of work to get through just a few pages, so they need constant payoffs. Plus, easy reader graphic novels need to have to easy to read sequential art, not just easy to read words. I suspect a lot of comic book publishers don’t get that, and so mistakenly think little kids don’t like comics. They do.

And re: Dark Hunger. Yes the stigma remains, but it’s shrinking. A lot. People who didn’t know what they were getting may have been pissed off, but I mentioned it to several people when I was ringing up other Feehan and paranormal romances and they at least sounded interested. Which explains the actual sales.

Gabaldon’s fans are super excited about her forthcoming comic (myself included). And it should very much not suck, since she used to write Donald Duck comics for Disney, so she has some experience with the medium.

I’ve lived in Mississippi all of my life and there are only about 7 comic stores in the state. 3 of those are within 30 miles of each other in the central part of the state. 3 more are spread in the southern and eastern parts of the of the state, and at least one may not even be open now. That is to service nearly 3 million citizens in the state, not all of which are comic readers of course. There are several chainbookstores that carry comics, but overall there are only a few more of them than there are comic stores. Also the conditions and selection at these chain stores are horrible and it is not uncommon for employees to damage the books while restocking or checking you out. So part of my concern is that there is a definate lack of interest in getting comics to the people. Are there even ANY other distributors besides Diamond?

Price drops may help, but that would mean a drop in paper and printing quality (I think). Unfortunatly, I think that “the market” is perceived as wanting the high quality paper and variant covers. Some people just want the story.

I don’t think that the traditional comic is going to disappear, but it may morph into a new form. Magazine size with more ads? Manga size with more story? Who knows. I think that the concern over the issue insures that it will be worked on before it is to late.

Using DC as an example, here are my suggestions/ideas on how to save the comic book industry (or at the very least, Marvel and DC).

1. ALL interconected ongoing and limited series DCU superhero,sci-fi,and horror comics should be both aimed at and suitable for kids/all ages. So no on panel graphic and bloody violent scenes,no cuss words (bitch, bastard,ass,or goddamn),and no strong sexual innuendos. This imprint would also be the home of licensed and creator own material aimed at and suitable for kids/all ages. And for the record, when I say “suitable for all ages”, I mean comics that don’t talk down to the readers and that can still deal with mature subject matter in a tasteful and subtle manner (like PAD’s HULK run,SPIDER-GIRL,and Larry Hama’s G.I. JOE and WOLVERINE runs).

2. Wildstorm will be home to creator owned,company owned,and license product aimed at teens and adults. This imprint will be able to get away with all of the things that I listed in the DCU imprint in terms language,sex, and violence.

3. Vertigo will be the same way as it is today, and would include company owned,creator owned,and licensed property aimed at adults.

4. All monthly ongoing and limited series will be combined and published as a line of over sized monthly magazines. For example all Batman related titles will be featured in a monthly BATMAN magazine.

I realized that I’ve been somewhat spoiled by big city comic shops, where a wide assortment of comics get more or less equal facing by a staff that’s broadly versed in books new and classic. I realized this because at present I have to usually settle for an outer suburb hole in the wall where they believe, and I am not exaggerating, that Image and DH are “indies.” (Perhaps in 1992.) Roughly 2/3 of the store is Marvel and DC mainstream, many of which get multiple facings; they don’t even order a full assortment of Vertigo. The smattering of smaller press, most of which are probably leftover from shot in the dark orders from five years ago, are stuck in a corner near the bathroom; the manga is hidden in a non-descript bookcase in the opposite corner. They lament about sales and wanted to expand, but when I talk about anything that doesn’t involve spandex their eyes immediately gloss over. (A glimmer of hope I saw today was when one clerk stated in wild-eyed astonishment that he’s HEARD that there are many cute girls at indie cons, even GASP! behind the tables! Never underestimate the selling power of a remote possibility of sex.)

The culture is the industry; the industry is the culture. They’re both fucked up and if not for the fact that they’re hogging more worthy real estate I’d say let them keep eating their own shit as long as there’s a peanut or kernel of corn to sustain them. Honestly, anyone who wants to make even a remotely mature comic nowadays is likely best served by forgoing anything resembling the industry model. The loss-leader concept is flawed at its core. Either the books work in that format alone or they don’t; if you chop a cat into pieces you don’t have a cat anymore, you have cat meat: a decent filler in certain restaurants but it won’t purr when you pet it. If it’s important that a potential audience be exposed to the material as time allows you to create it, put it online and let it be its own best advertising. If the material is strong enough, put the whole book out cold and let the market decide. But the floppies are stultifying every aspect, creatively and economically, and I think we’re just about ready to drop that vestigial tail.

BTW, I love Dean’s idea: I will buy an iPod when it resembles a Mother Box. If it comes with a dock that resembles Metron’s chair, I will knife my way to the front of the line.

I’m not excited. But, you win anyway because you do know better, as one inside the industry.

As you said, everything is fine up sales wise which you’re clear to point out at Vertigo and DC, so this entire news bulletin about the State of The Industry Alert really is just a false alarm.

I stand humbly corrected.

It is no surprise that some of these books got cancelled. Low monthly sales leads to cancellation.

Will the “floppy” exist in 5-years? I don’t think so. The webcomix model will go through growing pains and a serious trial but I believe serialized comix will need to join the iPod/iPhone/iMother Box [thank you Jack Kirby] in order to compete with TV and Beer. And, even though we’re entering the Digital Age of Comix, what matters most is good stories and interesting characters which we have an abundance of.

Yeah, I started reading comics just four years ago. The only stereotypical superhero books I’ve read are The Dark Knight Returns, Secret Identity and The Watchmen. I buy nothing from the main DC or Marvel imprints. I do read Y: The Last Man (in the collections) and I’ve tried to get into Fables so I do read some Vertigo.

BTW, its always the readers who are wrong and the people inside the industry who are right. It’s also those very people inside the industry who always claim readers don’t know what they’re talking about, ‘everything is fine and wonderful’.

Do you know why they say everything is fine and wonderful? Because in their eyes, it has to be. To admit everything isn’t fine, would also mean you guys have to admit that a) we’re not doing our jobs properly, which means then, you lose that job and b) we’re not as great as we make ourselves out to be.

Out of curiousity I dug that blog entry up as well as the Amazon page. The reader reviews are a hoot. It’s also funny that the book has gotten terrible reviews and yet it continues to heat up the GN bestseller chart. The book doesn’t look like it’s all that great either. I would like to imagine that this is the marketing plan of an evil genius. It certainly was an evil genius who wrote the book description: “Now she and Berkley take her “out-of-the-ordinary” (Booklist) in a thrilling new direction–and this time it’s more graphic than ever.”

While there may be a stigma attached to comics, I don’t think we should be using unsuspecting vampire romance fans who’ve had crappy manga sprung on them to make a measure of it.

There are definite structural problems with the industry…as there are with virtually every field of entertainment right now. I’ve said this before, but you wouldn’t want to be betting on the future of network TV in 2007. Or, to take another example: In comics, the slightest hiccup in the market makes everyone run around crying doom. In (trade) book publishing, everyone just sits quietly in their cubicles and hopes they’re not the ones laid off. So comics always looks like a dying field, and book publishing looks stable…while comics sales rise and trade book sales continue to drop.

I hope that’s negative enough. Yes, I’d love a world where creator-owned properties were easier to publish profitably, where comic shops had better margins, etc., etc. But I just can’t take overarching doom-scenarios seriously at a time when this industry is growing by every metric I can find.

So out of maybe ten people in my immediate circle of friends, there are maybe ten people who read comics and only two of us ever read superhero stuff. The other eight were introduced to comics via either Titntin, Bone, Maus, Persepolis, or Blankets. These are people who are in the range between twenty-five and fifty and are now avidly interested in good comics. A number of them were surprised that most American comics were in colour - since everything they had read up until that point was B&W.

So again, while there is probably cannibalization going on as you mention, eighty percent of the people I know who read comics don’t fit that picture.

It wasn’t a year wait between issues on All Star Batman and Robin. It was almost 3 months. Still, as Stuart says, sales on blockbuster books like ASBR are wonderful. Yes, there was 261,000 readers who bought into the #1, who I’m probably wrongly attributing to press coverage in Entertainment Weekly. By issue #4, 100,000 readers had fled the coup.

07/2005: All Star Batman #1 — 261,046 [306,976]

09/2005: All Star Batman #2 — 178,592 [184,962]

12/2005: All Star Batman #3 — 162,993 [166,218]

05/2006: All Star Batman #4 — 160,401

100,000 is quite a large number of readers. Of course, I’m just speaking out of my @$$. What do I know. The people in the industry know much more than we readers do and if they’re fine with a 100,000 drop off, no one should care.

Sales are still wonderful!

I don’t mean to come off argumentative either. When I mentioned timely delivery as an essential component for success, you may want to go back and reread that I was referring to the branching out and hooking mainstream audiences, who are different from the niche comic book readers who will wait because they patronize the shop weekly anyway.

It’s those readers you lose by making them wait. And go back to the sales numbers. There was a bit of a drop from issue number one and two (when the publicity first hit due to press coverage in EW) and when the next issue arrived almost a year later.

Wonder where all those readers went. Ah, who cares, right? No one needs them. Sales were fine anyway.

Of course you’re going to disagree.

You’re ‘in’ the industry and you people rarely admit wrong doing or danger. That would mean you guys would have to admit you aren’t as great as you like to think you are.

And you’ll always use those handy dandy sales numbers to keep yourselves feeling safe and warm.

Of course, if sales are so wonderful and the Vertigo imprint is doing pretty well, that makes this whole ‘State of The Industry Alert’ post pretty much, a false alarm.

So everyone, Stuart Moore says everything’s great!

Heidi, you can remove your post. The industry is doing fine. Vertigo is doing great, sales haven’t been better for DC and everything is wonderful.

I stand corrected.

The Beat’s recently mention of Dark Hunger by Christine Feehan was sobering in that regard. Mainstream readers (if romance readers can be called that) with standing orders for anything by their favorite author were outraged to discover the latest release was a “comic book.” Most of the anger was due to Amazon neglecting to mention it was a graphic novel, but still. Having a book in your hands by your favorite author and refusing to read it because it was a comic? Ouch. The stigma remains.

Part of the outrage was also the “high” price: $8 for 208 pages (!). Comics readers are used to paying a lot for what they love. The mainstream is not. We live in two different price-point worlds.

1. “This is an audience already dwindling due to the level of quality from the publishers.” Whether or not you like the level of quality from the publishers, the sales figures don’t show much dwindling. And there’s really no evidence for the mass disillusionment of former fans, one way or the other. It’s all anecdotal, and the web has a way of making a few people’s opinions look like major trends.

2. Vertigo has had its hiccups (I’ve edited a few of them). But the imprint is doing pretty well right now with books like Y, FABLES, and DMZ. Yes, Vertigo sells fewer copies of single issues than it did back in the PREACHER days, but its trade paperback sales — on some titles, not all — are way up.

3. Timely delivery is important as a business matter for comic shops, but the numbers simply don’t bear it out as a major factor for fans. Just look at ALL-STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN and ULTIMATES 2. Hot books sell, whether they’re on time or not; cold books don’t.

4. Ah, you can have 4! It’s so theoretical that I can’t really argue with it.

Yes, but as you clearly stated, you used to be of the mainstream superhero market but then stopped because you couldn’t keep up. Now you buy alternates.

That’s what I meant. Publishers are canabalizing from the same audience, a comic buying audience that’s already dwindling and the switch that readers are making is not large enough to keep the Vertigo brand afloat.

Things to remember:

1) The comics audience and mainstream guys associate most ‘comics’ with guys in spandex. It’s the appeal and draw for most. This is an audience already dwindling due to the level of quality from the publishers. When these publishers print 75 tie in event specials to this audience who already has a limited budget, there’s not much money left for them to try anything from Vertigo, Wildstorm and others.

2) Creators like Alan Moore and Neal Gaiman were the ticketed draw for lines like Vertigo and Wildstorm. They were the lure for readers. Once readers bought material from them, they were open to sampling material from other authors on the brand. DC Comics does their best to anger and pissed off quite a few creators… Alan Moore, and for whatever the reason, Neal Gaiman no longer writes new material for the brand. Other reputable editors like Scott Dunbier were also removed by DC. When you cease publishing NEW material from your high ticket sellers, you lose most of the audience as well.

3) I cannot stress the importance of timely delivery as the integral component to success. The audience doesn’t care that the author wants you to be patient and wait 6 months for a new issue. With all the other entertainment out there as alternative options, authors and artists need to get off their ego high horses and deliver because if they think people outside the niche comic audience is just going to sit around and wait for your next star studded issue, you’ve got another thing coming.

4) Once again, DC is the umbrella for all these smaller brands. If the umbrella has a reputation of leaving their readers all wet, it’s not going to give readers much confidence to try anything else from beneath that umbrella without the reader feeling they’re going to get wet there too.

To Brett:
“Most people will try and fool themselves into believing that the people who buy superhero comics and the people who buy Vertigo comics are different but that is an illusion.”

I’m not sure how much of it really is an illusion. I’m sure there’s reader cross-over between the superhero market and the Vertigo market, but that’s definitely not always the case. With the exception of Daredevil and Ultimate Spider-Man (whenever they get collected into nice hardcover form), I have completely stopped reading superheroes. It’s just too hard to keep up. Instead, I buy every Fables trade that comes out, every Y: The Last Man, every 100 Bullets, Usagi Yojimbo, Naruto, Courtney Crumrin, Yotsuba&!, BPRD, and Queen & Country. Plus, piles of OGNs.

My wife will read Daredevil volumes when I get them, but doesn’t have interest in other superhero stuff, preferring Vertigo and SLG and Oni Press and Top Shelf contributions to the medium.

My friends read a smattering of other stuff as well, but the closest they’ve come to superhero comics is 300 (though they’ve also expressed interest in Watchmen, knowing that the movie is coming out).

So yeah, it may be an illusion, but I suspect its not as much an illusion as you make it sound.

However, I’m not fooling myself when I observe that my fantasy-and-science fiction prose-fiction-reading friends enjoy Fables and Y: The Last Man but do not read DC Universe comics. Sure, it’s anecdotal evidence and not very broad at that, but I believe that it is not isolated. These people don’t even seem to think of these comics in terms of issues. They read the trades. There’s that old “waiting for the trade” debate, and I used to get upset when people did that because it meant that individual issues didn’t sell well, but it makes so much more sense to observe a consumer preference as to format and adjust how you do things. (We’re not talking content here; just format.) Vertigo probably still makes money off of their floppies (like maija, I use this term because “comic book” has become too broad a term; also, I use it the way classical musicians might call their violin a “fiddle”)–especially since the issues have ads in them, but I am wondering how long that model will last now that there is a growing, broader audience that does not go to comic book stores.

I like to speculate. Prose novels moved out of the serialized form in the early 20th century, and it was then that works like Ulysses and To the Lighthouse appeared. I think we’ve already begun to see what kind of innovations in comics can take place when constraints of format are removed.

Pulling people in from the mainstream audience has always been the target ideal for publishers. However, to reel that audience in publishers need to understand the psychology, buying habits and tolerance of the mainstream audience.

The mainstream audience, or average joe’s as their called, do not have the same tolerance as the niche comic buyers. The niche comic buyers patronize the shops regularly every week and some are patient meaning, they’ll wait for that new issue even if it takes a couple of months but publishers are trying the patience of that audience as well.

Mainstream buyers do not have that same dedication or necessity. If a publisher advertises a serialized story, they ship the first issue and the next doesn’t come out for another 6 months, publishers are fooling themselves if they believe that mainstream buyer is going to wait 6 months to a year for the next issue. It’s not that important to them so if its not there when the publisher says its going to be there, they’ve lost that new customer.

Publishers did a great job achieving mainstream press on books like Civil War, All Star Batman and Infinite Crisis. For a while, some of those average joes probably did buy into the hype. Then, one of two things happened:

1) The quality wasn’t high enough to retain the mainstream audience (Civil War — Yes, Mark Millar likes to think himself a superstar, a big fish in the small pond that is the comics audience but newsflash, to everyone else outside the pon, the story was just a complete wash out) or…

2) The next issue never showed up because the creator didn’t deliver and the publisher lost all those potential new readers reeled in from the mainstream press. All Star Batman and Robin. Did publishers really believe all those new readers were going to be hanging around the shops like flies waiting a whole year for the next issue? This would be because Jim Lee didn’t learn that simple lesson from the last time he reeled in new readers with Wildcats from Image Comics, you remember, when he solicited issues and didn’t deliver the either.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result.” - Einstein.

So yes, the key is hooking in mainstream readers. But before they do that, the industry needs to up the quality to keep those readers and deliver timely so the new readers know when to come back for the next installment. Of course, this is something the industry is sorely in need of fixing.

So: “floppy”. You know what I’m referring to. In fact it’s so easily and broadly understood that I fail to see how it’s elitist. It’s not jargon comprehended by a select few.

If someone wants to coin a better, clearer, less “elitist” term then get coining.