IDW comic sales

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andersonh1
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by andersonh1 »

Onslaught Six wrote:To be fair, it looks like there's been a steady drop in numbers across the board. Also, there's Movie comics to account for--I know, most people are probably buying both, but I'm sure there's a share that's buying the Movie comics instead of the G1 ones. Add up the numbers between Defiance, Alliance and AHM and you have something that's actually approaching the sales numbers the G1 book--at the time, the sole book--was getting.
That's a point. But with three books, you've got to pay three different artists, writers, etc. and pay to print three books instead of one. But still, it's possible that multiple books in the month account for some of the falling numbers on individual titles.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Sparky Prime »

Dominic wrote:The first issue of every other IDW series had a "bounce" from the last issue of the previous series. "Stormbringer" opened lower than "Infiltration" closed.
Again, by only a difference of 761. And comparatively, the first issue of Stormbringer still sold quite well even if it didn't outsell the last issue of Infiltration. You're making it sound like it was worst than it really was.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Dominic »

It is still the only TF book to drop, rather than bounce, with a first issue.


Anderson is right about it being the medium more than the property though. We all know that adult collectors are a small part o the fan-base. And, kids today are less likely to read than kids of yesteryear. Kids who do read at all are less likely to read comics. (If a parent is going to teach their kid to read and actively make sure they read, they are likely going to steer them away from comics.)


Dom
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andersonh1
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by andersonh1 »

ALL HAIL MEGATRON
139 - JUL08/#01 - 15,703
141 - AUG08/#02 - 13,363
151 - SEP08/#03 - 13,238
167 - OCT08/#04 - 12,837
140 - NOV08/#05 - 12,387
196 - DEC08/#06 - 11,843
139 - FEB09/#07 - 11,832
130 - MAR09/#08 - 11,731
135 - MAR09/#09 - 11,479
162 - APR09/#10 - 12,183
AHM #11 12,292
AHM #12 12,124
170 AHM #13 11,892
162 AHM #14 11,736

All Hail Megatron did pick up sales for the final three of the originally planned 12 issues, though the last issue lost a bit from issue #11. Any thoughts on the uptick? Some of the movie publicity spilling over onto the G1 comic series? Overall, sales appear to be fairly stable on this series, averaging around the 12,000 range for most issues. It seems likely that IDW agrees, hence the previously planned Coda being made a part of the AHM series properly.

I'll be curious to see how sales numbers for the ongoing turn out.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Onslaught Six »

andersonh1 wrote:Any thoughts on the uptick? Some of the movie publicity spilling over onto the G1 comic series?
"Oh, that painfully long series is ending now. I guess I'll read the last few."
Dominic wrote:It is still the only TF book to drop, rather than bounce, with a first issue.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Stormbringer running *alongside* another six-issue arc, not unlike Maximum Dinobots ran alongside AHM?
BWprowl wrote:The internet having this many different words to describe nerdy folks is akin to the whole eskimos/ice situation, I would presume.
People spend so much time worrying about whether a figure is "mint" or not that they never stop to consider other flavours.
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andersonh1
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Re: IDW comic sales

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Onslaught Six wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Stormbringer running *alongside* another six-issue arc, not unlike Maximum Dinobots ran alongside AHM?
I think it may have been out the same time as Hearts of Steel, or whatever that alternate series with John Henry was called.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Sparky Prime »

Dominic wrote:It is still the only TF book to drop, rather than bounce, with a first issue.
And it's still only a very small margin of difference. Not enough to "kill things" as you originally said.
andersonh1 wrote:
Onslaught Six wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Stormbringer running *alongside* another six-issue arc, not unlike Maximum Dinobots ran alongside AHM?
I think it may have been out the same time as Hearts of Steel, or whatever that alternate series with John Henry was called.
Now that you two mention it, yeah. The TF wiki says the first issue of Hearts of Steel was published July 5, 2006 and Stormbringer's first issue was published July 19, 2006.

Stormbringer being the first mini-series after Infiltration might have also confused some people, given IDW was presenting the stories as mini-series story arcs rather than as an ongoing.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Dominic »

it likely was the movie that caused the uptick in AHM's last few issues, (at least the issues we have numbers for). Objectively, there is no other reason for this to have happened. (I tend to avoid late run issues of a comic if I cannot get the earlier issues.) Of course, given the scale of the uptick relative to the movie, this is arguably still a bad sign.


And, "Hearts of Steel" cannot be the only reason "Stormbringer" did not bounce with its first issue. After all, there were other IDW books that were released alongside other series, and they still got a bounce in their first issues, even if they declined over time.


Dom
-is still curious about cost:benefit numbers for the license.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by andersonh1 »

New info from the IDW boards. And if true, it puts all the number seen so far into doubt.

http://forum.idwpublishing.com/viewtopi ... c&start=30
Ryall - First thing I can say is, I'd rather have people worry about the stories than the numbers. Things are healthy and fine with the TFs. And those numbers at that site are rarely 100% accurate. In this case, the orders for issue 1 with reorders were well over 20K copies. We printed around 25K and it's close to selling out. All of which is a good sign. I mean, sure, we'd all like to see the numbers higher but that's true of Marvel selling 100K copies of a book--you always want more. The key is if the numbers can hold and not keep dropping, so reorders on a title like this are actually more important than initial sales. If retailers see the book selling and order more, they're more apt to order more of issue 2 or 3 and beyond.

And like I say, the owners were happy, the book got off to a good start. I have no idea where that site got its numbers in this case but issue 1 sold a good 5,000 more copies than they're crediting us with. That's why I personally never pay much attention to those or even the Newsarama monthly numbers, they're usually not correct and are almost always too low compared to actual orders and sales.
And the poster goes on to say that sales have been fairly steady. So I wonder if AHM has actually sold about 20,000 or so copies per issue? There's no way to know, but the fact that coda was made a part of the series do indicate that IDW wanted to keep the series going rather than start a new mini. Every #1 has had diminishing returns, while AHM's longer run seems to have been more successful. Hence the ongoing series next month.

One other bit of info: overseas sales are apparently 5-20 % of overall sales, according to ICV. The question is, would that be lowballed in the same way that domestic numbers are?

It seems like the picture for IDW may well be healthier than ICV2 numbers would indicate.
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Re: IDW comic sales

Post by Dominic »

Well, I will say that I am a bit skeptical of numbers/statements from a publisher's house-organ forum. That said, it does raise the question of where/how to get credible numbers.


As far as diminishing sales on first issues goes, I suspect comics as a whole might be returning to where they were in the 70s, when low numbered titles were seen as less credible than high-numbered titles.

Dom
-might want to bring this up at NEFX, to see what people have to say.
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