$5.00 Comics! Sorry I'm Out!

[Mikekerr3]

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Inflation's not really the problem here. It's mostly production, transportation costs, and infrastructure costs. Fuel and property costs have increased exponentially over the past decade.

Inflation figures in all those things unless one dash somehow increased at a greater rate than inflation, Production cost for example have proportional gone down in Printing, Gone down quite a long way. transportation cost mostly follow inflation rates and the infrastructure costs of IP are minimal

[doodledude]

Meanwhile elsewhere struggling webcomics artist and writers are creating original content practically for free.

[Goggindowner]

Wow, $5 is your limit? Mine was $3, and I have trade waited ever since the price went above that. And by trade wait, what I really mean is I might read something five years later or so in most cases.

There is no economical reason for a 20-ish page comic to cost what they are asking for it. It's all in the readership and the shrunken market size compared to the amount of books that DC and Marvel publish per month. Ad revenue is down, sales are down, and instead of looking at ways to actually grow the readership in a significant and lasting way, they have taken the strategy to gouge the customers they have left for every penny they can. Nothing they are doing is making any kind of substantial impact on the actual monthly comic sales. Not even the massively successful movie franchises are helping all that much. Sure, they make the respective companies boat loads of cash, but they don't draw in new readers. Even the highest selling books now only hit cancellation levels from 20 years ago, with a few exceptions here and there. The readership as a whole might have grown some since 1997, but the numbers aren't really showing in monthly sales. All you have to do is look at the figures on sites like ComiChron to see the overall downward trend. Any new readers are either gravitating towards collections of older stuff, trade waiting, or reading less popular indy stuff that is more artistic in nature and less summer blockbuster that have significantly lower sales than anything that ranks in the top 100 every month.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

When I started collecting comics the price I came in at was $1.25. Within a month or two it went to $1.50. Now I don't feel like comics should stay personally for me at $1.50. But I do think the price for comics in my opinion (yes its opinion) should have never went above $2.00 an issue. I think Marvel and DC should have worked out things like , increasing advertising in the comics ...working out better terms with Diamond to sell and trying to find the cheapest methods of paper/production they could. I know people have said they can't go much cheaper...but reality sets in and people will only pay what they can.

My pull list right now is 5-6 issues of new comics. I collect mostly back issues. Today I picked up 17 issues for $1 buck apiece. And those issues will have more reading material in them than today's comics.

[emac1790]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this isn't an inflation issue. I think it's a cost-of-living issue. Creators now make real good money, compered to when I first started collecting. (comics cost 30/35 cents in '77, IIRC) You have to pay the creators and the best creators are usually on the most popular books.

When you look at all the costs of comic book production (paper, transportation, paying the people who worked on a comic, etc..) 3.99 is not as bad as, let's say, 5.99.

Unlike years past, comic books don't sell in the millions. Less people buying means the prices on monthlies will go up to cover the cost-of-living expenses of the creators that worked on the comic.

Is it any wonder why Marvel is so in to the movies? Marvel wishes that the GotG comic could make as much profit as the movie. Marvel probability made more money in one week with the movie then the comic did in all the time the comic's been out.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

I'm of the opinion that DC and Marvel can and will charge $5.00 for comics because they know people will buy them, plain and simple. Just like smokers more than willing to shell out nearly seven bucks for a single pack of cigarettes, comic book fans will shell out big time for the titles they like, and damn the expense.

[simbob4000]

You cant blame comics.

The American dollar is not worth what it was. Its worth less.

So a comic that just about costs 2 dollars not too long ago is going to jump up about double its price. In reality, its nearly exactly the same price it costs when it was 2 bucks. Most comics are around 4 bucks typically. Its just the dollar isnt worth what it was, so now you have to work more to get the same thing.

You should go knocking down the white house and telling friends about the people running the country to the ground so it can change. But of course most people wont do this.

Sure you can blame them. They've been slowly killing themselves for years, they're just trying to squeeze more money out of less people, which is going to keep more people way, which is going to mean more price hikes.

That comic books aren't in big stores anymore, and are now regulated to just comic shops and book stores has to be one of the dumbest things the comic industry has done to itself.

[Doc Omega]

When I started collecting comics the price I came in at was $1.25. Within a month or two it went to $1.50. Now I don't feel like comics should stay personally for me at $1.50. But I do think the price for comics in my opinion (yes its opinion) should have never went above $2.00 an issue. I think Marvel and DC should have worked out things like , increasing advertising in the comics ...working out better terms with Diamond to sell and trying to find the cheapest methods of paper/production they could. I know people have said they can't go much cheaper...but reality sets in and people will only pay what they can.

My pull list right now is 5-6 issues of new comics. I collect mostly back issues. Today I picked up 17 issues for $1 buck apiece. And those issues will have more reading material in them than today's comics.

When I started collecting comics they were still 50 cents. God I feel old

[Lady Warp Spasm]

Yeah, $5 is beyond my budget too even with pre-orders (most would be $4 which is still way too high.)

Right now, one Image title and occasion subscriptions to 2000AD are not only within my budget but satisfying me in ways the Big Two are not.

Disappointing that comics went from an affordable escape to a luxury.

[Taral-DLOS]

If they ever get to $4.99, I'll probably still buy, but buy fewer books a month. I'm currently doing about 18-20 issues per month (X-Men and Marvel cosmic, with a handful of others like Thor and Inhumans). I have to drop a few titles to keep myself buying the things I'm most interested in, and rely on digital code trading, TPB waiting, or digital sale waiting, for the rest. I love that if I want to read a title but am willing to wait patiently, I can expect that 6-8 months down the line, the digital price will drop to $1.99, and maybe even go on sale for $0.99. A couple of months ago I managed to finish buying unpurchased Infinity tie-ins, because enough time had passed that they dropped to $1.99.

One lame price issue though is that my LCS's preorder discounts just changed. I used to pay $3.23 CAD for a $3.99 book, but now I pay $3.36 CAD. That 13 cents adds up when you buy 18-20 issues a month. My LCS owner said that it's because the Canadian dollar just isn't what it once was, and that he'd been losing profits to a badly-priced discount for some time. So he raised it up a bit to account for the weakened CAD. I still buy from him ($3.36 is still better than US cover price or higher everywhere else, and I'm pleased that the owner, managers, and evening employees know me by name), but it was still irritating.

[FanboyStranger]

Inflation figures in all those things unless one dash somehow increased at a greater rate than inflation, Production cost for example have proportional gone down in Printing, Gone down quite a long way. transportation cost mostly follow inflation rates and the infrastructure costs of IP are minimal

Not true. The infrastructure costs of leasing a space in NYC and keeping it heated throughout the winter has increased well above the national average for inflation over the past twenty years. The costs for shipping and transportation have increased exponentially over the past twenty if you're using a service like UPS, which Diamond uses, resulting in much higher distribution costs. (That is why Diamond raised its cut-off point for sales a few years ago, leaving many indie books out in the cold.) The cost of health care for full-time employees-- talking editors, marketing, executives, etc., not freelancers-- has increased dramatically over the past twenty years. These are all what I would consider production costs. Most publishing ventures based in large cities have had costs increase at a far higher level than the national inflation level over the past decade, which is part of the reason why print is in such trouble. It's not the paper that's the problem; it's moving that paper around, for the most part.

[Shawn Hopkins]

The thing that irritates me about the debate is how many people want cheaper comics but flip out about a few ad pages. I'm willing to have a few ads in the periodicals if it keeps costs down. If you want the ad free version, buy the trade.

[Mikekerr3]

I'm of the opinion that DC and Marvel can and will charge $5.00 for comics because they know people will buy them, plain and simple. Just like smokers more than willing to shell out nearly seven bucks for a single pack of cigarettes, comic book fans will shell out big time for the titles they like, and damn the expense.

the price will n continue to climb until enough people stop buying to make the increase in prove non-profitable. It helps when you have a marked that is somewhat addicted to your product.

[Mikekerr3]

When I started collecting comics they were still 50 cents. God I feel old

10/12cents kid

[Mikekerr3]

Not true. The infrastructure costs of leasing a space in NYC and keeping it heated throughout the winter has increased well above the national average for inflation over the past twenty years. The costs for shipping and transportation have increased exponentially over the past twenty if you're using a service like UPS, which Diamond uses, resulting in much higher distribution costs. (That is why Diamond raised its cut-off point for sales a few years ago, leaving many indie books out in the cold.) The cost of health care for full-time employees-- talking editors, marketing, executives, etc., not freelancers-- has increased dramatically over the past twenty years. These are all what I would consider production costs. Most publishing ventures based in large cities have had costs increase at a far higher level than the national inflation level over the past decade, which is part of the reason why print is in such trouble. It's not the paper that's the problem; it's moving that paper around, for the most part.

the real estate costa are incidenal costs since we are tlking about verymodest offices.

Transportation coast have gone down, relative to infflation over that last twenty years, Don't buy a bridge form anyone telling you otherwise