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Here is a list of the comics I've got the 2008 Statement of Ownership data for:

Amazing Spider-Girl #26
Amazing Spider-Man #574
Captain America #43
Daredevil #112
Fantastic Four #561
Ghost Rider #29
Hulk #7
Iron Man Director of SHIELD #35
Moon Knight 24
Ms Marvel 32
New Avengers #46
Punisher War Journal #25
She-Hulk #34
Thunderbolts #125
Ultimate Fantastic Four #58
Ultimate Spider-Man #127
Ultimate X-Men #98
Uncanny X-Men #504
Wolverine #69
Wolverine Origins #29
X-Factor #36
X-Men Legacy #217


If you find a Statement of Ownership in any comic not on this list, please let me know. Thanks...

Sorry a bit lost here, but what does this pertain to?

Skyhawke wrote:Sorry a bit lost here, but what does this pertain to?

Bob and I talk a bit about this in the recent Mayo Report episode. The Statement of Ownership is published once a year in titles the distribute subscription copes via the USPS. It includes data on print runs, sales figures and other information that I use in some of my number crunching for the Mayo Report. Specifically, this is some of the data I use for ballparking how much of the overall sales that the Diamond data accounts for.

I try to set aside the issues I get that have the Statement of Ownership in them. The above list is the titles that I found the 2008 Statement of Ownerships for. The request I made in the episode was for people to let me know if they found one that I missed. In particular, I'm interested in knowing if any Archie titles include a Statement of Ownership.


Here is a list of the 2007 Statement of Ownerships that I've got:
Amazing Spider-Girl #14
Astonishing X-Men #23
Black Panther #32
Captain America #32
Daredevil #102
Fantastic Four #551
Incredible Hulk #111
Ms Marvel #21
New Avengers #36
New X-Men #44
Punisher War Journal #13
She-Hulk #23
Ultimate Fantastic Four #48
Ultimate Spider-Man #116
Ultimate X-Men #88
Uncanny X-Men #492
Wolverine #59
Wolverine Origins #19
X-Factor #25
X-Men #205

And I'm not limiting the request to only current issues. If you guys stumble across any back issues with a Statement of Ownership in them, please let me know. Thanks.

I normally make note of the Average Net Press Run as I come across the statement when compiling my database.

Here's what I've got... obviously I've missed a bunch over time. And since I'm behind on my reading, I haven't gotten to enter too many recent issues into the database just yet.

Action Comics #447
Batman #394
Detective Comics 561
Flash 332
Justice League International 12
Justice League of America 214
Superboy 194
Superman 371
Weird War Tales 111
Amazing Spider-Man 417, 513
Astonishing X-Men 6
Avengers (1963 Series) 38
Avengers (1998 Series) 49
Cable (1993 Series) 86,90
Captain America (1968 Series) 159, 173, 185
Captain America (2005 Series) 43
Captain Marvel (2002 Series) 4, 17
Daredevil (1964 Series) 181, 194, 207, 219, 230, 256, 265, 281, 290
Daredevil (1998 Series) 2, 9
Excalibur (1988 Series) 36, 63, 115
Fantastic Four (1961 Series) 168, 229, 253, 278, 291
Fantastic Four (1998 Series) 37, 50
Fantastic Four (2003 Series) 519, 532
Generation X 21, 71
Incredible Hulk (1968 Series) 198, 245, 271, 295, 369, 380, 437, 449, 459
Incredible Hulk (2000 Series) 21, 77, 87
Iron Man (1968 Series) 145, 170, 182, 256
Iron Man (1998 Series) 10
Marvel Team-Up 91, 130
Marvel Two-In-One 62, 74
Mystique 20
New Avengers 24, 36, 46
New Mutants (1983 Series) 43
New X-Men (2001 Series) 150
Sensational Spider-Man 33
She-Hulk (2005 Series)
Spectacular Spider-Man (1976 Series) 78, 240, 263
Spider-Girl 41, 54
Spider-Man 74
Spider-Woman (1978 Series) 37, 43
Thor (2007 Series) 11
Uncanny X-Men 387, 401, 465
Web of Spider-Man 64, 122
Wolverine (1988 Series) 37, 52, 78, 98, 107, 119, 144, 156, 184
Wolverine (2003 Series) 20, 34
X-Factor (2006 Series) 36

Just Bill wrote:I normally make note of the Average Net Press Run as I come across the statement when compiling my database.

Here's what I've got... obviously I've missed a bunch over time. And since I'm behind on my reading, I haven't gotten to enter too many recent issues into the database just yet.

Action Comics #447
Batman #394
Detective Comics 561
Flash 332
Justice League International 12
Justice League of America 214
Superboy 194
Superman 371
Weird War Tales 111
Amazing Spider-Man 417, 513
Astonishing X-Men 6
Avengers (1963 Series) 38
Avengers (1998 Series) 49
Cable (1993 Series) 86,90
Captain America (1968 Series) 159, 173, 185
Captain America (2005 Series) 43
Captain Marvel (2002 Series) 4, 17
Daredevil (1964 Series) 181, 194, 207, 219, 230, 256, 265, 281, 290
Daredevil (1998 Series) 2, 9
Excalibur (1988 Series) 36, 63, 115
Fantastic Four (1961 Series) 168, 229, 253, 278, 291
Fantastic Four (1998 Series) 37, 50
Fantastic Four (2003 Series) 519, 532
Generation X 21, 71
Incredible Hulk (1968 Series) 198, 245, 271, 295, 369, 380, 437, 449, 459
Incredible Hulk (2000 Series) 21, 77, 87
Iron Man (1968 Series) 145, 170, 182, 256
Iron Man (1998 Series) 10
Marvel Team-Up 91, 130
Marvel Two-In-One 62, 74
Mystique 20
New Avengers 24, 36, 46
New Mutants (1983 Series) 43
New X-Men (2001 Series) 150
Sensational Spider-Man 33
She-Hulk (2005 Series)
Spectacular Spider-Man (1976 Series) 78, 240, 263
Spider-Girl 41, 54
Spider-Man 74
Spider-Woman (1978 Series) 37, 43
Thor (2007 Series) 11
Uncanny X-Men 387, 401, 465
Web of Spider-Man 64, 122
Wolverine (1988 Series) 37, 52, 78, 98, 107, 119, 144, 156, 184
Wolverine (2003 Series) 20, 34
X-Factor (2006 Series) 36

Wow. Thanks Bill.

Looking at those Cable issues, I'm thinking I must have accidentally posted it on both issues, because that's awfully close together numerically, and I have the press run listed as 82,775 on both.

I love reading these. FF was shocking to me -- 38k. Hard to believe a cornerstone book like FF would do 30% of the numbers most of the top books do.

It made me wonder if Marvel could realistically cancel FF for a time . . .

Trev wrote:I love reading these. FF was shocking to me -- 38k. Hard to believe a cornerstone book like FF would do 30% of the numbers most of the top books do.

The Fantastic Four numbers are exceedingly unlikely to be correct. They fall too far below the sales through Diamond. But, we are unlikely to ever see corrected data as Marvel is under no obligation to print corrected data.

JohnMayo wrote:

Trev wrote:I love reading these. FF was shocking to me -- 38k. Hard to believe a cornerstone book like FF would do 30% of the numbers most of the top books do.

The Fantastic Four numbers are exceedingly unlikely to be correct. They fall too far below the sales through Diamond. But, we are unlikely to ever see corrected data as Marvel is under no obligation to print corrected data.

I thought this was required to be accurate data. No?

Trev wrote:

JohnMayo wrote:

Trev wrote:I love reading these. FF was shocking to me -- 38k. Hard to believe a cornerstone book like FF would do 30% of the numbers most of the top books do.

The Fantastic Four numbers are exceedingly unlikely to be correct. They fall too far below the sales through Diamond. But, we are unlikely to ever see corrected data as Marvel is under no obligation to print corrected data.

I thought this was required to be accurate data. No?

Yes but mistakes happen.

JohnMayo wrote:

Trev wrote:

JohnMayo wrote: The Fantastic Four numbers are exceedingly unlikely to be correct. They fall too far below the sales through Diamond. But, we are unlikely to ever see corrected data as Marvel is under no obligation to print corrected data.

I thought this was required to be accurate data. No?

Yes but mistakes happen.

Most obvious mistake would be that it should have read 138k and not 38k. That would make FF one of marvel's best books, if not their best regular monthly. Based on the buzz it generates, that sure seems unlikely.

How could they miss like 50k copies (assuming it's where I think it *should* be relative to other books)? Somehow only publish non-diamond numbers? Where do the diamond numbers for FF indicate it should be?

Trev wrote:

JohnMayo wrote:

Trev wrote: I thought this was required to be accurate data. No?

Yes but mistakes happen.

Most obvious mistake would be that it should have read 138k and not 38k. That would make FF one of marvel's best books, if not their best regular monthly. Based on the buzz it generates, that sure seems unlikely.

How could they miss like 50k copies (assuming it's where I think it *should* be relative to other books)? Somehow only publish non-diamond numbers? Where do the diamond numbers for FF indicate it should be?

Here is the data I have for the Fantastic Four issues in question:

Fantastic Four #550 @ $2.99 (2007/10/10): 57,849 / $172,968.51
Fantastic Four #551 @ $2.99 (2007/11/07): 58,595 / $175,199.05
Fantastic Four #552 @ $2.99 (2007/12/12): 51,285 / $153,342.15
Fantastic Four #553 @ $2.99 (2008/01/30): 48,295 / $144,402.05
Fantastic Four #554 @ $2.99 (2008/02/13): 98,048 / $293,163.52
Fantastic Four #555 @ $2.99 (2008/03/12): 67,398 / $201,520.02
Fantastic Four #556 @ $2.99 (2008/04/09): 64,997 / $194,341.03
Fantastic Four #557 @ $2.99 (2008/05/21): 62,717 / $187,523.83
Fantastic Four #558 @ $2.99 (2008/06/25): 60,973 / $182,309.27
Fantastic Four #559 @ $2.99 (2008/08/13): 59,758 / $178,676.42
Fantastic Four #560 @ $2.99 (2008/09/24): 58,242 / $174,143.58

The print runs listed in the 2008 Statement of Ownership for Fantastic Four in issue #561 of 15,813 for the most recent issue (dated September 2008) and an average of 46,340. Compare those to the Diamond sales for the most recent issue of 58,242 and the average sales of 62,560.

Your guess that right number could be well over 100,000 seems unlikely. Depending on the process used at Marvel for generating and reporting on this data, it could be as simple as bad handwriting that lead to the mistake.

The bottom line is that the data in the 2008 Statement of Ownership for Fantastic Four is highly suspect. Again, mistakes happen.

Someone with fat fingers reaching for the "six" on the number pad and hit the "three" instead would be my guess.

Just Bill wrote:Someone with fat fingers reaching for the "six" on the number pad and hit the "three" instead would be my guess.

I'm kind of suspecting that too but there are a few other oddities that wouldn't be explained by bad typing.