THAT is not a healthy industry

This was originally posted on the Black Tower Face Book page 17th July 2018

Here is a very stark and very real wake-up call to all of the people who say "Comics are doing great sales wise!" and "The comics industry is strong and vibrant!" and also "It's a great time to be an Independent comics publisher!"

Firstly, I need to point out that these people ALWAYS refer to the Big 5 -Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse and IDW that are worth millions and have the industry sewn up and all the "mouthpieces" they could want.

Secondly, by the very fact that they handle movie, TV and other franchises and are worth millions -Image, IDW and Dark Horse ARE NOT "Independent" publishers. That is just a very, very erroneous title to give these companies and comic readers fall for it and some may seriously believe these companies are independent so that they can claim "I support Independent comics!" No, you support MAINSTREAM comics.

Now, Black Tower moved from Small Press style to Independent Comics and books in 2009 with two books -Some Things Strange & Sinister and The Bat Triumphant. Both were a struggle and shock to the system if you have worked in cut 'n' paste/photocopying. I learnt a lot from that nervous breakdown! :-)

Since that time Black Tower has grown. Educational books such as Cruisers In The Clouds looking at early air ballooning. Nature –The Red Paper: Canids a history of foxes, wolves, jackals and other canid species in the UK. "Mystery" books -Some Things Strange & Sinister, Some More Things Strange & Sinister, Pursuing The Strange & Weird -A Naturalist's Viewpoint, UFO Contact?, Mysterious and Strange Beasts, The Bizarre Legends, Crimes And Truth of Spring Heeled Jack. Then there was comics history with 35 years of creator interviews in The Hooper Interviews.

Then the comic albums (A4 format and over 48 pp) including series such as BT Adventure, Tales of Terror and graphic novels (over 100pp) Return of the Gods, Descent, Dervish Ropey and, of course, the collected books and I am not -you will be happy to hear- going to list all of them.

Comic Bits started as a print publication (4 issues) but as an internet "presence" began in the late 1990s -Yahoo 360, Freeservers, WordPress and currently Blogger. When CBO shifted from WordPress it had 6 million views.

In 2011 everything moved to Blogger. Combined views of CBO via Blogger and combined with Google+ totalled over 6 million by 2015. Although Blogger belongs to Google the company no longer accepts any views figures other than direct-to-blogger. It also will not allow comments via Google+ and in 2015 it wiped out total page views on Google+ so that everything started from Zero again.

However, I keep tabs on "monthly views" and they have gone past 1 million (in 2016). People who love doing these things tell me that (all independent of one another) that CBO (alone) has had well over 6 million views but adding everything else in...well, it is a very high figure.

So, all these people -comic fans?- see all the Black Tower posts and some have had individual post views of 5,000. To this books, obviously, have been promoted on other blogs (all now concentrated on the Blogger Black Tower Comics & Books blog). And, again, there are book and feature posts on the Anomalous Observational Phenomena blog. Add to these my various Yahoo groups, Face Book, Twitter, Pinterest and so on.

At one point it was stated that Black Tower was "the UK's largest Independent publisher of black and white comics" -I used that quote as three people who are well into checking all these things stated so. They ignored the books though. But then these stat and figures people had a chat amongst themselves (I put them in touch with one another as dyscaculia means I have no real interest in numbers!). It all went quiet. Then I was told: "You are Europe’s largest Independent publisher of black and white comics".

I was made, right? Decades of work was paying off. I just checked the Blogger only stats for total views today (I've just seen they are rising again!):

AOP Blog    345, 180

Black Tower 30, 210

Comic Bits Online 3, 595, 902

Total (thank gods for online calculators) 3, 971, 292

My sales with all the publicity and views must be incredible, right? I checked my Lulu account to see sales since 2012 -163 sales ranging from £2.40 to £7.00 and one sale of £11.00. I suddenly thought this was odd and then realised that, as I had no bank account or credit card, initially all of my review copies and copies to go to friends were purchased by my brother for me!

The true figure is around 90-95 sales. That is from 2009-2018 and the sales only began in 2015. When I see total sales 2009-2018 of £919.00 I have to deduct my own purchases taking it down to £700 which is dribs and drabs -sales this year amount to £11.00. 

And if people in the United States buy a book I get taxed. So the initial ‘profit’ just is not what I’ll get!

When you consider you then have to (I no longer do) send out review books or get proof copies you suddenly look at all the £00.00 in those columns. Basically, since 2009 I've spent more that £700!

If sales were regular no problem but you go months looking at zeroes then see £2.50 before going into months before another sales of, maybe £5.00. Gaps between sales vary from 6-8 months or a year.

With the number of views involved in the blogs, all the social media used and the number, types and genre of books a "healthy" industry should be keeping me going.

Now there are a lot of people -many of them in comics- who do not like, in fact "hate" is a better word, my divulging these types of figures. Comics have always been a secretive, crooked business. I made the decision that Black Tower would be open to scrutiny. I publish monthly sales/lack of sales charts and I disclose most everything except the size of my underpants (a chap has to have SOME secrets).

I hear a lot of stories similar to my own from publishers going out of business...or who give up. Most will NOT state all of this openly for a number of daft reasons -some are even afraid of bullies in comics. If you are over 18 years old you are an adult so if someone harasses you when you state proven facts -tell everyone...no, that isn't "nice" is it?

So, and you'll be happy to read this, I'll conclude by stating that if you have millions of 'comic fans' reading your posts and a wide selection of books and you only manage to sell (despite many special offers and ridiculous price decreases) around 90 books in 10 years: THAT is not a healthy industry.