Comics Sales 2014 – January – Surprise high and low sales report

Comics Sales 2014 – January – Surprise high and low sales report

Market report by comics historian Terry Hoknes – hoknes@hotmail.com of www.HoknesComics.com

Every month Diamond Distributors reports the top 300 best selling highest ordered new comic books of the month

Retailers order new products 2 months in advance and must predict how well new comics will sell for them.

What happens every month is some titles are over-ordered and some retailers under-order.

As a stereotypical rule most retail shops will order extra heavy on all DC and Marvel titles knowing they might have potentially longer shelf life.  All other smaller publishers most retailers will NOT take the same risk with financially.

Therefore the best selling comics of the year are predictably from the “big 2″ publishers and the smallest print runs and books that sell out the quickest are from the smallest publishers.

Let’s analyze the best selling comics of the past month.  In the following list I will make notes of any comics I believe stand out specifically for having higher or lower orders than might have been expected.  This will strongly affect the future back issue prices of these comics.

Batman holds continuously as the best selling ongoing series but sales have been down and sales this month were so poor in comic shops that only 1 comic sold over 100,000 copies.

Harley Quinn sales stay decently strong and each issue has been selling out and going to 2nd prints.   If popularity stays up the early issues could eventually become valuable for future collectors.

Walking Dead – same as Harley Quinn.  Orders are quite high but issues do sell out and many go to 2nd prints.  If the TV series continues for a few more years these issues are likely to see price increases for future collectors.

2014 is the year that Marvel is restarting all their series with new #1’s.  This month we saw the first batch of them.  None of them had crazy high orders and since Marvel only prints whats ordered they all sell out and have 2nd prints immediately.

Miracleman #1 came in with a decent 52,000 copies – not bad for a comic which is basically a reprint series.

All New X-Factor #1 had the lowest print run of the new ongoing series at only 45,000 copies.  If this turns out to be popular this could be the hot new Marvel series of the month.   The original ongoing series debuted in 1986 with an estimated print run of 750,000 copies.  How’s that for a change in the comic industry !

I have written numerous articles lately stating my concern over the comics industry.  Some of the most popular characters in comics have very small print runs.  Either the quality of the books are suffering or have the readers had enough.   New issues of X-Men, Wolverine, Spider-man, Spawn, Transformers etc have hit print runs as low as in the 9,000 to 13,000 range each.   These books do not even make the top 100 anymore.

Looking at the rest of the list with a quick overview I will mention titles that I think the print runs were too high or too low.

If the print runs were too high then those copies are just gonna sit on shelves.

If the print runs were too low it likely sold out immediately at Diamond and in comic shops and has the best chance of all new comics to go up in value quickly.

PRINT RUNS TOO HIGH ?

Serenity Leaves On The Wind #1.   Dark Horse had a hefty print run of 47,000 copies of this new miniseries based on the Firefly TV series from a decade ago showing that retailers know there is a strong fan base.  However I think this print run is simply too high to have a price increase anytime soon.

As usual most Marvel/DC/Dark Horse comics do not sell out and retailers take bigger chances making these books unlikely to ever go up in value.

PRINT RUNS TOO LOW ?

Archie Funhouse Double Digest #1 – 1,300 copies for a new Archie #1 !   Did not even rank in the top 400 of the month.    While it is just another Archie story being such a small print run of the first issue meant most retailers didnt order any of this one.

Dredd Underbelly movie one-shot.  3,900 copies – many stores ordered 0 copies and the interest especially online in the UK helped draw demand for this cult classic  character and pushed prices up to $50.00 within a month of release.  Comic did not even rank in the top 300 of the month.

Walking Dead reprints.   The series is now bi-monthly and each issue sells out and goes to a small print reprint.  If completists want them these 2nd printings range from 1,500 to 8,500 copies.

Hacktivist #1 – 5,100 copies – Alyssa Milano is the writer/creator and this small print run and sold out.

Deadly Class #1 – 34,000 was the highest print run of any new Image title this month.  But with 2 covers and a hot writer – Rick Remender the book went up in value immediately with some sales hitting $11.00 already.  This shows that a decent print run can still be too small if the creators are in high demand.

Black Science #3 – 23,000.   The print run climbed from the low sales of 20,000 on #2 which sold out immediately but retailers were still cautious so #3 should sell out and still have a chance of climbing in the long run for collectors of this hot new series.

Manifest Destiny #3 – 12,000.  The single hottest back issue ongoing series had yet another small print run.  This issue is destined to go up in value like all early issues as everybody loves this series.  But I have some serious worries about the state of the comic industry when comics that everyone raves have such small print runs and many stores obviously do not bother ordering in any for the shelf.

Once again Image comics debuts a bunch of new series this month and the sales keep dropping month to month.   Any quality books are selling out quickly in advance at Diamond and retailers are not taking any chances.

Egos #1 11,000 / Saviors #2 8,000 / Minimum Wage #1 7,000 / Umbral #3 6,900 / Protectors Inc #3 6,200 / Drumhellar #3 5,100 / Krampus #2 5,000 / Aphrodite IX #1 4,700 / Black Science #2 (2nd print) 4,400 / Carbon Grey #2 4,200 / A Voice In The Dark #3 4,000 / Sex Criminals #1 (4th print) 2,400

I want to take this moment to repost a comment made by the author/writer of Umbral (Image Comics) and his sales analysis of the industry.     “For Umbral #1, 70% of our orders came from less than 30% of Diamond accounts. That’s every store that ordered 10 or more copies.   If you move that threshold up to 20 copies, you’re then accounting for fully 50% of our orders; and that came from just 10% of Diamond accounts.   And those numbers don’t even include stores that ordered zero copies. It may surprise you to learn that some stores literally only order Marvel + DC books, nothing else.    So think on that. More than 70% of Diamond accounts didn’t even order 10 copies of a brand new Image #1.”

I dont like these numbers.  Image is the 3rd biggest comic book publisher and yet this statement shows that some stores do not order a single copy of new Image titles (except likely Walking Dead, Saga).   Most stores order very small numbers.  Only 30% of comic stores – approx 450 out of 1500 stores ordered 10 or more copies.   Only 150 out of 1500 stores order 20 or more copies of new Image #1 issues.   This shows a small percentage of stores order a decent quantity but it also makes it more obvious that many copies ordered in bulk come from a small number of retailers who are also the ones that most likely speculate on hot books for online sales (like myself!).

PRINT RUNS – TOSS UP ?

All New Marvel Point One #1 – 32,000 – with the 1st full app of the new Ms  Marvel.  Hefty $5.99 cover price made this print run large enough. If the character proves popular this book (which already has a 2nd printing) will have a chance of going up in value.

Injustice Year Two #1 – 24,000 – still a small print run but just as large as the original #1 from a year ago.  Since readership is no longer climbing its not too likely this one will go up in value but a sellout seems likely and I did sell one copy for $8.99.

Revolutionary War #1 – 16,000 and 14,000 – very small print runs for new Marvel series.  While Marvel’s rarely go up in value, this one had sold out at Diamond even before release date so if there is any buzz on this storyline it will have a great chance of becoming a hot book.

Scribblenauts #1 – 11,000 – new DC kids series inspired by classic characters and mostly ignored by collectors -would take little for this to heat up.

Vampire Diaries #1 – 10,000 – a major publisher DC and a major TV series brought in surprisingly low orders – show must be past its peak of interest but still long term interest should make this a sell out.

Amazing Spider-man movie adaptation.   7,500 – while I have never been a fan of movie adaptation comics there is no denying that is print run for Spidey himself is super low and one of the rarest Spidey comics ever made !

Best Selling comics of Jan 2014 – interesting books to note for high or low sales:

About Post Author

hoknes

Author of Investing In Comic Book series
looks at history and rarity and historical importance of
classic comic books golden/silver/bronze age
Also owner of HoknesComics.com dealing in hot new comics

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