Quite an interesting graphic, numbers and comment from Bendis about these released 1985 'sales' numbers.
http://brianmichaelbendis.tumblr.com/po ... id-80s-are
John, what do you have to comment about this?
Trevor Chapman
Monarch Comics Briefing
Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Moderator: JohnMayo
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
OMG!!! Sell Through Numbers!!!
Stunning.
Question is, do you think the sell through % is fairly constant over time?
Also, major credit to Phil Seuling for essentially saving the comics industry by shifting the risk from the publisher to the retailer.
Can we infer anything about how margins and volume discounts work with the sell through numbers?
Credit to Shooter for posting the memo. His blog is awesome.
Note to self -- read Shooter's blog more often . . .
Stunning.
Question is, do you think the sell through % is fairly constant over time?
Also, major credit to Phil Seuling for essentially saving the comics industry by shifting the risk from the publisher to the retailer.
Can we infer anything about how margins and volume discounts work with the sell through numbers?
Credit to Shooter for posting the memo. His blog is awesome.
Note to self -- read Shooter's blog more often . . .
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
I'll look this over in detail over the weekend. At a glance, it looks very interesting.Ratenef wrote:Quite an interesting graphic, numbers and comment from Bendis about these released 1985 'sales' numbers.
http://brianmichaelbendis.tumblr.com/po ... id-80s-are
John, what do you have to comment about this?
Trevor Chapman
Monarch Comics Briefing
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
I'm having a hard time determining the scope of this data. Is it the entire market? Just the newsstand sales? Just the direct market? A subset of the direct market?
The text below the letter indicates it is newstand sales. In 1985, the direct market was alive and well. Exactly how "well" is questionable. But this data doesn't seem to include any of the direct market data. So, not as apple-to-apples with the Diamond data as I was thinking at first glance.
The text below the letter indicates it is newstand sales. In 1985, the direct market was alive and well. Exactly how "well" is questionable. But this data doesn't seem to include any of the direct market data. So, not as apple-to-apples with the Diamond data as I was thinking at first glance.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Yeah, it isn't a clear delineation of data, but it is interesting to see that of the 100s of thousands of comics printed (Draw), less than 25% were actually reported as sell through.
I think that Bendis is suggesting that if you look at that <25%, the difference between those numbers and the current monthly numbers, the discrepancy is not as vast as we have all been supposing.
Perhaps the non-returnable era has created an environment of far less inflation, essentially burst the bubble, of the reported numbers of comics sold. Which could suggest that the industry is nearly as strong as it was during those hey days of the mid 80's.
But, as you've pointed out we are NOT comparing apples to apples here, but we have taken a small peek behind the curtain at the man pulling the levers.
I think that Bendis is suggesting that if you look at that <25%, the difference between those numbers and the current monthly numbers, the discrepancy is not as vast as we have all been supposing.
Perhaps the non-returnable era has created an environment of far less inflation, essentially burst the bubble, of the reported numbers of comics sold. Which could suggest that the industry is nearly as strong as it was during those hey days of the mid 80's.
But, as you've pointed out we are NOT comparing apples to apples here, but we have taken a small peek behind the curtain at the man pulling the levers.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
i read the bendis piece, now reading shooter.
my read is that it is primarily newsstand sell through. what i can't tell is if DM numbers are part of the total -- if they were really differentiating at that stage.
Given that there are no longer newsstand sales of any consequence save Archie, then do you think it is still representative of sell through of the market? I can't imagine that 30% sell through is what is happening today.
HOWEVER, assuming current sell through is more like 70-90% and given current size of print runs relative to 1985, I think it is somewhat safe to say that the total market may not have shrunk as much as we have been led to believe.
What percentage of the market do you think the DM was in 1985? By 1985, I would say that 50-70% of the books I bought were DM, but I was still frequenting my local drug store for books too, since it was significantly closer to me than any DM retailer. By late 1987, I was 100% buying from the DM.
my read is that it is primarily newsstand sell through. what i can't tell is if DM numbers are part of the total -- if they were really differentiating at that stage.
Given that there are no longer newsstand sales of any consequence save Archie, then do you think it is still representative of sell through of the market? I can't imagine that 30% sell through is what is happening today.
HOWEVER, assuming current sell through is more like 70-90% and given current size of print runs relative to 1985, I think it is somewhat safe to say that the total market may not have shrunk as much as we have been led to believe.
What percentage of the market do you think the DM was in 1985? By 1985, I would say that 50-70% of the books I bought were DM, but I was still frequenting my local drug store for books too, since it was significantly closer to me than any DM retailer. By late 1987, I was 100% buying from the DM.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Reading shooter's blog, it has much more interesting insight. There were (and are) secondary revenue streams that I don't think we consider very often. Though I think it is probably less interesting for most people.
Looking at how the distribution market functioned pre-DM, it is easy to see how the mob was involved.
Looking at how the distribution market functioned pre-DM, it is easy to see how the mob was involved.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
I don't think the direct market sales are part of these totals. I'm not sure how much that would add to it.Trev wrote:my read is that it is primarily newsstand sell through. what i can't tell is if DM numbers are part of the total -- if they were really differentiating at that stage.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Having read both the Bendis piece (I can’t tell if he wrote this or simply reposted something Chris Roberson wrote) and the Shooter piece. The problem is there is a lot specious reason. The Bendis posted piece is much worse in this regard.
First off, draw and print run are not synonymous; the Bendis posted piece doesn’t seem to understand that. Shooter tries to explain this in the fourth paragraph of his piece. This fact alone invalidates almost everything in the Bendis posted piece. The draw was the number of copies sent to the newsstand national distributor, not the print run.
Secondly it is very convenient to pick the late 1985 DC numbers. Times were bad at DC at this time, we all know this, it is why DC tried Crisis. DC wasn’t doing well in early 1980’s that isn’t news!
Thirdly Shooter’s piece is about the possible scams that were being run by the news stand distributors, not about total sales. Shooter even points to the statement of ownership from an April 1966 book, something that late 1985 books would still have. If you want an insight into the numbers from that era look to the statement of ownership printed around that time not this report. As a matter of fact what maybe very interesting would be to compare these numbers to the numbers in a statement of ownership from the time, that in theory would allow you to figure out the size of the direct market at the time.
While this report is interesting for what it is, what it isn’t is more important. None of conclusions drawn by the author of the Bendis posted piece can be drawn from the report given. You notice Shooter didn’t draw any of those conclusions btw.
First off, draw and print run are not synonymous; the Bendis posted piece doesn’t seem to understand that. Shooter tries to explain this in the fourth paragraph of his piece. This fact alone invalidates almost everything in the Bendis posted piece. The draw was the number of copies sent to the newsstand national distributor, not the print run.
Secondly it is very convenient to pick the late 1985 DC numbers. Times were bad at DC at this time, we all know this, it is why DC tried Crisis. DC wasn’t doing well in early 1980’s that isn’t news!
Thirdly Shooter’s piece is about the possible scams that were being run by the news stand distributors, not about total sales. Shooter even points to the statement of ownership from an April 1966 book, something that late 1985 books would still have. If you want an insight into the numbers from that era look to the statement of ownership printed around that time not this report. As a matter of fact what maybe very interesting would be to compare these numbers to the numbers in a statement of ownership from the time, that in theory would allow you to figure out the size of the direct market at the time.
While this report is interesting for what it is, what it isn’t is more important. None of conclusions drawn by the author of the Bendis posted piece can be drawn from the report given. You notice Shooter didn’t draw any of those conclusions btw.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
could this be figured out by finding the statement of ownership from the time.JohnMayo wrote:I don't think the direct market sales are part of these totals. I'm not sure how much that would add to it.Trev wrote:my read is that it is primarily newsstand sell through. what i can't tell is if DM numbers are part of the total -- if they were really differentiating at that stage.
The thing is would the DM numbers be listed as subscription sales or sales to dealers?
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Reporting on Statement of Ownership data has been on my "to do" list for years. Since I'm only one guy with only so many hours in the day, this has been forced to take a back seat to other tasks. Since I use the Diamond data every month for the podcast, revamping the number crunching process for the Diamond data has been a higher priority. With that task moving along (but still far from done), there is hope that I'll get to the Statement of Ownership data within the not horribly distant future.fudd71 wrote:could this be figured out by finding the statement of ownership from the time.JohnMayo wrote:I don't think the direct market sales are part of these totals. I'm not sure how much that would add to it.Trev wrote:my read is that it is primarily newsstand sell through. what i can't tell is if DM numbers are part of the total -- if they were really differentiating at that stage.
The thing is would the DM numbers be listed as subscription sales or sales to dealers?
Here is a chart of the Captain America data since that it the title I have the most Statement of Ownership data for:
The zeroes are for years I either don't have, haven't located/found or haven't scanned in the Statement of Ownership.
Based on that, I'd say sales are down on this title. I'd love to get more data into the system and see what the individual trends and average trend looks like.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
Okay, here's a question, does the Statement of Ownership numbers reflect the Draw #'s from the link I provided or the Sales #'s from the same?
If they are the Draw #'s as that would mean that Captain America in 1985 was printing about as many issues as Justice League, which makes some sort of sense.
If they are the Sell through #'s, that would mean that including the Direct Market it was selling about 2.5 times as many issues as DCs highest spinner rack issue, Crisis.
The latter would further suggest that the DM during the time of 1985 was a significant portion of overall sales, enough that the letter Shooter has put forward is almost meaningless without this additional data. Which could be why he was comfortable sharing it.
There are just too many unanswered questions to really make the true value of this 'data' significantly 'intelligent'.
If they are the Draw #'s as that would mean that Captain America in 1985 was printing about as many issues as Justice League, which makes some sort of sense.
If they are the Sell through #'s, that would mean that including the Direct Market it was selling about 2.5 times as many issues as DCs highest spinner rack issue, Crisis.
The latter would further suggest that the DM during the time of 1985 was a significant portion of overall sales, enough that the letter Shooter has put forward is almost meaningless without this additional data. Which could be why he was comfortable sharing it.
There are just too many unanswered questions to really make the true value of this 'data' significantly 'intelligent'.
Re: Comparing 1985 sales to today (from the Bendis blog)
The Statement of Ownership has the print run, the "total paid circulation" and mail subscription copies. The "Draws" are a subset of that print run for the newsstand and the "Sales" a subset of that "Draw" as described by Shooter's write up. I think by 1985, the direct market was fairly strong, the newsstands not so much as DC sales so-so.Ratenef wrote:Okay, here's a question, does the Statement of Ownership numbers reflect the Draw #'s from the link I provided or the Sales #'s from the same?
If they are the Draw #'s as that would mean that Captain America in 1985 was printing about as many issues as Justice League, which makes some sort of sense.
If they are the Sell through #'s, that would mean that including the Direct Market it was selling about 2.5 times as many issues as DCs highest spinner rack issue, Crisis.
The latter would further suggest that the DM during the time of 1985 was a significant portion of overall sales, enough that the letter Shooter has put forward is almost meaningless without this additional data. Which could be why he was comfortable sharing it.
There are just too many unanswered questions to really make the true value of this 'data' significantly 'intelligent'.
I recall at that time leading up to Crisis on Infinite Earths, the comic book store I was working at ordered three copies of Wonder Woman. One for the owner of the store, one for me and one for the rack which usually ended up in the back issue bins. It wasn't a huge store but even so, no customers were buying the title at the time.