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Well, you folks seem to like these distributor order-uggestion fliers, and I only wish I had more than the two I’ve got.
First of all, in regards to that mystery Mantis #1 listing noted by The Tipster, it’s Daniel T to the rescue with this entry in Marvel Age #7 (October 1983):
Denny O’Neil and Val Mayerik, eh? That would’ve been something. Note there’s no inker listed, which certainly makes it sound like whatever they were working on here wasn’t ready to go. Not quite like the books that have “TBD” [“To Be Determined”] listed all over the credits, but at the very least the entire creative team hadn’t been put together yet.
Now we need to find any art/mock-up covers that may have been produced.
Anyway, at least Marvel gave themselves an out here:
And Matthew Murray had a couple of notes to add:
“took the note on the issue of Peter Parker to be that it should sell for 25% more as a back issue. (So price it at $0.80 instead of $0.60?)
“Though looking at that issue, it was drawn by Fred Hembeck for Assistant Editor’s Month. Clearly that’s the real draw for that issue!”
I don’t get the feeling that our Tipster is talking about secondary market prices on any these. I think s/he’s strictly discussing initial order numbers.
And I keep forgetting the Marvels for the period under discussion are mostly Assistant Editor Month titles! For those who don’t know, “Assistant Editor Month” supposedly involved the Assistant Editors taking over the titles and doing wild things with them while the folks in charge were away at convention, or something like that. The results were mostly entertaining, none more so than Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #86, drawn by the legendary Fred Hembeck:
It seems weird that the Tipster would note “Black Cat appearance” and not say “oh, also it’s drawn by Hembeck,” as I feel it may have been noted as “it’s a goofy gag comic, not a ‘real’ issue, don’t raise orders.” Which would be foolish, because as can plainly be seen, this issue is awesome.
Okay, let’s move on to the other Tip Sheet I have here, this one dated June 1984 for books cover-dated…well, looks like between December 1983 to February 1984, based on the few I spot-checked here. You get another cool logo:
“Remember kids, be cool and smoke like Wolverine!”
It looks like the Tipster here is referred to as “our phantom writer,” which isn’t capitalized or anything so I don’t think that’s his intended nomme de distributing, so “Tipster” it remains here in this blog, nigh four decades later.
And dipping into the cover price thing…Batman went to 75 cents cover date November 1983. Uncanny X-Men went to 65 cents cover date April 1985, and 75 cents cover date October 1985. So Marvel held the line at “cheaper than DC” for a little while, anyway.
It feels a tad amusing to see the worry over comics going all the way up to 75 cents, in this time of everyone cranking out $5.99 books at the drop of a hat, but I’m sure it was still a matter of concern. My old boss Ralph likes to tell the story of going to the market with a dime to buy a new comic, only to discover they were 12 cents now. He had to root around in the vacant lot nearby to find a bottle or three to recycle to make up the difference. I don’t think too many people buying their comics in late ’83 were quite as inconvenienced, but I’m sure at the very least it was a little annoying.
And for the first batch of listings I’m presenting today:
…it’s not quite as info-packed as the last couple of entries, but that Batman and the Outsiders bit does remind us of what an influential sales giant New Teen Titans was at the time.
Looks like big dips recommended on DC’s two fancier-format, mature audiences titles Vigilante and Thriller. A tiny bit of a surprise here as I thought the Vigilante was something of a hot character then, having spun out of the aforementioned New Teen Titans book. Order drops on second issues are par for the course, but back then a 40% reduction probably meant cutting dozens of copies. Nowadays it’d be more like, I don’t know, 4 copies on some of Marvel’s slower movers.
And this Detective Comics listing finally makes it clear where The Tipster stands on the art of Gene Colan. Honestly, in that other flier I just couldn’t put my nickel down on what was being said.
That’s enough typing for now…come back Friday for the rest of this flier!
I did you folks a disservice last time when I started talking about this sheet of distributor ordering suggestions by not presenting the logo:
Very charming!
Anyway, before we get into part two, let me address this note from DonaldG:
“Avengers Annual #7 came out years earlier than the other comics on this list. The real Avengers Annual for 1983 was Avengers Annual #12.”
True facts, #12 was the one due out in January 1984. Well, despite all appearances I didn’t invent typos, and this anonymous tipster obviously was afflicted with brainfartitis and mixed up the Avengers Annual number with the X-Men Annual #7 on the very next line. Ah, well, worse things happen at sea.
And Matthew Murray had some questions about comic sales of yesterday as compared to today, plus ordering strategies and cutting/raising orders at the time, and I feel like that’s a longer post than just a quick response here. Let me ponder it a bit.
So here’s part two, with some straggling Marvels and the notes on DC boks:
Okay, first off, let me skip ahead just a tiny bit and say “um, Mantis #1?” Far as I know, Marvel didn’t release a solo title for (presumably) the Avengers/Guardians of the Galaxy character. I presume one was apparently announced and on the schedule but pulled at the last moment. I checked through the “Coming Comics” sections of Amazing Heroes from that period and didn’t spot it in the listings, but maybe it was mentioned in one of the news sections? Something to check when I have more time. Or maybe somebody with the first year of Marvel Age can check for references to the title there?
Backing up a bit, I guess Black Cat was popular enough to be a sales incentive to bump orders up 25%. The character had only been around for about four years at that point, so, you know, I guess? This seems to suggest she was a hot commodity, which I didn’t remember but certainly not out of the question.
I wonder if there was a specific reason for The Defenders to suddenly bump up in sales this late in the run. Maybe the cover on #125 attracted new readers and they stuck around a bit?
Also, definitely pick up Dreadstar #7 and #6, as they had Bernie Wrightson back-ups. Also, #6 (which I bought because of that back-up) is a good jumping-on point for Dreadstar as a whole, apparently, since I read the lead story and had to read more.
Okay, to the DCs!
“Atari Force: Aimed at kids. Order like G.I. Joe #1 sold.” I’m having trouble parsing this, because in usual comic shop parlance of the time (and sadly even today), “aimed at kids” means “ain’t gonna sell to your regular customers to don’t order a lot. But…G.I. Joe #1 did well, didn’t it? Also, Atari Force wasn’t necessarily “aimed at kids” as such. It was a solid science fiction adventure book with great writing and that wonderful, wonderful Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez art saddled with a baggage-laden name.
The advice for DC Comics Presents #65 may be why I used to find this issue in bargain boxes all the time. That’s how I got mine. Also, good issue. That Gray Morrow art is beautiful.
The “NOT [Pat] BRODERICK!” warning on Firestorm was sort of unnecessary, as the artist who took over, Rafael Kayanan, was honestly close enough. Book was still good, hadn’t hit the doldrums of the saggy middle of this 100 issue run yet, and it also had this striking cover.
Batman #367 did have a nice cover, and also it’s Poison Ivy. I don’t know if Ivy was much of a sales-bumper then but boy, given the number of requests I get for Ivy comics now, ordering up on the issue would be a no-brainer.
The reprint warning on Flash is definitely a sign of the times. That sure seemed to happen a lot, and I hated when I got hit with one of those. There was an issue of Green Lantern around this time that kind of annoyed me. Anyhoo, in this case the Comics Tipster may have gotten his/her wires crossed, as the previous month’s issue was the one with the reprint with the new framing story. #329, the one with the January 1984 cover date like the rest of the books listed here, is all new. Or maybe it was another last second schedule change swapping the order of release on these.
The Omega Men entry reminds us that this was once A Hot Title, particularly early on when it was somewhat controversial for its violent content (which I think would barely be noticed today, frankly).
Now I don’t recall lateness with the Green Lantern/Green Arrow reprints, as I was buying it at the time. In fact, checking the Grand Comic Database listings, the release dates for each issue were consistently a month part. Are those dates wrong, or did everyone just assume Adams was going to be late?
Harsh words for Power Lords from our tipster friend. I was going to say “and nobody still cares” but I looked on the eBays and someone managed to sell a set for $20, which is about $25 more than I expected. So what do I know?
I believe most retailers did indeed “GET THIS!” when it came to Thriller #3, as it was one of them newfangled “Comics Aren’t Just for Kids!” titles from DC on the nicer paper and also it was getting some play in the ‘zines. …Unless the store was one of those that didn’t order DCs, which, I don’t know, I kept hearing about stores like that but have never actually seen one in practice.
New Talent Showcase I have to admit, that’s a toughie to order. Even when DC did it again not so long ago that was tricky to order, even with loading them with regular DC Universe characters.
“[Gil] Kane is not the artist for Superman.” Oh, how very dare you, sir or ma’am. Don’t forget those issues of Action. Revel in them, SING THEIR PRAISES
“Pencils by [Gene] Colan” on this issue of Detective. “Need we say more?” Um, well, yes, I think so. I don’t know if you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I assume it’s good, but then I think about it a little longer and start to wonder “is s/he warning us?” Anyway, after the Kane comment, there’s no telling.
World’s Finest – “[Ross] Andru is a weak penciller. Keep it low.” Okay, now them’s fightin’ words.
Redeemer actually finally came out, kinda sorta, so I can’t bust out any gags on it being vaporware, I suppose. I don’t even know how to respond to the art comparison between Kubert and Byrne/Miller here, but I will say “DC hasn’t let us down yet!” — um, weren’t you just busting on Power Lords?
Okay, I found one more sheet of these tips to look at, so I’ll go through ’em later in the week. I’m glad you folks seem to be enjoying these as much as I do!
So here’s a thing I found in one of the many, many boxes of old promo material I inherited from the previous place of employment…a sheet of ordering suggestions sent out by a distributor:
These seem to be all for comics with a cover date of January 1984, which means they were released a couple of months before that, which means this sheet was sent out mid/late-ish 1983.
Now, I love stuff like this…I immediately scoured the boxes and found only one or two more of these. But it’s a great insight into what the comic market was like at the time, outside of just order and sales numbers. This is why I also like period fanzines, in that you get the opinions of the time, what people were anticipating, what reactions they had to new projects, that sort of thing.
Reading this now, we have the advantage of hindsight, like with the note that New Mutants was beginning to drop in sales. We know seven months later that the very artist this writer was ballyhooing in the Dazzler entry, Bill Sienkiewicz, would be taking over and revitalizing the book. Also, I may be reading a bit into this, but I feel like there’s an implied “GOOD” response to the dropping sales, as I seem to recall some resentment at the time from X-Men fans that the very idea of having to buy a second X-title was such a burden. Anyway, they didn’t know how lucky they had it.
Other observations:
I think time has shown that Machine Man was “the worst mini-series yet” is WRONG WRONG WRONG. Also, the idea that Hercules was a low-selling series surprises me, as I thought it’d been relatively popular. Or maybe it was, just graded on the Marvel sales curve it’s still way below X-Men. Anyway, both of these were good comics and strong back issue sellers for a long time.
The “woof woof” on the Marvel Fumetti comic was amusing. I suppose it must have seemed like just more Marvel rack-crowding by pumping out junk, but I bought a copy of that when it was new, and it’s cute and funny! Plus it’s nice to see even black-and-white photos on newsprint of the Marvel crew.
Uncanny X-Men Annual #7 sure seemed like a big deal to this writer, I guess, spurred on by the artwork of Mike Golden. This annual was the goofy Impossible Man story, and yeah, it’s a consistent seller today, only because demand is way up on X-Men as a whole.
The Cloak and Dagger entry is a nice reminder of how hot the comic once was.
I guess this writer’s dog shared the byline, as here we are in the Sub-Mariner #1 entry with an “Arf.” Truth be told, this is like one of the forgotten Sub-mariner titles.
I’m glad the Aunt May/Galactus team-up in Marvel Team-Up #137 got the positive nod. I presume fans were probably amused by the very idea, and I know I certainly bought one. It was also part of the “Assistant Editors Month” event, with crazy things happening in each comic. I’m sure the sales bump was a good idea.
Part two on Monday, where we look at what we should be ordering on DCs! Plus, a mystery title?
Just noticed I typoed the last name of Sergio Aragonés in Monday’s post, and didn’t notice it ’til now. I assure you, as a fan of the man’s work for, what, over 45 years, and having interacted with him in person many times starting over 30 years ago, I know how to spell his name! All I can say is that I must have been pretty tired Sunday night when I was writing that entry.
EDIT: And I typoed his FIRST name this time. “Spelling Sergio Aragonés correctly” is the second thing to go, apparently. Fixed now, hopefully.
And I’m not much less sleepy now, but the blog must go on! Let’s continue addressing some of your comments from the last few days:
Joseph P Gualtieri notes
“Questioning whether or not Turok #1 was a sales success is a good reminder that sales charts for comics only show how many copies retailers order, not how many copies fans actually bought. A success in one doesn’t mean success in the other. See also, dead or discounted stock ordered to get variant covers.”
The “ordering to get the variant” really came to a head with the recent autographed Spawn comics, where the publisher shouted from the rooftops their inflated order numbers. As I talked about relatively recently, a customer wanted that autographed King Spawn, and paid enough for it that I was able to sell the regular covers for about a buck a pop as a special promotion. I’m juuuuuust about out of ’em now, but I’d probably still be sitting on boxes of the things if I had them priced at full cover.
And Marvel’s no stranger to this, if I may quote the above linked post:
“…Marvel trumpeted their X-Men #1 orders, and their X-Force #1 orders, without mentioning how many ended up being warehoused, buried in storage lockers and occasionally being dragged out into daylight and into shops like mine to unload.”
I think, nowadays, this sort of order-padding to grab benefits like “more variants” is not as common as it used to be. Shaving orders a little closer to the bone feels like the preferred strategy, especially in this market (which alas encourages speculation on a randomly-picked “rare” comic each week — uh, buddy, they’re all rare). But there are always exceptions, and once in a while even I’m like “well, I’ll just order a couple more to get that ratio variant.” It’s going to happen, but I don’t chase the variants with my order numbers like I used to, unless I’m darned certain it’s going to be worth the money I’m spending.
• • •
Chris G wants to know
“Let’s say I have a lot of comics stacked in boxes at my parents’ house and they’re starting to talk about downsizing. And given that the books in question have been sitting there largely unread for 20 years, it seems the best thing to do would be to sell them. I don’t care about making a ton of money, and few are bagged and some are very well read. But I also don’t want to get nothing for them. So I guess my question is: What are the two or three least effortful things I can do to goose any offer I might get from a shop near my parents by a couple bucks?”
Some minor things that might help:
Make sure they’re clean…boxes not covered with dust and cat pee and just general crap.
Have the books in relatively decent order…not like everything has to alphabetical or anything, just have all copies of the same title together. And all facing the same direction in the box..don’t make me constantly flip things over.
Make sure they’re accessible…don’t bunch together a dozen or so comics into a magazine bag before sealing it up. And if they’re in crummy plastic bags sealed with tape that’s going gooey with age, and you have to literally peel comics apart to look at them — man, I’m dealing with a collection like that right now and it sucks. I have to cut comics out of their bags, it’s terrible.
Basically, make it easier on the person looking at your collection to actually look at your collection. It may not bump up the moolah you receive for your books by much, but it surely won’t hurt. And the other suggestions from your fellow commenters in the thread are pretty good, too.
• • •
Chris Gumprich
enters the following inquiry
“How is it that your store (started in 2014) has such an amazing stash of promos from the 1980s and 1990s? I know I personally have bought a number of promo posters from you — including such 80s classics as normalman, Thriller, and Mr.X — and yet every time I look at your ebay listings you have more up.
“Did you find a lost cache of promos from a store that went out of business in 1987 and has laid undisturbed ever since?”
Oh, huh, I thought everyone know, but maybe it’s been a while since I’ve said and some of us, Chris, may not have committed my entire website to memory like everyone should have from now.
My former place of employment was a comic shop that had been active since 1980. After the complicated semi-change in ownership of the shop (detailed here), my old boss still had all the old promotional material he’d accumulated over the decades. When I opened up my shop, he sent over all the promotional material and had me sell it for him on his behalf. That’s kind of it, really. I’ve got boxes of this stuff, and I go through it when I can.
Interestingly, I also “inherited” a few boxes of old comic distributor invoices and order forms, going back to very nearly the beginnings of the old shop. I keep meaning to do a little data-mining on those, but I’ll occasionally look at one, think “we used to order that many of The Flash, and then just be depressed. Ah well.
Yes indeedy, you folks keep bringing up topics in the comments that I want to answer here. And also yes, someday, I will get back to variant cover-age — I’m not done yet! — but I want to get to these responses out while we’re all still young and hearty.
First off, from not too terribly long ago, the King of the Moon crowned me with
“I used to pop in on my LCS during weekday times I knew would be slow because it was the best time to get good conversation and recommendations from the person behind the counter who was also a ;’well known comics blogger'”
Aaiieee, keep your fingers away from that blogger’s gnashing teeth, they’re all pretty much like Gollum.
Anyway, I literally have no idea if that was a veiled reference to me personally (I mean, a guy working in a comic shop who has a blog? How many of those can there be). But yes, a vital part of working in a comic shop is chatting with the customers, helping them find books to read, that sort of thing. There is a balance to strike, though, in between being “Helpful Dude at he Shop” and “Oh God He’s Coming to Talk to Us About Swamp Thing Again.” I may have told the story about going into a watch store at a mall (remember malls?) and trying to find a gift, but the employees there would not stop trying to chat with me and I couldn’t focus on shopping. I ended up bailing on that store and buying a watch elsewhere.
That’s really what I’m trying to avoid. I mean, that’s different from a customer coming up and talking to me and asking me stuff and engaging in conversation willingly, which is more what you’re talking about.
I think those of you who read my bloggering here on the site and then meet me in person are a tiny bit surprised at how relatively taciturn I am compared to the endless typing I make you all endure. Not that I don’t say anything, just I’m not quite as…verbose, or even semi-eloquent In Real Life as I am online. Over the years I believe I have become a little better at yakking it up with the folks in the shop, if only because I’m the captain and sole crewmate of the good ship Sterling Silver Comics and if not me talking, then who?
However, I believe it was our pal Tegan O’Neil who once said I write like I speak. I’m pretty sure that was meant as a compliment, but perhaps that also means my perception of myself as a tongue-tied funnybook purveyor is a bit off.
• • •
JohnJ does declare
“Your mention of Swamp Thing makes me ask if you’re aware of Rifftrax and the Kickstarter for this August’s Rifftrax Live! showing of Return of Swamp Thing. They’ve got a cool t-shirt designed for fans with art of Swampy carrying Heather Locklear. You don’t mention that movie nearly as often as you plug The Spirit (Frank Miller’s unauthorized Daredevil movie, I’ve always thought) so I just thought I would mention it.”
Yeah, I do lean kinda heavily on the Frank Miller’s The Spirit thingie, only because that’s funnier. I mean, it’s funnier to me, which is the only valid metric by which such things are judged.
But yes, I am absolutely a proud Kickstarter backer of the Return of Swamp Thing Rifftrax edition:
I am a long time fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000, from which Rifftrax was born, and I have enjoyed plenty of Rifftrax’s offerings as well. For those unfamiliar, Rifftrax offers downloadable “commentary tracks” of movie-mocking jokes you can listen to while watching the mocked movie in question…or you can get the movies with the humorous tracks already embedded in the soundtrack. Return of Swamp Thing will be one of the latter.
In fact, like it says in the pic there, it’ll be a live show, recorded from a theatrical performance where they “riff” the movie in front of an audience. I found during MST3K creator Joel Hodgson’s simliar project “Cinematic Titanic,” I enjoyed the live performances quite a bit more over the studio ones. I liked the studio ones fine, but I enjoyed hearing the audience laughter, the occasional flubbed line from one of the performers, etc. Same with the Rifftrax output…the live stuff just feels more organic. Yes, I know it’s all equally scripted, but I like hearing the audience laugh, what can I tell you.
I didn’t support the Swamp Thing Rifftrax at a level that would have put my name in the DVD/Blu-Ray’s credits, but I will be getting the t-shirt (don’t wear t-shirts much any more, but I’ll still love to have it!) and the enamel pin, and the Blu-Ray, plus all sorts of digital downloads and extra material (including other riffed shorts, and I think an audio riff track for Cats). Anyway, they really piled on the extras, so I’m looking forward to all this nonsense.
• • •
Daniel
wonders
“If you hadn’t gone into comics retail as a career, do you think you’d still be a comics fan/reader today?”
I’m pretty sure I still would be. I’m interested enough, invested enough, in certain creators and comics that I would keep following them, even if maybe the books would be harder for me to track down. I’m always going to want to see what Sergio Aragonés and the Hernandez Brothers are up to, for example. And I’ll always follow Swamp Thing comics, and Hulk stuff, Green Lantern, and the Superman books (though to be honest the whole Warworld story in Action, now entering its 34th year, is beginning to wear a little).
I don’t know that I’d read as many comics as I…try to do, anyway. I’m going through bit of a thing lately where I still have a large backlog of books stemming from that period where my eye problems were keeping me from reading anything. While I’ve had good luck of late in preventing any rebleeds in my eyes from happening and obscuring my vision again, my vision is impacted enough to where I can’t read nearly as quickly as I used to.
Combined with the fact that I don’t even have as much time to read them anymore, that backlog isn’t getting any smaller. I try to read all the new comics I pick up now, but even as few as they may be, that doesn’t leave much time for digging back into the older pile. I may be just cutting my losses and returning stuff to the shop. I’ve no idea.
That’s getting a little off topic from your question, Daniel, but it’s just stuff I’ve been thinking about lately. I like reading comics, but one of the ironies of owning a comic shop is having less time to read comics, even if you don’t have eyes that explode on you on occasion.
But yes, I’d still read comics if I didn’t work in a shop. Would I still be a comics blogger? All my early online stuff, on local BBSes and early AOL message boards, stemmed from my working in a comic book store, so I feel like my comic book internetting is heavily tied to that. Maybe I’d been involved in the online comics community in some respect, but as just a mere commoner, not the high falutin’ comics retailer whose majestic presence is before you now.
• • •
Roel
thus spake
“What are the logistics for transferring a pull list? Is there a payment for each customer name?”
Roel is referring to my previous place of employment sending its pull list customers to another shop near its location, due to shutting down. I’m not privy to the details, so I don’t know if there was a specific price attributed to the customer base for the pull lists, or if it was just kinda lumped in with everything else. To be honest, I’m not sure how I would price that out if I were selling my business to another company. There is a value, but what is it? Do you charge $(X) for this one customer, but $(5X) for that customer who gets a lot more set aside for him? Or just make a rough estimate based on the pulls in total.
When I opened up my own shop, a number of the pull lists there came with me. Mostly mail order pulls, plus a handful of pulls from customers who lived closer to my shop than the old one. They were basically just handed over to me out of good will. Maybe that happened in this newer case, just handing the info over and making sure the customers had a smooth transition, figuring it’s just part of the lump cost of the business’s sale. Again, I haven’t the foggiest.
Okay, that’s enough typing for now. Thanks for reading, pals.
So way back when on that post I made about Turok: Dinosaur Hunter #1’s solicitation, Chris V flew in with
“I never realized that Turok was considered a sales failure. I was always under the impression that it sold really well.”
To be fair, I did state that first issue experienced “relative sales failure (relative to its massively excessive orders, I mean).” I’m sure it did sell an enormous number of copies. There had been a lot of anticipation for it at the time, after all. But as I said, compared to the huge numbers retailers actually ordered and still had stuck in their backrooms (until they were dumped in the shredder, natch)…well, it didn’t sell up to preorder expectations.
It was technically a success for Valiant, as they still got paid for all the copies they shipped. (Though it was perhaps the beginning of the beginning of the beginning of the end for that iteration of the company.) But it was a marketplace failure, in that many copies were left unsold, and it was a retailer failure, most of them ordering way too many to begin with.
The comic because one of the symbols of the excesses of 1990s comics retailing, maybe not directly causing that decade’s market crash but it certainly didn’t prevent it. As such, despite actually being a not half-bad comic, it gets lumped in with Deathmate and other ill-received books from the time, symptoms of a sick marketplace that needed to get worse before it got (slightly) better.
More of your questions/comments responded to next week! Stay tuned!
Let’s hop into the ol’ Wayback Machine, because I’m covering some comments y’all left on this site back in the distant past of late February 2022!
Mostly I wanted to address this exchange in the comments to this post. It starts with Chris V. noting the relative dearth of customers in his local comic shop and its possible relation to high price points on new books:
“There’s no telling how long people will be willing to pay that amount of money either…and, in fact, a ton of people have already said ‘enough is enough,’ which is why the local comic book store tends to be empty when I visit. They obviously do have customers or they wouldn’t be in business, but the amount of customers seems to be decreasing by the year.”
…with Allan Hoffman responding thusly:
“Keep in mind that our impression of the customer base of a shop is based solely on what we see when we are there, which on average would probably 10-20 minutes on one day. Mike has often noted how his store can be dead at one moment followed by a crowd of people buying stuff.”
A few months back my girlfriend’s extended family was having a gathering at the restaurant next door. It was a Sunday afternoon, and Sundays can be pretty hit or miss for me (most Sundays are okay, some are great, and some like yesterday were…eh). This particular Sunday, I had a lot of business in the early part of the day, and in the later afternoon, things had slowed down quite a bit, allowing me to do some stocking-type stuff.
Apparently dinner next door had ended, and into my shop wanders one of the nieces. Seeing me alone in the store, she loudly exclaims “Don’t you ever have any customers?” “Yes, of course I do, you horrible child, it’s just slow at the moment,” was my reply, and she gave me the “yeah, right, old man” look as only a young teenager could give you.
And then another niece, this one a tad younger, walked in, looked around and asked “Where are all your customers?” “I’VE GOT CUSTOMERS, JUST NOT RIGHT NOW” I cried out, but to no avail as I was still pummeled with scornful disbelief.
She was followed by a nephew, brother to the first niece and the youngest of the three, who also noted “You don’t have any customers!” It was at this point I struck them all from the will.
So yes, as Allan says, it’s hard to judge a store’s business flow just from a short visit. I don’t know how many times I’ve had a full store for an hour or three, which then suddenly empties out, only to have the next person who comes in say to me “So, slow day, huh?” The ebb and flow of customer traffic can have an element of randomness to it, but I recall, at the previous place of employment, we had a cash register that could print out transaction totals per hour since the last time the machine was zeroed out. Basically it told us at what time of the day we were the busiest (barring unusual events like someone buying a $1000 comic at 2 in the afternoon or something). As I recall, it was usually around noon, which was an hour or two after we opened. Telling you what the second busiest time of day was, or the slowest time, would just be me guessing, as it’s been a while, but you get the idea.
The register I have at my store now doesn’t have that function (mostly just adding and multiplying, sometimes correctly), but my general sense is that late morning/early afternoon, followed by late afternoon/early evening, are my busy times, with slow times popping up in the early afternoon. Wednesdays are of course the busiest, being the New Comics Day of choice (despite DC trying to move some of that action to Tuesday). Later in the week is usually busier than early in the week. And of course this is all just generalization…nothing here is set in stone. I usually think of Mondays as slower days, but sometimes I have spectacular business that day. You never know.
New Comics Day is no exception to this. I’ve had great and busy New Comics Days with people waiting at the door when I open, all champing at the bit to get the new goodies. And I’ve had New Comics Days where…well, it’s not exactly a ghost town, but there were certainly longer lulls than usual between bursts of customers. Again, it Just Happens. It happened during the 1990s boom, and it happened during the later ’90s crash, and it happens now. So long as you’re taking in enough money to make the whole “selling comic books for a living” thing worthwhile, everything should be fine, even if maybe at some points during the day you can hear your own heartbeat because the store is so quiet.
Chris V says something else I’d like to comment upon:
“I’m concerned about the state of the comic industry as it currently exists, but more from a lack of collectors rather than from speculation.”
I don’t know about other shops, but I can tell you this about my experience. I know I bring up speculation a lot on this site and on the Twitterers, only because that sort of purchasing behavior can throw a monkey wrench into my planned orders. But that’s a minority of transactions. Most people coming into the shop for comics are readers, are collectors, and not just looking to flip this week’s first appearance to other speculators on eBay.
My business health has also been fine, with 2021 being my best year yet, financially. Sales are up, overall, I’m seeing new faces in the shop every day (even if, on a slow day, that one new face is all I see!), and I’m very happy. Given that there are many other comic shops in surrounding towns, I am grateful for the clientele I’m still acquiring.
Which reminds me, someone had asked (and I can’t find who did so at the moment) if my previous place of employment shutting down meant a lot of their customers coming my way. And the answer to that is “not really, maybe too soon to tell” which isn’t a surprise, as my shop is about a half-hour drive from the old one, and there are a few shops in the immediate vicinity of the defunct store, and the store’s pull list was transferred to one of those shops. Frankly, I’m too far out of the way to get much of that customer base, especially given today’s gas prices, not to mention any customers who were going to leave that old shop and start shopping with me already did years ago when I opened up. Not to say I saw no new customers from that unfortunate closing, but not nearly as many as you think.
Okay, even more questions in the queue (yes, even your Miracleman one, Thom!) so I’ll get to those shortly! Thanks for reading, pals.
Okay, let me catch up on a few more questions from some posts earlier this…er, last month:
Mike Loughlin wants me to cover
“Is there any demand for older, limited variants? For example, do people come in looking for the 1:100 Superman Unchained cover anymore, or does the interest dry up once the book has been released? What about for less popular books (say, a 1:100 variant for an Outsiders series from about 5 years ago)? Do you sell those variants at a discount if they don’t move after a few weeks?”
Usually once the sales window on a new comic closes (generally about a month, when the next issue comes in), if any of the pricier “ratio” variants haven’t moved by then, that’s likely it. I’ll put them in a box on the counter marked “VARIANTS,” and occasionally they’ll sell out of there, but honestly I really should mark them down or something.
But yeah, with rare exceptions the demand drops on these variants almost immediately, regardless of how big or small, how hot or lukewarm, the comic may be. I can see some of them going for, and actually selling, for big money, but every time I try to sell a pricier variant online I get bupkis, so I stopped trying. Though maybe I should throw a few for cheap up on my Hipcomic page. I’ve been having better luck selling comics there than I ever did on eBay.
• • •
Joe Gualtieri speculates
“Wouldn’t some artists with established fanbases like Hughes or Campbell be worth it to get the variant every time out, or close to it?”
Well, sure, if you like those artists. And sometimes they can hold value…but not always. And usually it’s not the one you’ll think it’ll be (though with “investment” apps and a pretty wide echo chamber repeating to all who will listen “this will be hot” we get a lot of self-fulfilling prophecies).
• • •
Matthew Murray
crowns me with
“Did you notice any increase in interest among your customers for the King Spawn series after selling those #1s for 99 cents each? Did m/any customers add the title to their pull lists? Did you order more of #2 than you would have otherwise?”
I did bump up orders on #2, and sold through, but as time went on the King Spawn orders normalized to about what I’d normally order on Spawn comics. And by “about” I mean I’m selling a little bit more on all the Spawn comics, though sales on those books had been creeping up a tad of late anyway.
Will get to the rest of questions later. But first, I must enter the Odinsleep. See you folks on Monday, and as always, thanks for reading.
It’s because the atomic number of iodine is 53.
Anyway, about Monday’s post…the plan was to respond to some of your comments from a couple of weeks ago, long delayed because of early morning doctor appointments disrupting my late evening blogging habits. However, I got caught up with looking into that whole Saturday Night Live thing I decided to make investigating that the whole post. Of course, being weeks after the fact, the matter had already been long settled and I’d come to the wrong conclusion anyway, so there you go.
I did get in a brief anecdote about my previous place of employment helping out a local theater production, as well as ending the post with a fairly solid gag, so it wasn’t all in vain!
Speaking of the previous place etc., Eric had this question about the old sign I procured from there:
“Did the dragon have a name?”
Here’s a better pic of the dragon from the sign:
And no, to the best of my knowledge the dragon had no name. Which is weird because we sure liked putting names on things at the store. At one point former coworker Rob had brought in a skull sculpture (a skullpture?) that he’d just kept on a shelf behind the counter. The skull was dubbed “Sid,” and eventually, when we got a second somewhat smaller skull from parts unknown (or forgotten), it was called, of course, “Marty.” And there were other things around the shop we named…most notably, the old wooded baseball bat Ralph kept behind the counter that was referred to as “The Peacemaker.” (No relation.)
But alas, our painted dragon friend lacked a sobriquet. Well, the sign’s mine now, so I shall dub…her, let’s say she’s a her, “Jennifer,” for no good reason I could adequately explain.
And adrian hunter sez about the sign
“I love how signage like this always ends with ‘science fiction.’ Science Fiction…what? Double-Feature? Books? videos? games? all the above? I don’t know about the rest of the world, although from this sign it seems endemic but in CT it happens a lot. It’s just amusing to me.”
Ralph (if you recall from my recap of his retail history) had been in a shop up in Santa Barbara that specialized in science fiction books and comic books. Ralph was the one in charge of the sci-fi books, as that had been, and still is, a particular interest of his (along with comics, of course). So, when he opened up his own shop it was probably no surprise that he wanted to emphasize the “science fiction” part of the business, especially with all the Star Warsing and Star Trekking going on.
And to your question of “science fiction what,” the answer is “yes.” Books, videos (eventually) games, even comics sometimes. And “double feature” of sorts…Ralph had plenty of Ace doubles.
But seriously, “science fiction” is a good, overall eye-catching term to grab people where things like “comic books” and “baseball cards” might not. Come to think of it, I should probably replace that “SPECULATIVE EVOLUTIONARY DIESELPUNK” painted in the window with “SCIENCE FICTION” instead. Might get more positive attention.
yet another artifact from the Previous Place of Employment (if you missed it, I posted one on Wednesday): the Ralph’s Comic Corner clock!
Gifted to the shop by a customer (and alas, which customer I can’t remember), the image for the clock’s face was blown up from a business card and colorized. (The drawing, like nearly all drawings done for the store’s business cards, fliers, signs and such, was by cartoonist/animator Tom Foxmarnick).
As a nod to the ol’ role playing game part of the business, please note that the clock’s numbers are made up of teeny-tiny dice:
When Ralph brought it to me, he wasn’t sure if the clock still worked, as he replaced the battery in the back and no tempus fugited. However, I am happy to report that I had a fresh new battery at home, and once placed in the clock, the hands once again started ticking off the remaining seconds of our fleeting lives. Hooray!
• • •
In other news, comments have been left on the posts from earlier in the week, and I’m not ignoring them! I will respond to those that need responses sometime next week. Thanks for reading, and commenting!
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