tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19387347.post1216288302608154833..comments2024-03-19T06:14:23.325-04:00Comments on Kleefeld on Comics: And Another Thing About Digital Comics...Sean Kleefeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10492399469370737192noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19387347.post-15014588248116978862010-06-19T21:48:07.036-04:002010-06-19T21:48:07.036-04:00I have less than no doubt that something will even...I have less than no doubt that something will eventually selling "a million copies" -- if Spidey Meets Obama was on an iPad, I bet they could have sold a million of those for 99 cents, no doubt.<br /><br />I just have a harder time believing that xx,000 people are going to be interested in buying {whichever specific book] digitally, month-in, month-out.<br /><br />I may well be very very very wrong, but as I've watched my own market, the broader DM, the bookstore market, and so on, I just don't see some of the numbers that people are suggesting... not in a sustainable fashion.<br /><br />Marvel and DC don't strictly NEED comics, no, but I really do believe that if either one of them gave up that business, within a decade or so after that they'd fall apart due to abandoning their core.<br /><br />That's not to say the DM, itself, is the most important aspect of their business -- but that comics is the root of what they do, even if it isn't where most of thier revenue comes from.<br /><br />-BBrian Hibbshttp://comixexperience.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19387347.post-3369495895283269972010-06-19T07:29:51.318-04:002010-06-19T07:29:51.318-04:00Thanks for stopping by and responding, Brian.
Lik...Thanks for stopping by and responding, Brian.<br /><br />Like I said in the original post, I really am just guessing on long-term digital sales here. I've got absolutely zip to back that up beyond some vague hunch. Call it "digital proponent optimism" if you like. :) But by the same token, I do get the sense that you're thinking more pessimistically about it because, if a digital program from Marvel and DC were a big success, that could have a huge negative impact on your livelihood. I don't mean that as a slight. I've seen a few people that are very dismissive of your digital arguments, claiming that, "Well, he's just a whiney retailer because it'll disrupt his business." Let me be clear that I <b>don't</b> think that. I think you do have some very valid points. But I also think your retailer perspective could be skewing your view a little more pessimistically here. I certainly don't begrudge you for that, I just want to offer up another opinion. <br /><br />I am surprised to hear that you've got books with a longer shelf life than a month. The retailers I've talked with on this (which, admittedly, only totals three) have all reiterated the 30 day life expectancy, and their stores are designed accordingly with only the latest issues really accessible. I wonder if that's mostly a difference in buying practices and/or clientèle...? They could well be assuming that ALL comics have a short life span and don't really consider what might be exceptions. I appreciate your insight here.<br /><br />Finally, you do have a good point about Marvel losing out on more than $5 million in my worst case scenario. But my larger point -- that Marvel (and likely DC) do a decent amount business <i>outside</i> of selling comics and would still be a profitable company without them -- remains. I don't think that's a point you're unaware of, but it's one that I haven't seen brought up by anyone in the recent discussion of their digital experiments. Yeah, if whatever future experiments they have with digital go south in a big way, that will certainly hurt them as a company financially and the shareholders will get really pissed. But where I'm going with this is that they can withstand dramatic shake-ups in the comic industry, whereas retailers (I was about to add "like yourself" but you're more the exception than the rule in this regard, Brian) can experience huge upheavals at an individual level that might be only caused by small market tremors. <br /><br />I'm just saying, for the people who might not be as versed on the business side of things, that the retailer and publisher perspectives here are going to be inherently different.<br /><br />In the end, I think our only real point of divergence here is in how well digital comics will sell. As you pointed out in your TaW, that's just something we do not have a model for yet. I'm sure we'll all be interested to see the numbers with the <i>Iron Man Annual</i> experiment (not that we're actually likely to). <br /><br />What's that old Chinese curse? "May you live in interesting times." :)Sean Kleefeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10492399469370737192noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19387347.post-89690705376940433172010-06-18T20:29:09.514-04:002010-06-18T20:29:09.514-04:00"However, my take on that is more positive be..."However, my take on that is more positive because that means the latest issue of Daredevil would only need to sell around 70,000 digital copies to earn the same profits it's earning now. "<br /><br />I have a bit of a hard time believing that there are sustainably 70k people who *would* be buying Daredevil, but can't/won't currently. Only time will tell who is correct, however...<br /><br />"One aspect that Hibbs did not bring up is that digital comics, by the nature of their not requiring any actual shelf space or the need to be reprinted ever, have a decidedly longer shelf life."<br /><br />I tend to suspect that the Long Tail of random, not-beloved old comics (note: "old" can mean "last month", even) will be measured in annual sales in the hundreds, not thousands.<br /><br />Now, in the aggregate, that could still mean hundreds and thousands of dollars of monthly revenue that's essentially "found money", but I'd be truly flabbergasted if old random issues of Marvel Two-in-One had monthly downloads that hit triple digit numbers -- certainly the annual sales figures for ESSENTIAL reprints (which end up priced fairly close to what Digital readers say they WANT to pay) via BookScan are under 300 copies for both volumes, and I suspect DM sales aren't really all that bigger. Obviously an ESSENTIAL isn't the same as a digital release, but I'm going to guess your sense of scale is off.<br /><br />"The shelf life of a new comic now in a comic shop is 30 days with most of the sales happening in the first 7"<br /><br />A shitty comic, yes.<br /><br />However, I can find you a dozen periodicals or more that I'm still actively restocking a year or more after release because they still have strong velocity -- and that's not even counting certain "alternative" comics (Dirty Plotte, Hate annuals, Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, etc) that I'm still stocking A DECADE OR MORE after release.<br /><br />But, yeah, they've got 4 weeks or less to sell this week's "Age of Heroes #2", for instance.<br /><br />"That means that, in a three month period, their operating income (for our purposes here, that's effectively what they have left after paying all their employees and rent and whatever) goes from $37 million to $32 million."<br /><br />That's logical (after a fashion) in the aggregate, but I think the thing you're ignoring there is that that would mean that "most" of the comics they produce wouldn't be earning back their creative costs... and thus "most" of their books would end up canceled, lowering their gross profits further...<br /><br />-BBrian Hibbshttp://comixexperience.com/noreply@blogger.com