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Posted by: Brian Hibbs on May 11, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
You can read the latest right here, as I talk about FCBD, changes at DC Entertainment, Diamond’s breaking street date, and some bits on digital. I’m a little behind on writing reviews (as I pretty much haven’t read any comics yet this week [it's been hectic], but I expect I’ll get something up BEFORE the next batch arrives, just watch me! -B
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on May 1, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
There’s NO WAY I am going to do this each and every week, but I thought it might be instructive to look at first week digital sales here. So far, we’ve sold six comics. One was to a fellow retailer, who, when contacted, said “just wanted to see what the user experience would be like, thought that was worth $4!”, so I’m kind of not going to count that one. Of the remaining five, and I find this FASCINATING, only 2 of the 5 were a book from a review (in this case, Popeye #1… which, additionally, IDW seems sold out on; or at least, there were no copies to reorder this week) Two other sales were for Danger Club… Read More…
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on April 28, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Until May 5, you can download this month’s installment of our in-store newsletter, COMIX EXPERIENCE ONOMATOPOEIA, from this link. If you also want the subform that goes with it, click here. -B
Over/Under: The “Death of the DM”
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on April 8, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Every day, in thread after thread after thread I see people declaring the DM is “dying”, that “print is done” and so on and so forth. Now I, for one, don’t think PRINT will every fully cease, ever, but I’m willing to entertain the possibility that the “Direct Market” might one day be done. So, let’s have your prediction of the date that… hm, how to define it? The week that Diamond ships it’s last weekly comics shipment that includes periodical “floppy” (*shudder*) comic books from at least five distinct publishers, maybe? You’re so sure of yourselves, here, try to pin a date on it: “winner” gets bragging rights. If your date comes and goes, however, you have to promise… Read More…
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on April 5, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Mark Waid has a very thorough post over here on “Print Math” that I think everyone should read. I started to write this as a response in the comments thread, but then realized it would be quite a bit longer than a comments thread response should probably be, and, anyway, would almost certainly be down at response #80 or something by the time I finished writing it, so I thought it better to dance the dance over here, below the cut.
SUPER SECRET LEAP YEAR DAY SALE!
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on February 29, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
20% off anything at Comix Experience that isn’t on the New Comics rack. Because it is also Superman’s Birthday, you must say “Mxyzptlk” in order to get the discount! We nearly never have sales, so this is something a little special and very rare. HAPPY SUPERMAN’S BIRTHDAY!!! -B
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on February 28, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Until March 6th, you can grab the (FULL COLOR!) CE:O #194 (for May ’12 books) by following this link. You can also get the associated sub form by hitting this link. This is really a bunch of extra work, so I really need to know if any CE customers are finding this helpful…. -B
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on
Categories: Retailing/Industry
While I was writing my last post, I had missed some of the talkback in David Brother’s original post, including Very Special Guest Steve Wacker from Marvel. David’s second post addresses most everything, but I want to drill down to one statement that Steve made which I think is germane here: “We’ll keep making comics and the sales will tell us whether or not people like ‘em. That’s the foundation we’re built on.” That’s a very fair point, and the one that I really want to get across as well — for in January 2012, Marvel’s single best-selling comic (UNCANNY #5) sold (according to ICv2) a mere 63,477 copies. Of course it’s more than that, as Diamond’s reports under-report by… Read More…
The Problem With Marvel’s Current Strategy
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on February 27, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
David Brothers has a very excellent post about how the notion of the stable creative team has gone out the window at Marvel with their double shipping madness. I think there’s some more pernicious impacts as well that David didn’t address. One primary consideration is that every book, every where, (nearly) every time, suffers from what we generally refer to as “standard attrition” — that is to say that virtually every comic shows a slightly decreasing audience each and every month as readership walks away, or gets sidetracked. There are certainly ways to get bunches of new eyes looking at a book (crossovers used to do it… not so much any longer), and spike those numbers up again… but the… Read More…
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on February 22, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry , Uncategorized
For the dozen of you that are interested, I’m 1 year without tobacco as of today. Also, if you’re in the Bay Area, don’t forget that this weekend is the Image Expo, and on Sunday I’ll be on a panel with James Sime from Isotope and Steve Anderson from Third Eye comics in Maryland; come to the show and check it out! You can find the full list of programming here. I should have reviews (what are those?) again tomorrow, and then, I hope, regularly again for a good while again, after we have some frickin’ GIANT news in the next day or so… -B
Some small notes RE: DC (& Digital) from this year’s ComicsPRO meeting
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on February 12, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
I’m just back from Dallas and the 2012 ComicsPRO meeting. I forgot that the laptop didn’t have any of the log-in info for the Savage Critic site, and I forgot to write it all down, so, gr to that! I have an entire Tilting column that I’m going to write which is sort of kind of “about” the meeting (but not really, since that won’t be for three more weeks, and then we’re talking about the past, which no one ever likes!), but I don’t think I’ll have any room there for any of this stuff. I wrote these all down on scraps of paper, but I did ask that I can report them… but I might have made a… Read More…
Big Numbers: Brian’s Tilting… on the 2011 Bookscan Numbers at CBR
Posted by: Jeff Lester on February 10, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Hey, everyone. Since Brian is off doing what Brian does best–pestering comic book publishers for hard data–(and let’s face it, that isn’t very pretty), he asked me to give all y’all a link to his latest Tilting at Windmills over at CBR. It’s his annual review of the Bookscan numbers which I think makes it even more of a look-see than usual. This is the ninth time Hibbs has sat down and crunched numbers of the Bookscan report (the sixth time he’s looked at *all* the numbers for the year) and, as always, the results are fascinating, terrifying, and stultifying all at once. This year’s report runs approximately 15,000 words which is…pretty god-damned daunting, so my brain always breaks when… Read More…
Comix Experience ONOMATOPOEIA #193
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on January 31, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Let’s try this new experiment: for a week (until 2/7/12) you can get a (COLOR!) PDF of CEO #193 (April 2012 Shipping books) written by Graeme McMillan by clicking here. You can also get the companion order form right here. Let me know if that works for you, and if you like it enough for me to bother creating and linking to it each month? -B
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on January 13, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
It’s the newest Tilting at Windmills! You can of course comment here if you don’t want to comment there! -B
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on January 3, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
I’m slightly embarrassed to say I’ve never thought to check for this before, but how about looking at things in terms of publisher breakdowns?
Comix Experience 2011 Best Sellers: Books
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on January 1, 2012
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Books are the majority of what I sell (this year: 56% of sales vs 40% on comics), so let’s look at those!
Comix Experience 2011 Best Sellers: Comics
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on
Categories: Retailing/Industry
New Year, so how’d the last one do? Let’s Find out!
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on December 22, 2011
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Since it was so deep in a grown-tiresome thread, you probably missed this, but I loved loved loved Steve D’s post here. Tom Spurgeon is back with another fabulous round of Holiday interviews, and while I don’t know how many people go here without going thee every day, I wanted to really point out the interview with The Beguiling’s Peter Birkemoe. It’s super rare to see in depth interviews with retailers, and I wish we had more such interviews and profiles. I used to (when it was still a monthly magazine) beg The Comics Journal to do a few interviews with pioneering retailers before it was too late and we lost that history to second hand stories. There are… Read More…
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on December 16, 2011
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Find it on CBR. It must suck, since no one is commenting over there…. orrrrrrr I’m so insanely reasonable that everyone has been struck dumb! U decide! -B
Questions I have about digital
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on December 7, 2011
Categories: Retailing/Industry , Uncategorized
I really like the general level of commentary over at the Beat, and there’s some very interesting stuff being said in the latest thread about Brian Wood’s new missive (which is, in itself a valuable read), but if one thing absolutely slays me about the Beat it is how fast stories scroll off the front page, and the commentary scroll with them. There’s no notification system there, so we’re kind of stuck with a day, or maybe two, of conversation before it scrolls off away into the ether. This page is a little more forgiving in that regard, so let me try to put some thoughts here, and see if it sparks any kind of substantive conversation.
Posted by: Brian Hibbs on November 18, 2011
Categories: Retailing/Industry
Showing you just how busy I’ve been this week, I’m just getting to linking this now. http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=35526 How sad is that? Comment here if you’re not up for CBR commentary. -B
