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Episode 1487 Talkback - Comic and Convention Talk
Adam_Murdough
Posts: 506
Convention season is in full swing, and we discuss a few recent and upcoming cons of interest, including a glowing description of Pants' Heroes Con 2014 experience from the man himself! Our second feature: a prolonged discourse on the present and future state of the back-issue market, with retailer's insight from Chris Eberle. (1:40:20)
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As for conventions, I found newish issues of Hickman's New Avengers for $1 apiece at Special Edition: NYC two weekends back. What's great about that is as long as the issue is less than a year old you're scoring both a physical AND digital copy for a buck!
That's even better when you find one of the .NOW issues for a dollar, as you get Volume 1 of that series included in the deal. Hard to pass up.
As for March 7th, I'm putting it on the calendar now, and will be looking to see if Chad and Yanni are up for a road trip and a Friday to Saturday stay. That way we can be around for dinner on Friday, Mape beforehand on Saturday, and be there for the recording in the afternoon! :D
One of the things I've really come to love about Chris' participation in these episodes is hearing his frank and passionate opinions about the industry as both a fan and a retailer. So much of what he says strikes a chord with me that I find myself often nodding in agreement as I listen at my desk. And when Peter is also a participant in the conversation the enjoyment goes even further.
Regarding the opinions stated about paying inflated prices for comics at conventions and online, while I agree wholeheartedly I personally find myself with little other option most of the time. I've long since set an upper limit on the amount I'm willing to pay for a particular book, and like you all am more than happy with "reader copies" of issues I want. But in the rare case where I'm missing an issue that I can't locate anywhere else, I'm often forced to resort to online sites such as Mile High Comics. Granted, this is few and far between, but I don't attend many conventions (truthfully, the only ones I'm even able to go to are the local Nittany Con and Pittsburgh if I'm lucky). As much as I'd love to go to something like Heroes or New York or Emerald City that's not an option at the moment. Like Shane, familial obligations take precedent and prevent me from traveling anywhere further than a day trip's distance. But rest assured that if you do indeed have some kind of event come next March I fully intend to make whatever arrangements are necessary for me to be there.
I'm also happy to hear that the issues of John Aman made their way safely to you. I've really been enjoying the issues thus far and am looking forward to the imminent release of the third issue soon. I'll freely admit that I knew next to nothing about many of the characters they intend to use in this series, so I was thrilled to find a new group of great classic comic heroes and villains to research. Fortunately, the Public Domain Super Heroes Wiki was available for me to do so. And I'll admit that the final page's group splash page/mock cover is my favorite part. Barry and Steven are really doing a fantastic job modernizing the characters while giving them and their creators the honor they deserve. It's a whole new universe that I'm excited to explore.
As for @Pants' desire to fill his Marvel Team Up and Marvel Two in One runs, I'm wondering if anyone would like to start a trade thread here. I have a lot of duplicate copies of MTU and M2I1 issues I don't need and I would like to complete my runs as well. Reader copies are fine with me (VG+ to F+).
Instead of trying to move these duplicates in lots on EBay, I'd certainly prefer to just trade evenly and spend money on shipping. Anyone else interested?
Back issue talk was the highlight here, and I agree with most of what was said. On the one hand, there obviously IS a big market for back issues, especially if they're marked down to about $1 each. Huge demand for those kinds of sales. So, no, the back issue market is far from dead. On the other hand, it's ridiculous to charge cover price for (most) recent back issues, much less mark them UP 25 or 50 cents as soon as they're off the new-release shelves.
There's a comic shop about an hour's drive away from me, and they have a GREAT selection of back issues. But they're all cover price or higher and the owner NEVER has sales. The ONLY way I ever buy back issues there is if I bring in stuff to trade in for store credit. And, actually, the owner is very generous about trade-ins, so I'm happy to shop and barter there, because I end up with pretty good deals overall. But just going into a comic shop and plunking down $20-some dollars for six or seven comics from 2005-2011 or whatever? I'd never do it. Can't imagine why anyone would. You can go online and find 95% of all recent back issues for $1-2 each if you do a bit of looking and don't care too much about condition.
That said, I think there ARE quite a number of back issues from recent years that are legitimately worth well over cover price. And I'm not talking about 1:50 variant covers or rare printings of Image titles. I'm talking about mainstream Big Two releases of marquee characters like Spider-Man and Batman. The first appearance of the new Venom (in some Amazing Spider-Man Point One issue) is worth quite a bit of money. The first appearance of Damian Wayne and the first appearance of Future Damian Batman are key issues that can always sell for over cover price -- and it makes SENSE for those issues to sell for more than cover price, because there's a demand for them that's easily recognizable and based on CHARACTER and STORY, not hype. There are a lot more examples like that out there (the first issue of Scott Snyder's Detective run, the issue of Rick Remender's Uncanny X-Force where they kill Kid Apocalypse, early issues of Fraction's Hawkeye). The recent back issue market is a real thing, and when you have some of these issues holding up in value for like five years now... that's a lot different than someone spending $80 for a comparatively "rare" 3D Villains Month cover on the week it comes out, only to watch that comic plummet down to $5 a year later. (Actually, that Joker's Daughter 3D #1 still sells for $25, at least. So people who said things like "A month from now, that comic'll be in the dollar bins" were just... wrong.)
I think people just need to know what the value of comics are, and not get sucked into hype, overestimation, or short-term gain. There is real, stable value underneath back issues, but you're not going to see much return if you're a dealer trying to charge $3.25 or $4.25 for every single back issue from 1990 onwards; that's crazy. On the other hand, as a buyer you're looking at a lot of frustration if you buy a variant cover for $100, only to see it for sale at $9.99 a couple months later. It's all about having the restraint to only pay reasonable prices (i.e., prices that people don't later regret paying, because that creates bad blood).
But I think the back issue market for Copper and Modern Age actually HAS risen in the last few years, in a stable and sustainable way. A lot of those old Jim Lee "Uncanny X-Men" issues have ticked back up in value. They're not all $10-$20 comics they way Wizard said they were in 1993, but it's no longer common to see them going for $0.99 on eBay either. Ditto for a lot of McFarlane "Amazing Spider-Man" issues. There's a real, growing demand for otherwise common issues like those (and not just #298 & 300). I think it's kind of healthy and I think it speaks to the relative sanity of the back issue market. What WOULD be insane is if most recent back issues COULD be sold for $3-$4; they can't. But I'm glad that there's still a modest but growing demand for some of this stuff. I don't think there's a sense that the back issue market is freefalling into nothingness, the way it seemed to be half a decade ago.
Anyway.
Oh, lastly, the only thing I disagree about is Chris's contention that new comics won't be around anymore in five years. I've been hearing that same talk for ten years now. I think current comics are still healthy ENOUGH to keep going for the foreseeable future. If $3.99 was the cut-off pricepoint, then Marvel wouldn't've made multiple issues of Infinity and Original Sin at least $4.99. They tried it out in Infinity, and the sales were evidently still there enough for them to make Original Sin #0 and #1 $4.99 comics. As long as there's a bit of extra content, customers will pay $5 for a new comic: it's kind of insane, but the facts are in. Meanwhile, despite some exceptions, DC has GENERALLY "held the line at $2.99" for MOST of their titles for years and years now; and evidently it's still been profitable enough for them. Meanwhile, Image does just fine with their $3-$3.50 comics. I DO think the model has flaws in it, but I don't see it changing. Nor do I see enough preexisting customers dropping off. Maybe it's just your store or whatever. I think Diamond new releases are healthier now than they were 5-10 years ago, so I'm not sure why anyone would think that there was only 5 years left for print copies of single issues. Digital will supplement this, but if day-and-date digital was anywhere close to profitable enough at this point, then Marvel wouldn't be handing out free copies all the time. Clearly digital is not anywhere near profitable enough (keyword: ENOUGH) at this point, otherwise you wouldn't've had Marvel handing out free Vol. 1 TPB codes in single issues of All-New Marvel Now issues. The print comic is $4, and it comes with a free digital copy (which otherwise would have cost $4 on its own) and a free Vol. 1 collection (which otherwise would have cost $25 on its own). If Marvel is willing to give away $29 worth of digital content for $4, then clearly the digital model for new releases is not up and running.
I have been hearing it since the mid 70’s. No lie, editors in comics in the mid 70’s talked about having it work on putting together contacts in animation and book publishing because they KNEW comics would be done by 1980.
I think as long as we have no idea how much money Marvel and DC make off of digital comics (and obviously they make enough for Amazon to buy Comixpress) we don’t know what the economics are. Now, can a COMIC SHOP survive in the current declining climate? Sure, if they are smart, and if they diversify their product line. I know of VERY few comic shops that survive off of the Wednesday haul. They work trades, hardcovers, games, toys, shirts and other merchandise. I am visiting one this weekend that has an attached arcade that has vintage video games.
The companies are obviously doing well. IDW is expanding their “Artist Edition” line, and dark Horse is gearing up to survive the loss of Star Wars. Image is breaking all sorts of sales records and other second tier companies are doing well. There is a LOT of money sloshing around the comics industry even without all of the Hollywood development money coming in. If you think Boom didn’t make bank off of “Two Guns”, you don’t know why they exist.
The other thing to think about is the long tail. Yeah, the top books top out at 100k, and most of the midline series sell around 40k, but back in the late 90’s, the book in spot #300 on the sales chart usually sold about 900 or so copies. Now, the book in that same slot sells 4,000 on a regular basis.
Will the weekly comic shipment survive? Probably. There will be ups and downs and right now, we’re in a down, but the New 52, like it or not, was a HUGE up, and DC’s across the line sales are still up over this time the spring before the New 52. Marvel’s got some big stuff planned for next year with a new Avengers movie hitting when they have a Huge Secret Event that may get the same sort of play as the New 52.
Comics didn’t go away in 1980 and they won’t go away in 2015. But they won’t be the same, either.
Conventions: Because of my distance and timing challenges, it's hard for me to get to things like a Wild Pig sale or a Heroes Con or even a Retro Con. So, since I'm usually off between say Feb 15th and March 30th, then August 8th to September 15th, I usually go to either Emerald City ComicCon or Fan Expo in Toronto. (I wonder: Are those expensive cons? I don't remember the ECCC 3/4 day pass price, but FanExpo seems to be just below WizardWorldPhilly, $122Canadian for a delux 4-day, I usually get the 4-day Premium, $149Canadian). Anyway, next year I'd like to celebrate the 10th anniversary with you guys, but if it's ONLY to attend that suggested get-together on March 7th, it might not be worth the trip. Now if say Chris's Wild Pig or Golden Eagle were to do sales in conjunction with the anniversary show or maybe if there were some artists and/or panels then maybe I'd drop ECCC (March27-29) and come there instead. Food for thought...
BACK ISSUES: speaking of Fan Expo, after I saw you guys there last year ( @Adam_Murdough and @Pants) you mentioned (on the air, not to me in-person) that there was a retailer selling really good back issues at decent prices. Do you remember who that retailer was? I don't think it was Silver Snail...We DID talk about the $1 bins that I saw Adam at, so that wasn't it.
As for the back issue market, I can only speak for myself as a single baby boomer. Basically, I buy a lot of back issues and most of them I'm getting because I had them before, but I read so much and roughed them up so badly (trying to copy my favorite artists) that they basically disintegrated. So, I enjoy getting them again even if they're just reader's copies. And that then leads me to search for issues of the same titles that I totally missed the first time. Thus, from my vantage point, the back issue market is ALIVE! As for the future of the floppy, I find it hard to ignore Chris's points since he is a retailer, but on the other hand find it hard to believe that in FIVE (5!) years things'll go all digital. BUT I totally agree with Chris on the pricing. $3.99 and $4.99 is just crazy! (....and DC hasn't held the line for a LONG while now!) And yet I still buy a fair amount of certain issues. Not as much as I was say, 3 years ago, and certainly not as much as I could've bought 10 years ago. So, hey, maybe Chris is right and the new issue market will implode, too much product for too few consumers or something? Then maybe the companies will try to save money by eliminating printing costs? I guess it's possible.
http://www.theouthousers.com/index.php/news/127893-the-era-of-the-five-dollar-comic-begins-in-the-marvel-september-solicitations.html
Does this mean a 6-issue TPB will soon retail for $30?!?
I just chalked it up to Kitty fully grasping the extent of her powers. Phasing through objects was the basic level with phasing through time as paramount of her powers. Kind of like with Jean & her Phoenix powers.
M
I thought in X3, Xavier talked about concealing that side of Jean from her? I could be mistaken though. Haha
M
Things I love, Pants talking about con travels, Peter discussing tends in the industry, Chris talking about retail business and Murd giving us a detail summary of comics (even though this show didn't have that).
As far as the anniversary, I think you guys show have it at Golden Eagle ... everything can come full circle from the first super show. If you just have a get together at the studio I love to show up ... I think you said March 7th 2015.
Take care,
JP
Though I have to brag, I got my New Teen Titans # 1 & 2 in a NTT bundle at a Half Price Books and I think, once one does the math, I paid .35 each. I have good comic karma like that.