I decided to keep things reasonably simple and did the analysis using the standard 40% discount DCBS offers on most comics from the premiere publishers. DCBS usually offers a number of door buster discounts each month but to keep things simple, I didn't include that in my analysis. For that level of granularity, each person should just download the monthly Excel order form and plug in the specific comics they want to see how it stacks up for them. I also kept the cover price consistent across all titles and only looked at $2.99 and $3.99. As far as bags and boards, I only considered with or without the $0.12 option. Since sales tax varies from place to place, I left that out of my analysis. Clearly, this is kind of an ideal case comparison and not as completely real world situation analysis. Again, for that, download the Excel order form from DCBS and plug in your potential order and compare that against how much those comics would cost you locally and see how things stack up.
It might be a bit surprising just how low the financial breakeven point was. With as few as half a dozen $2.99 comics a customer can save a little bit of money using DCBS provided they go with monthly shipping and no bags and boards. So if saving $0.95 on $17.94 worth of comics, a 5% savings, is worth the effort of preordering then go for it. If, however, you aren't pinching pennies that tightly and/or you live in an area where the shipping results in getting the comics almost a full week later, maybe DCBS doesn't make sense with just six comics. (Which was the point I think Bob was making.) Different people have different thresholds for how quickly they want the comics and how much they need to save for it to be worthwhile preordering comics.
Adding in bags and boards on a DCBS order of six $2.99 comics with monthly shipping reduces the savings to $0.23. Again, it is cheaper but depending on numerous other factors, it might not be enough of a savings to justify the switch to mail order.
Personally, one of the advantages of DCBS is that getting my comics involves ducking into the UPS Store where I have a mailbox to pick up my box each week. The UPS Store is easier and faster to get to than any of the comic shops in town and has plenty of parking. It usually only takes me a minute or two to get my box and be on my way. As great as some of the shops are here in town, parking can be limited and they are not particularly convenient to where I work and live. So, in that regards, getting my comics from DCBS is much more efficient in terms of time than shopping at a local store. It also has helped keep my impulse purchases under control.
Shifting to twice a month shipping, the breakeven point is 11 comics at $2.99 with no bags and boards with a $0.70 savings and 12 with bags and boards having a $0.46 savings. Shifting to weekly shipping, the breakeven without bags and boards is 16 comics costing $47.84 cents locally and through DCBS. Adding in bags and boards shifts the breakeven point to 18 comics with a $0.24 savings.
Here is a chart which shows the breakeven points for $2.99 comics at a 40% through DCBS:
Here is a chart which shows the breakeven points for $3.99 comics at a 40% through DCBS:
At the higher price point, it obviously takes fewer comics to make DCBS worth considering with 4 comics being the breakeven point for monthly shipping, for twice a month shipping it is 8 (without bags and boards) or 9 (with bags and boards). With weekly shipping it takes only 12 (without bags and boards) or 13 (with bags and boards) to breakeven.
So, even at the very low end of the scale, DCBS is a viable choice. At the higher end of the spectrum, it can stretch your comic book spending dollar much further.
But at what point is it worth doing? The will vary from person to person. For me, if the cost is roughly the same, I'd strongly consider getting my comics locally since I'd get them on Wednesday instead of the following Monday (or Tuesday if Monday is a holiday). The savings needs to be above both a flat dollar amount and some percentage of my total spending to justify the transition to mail order. I'm not entirely sure what those threshold are for me.
One of the more perplexing comments I've heard over the years is that my purchasing comics through DCBS is somehow bad for the comic book industry. I've never understood that mindset. For the most part, it seems like it is more helpful than hurtful.
Any reader with the choice of two local stores is likely to mainly shop at just one of the two stores. Is that second store bad for the comic book industry? Of course not. Likewise, DCBS is just another retail alternative available to a geographically wider group of readers. So, while shopping at DCBS versus some local store is obviously not good for that local comic shop, it is no worse than if you shopped at some other local comic book store. So, at the retail level, shopping though DCBS is no more or less harmful than shopping at any specific store over another. In the case of readers with no local comic book store as an alternative, mail order services like DCBS are a huge benefit the industry.
The publishers and creators are getting the same percentage of the cover price regardless of where a reader buys it within the direct market. As a result, where a reader purchases a comic and how much the reader pays has no impact, either good or bad, on the publishers and creators. If anything, the less a reader pays for a comic, the more money they potentially have to spend on other comics. Obviously not all of the savings will be spent on other comics but any that is spent on more comics clearly benefits the publishers and creators.
My personal stand on the subject is that readers should by what they want wherever they want for whatever price they are willing to pay. For me, DCBs has worked out great and I would recommend them to people looking for a good mail order comic book service. That having been said, if you have a great local comic book shop that you are happy with, support the local store.
