How Do We Request Trades to be Collected?

[arosenbarger]

I love picking up collected comics in trades and omnibuses. As a publisher with library of floppies avail to collect, does anyone know how these companies Cost Benefit Rationalize publishing reprints of yesteryear comics?

Looking over these posts - I've seen the "wishlists" we've all posted. If we're wanting book XYZ and book XYZ happens to be published we say" someone's listening to us." I'm not sure if that pespective is true or not. With all of geek in and outs I am just actually asking not counting the movie tie ins (In reprinting Winter Soldier when the movie came out/DOFP same) - how do the companies select trades to republish?

[NZ_InFerno]

They decide by whatever metrics they use, DC for example throws floppies out the window and whichever ones hit the ground first get a HC. I'm joking but it does seem that way sometimes, you have no say really in what gets printed. Well technically if you and 100,000 mates buy a book, and its critically acclaimed then it is more likely to be collected in a nicer edition. If there is a movie or some other marketable event on then it's more likely that there will be books published of the same character or team.

The only real way I've seen it is on the masterworks forum where Marvel surveys members about what books they want, but the top requested books are not necessarily then printed.

The "someone is listening to us" is a bit of a running joke too.

[victorxd1999]

Well, whereas we have our own preference, the company has too. A group of people decide and that's basically what would sell best or be the best recieved. It's all about the money

[CrazyOldHermit]

I suspect it has to do with trends. "Books from the 90s are selling more? Lets do more of those!" "Archives don't sell so much? Lets cool it down then."

For example, look at Marvel's Epic Collection. In a year's time it has expanded from six to ten lines. Daredevil was solicited as a one-off book before being rebranded as an Epic. Clearly at that point the sales data had come in and the Epics had exceeded expectations.

[Spirou]

I suspect it has to do with trends. "Books from the 90s are selling more? Lets do more of those!" "Archives don't sell so much? Lets cool it down then."

For example, look at Marvel's Epic Collection. In a year's time it has expanded from six to ten lines. Daredevil was solicited as a one-off book before being rebranded as an Epic. Clearly at that point the sales data had come in and the Epics had exceeded expectations.

I strongly believe that the big comic companies still rely more on sales data then on customer opinions to decide what's going next. I don't see how this is going to change as long as we don't see polls everywhere and as long as the decision makers and marketing guys don't discuss these topics with their fan base in the relevant channels (i.e. this forum). I work for a large retailer here in Switzerland and we have had some very good ideas developped together with our customers, leading to unexpected successes like Mojito toothpaste (no joke!). But in the end, most of our products are still beeing developped without tooooo much research and co-operation with our customers. we now what sells, we have the experience, we have been doing this job for decades, right? If the toothpaste doesn't sell, well then it's done. And it won't help that a small but very engaged group of Mojito toothpaste fans claim that this product is cool (which it is). But i think that in the comic scene, listening to the fans could actually really increase sales and profit more than in classic retail. So that will be the way to go imo (still having a look on these sales numbers of course).Is there anybody listening?