Current Spider-Man Sales

[Kaitou D. Kid]

I really don't think you want to imply that if sales drop, even if sales stabilize at a decent place, it implies the quality of USM is not good.

If sales drop but the quality stays the same a few issues from now, there would likely be a reason for that (e.g. economy getting even worse and people having even less money).

With a book like USM, there is no reason to think sales will suffer a significant drop "just because". Even the original USM continued to stay strong for a number of years, and no surprise because it was well-written.

The success of the first issues of USM doesn't mean it's going to work in the long-term, or that Amazing Spider-Man can sustain decades of stories if Peter and MJ's relationship is calcified.

The main alternative to the illusion of change is either stories with no change or radical change. At a certain point, it's different from the series you enjoyed. That may be part of its new charm, but there are trade-offs.

The only thing that doesn't work in the long-term is stagnation, as change is the only constant. And as we talked about in the past, there is no such thing as "calcification".

That's why Editorial's current policy will not last long-term. ASM is already becoming irrelevant relative to the adaptations.

[TinkerSpider]

If Amazing Spider-Man sells okay in a poor market, that suggests Marvel should do more to overhaul the other titles.

Marvel needs to look at its entire line and its content/sales strategy, that is true. But that includes, not excludes, ASM. The two are not mutually exclusive by any stretch of the imagination.

As the biggest seller, that means ASM has the opportunity to reach the most customers and thus expand its audience.

And we now have evidence, albeit still early days, that ASM is leaving a nice amount of money on the table. ASM readers are willing to buy USM. But there is a new audience who is willing to buy USM who are not wiling to buy ASM.

Corporate executives who have to justify their jobs to their bosses, who in turn have to justify their leadership to Wall Street and investors, don’t like leaving money on the table. Especially when they have evidence they can improve a struggling market.

There are issues that may affect the entire industry, and Amazing Spider-Man sales could increase as those issues (costs, distribution models, overall direction) are fixed, but those issues would be unlikely to unique to Amazing Spider-Man.

But they are reasons why Marvel should lead with ASM.

When car sales are struggling, car markers don’t tinker with their lower selling models - they cancel them. They improve and innovate their top sellers, as those top sellers already have established brand equity and therefore need less marketing/PR spend/work.

Comicshub information is incomplete, but we'll get some data. We may not know the gap between Ultimate Spider-Man #2 and the second best-selling comic that month,

Actually we get an idea from the Bleeding Cool weekly round up of the top 10 titles - and so far the gap has been an astonishing ~40 points between USM #1 and USM #2 and the books that came in number two that week (Transformers and Batman respectively).

However, the same caveats about the squishiness and unreliability of the data apply, as Bleeding Cool is also using ComicHub.

but we'll get information about best-selling comics of 2024 at the end of the year and the charts will tell us something. If Ultimate Spider-Man is always the best-selling comic of the month, that's a major indication of astounding success. If a previous month's issue of Ultimate Spider-Man has significant sales of leftover copies the next month, that will also pop up in the charts.

And we look at the Comicshub information in the context of other data.

I'm not going to get a Pro subscription to ICV2, but it doesn't seem that exclusive at 12 bucks a month or 120 bucks a year. If there's something especially unusual under the hood about the numbers, I think it'll come out.

Except it doesn’t. I believe that is the gist of the discussion about Spider-Boy. People are taking the chart as literal gospel. It’s not. It’s not even particularly good data. It’s inherently biased and flawed due to its collection criteria, and tells us nothing but a ranking over a set period of time.

[Vordan]

Feb sales:

1 Ultimate Spider-Man #2

6 Amazing Spider-Man #43 (Gang War)

8 Edge of Spider-Verse #1

17 Spider-Punk: Arms Race #1

18 Amazing Spider-Man #44 (Gang War)

21 What If…? Venom #1

25 Ultimate Spider-Man #1 (Resolicitation)

31 Miles Morales: Spider-Man #16 (Gang War)

34 Venom #30

40 Spider-Boy #4

48 Superior Spider-Man #4

67 Spider-Gwen: Smash #3

68 Miles Morales: Spider-Man #17

80 Spider-Woman #4 (Gang War)

109 Carnage #4

111 Spider-Boy #3 (Resolicitation)

127 Amazing Spider-Man #42 (Gang War) (Resolicitation)

138 Amazing Spider-Man #252 Facsimile Edition

177 Amazing Spider-Man #41 (Gang War) (Resolicitation)

199 Superior Spider-Man #3 (Resolicitation)

[Dan Slott]

111 Spider-Boy #3 (Resolicitation)

127 Amazing Spider-Man #42 (Gang War) (Resolicitation)

138 Amazing Spider-Man #252 Facsimile Edition

177 Amazing Spider-Man #41 (Gang War) (Resolicitation)

199 Superior Spider-Man #3 (Resolicitation)

Now imagine those extra sales-- from a book released on the last day of the month, and a book from a week before that-- were subtracted from their February sales tally and added to their January sales tally...

I'm pretty happy to have both books in the Top 50 without either of them being a flagship or legacy title-- and with one of them being (effectively) a new IP for Marvel. Like I said on a previous thread, you can look at the previous month's rankings and intuit (since I know Spider-Boy's selling a little higher than Superior), that SPIDER-BOY was a Top 50 book last month, but suffered a bit by being released on January 31st and only having a number of days of sales counting towards its tally in that chart as opposed to a number of weeks.

It's almost like I'm being earnest and upfront about everything when I post here, and just telling it like it is. :-P

[Mercwmouth12]

Now imagine those extra sales-- from a book released on the last day of the month, and a book from a week before that-- were subtracted from their February sales tally and added to their January sales tally...



It's almost like I'm being earnest and upfront about everything when I post here, and just telling it like it is. :-P

Would ever consider doing a Venom run after spider boy ends?

[Dan Slott]

Would ever consider doing a Venom run after spider boy ends?

Trick question. Spider-Boy will never end.

[Mercwmouth12]

Trick question. Spider-Boy will never end.

Could we expect Spider-boy to run through 2025 or could he have an event with him as the main player sometime this year?

[SturdyMike89]

Feb sales:

A solid month for Spider-Man all around. The only book that looks a bit weak to me is Carnage. I do wonder if a character this dark is simply incapable of supporting a book for a long period. Spider-Verse and Spider-Punk books will probably continue to be a popular staple in the Spider-Man line. Congratuloations Dan on Spider-Boy and Superior's continued success. This is probably the most enjoyable that I have found the Spider-Man line since just before the second clone saga.

[Vordan]

A solid month for Spider-Man all around. The only book that looks a bit weak to me is Carnage. I do wonder if a character this dark is simply incapable of supporting a book for a long period. Spider-Verse and Spider-Punk books will probably continue to be a popular staple in the Spider-Man line. Congratuloations Dan on Spider-Boy and Superior's continued success. This is probably the most enjoyable that I have found the Spider-Man line since just before the second clone saga.

Spider-Punk is a #1 so I’d hold off on declaring it a success until we see how much sales drop off for issue 2. Otherwise though, the Spider-Line remains incredibly strong. Doubly so with USM in the mix.

[Kevinroc]

Those ICV2 numbers haven't been released yet. But Bleedingcool released their charts. As always, these lists aren't fully accurate of the industry at large, yadda, yadda, yadda.

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/ghos...stseller-list/

1 Ultimate Spider-Man #3 Marvel Jonathan Hickman Marco Checchetto 4.99 100
2 Amazing Spider-Man #46 Marvel Zeb Wells Carmen Carnero 4.99 45.2

USM 3 sold more than double what ASM 46 did according to Bleedingcool. (And remember that USM 3 will also have a 2nd printing with the potential for more later.)

[Frontier]

Those ICV2 numbers haven't been released yet. But Bleedingcool released their charts. As always, these lists aren't fully accurate of the industry at large, yadda, yadda, yadda.

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/ghos...stseller-list/

1 Ultimate Spider-Man #3 Marvel Jonathan Hickman Marco Checchetto 4.99 100
2 Amazing Spider-Man #46 Marvel Zeb Wells Carmen Carnero 4.99 45.2

USM 3 sold more than double what ASM 46 did according to Bleedingcool. (And remember that USM 3 will also have a 2nd printing with the potential for more later.)

Probably a good thing Wells' run is winding down (we hope), they'll likely relaunch soon.

[logo449]

Probably a good thing Wells' run is winding down (we hope), they'll likely relaunch soon.

Agreed. You can say USM is still in its infancy/new car smell stage while ASM has been chugging along for 2+years as reason for the discrepancy. But for a book that has been heralded as Marvel’s top selling book for going on a year now, USM outselling it by double (allegedly) is pretty noteworthy.

[Kevinroc]

I'm curious. How many issues are we supposed to say USM is in its "new hotness" stage?

[ImOctavius]

I'm curious. How many issues are we supposed to say USM is in its "new hotness" stage?

I would say between #6 and #12, after the first arc.

[Spider-Tiger]

For comparison, Ultimate Spiderman Vol #1 didn't outsell Amazing by a 2:1 margin (excluding reprints.) It appears to have averaged 10-20% more around this time based on data available on comichron. Of course, the bleeding cool data is not as representative of the entire market.