Could old school comic book sales structure would stand any chance of work today

[Tzigone]

Just thinking about comic sales. And an aging audience. Now there are tons of other things that could be done, and I don't really want this thread to be about suggestions on new characters, etc. This is specifically about structure and audience.

You know, one issue, one story (possibly more than one story per issue, as that was common). I'm not saying there couldn't be any aging or character progression over years, or that marriage, babies, job changes or divorces couldn't happen. Though it could similarly be a Simpsons/Ducktales, etc. sort of thing where no one ages. The point is the idea of putting your general monthly comics in Walmarts and Rite-aids and and so on and making it easy for a person (especially a kid) to pick up an issue and get a story that has a beginning, middle, and end and they don't have to buy next month's issue to find out what happens and they can read only one out of every four issues and not be confused. To make it casual reading for a broad audience again.

I can't say that I really believe it would work - that method was failing when they went away from it. And there's so much more competition for entertainment now. And comics are more expensive. But this open-ended comics with multiple crossover and events is not very accessible for new readers. I love the ongoing universe, but I do have to admit that it can only go so many years before it collapses in on itself and retcons and inconsistencies make it messy and make a reboot (soft or hard) more desirable. And that number of years gets shorter and shorter with more big events that "change everything" and turn villains good and heroes bad. It's the worst of both words - a lack of accessibility for new readers and and old-time readers frustrated with no actual forward progression and established events and characterizations tossed out the window whenever it's convenient.

Obviously, all OGNs would be another approach to take, but I'm really talking about monthly comics in an open-ended universe and whether said model would stand any chance of success or just kill them more quickly because of hemorr*****g older readers and being unable to appeal to newer ones.

[Digifiend]

haemorr*****g? Why is H A G I N censored? That's not even a word, is it?

[Jim Kelly]

Let me preface this by explaining a change that I think happened from the 1940s to the 1960s. In the 1940s, comics were ten cents but you could get 64 pages of content in an anthology style format. In the 1960s, they held the price to 10 cents but cut the pages (also more ads) and comics became single features. However, if you bought three or four comics, you could mix and match to get your anthology experience.

So for publishers, the profit was in putting out a number of titles as a group, rather than one title full of features. And for the consumer, in any given month you could buy several comics to have that variety. If the stories were stand alone, then you could try out different titles each month.

Now I think the main problem with the mass market approach is that people don't buy physical media as much as they used to. But this model should work for a digital platform. If every month you have a selection of features to read and you can mix them up, then having stand alone stories suits this model.

I think some digital publisher will try this approach, if they haven't already. If a viewer subscribes to the platform and can select ten stories every month--and most stories are stand alone--then they can vary which features they choose to read each month.

[D.Z]

Not now but for the future? Maybe.

[Tzigone]

Now I think the main problem with the mass market approach is that people don't buy physical media as much as they used to. But this model should work for a digital platform. If every month you have a selection of features to read and you can mix them up, then having stand alone stories suits this model.

I like the digital format. And the ability to mix and match. But it doesn't really hit the "mass market" way I was thinking too well. I mean, kids can't just buy them with their allowance, they have to involve an adult (as they would with any sort of subscription). Of course, you don't have to target that young an audience, and we do know plenty of adults keep Disney+ and the like for their kids. The other part is they aren't easy to casually pick up an occasional story that way. It's not in the checkout line of the grocery store like compiled-Archie-comics (and I'm told Donald Duck comics in some countries). Someone who has never thought to buy a comic isn't going to think to seek them out online, whereas an 8 (or 18) year-old could see them in the checkout aisle (or toy aisle with action figures) and want to check out something they'd never thought of. And it wouldn't serve the occasional reader too well. You know, reaching a potential new audience of casual readers. But like I said, I'm not sure it's doable.

I guess I'm thinking of when I started reading comics. I watched cartoons with superheroes. I guess I just thought of comic books as something that used to exist. Or I didn't think of them at all, really, to even think if they still existed. Then, on a car trip on vacation, my dad saw some X-Men comics in the gas station and bought a few since he knew watched that. And I became a comic book reader. But I had to know about them, think about their existence, to want to buy them in the first place. Admittedly today, a kid is a lot more likely to do a Google search and immediately come up tons of information on current comics. I can't recall if I just had AOL then, or if it was shortly before we had an internet connection at all, but I hadn't thought to search for fandom material - now I gotta go feel old.

[Captain Nostalgia]

Just thinking about comic sales. And an aging audience. Now there are tons of other things that could be done, and I don't really want this thread to be about suggestions on new characters, etc. This is specifically about structure and audience.

You know, one issue, one story (possibly more than one story per issue, as that was common). I'm not saying there couldn't be any aging or character progression over years, or that marriage, babies, job changes or divorces couldn't happen. Though it could similarly be a Simpsons/Ducktales, etc. sort of thing where no one ages. The point is the idea of putting your general monthly comics in Walmarts and Rite-aids and and so on and making it easy for a person (especially a kid) to pick up an issue and get a story that has a beginning, middle, and end and they don't have to buy next month's issue to find out what happens and they can read only one out of every four issues and not be confused. To make it casual reading for a broad audience again.

I can't say that I really believe it would work - that method was failing when they went away from it. And there's so much more competition for entertainment now. And comics are more expensive. But this open-ended comics with multiple crossover and events is not very accessible for new readers. I love the ongoing universe, but I do have to admit that it can only go so many years before it collapses in on itself and retcons and inconsistencies make it messy and make a reboot (soft or hard) more desirable. And that number of years gets shorter and shorter with more big events that "change everything" and turn villains good and heroes bad. It's the worst of both words - a lack of accessibility for new readers and and old-time readers frustrated with no actual forward progression and established events and characterizations tossed out the window whenever it's convenient.

Obviously, all OGNs would be another approach to take, but I'm really talking about monthly comics in an open-ended universe and whether said model would stand any chance of success or just kill them more quickly because of hemorr*****g older readers and being unable to appeal to newer ones.

Getting comics back in the news stands (Comic racks) in Wallmart & Convenience stores might help a little bit, but.....the problem is in a few years most of those young kids will stop buying comics when they know they can read them for free on the internet.

Piracy is killing the business. It's not that young people aren't reading them, it's that they are reading them online for free. The business relies on older fans because we grew up buying physical copies & many of us continue to do so.

If your 14 do you want to be spending $40 dollars a month of comics when you know you can save that money for something else, because you can read Batman & Spiderman for free?

Piracy will be the end of DC Comics as we know it, how can you continue to make a healthy profit, when offshore accounts are streaming every new Marvel & DC comic for free the day of its release, which can be easily found with a simple google search.

[married guy]

The newsstands are finished.
We will never see that again.
There is simply no profit margin for the newsagents to bother stocking them.
The decline especially in the last 3 years has been enormous.
Where once there would be Phantom, Batman, Superman, Archie and the odd issue of Flash, NOW I'm lucky to see a copy of the Phantom.
It would take a completely new business model to work - and that ain't happening.

[Jim Kelly]

I've long thought the way for comics to go is to give away comics for free, but find another way to monetize that. Comic books started out, way back in the beginning of the universe, as free giveaways.

In the past I would have said a way to do that would be putting them in newspapers or giving them away at fast food restaurants. Perhaps, giveaways at Walmart would work, if Walmart thought it would help boost customer satisfaction. But with the death of physical media, giving them away online might be easiest.

If the publisher has a better platform than the piracy sites, then kids will go to the publisher's site. Once they've got them hooked, they can find other ways to make money off the little rugrats. For us old fogies, they should then package those comics in books we can buy at a later date.

[DrNewGod]

It's not just comic reading that is in decline, it's reading period. IMO, of the characters we love are to endure, their medium is not only digital, but interactive, and over multiple platforms. If you want the future to engage with a superhero story, at least some component is going to have to be a game.

[Jim Kelly]

It's not just comic reading that is in decline, it's reading period. IMO, of the characters we love are to endure, their medium is not only digital, but interactive, and over multiple platforms. If you want the future to engage with a superhero story, at least some component is going to have to be a game.

If you read Scott McCloud's Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology Are Revolutionizing an Art Form (2000)--now more than twenty years old--he lays out how he thinks comics could progress.

I don't entirely agree with him, but it was already obvious in that book that the internet was using comic book language. You see it now everywhere, all over social media, such that people no longer recognize that this visual language came from the comic books and comic strips of old. Ironic that just as that was happening, the embarrassed comic book creators were abandoning some of that visual language to make movie story boards pretending to be comics, because they thought comic book visual language looked silly. Turns out, on social media, people like to be silly.

We are still reading--just in a different way. And comics were the leader in that change. It saddens me, because I love the written language, but people have opted for a different kind of literacy.

McCloud seemed to think that the comic book would just become a better version of itself. I'd say that a comic book has to be a book--and once you put it on screen and take advantage of all the interactive thngs you do on screens, it's no longer a book. It's something else. The static nature of comics--where artists create a mental motion using stationary images--is intrinsic to that artform. So whatever McCloud imagined is a different artform.

[caj]

Are comics still available for sale at Barnes and Noble?

[CaptCleghorn]

The newsstands are finished.
We will never see that again.
There is simply no profit margin for the newsagents to bother stocking them.
The decline especially in the last 3 years has been enormous.
Where once there would be Phantom, Batman, Superman, Archie and the odd issue of Flash, NOW I'm lucky to see a copy of the Phantom.
It would take a completely new business model to work - and that ain't happening.

Exactly. And where you do see magazines, they are usually weeklies which have four times the sales potential of monthlies. The money made on a comic book isn't worth the time and space it takes up. I talked with a retailer about this and he told me he only sold "giant" comics because the regular sized comics weren't worth the space on his shelf. And this was 50 years ago.

[DrNewGod]

If you read Scott McCloud's Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology Are Revolutionizing an Art Form (2000)...the internet was using comic book language. You see it now everywhere, all over social media, such that people no longer recognize that this visual language came from the comic books and comic strips of old. Ironic that just as that was happening, the embarrassed comic book creators were abandoning some of that visual language to make movie story boards pretending to be comics, because they thought comic book visual language looked silly. Turns out, on social media, people like to be silly...

I have not read him, but (if I understand you correctly) I agree with the premise. It seems to me that nobody since the early 1990s has had the kind of visual flair for action of guys like Gil Kane, or the Buscemas.

[thefinalguy]

Leaning towards digital would have to be the way to go to actually attract and keep new readers engaged. Monthly formats arent sustainable for the casual reader who has a fleeting interest in something.

Of course, print can't be entirely done away with, especially not for loyal fans.

$5 a comic is a lot tho, especially for something you may or may not like.

They just have to get smart about how they tackle it, and that requires some shift in formatting and some experimentation.

But, to answer the question, no the old comic book sale format won't work in the modern era.

[DanMad1977]

Is it about reading? Are novel sales declining, too? I don't know. What I do know is, that I don't read novels anymore, I didnt buy one for over 10 years, because I don't have the attention span anymore. Maybe thats not true altogether, because I read books based on science {the universe and stuff).

Comics? I buy them, but more and more in tpb format or omnibis.