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Terry Hooper-Scharf

Saturday 20 May 2017

So WHO Is Lying About Comic Sales/Orders?




I had another laugh yesterday.  A couple of vloggers -You Tube comic bloggers- laughed when they showed their bagged copies of the Death of Superman.  One said "Hey, guys ~remember when we thought these would be worth a million?"

The crushed look as a copy of the white bagged Superman is alive issue was held up.

Of course, Superman, and every other DC comics character has, like those at Marvel, died over and over.  But excluding the imaginary stories comics of the old DC, Superman had died before The Death of Superman.  All I have to write is Crisis On Infinite Earths (how'd that seal your future occupation with DC, Marv?).

When Crisis On Infinite Earths appeared it was a bolt out of the blue.  Back then, seeing your heroes ~I was never a big DC fan but Justice League and Justice Society of America and other characters I liked~ killed off was...well, it was like being kicked in the balls.  Supergirl dead?  Flash dead??  WTF???

Well, this was before DC insulted fans by saying "F*** continuity!"

Look at these comics sales figures for March 2017 from Comichron http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicssales/2000/2000-03.html

UnitsDollarsComic-book TitleIssuePricePublisherEst. units
11Amazing Spider-Man25$9.99Marvel113,934
22Dark Knight III Master Race8$5.99DC107,892
36Batman18$2.99DC98,100
47Batman19$2.99DC97,501
54Iron Fist1$3.99Marvel89,652
63X-Men Prime1$4.99Marvel83,689
78Star Wars29$3.99Marvel72,017
85All Star Batman8$4.99DC71,809
912Walking Dead165$2.99Image70,422
1018Justice League16$2.99DC62,515
1121Justice League17$2.99DC61,165
1213X-O Manowar1$3.99Valiant60,524
1311Star Wars Darth Maul2$3.99Marvel60,415
1425Detective Comics952$2.99DC59,722
1528Detective Comics953$2.99DC59,160
1631Superman18$2.99DC57,879
1733Superman19$2.99DC56,439
1835Flash18$2.99DC54,959
1922Batwoman1*$2.99DC54,849
2038Flash19$2.99DC53,918
2127Justice League of America2*$2.99DC53,349
229IVX6$4.99Marvel52,811
2316Spider-Man Deadpool15$3.99Marvel50,691
2410Inhumans Prime1$4.99Marvel50,422
2539Justice League of America3*$2.99DC48,504
2651Wonder Woman18$2.99DC47,484
2719Old Man Logan19$3.99Marvel47,428
2817Action Comics975$3.99DC47,382
2920Deadpool28$3.99Marvel47,026
3042Super Sons2*$2.99DC47,021
3152Action Comics976$2.99DC46,846
3253Wonder Woman19$2.99DC46,745
3323All New Wolverine18$3.99Marvel46,731
3426Unworthy Thor5$3.99Marvel45,298
3556Suicide Squad13$2.99DC45,064
3614Neil Gaiman American Gods Shadows1*$3.99Dark Horse44,885
3724America1$3.99Marvel43,592
3861Suicide Squad14$2.99DC43,388
3960Harley Quinn15$2.99DC43,264
4029Man-Thing1$3.99Marvel43,131
4162Harley Quinn16$2.99DC42,767
4265Titans9$2.99DC42,557
4334Star Wars Doctor Aphra5$3.99Marvel42,465
4436Doctor Strange18$3.99Marvel41,801
4515Clone Conspiracy Omega0$4.99Marvel41,179
4671Nightwing16$2.99DC40,289
4773Nightwing17$2.99DC39,467
4841Captain America Steve Rogers13$3.99Marvel39,454
4974Trinity7$2.99DC39,380
5043Avengers5$3.99Marvel39,204
Look at these figures from Comichron for sales in March 2000


Comic-book TitleIssuePricePublisherEst. preorders
1X-Men100$2.99Marvel144,878
2Uncanny X-Men380$2.99Marvel115,158
3Wolverine150$2.99Marvel99,054
4JLA41$2.99DC77,145
5Magdalena1$2.50Image76,364
6Avengers28$1.99Marvel76,125
7Spawn96$1.95Image68,967
8Daredevil13$2.50Marvel67,544
9Punisher2$2.99Marvel67,365
10Fantastic Four29$1.99Marvel59,062
11Tomb Raider4$2.50Image58,405
12Cable79$1.99Marvel55,907
13X-Force102$1.99Marvel54,395
14Amazing Spider-Man17$1.99Marvel54,097
15Thor23$1.99Marvel52,490
16Generation X63$1.99Marvel51,982
17Gear Station1$2.50Image51,938
18Peter Parker Spider-Man17$1.99Marvel51,579
19Batman577$1.99DC49,749
20Iron Man28$1.99Marvel49,729
21Batman Dark Victory6$2.95DC49,724
22Batgirl2$2.50DC49,465
23Captain America29$1.99Marvel49,057
24Detective Comics744$2.50DC48,032
25X-Man63$1.99Marvel47,744
26Mutant X19$1.99Marvel47,445
27Rising Stars6$2.50Image47,266
28Soul Saga3$2.50Image46,774
29Gambit16$1.99Marvel43,376
30JSA10$2.50DC42,814
31Batman Gotham Knights3$2.50DC41,709
32Superman156$1.99DC41,192
33Nightwing43$1.99DC41,048
34Witchblade39$2.50Image40,520
35Batman Legends of the Dark Knight129$1.99DC40,391
36Action Comics765$1.99DC40,252
37Astro City Vol. 222$2.50DC39,859
38Green Lantern124$1.99DC39,859
39Superman The Man Of Steel Coll Ed100$3.99DC39,257
40Preacher61$2.50DC39,252
41Amazing Spider-Man 2000$3.50Marvel39,177
42Flash160$1.99DC38,953
43Darkness30$2.50Image38,789
44Crimson17$2.50DC38,630
45Steampunk2$2.50DC38,530
46Incredible Hulk14$1.99Marvel38,157
47X-Men The Hidden Years6$2.50Marvel38,157
48Adventures Of Superman578$1.99DC37,476
49Thunderbolts38$1.99Marvel37,436
50Avengers Two Wonder Man And Beast1$2.99Marvel36,923

Notice how the sales are not incredibly high?  So ask a question: how can all these comic 'experts' claim that "a Marvel title has average sales of 25,000 these days"?  Where is this quote from because I searched from 2200hrs to 0100 hrs (yeah, I am that kind of idiot) and cannot find a source just lots of bloggers/vloggers and "fans" quoting it.

If you know let me know where this figure came from!  The lowest figure for a Marvel title in March, 2017 is 39, 204 which is for The Avengers at no. 50  -a low placing but still far more than "25, 000".

And here is the major problem: the figures talk of established orders. Not actual sales.  To get a rough estimate of a title and its sales you would need to contact every retailer -shops, online sellers and so on.  We know comics is a crooked business and there are many reasons why one of these sources would report bad sales....or good sales. And here we are only talking about orders to the United States not international orders.

Comics are not selling as well as they used to.  Yes, insulting and exploiting fans with bad stories and even some bad art.  Also the "Big fans" of comic book originated characters on TV or in the movies do not necessarily read comics. Despite all the screw ups, DC comics is still has more titles in the top 10 than Marvel.  Yes, the Dollar comic bins are far more wide spread now in the US, in fact they seem to be more prominent than new comic book displays.

In the UK, of course, unscrupulous dealers are charging vast amounts for back issues.  Comic titles (I went by two that were commonly featured in $1 and $2 bin features from the US) that were being bought for $1-$2 or in a pack of "Five for $5" are on sale in the UK for between £7.00 to £20.00 which is between $9.00 to $26.00!!  And these comics are not rare and neither are they in short supply.

The UK gets hit like this on everything.  I was watching some gamer (RPG) videos and they were showing figure purchases of HeroClix and other figures in bulk "These things average 35 cents a piece to 75 cents. The most I've ever paid for a particular figure was $1!"   Every video.  UK?  One of those same figures (a SINGLE one) was £19.00 to £23.00 which is $25.00 to $35.00. Not rare. Not scarce. It is just people trying to be greedy and make a lot of money ~oh, and that price was before UK postage!

 But getting back to new comics, it seems that everyone is being ignorant or lying or twisting facts for their own cases whether SJWs, anti-SJWs or anti-Brevoort (Brevoort just outrightly lies like breathing, it's just natural to him.

So, please, take this "average of 25,000 copies sold" on every title with a sack of salt until you can find the source.  I cannot.


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1 comment:

  1. Unknown20 May 2017 at 11:27

    Just looking at data from the Top 50 best selling titles of the month will naturally give a skewed result. If you take the Top 300 sales and crunch numbers it reveals that on average each Marvel title sells a shade under 30,000 units to retail stores (Top seller: Amazing Spiderman 113,954; bottom seller Foolkiller 5210). But, as you say, this isn't the full story, this is just what Diamond have sold to the stores. With a world population of over 7 billion, there's approximately one copy of Amazing Spiderman per 60,000,000 people! (Although the maths does depend on your definition of a billion!)

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