I have just watched yet another video on You Tube from someone asking how they can possibly survive as a Small Press creator.
Simple.
Get a job that pays.
I have, in 40 plus years, seen so many Small Press publishers come and go that some I only get reminded on when I find their publication in one of my zine archives. I have hundreds of zines. Some go back to the 1960's or 1970's.
Looking at the publishers who were active in the 1980's I can think of two that left then came back. 99.9% of those who got into the Small Press were producing zines for fun or to get experience or even hoping to get people to notice their poetry or prose work. Not one thought that publishing a zine was going to make them a living -that came from working for a larger publisher once you gained experience.
We now have Millennials -sorry but that is the group involved here- who think that producing one publication a year or every couple of years will set you up and draw in the money. That is not how it works.
I have over 9 pages on the online store which is a hundred books and they cover all genres as well as prose books. I actually have in stock, in my other room, over 140 books. I sell nothing despite even steeply lowering prices. And that is with all the publicity any publisher could wish for.
I know an author who has been on TV, radio, in newspapers all over the place and living off the earnings from his books? No. He does not make enough.
Look at John Hanson and his Haunted Skies books -a series looking at UFO history full of data, illustrations, colour and black and white photos and high end printing and in the 1980's we would have rioted to get copies. He hardly sells any.
Independent comic publishers with good quality titles have gone out of business in their dozens in the last 3 years. The market is not flooded -people just can't be bothered buying and reading.
In the last 10 years -and some I used to post to CBO- I have watched 20 You Tube videos (some are still out there) titled or claiming that "The Small Press is going to save the comics industry!"
It failed.
Small Press events you usually find that friends of the publisher are the ones buying the books "because" and I have heard friends of friends who are going to buy a publishers book as they want to stay as a part of a little group. Do any of my friends buy my books? No. You cannot rely on your friends or their hangers-on to support your life style and if you want to eat and have a roof over your head you need a paying job.
I have no idea just how this Millennial fantasy started -"comics are cool, hip and chic so they must earn big money!" Yeah. Not in real life.
I will look at peoples books and discuss them, review them or give pointers but it will make no difference: you NEED to have a source of income to keep you alive.
One pointer for free: NEVER EVER EVER EVER OFFER YOUR COMIC AS A FREE DOWNLOAD. Once someone has that download they WILL put it as an illegal download online and no one will ever buy your book -I speak from experience with two books that if even sold at 50p/50c a download would actually make myself and the artist involved (and the widow of one artist) worth over a million each. "I'll download it and IF I like it I will buy it" -lie. That is theft and robbing creators of a living. NEVER make that mistake.
You need places to sell but do not expect comic shops to put your books on their shelves. Again, decades of experience there and if you are not robbed of your earnings or conned from the get go you are one in a million! Comic shops are suffering from poor sales and closing up or going into games as a new business and while now might be the time for them to bring in new creators work they won't.
"We'll take your book and we'll take 60% of the cover price for ourselves. Add up your printing costs, the cost of getting books to those shops and....you might end up with a couple quid. Shops are offering to take prose books -such as Haunted Skies or my own titles- for FREE. They will then see if they sell and if they do then decide how much of the cover price you will be paid. That is taking advantage and they know all the benefits are in their pockets not the creators'.
Oh "Queer Small Pressers are going to save the Small Press"/"Queer Publishers Will save the Small Press" is the latest. No. No they will not. Not to be upsetting anyone but there were gay people in mainstream comics as well as the small press decades ago. They never earned a living from it either. The whole "Queer creators" scene at Marvel Comics have actually driven the company into a nose-dive it does not look capable of pulling up from.
Being gay or any "colour" or ethnic minority is NOT guaranteeing you earning a living. Publishers are promoting this as a fad. "Hey -let's get black artists and writers!"/"Hey -let's get British writers and artists in!"/"Hey -let's get some Filipino artists in!"...the list goes on and on as publishers look for the next fad that might earn them money. In the old Fleetway 2000 AD the fad came in to get younger and younger artists in which really achieved nothing according to Gil Page (then Managing Editor) other than "not very good work" -and he was at one time in charge of hiring artists from Italy, Spain, Argentina, Brasil -anywhere that had good quality artists who were cheap. That was the business.
All you can do is produce your book. Try to attend events and sell there and get reviews -you might not be guaranteed sales from that but it gets your book noticed and you can use reviews to promote your book.
It is sad and very depressing but if you live in the UK you will find that comic art -or any type of art- is not even considered worth thinking about let alone encouraging. Look at Tommy Ross, David Gordon, Richard Anthony Pester, Paul Ashley Brown...the list goes on and on and on. Talent is never rewarded so set your high standards but do not expect it to appreciated or to make you a living.
The simple answer is that you CANNOT survive on selling comics or books. If you are in the UK you have that against you. In a perfect world good stories, good art and a love of art would be appreciated and I love comics and books and I produce them. My main meal of the day was a tin of chopped tomatoes and three slices of bread: reality
Simple.
Get a job that pays.
I have, in 40 plus years, seen so many Small Press publishers come and go that some I only get reminded on when I find their publication in one of my zine archives. I have hundreds of zines. Some go back to the 1960's or 1970's.
Looking at the publishers who were active in the 1980's I can think of two that left then came back. 99.9% of those who got into the Small Press were producing zines for fun or to get experience or even hoping to get people to notice their poetry or prose work. Not one thought that publishing a zine was going to make them a living -that came from working for a larger publisher once you gained experience.
We now have Millennials -sorry but that is the group involved here- who think that producing one publication a year or every couple of years will set you up and draw in the money. That is not how it works.
I have over 9 pages on the online store which is a hundred books and they cover all genres as well as prose books. I actually have in stock, in my other room, over 140 books. I sell nothing despite even steeply lowering prices. And that is with all the publicity any publisher could wish for.
I know an author who has been on TV, radio, in newspapers all over the place and living off the earnings from his books? No. He does not make enough.
Look at John Hanson and his Haunted Skies books -a series looking at UFO history full of data, illustrations, colour and black and white photos and high end printing and in the 1980's we would have rioted to get copies. He hardly sells any.
Independent comic publishers with good quality titles have gone out of business in their dozens in the last 3 years. The market is not flooded -people just can't be bothered buying and reading.
In the last 10 years -and some I used to post to CBO- I have watched 20 You Tube videos (some are still out there) titled or claiming that "The Small Press is going to save the comics industry!"
It failed.
Small Press events you usually find that friends of the publisher are the ones buying the books "because" and I have heard friends of friends who are going to buy a publishers book as they want to stay as a part of a little group. Do any of my friends buy my books? No. You cannot rely on your friends or their hangers-on to support your life style and if you want to eat and have a roof over your head you need a paying job.
I have no idea just how this Millennial fantasy started -"comics are cool, hip and chic so they must earn big money!" Yeah. Not in real life.
I will look at peoples books and discuss them, review them or give pointers but it will make no difference: you NEED to have a source of income to keep you alive.
One pointer for free: NEVER EVER EVER EVER OFFER YOUR COMIC AS A FREE DOWNLOAD. Once someone has that download they WILL put it as an illegal download online and no one will ever buy your book -I speak from experience with two books that if even sold at 50p/50c a download would actually make myself and the artist involved (and the widow of one artist) worth over a million each. "I'll download it and IF I like it I will buy it" -lie. That is theft and robbing creators of a living. NEVER make that mistake.
You need places to sell but do not expect comic shops to put your books on their shelves. Again, decades of experience there and if you are not robbed of your earnings or conned from the get go you are one in a million! Comic shops are suffering from poor sales and closing up or going into games as a new business and while now might be the time for them to bring in new creators work they won't.
"We'll take your book and we'll take 60% of the cover price for ourselves. Add up your printing costs, the cost of getting books to those shops and....you might end up with a couple quid. Shops are offering to take prose books -such as Haunted Skies or my own titles- for FREE. They will then see if they sell and if they do then decide how much of the cover price you will be paid. That is taking advantage and they know all the benefits are in their pockets not the creators'.
Oh "Queer Small Pressers are going to save the Small Press"/"Queer Publishers Will save the Small Press" is the latest. No. No they will not. Not to be upsetting anyone but there were gay people in mainstream comics as well as the small press decades ago. They never earned a living from it either. The whole "Queer creators" scene at Marvel Comics have actually driven the company into a nose-dive it does not look capable of pulling up from.
Being gay or any "colour" or ethnic minority is NOT guaranteeing you earning a living. Publishers are promoting this as a fad. "Hey -let's get black artists and writers!"/"Hey -let's get British writers and artists in!"/"Hey -let's get some Filipino artists in!"...the list goes on and on as publishers look for the next fad that might earn them money. In the old Fleetway 2000 AD the fad came in to get younger and younger artists in which really achieved nothing according to Gil Page (then Managing Editor) other than "not very good work" -and he was at one time in charge of hiring artists from Italy, Spain, Argentina, Brasil -anywhere that had good quality artists who were cheap. That was the business.
All you can do is produce your book. Try to attend events and sell there and get reviews -you might not be guaranteed sales from that but it gets your book noticed and you can use reviews to promote your book.
It is sad and very depressing but if you live in the UK you will find that comic art -or any type of art- is not even considered worth thinking about let alone encouraging. Look at Tommy Ross, David Gordon, Richard Anthony Pester, Paul Ashley Brown...the list goes on and on and on. Talent is never rewarded so set your high standards but do not expect it to appreciated or to make you a living.
The simple answer is that you CANNOT survive on selling comics or books. If you are in the UK you have that against you. In a perfect world good stories, good art and a love of art would be appreciated and I love comics and books and I produce them. My main meal of the day was a tin of chopped tomatoes and three slices of bread: reality
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