Comic books.
Comic books are to America what Manga is to Japan. A cultural symbol and part of art history. No matter how you try to describe or see it, comic books, have been a long part of American history since the 1930s. It all started with Action Comics who introduced to the world, Superman.
American comic book artist invented the superhero genre as well as action movies that other countries would get inspiration from. Like many things in life, once something goes up high enough, the only way to go is down. It looks like the comic book industry has reached a point where it either has to evolve or it will completely die out and there is no telling what will happen.
You would think that with all the successful super hero movies, comic books would be selling by the millions and in a way they are but not how you think they are.
There were two super hero movies that actually opened the door for super hero movies in the late 1999’s and early 2000s. The successful Blade movie (Blade the vampire of Marvel Comics) was really successful and had made it just in time for the vampire hype in the early 2000s when being goth was super cool. Also the success of the Spiderman movie with lead actor Toby McGuire.
The numbers say that over 85 million comic books have been sold in 2018 in North America. However, if that was true then why are all these comic book stores closing. The success of superhero movies means that more people would go out and buy comic books right? but that is not what is happening.
Something smells bad with all this and we age going to get to the bottom of it.
Who Distributes Comic Books?
The biggest comic book distributor in North America is Diamond Comic Distributors. They are the ones that are throwing the numbers around. So thus far as of 2018 it has been reported that Diamond has sold 85 Million copies of all comic books combine. That sounds like a big number. Also the total sales revenue according to Diamond, for all their comic books is $516 million total revenue in 2018. That is in North America only. So half a billion dollars.
Check out Comichron to look at the numbers.
So Diamond is making hundreds of millions of dollars as the one and only comic book distributors. The question is how much are comic book stores getting out of this pool of money.
Do Comic Book Store Owners Make Much Money
For comic book stores to be profitable, is all about Location. You can be sure that comic book stores in New York or Los Angeles are not going to go out of business so easily. However, if you are in the suburbs of Connecticut, USA, it is hard to make it profitable when there is not enough people visiting your store. I had written and article about 5 ways comic book stores care survive. It is hard enough for an artist to make a comic book profitable, a comic book store has its own set of problems trying to sell comic books for $3.
Following what was said about Diamond Comic Distributor. They claim that the comic book industry is selling more than ever but here is why comic book stores are not making a profit and have to close. Comic book store owners have to play it smart.
If you own a comic book store, you have to buy comic books in bulk from Diamond Comic Distributor. You have to buy the comic books that you think will sell so its a bit of a gamble. your best bet is of course, Marvel and DC but also some of the comic from other publishers like Dark Horse.
As a comic book store owners you have to pay attention to the superhero movies that are coming out and what cartoons are being made. So if when the next Avengers movie comes out, you need to have many of those Marvel Comic books on your shelve to pay the rent.
So the ones that make the first sale really is Diamond Comic Distributor. The comic book stores have to gamble and or have really good knowledge of comics and what is hot right now. Comic book store owners buy the comics from the Diamond at a 40% discount and then resell it at a higher price. That is how it works. Afterwards, its up to the comic book store to sell more comics to make that money back and then make a profit. So if the store orders 1000 marvel comics and only sell 200 within a few months, then they have to get rid of 800 comics and its not like they can sell it back to Diamond, they have to selling it at a lower price to get rid of it or just throw it out.
Sucks, doesn’t it.
So comic book stores are not getting a piece of that $516 million revenue that Diamond claims the industry is making.
Digital Sales Are Not Beating Retail Store Sales
Digital sales are about less than 9% of the comic book sales. Most people get their comics from the stores nearby. Sure, Barnes and Nobles sells comics as well however, their manga section is so much bigger than the comic book section.
Some would think that online sales would be higher than retail sales for comic books. However, that is not happening. One of the reasons why novels are more profitable than comic books is because of how well accepted they are by the overall public. Its not like the Amazon kindle or the Barnes and Noble Nook reading device. For the fiction book industry, ebooks are 40% of the industry sales. People read everywhere. With comic books is different. There are reasons why some people might not like your comic book over someone who does not like comic books but would read a Superman novel. Does that make sense.
Stan Lee once said.
Comic books are like boobs. You love looking at them but you want to hold them too.
So there is a difference between reading a novel on a mobile device versus reading a comic book or manga on a mobile device. Because is art, many people prefer to hold the book in their hands.
Political Agendas being added to comic book story
I hate to go into this topic but you have heard it over and over again haven’t you. Feminism, LGBT, Social Justice Warriors and leftist political agendas have reached comic books and movies. It has been like this since 2014. Being politically correct, movies being washed with diversity and so on.
What the masses don’t understand is that, this group of people that fall under feminism, LGBT and are for political correctness, its only a small percent of the population however, they are treated as if they are 80% of the population.
Many entertainment companies (such as Disney) are changing modern day content to cater to these people. There has to be a gay character, a transgender character, a racial minority character and a disabled character.
The stories are now more focused on the genre and political identity of the characters rather than the story. That is why movies like that all female Ghost Buster movie flopped, Charlies Angel movie flopped and other female centric movie flopped. the reason is because the focus of the story is the political agenda and not writing a good story. Whether if the character is male, female or gay, does not matter. The problem is that the story no longer matters.
So the reason why many people are not buying comic books and turning to manga and anime and other forms of art and entertainment is because of what is being pushed by a certain side of the political parties.
And this is why many comic book stores are closing all over North America.
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