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Bleeding Cool Bestseller List – 15th January 2016 – "DC Continues To Sell Circles Around Marvel"

Published Sun, 15 Jan 2017 14:00:43 -0600

Last updated Wed, 18 Jan 2017 17:17:31 -0600

This is the Top Ten Bleeding Cool Bestseller List, as compiled by a number of comic stores from their sales on Wednesday and Thursday. It measures what are known as the "Wednesday Warriors", those who can't wait to the weekend to get this week's comics. We salute you, and the keenness you bring to your passion.

If it weren't for the returning X-Men titles to prominence – IVX so far – this would be a clean sweep for DC Comics. It's bad news for Marvel when you look at actual sales in-store right now, but ResurrXion may help turn thing around.

Justice League Suicide Squad #4
All Star Batman #6
Detective Comics #948
Flash #14
Justice League Power Rangers #1
Suicide Squad #9
IVX #2
Wonder Woman #14
Titans #7
Action Comics #971

Thanks to the following retailers,

Hourglass Comics, BC, Canada
Jesse James Comics, Glendale, Arizona
Rodman Comics of Ankeny, Iowa
Fat Jack's Comicrypt of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Yesteryear Comics of San Diego, California
Dr. No's Comics & Games Superstore of Marietta, Georgia
Famous Faces & Funnies of West Melbourne, FL
Ssalefish Comics of Winston-Salem, NC
Graham Crackers Comics – 11 locations in the Mid-West

Who had this to say,

I've traditionally been a Marvel guy, but DC is holding solid in sales these days while Marvel continues to drop, and drop fast. Marvel's overship hasn't helped at all, because I order very well what my customers actually buy, so extra copies aren't needed. I will probably give the extras away at the local library with coupons, so they won't be totally wasted, I suppose.

I was surprised how well Justice League Suicide Squad has done, when you consider that many customers are tired of crossovers and prefer the $2.99 price point. A weekly book can also be a tough sell, but customers have been buying it. This week's Detective has such a beautiful regular cover that pushed it to the top in my store. I think All Star Batman was held back by the alternate covers looking nearly the same as the regular.

God Country appears to have sparked the speculators, as I had many phone calls from people who aren't my regular customers looking for that book. I'm pretty sure at this point that I sold #1 to many people who aren't going to read it, which is a shame.

The loser-of-the-week award has to go to Rocket Raccoon #2, which dropped a shocking 90% from issue one! There are just too many Marvel books, they are too expensive, their printing quality is too cheap, and not enough of them star Marvel's name characters. I applaud Marvel's attempts to diversify the market, but it is possible to work to attract new customers without having to alienate the old ones. In fact, it's really important that you do both, all the time. It's just harder work.

It's also something DC seems to be doing well. Rebirth sells just as well to the young/new/minority customer as it does to the classic crowd, while Marvel don't seem to be selling (in big numbers) to anyone. Someone needs to right that ship soon.

All Star Batman #6 took the top spot this week along with a bunch of other DC titles.Star Wars:Poe Dameron and IVX did quite well and people are back tracking to get previous issues…good sign.

Hack/Slash, Locke and Key and really anything independent did well on the back issue front this week. I assume that it is people following up from Christmas gifts that they received.

DC takes control of our store's Top Ten once again, sweeping all ten slots (one of them a book co-produced with Boom). The highest-placing Marvel was IVX #2 at 11th place. Marvel only managed to get two other books in our store's top twenty, continuing the decline of the industry's former leader.

Strong interest in pre-Rebirth Batman family titles, with a lot of attention towards Harley Quinn, Batgirl, and Batwoman appearances…

DC had another strong week here. It is interesting that the higher cover priced DC books are my top 2 books. Is cover price a real factor when just comparing $2.99 to $3.99? Thanks to staff suggestions, Moonshine cracked our top 10 and Southern Bastards is our most asked about non-Super Hero Comics. If the Jasons are reading this, that means PLEASE don't make us wait so long between issues. Thanks to my six year old daughter's demands, Frozen issue 4 also cracked our top ten.

DC claims 9 out of the ten top spots this week with Marvel sneaking in Captain America Steve Rogers 9. Justice League vs Suicide Squad keeps on being number one. While Justice League Power Rangers 1 did try to give it a run for it's money. Flash keeps increasing in readership. All Star Batman 6 did have a noticeable drop from the previous issue. Hoping people just aren't aware it is out again since the last issue was just two weeks ago. Suicide Squad 9 had a bit of help I am being told thanks to Diamond shorting another store of the title. Strong Wednesday sales followed by weak Thursday sales. Oh January how cold and cruel can you be?

Most of our back issues customers were looking for Carrie Fisher related comics. I had some mixed feelings about this but I am happy to please true fans.

Others sales included Rebirths issues 7 and above since the rapid selling DC Rebirth trade paperbacks cover the one-shots and the first 6 issues.

DC continues to sell circles around Marvel. The higher-ups at Marvel are going to have to address the attrition eventually, hopefully sooner than later, as customers are dropping their titles at a frighteningly progressive rate. Fans are responding very well to the generally high level of synergy in DC books as they slowly build towards their Watchmen-inflected event.

Another week of zero Marvel titles in our top ten bestsellers, although they were close with Spider-Man/Deadpool at spot 11, which has been our bestselling Marvel ongoing for a while now, although it's also on the downward slide. Then Uncanny X-Men, IVX, Spider-Man Renew , and Daredevil at spots 15 through 18. Only 5 Marvel books in our top twenty for the week and most would have been one lower if we weren't shorted half our order on Action Comics by Diamond this week. Our FFF top ten was Justice League Power Rangers in a commanding lead, Justice League Suicide Squad, Detective, GOD COUNTRY at 4, All Star Batman, Suicide Squad, Flash, Wonder Woman, Titans and Hal Jordan at 10.

God Country 1 we ordered pretty aggressively on, but we could have sold more and we're ordering a lot of the second print too. It was our book of the week, and we're giving Curse Words 1 our big push for next week's book of the week, so keep an eye out for that oneJanuary 18! God Country was a big hit and only gets better with the next few issues (and is hot as hell on eBay right now). We sold all our copies at cover price in store, but they're selling for about $15 to $30 on eBay already. Image will have a lot more hits that might go under the radar because most retailers are ordering more conservatively right now. I appreciate Image letting retailers check out the first few issues in advance. Because of that, and because they were really well done, I bumped up my orders significantly.

Just outside of my top ten, at spots 13 and 14, I'm surprised that Superwoman and Scooby Apocalypse are still outselling almost all Marvel books in my store (except Spider-Man/Deadpool). I wish I was selling more Jessica Jones, GLA and we're even seeing a slowdown on All New Wolverine, Ms Marvel, Daredevil, Guardians of the Galaxy, Spider-Man, and Poe Dameron, which used to be some of our Marvel bestsellersa few months ago. But between the higher prices and too many Marvel books competing with each other, Marvel just isn't selling at our shop. We appreciate the Marvel overships, but we haven't sold any of our free copies yet, and will have an incredible bonus selection for this year's Free Comic Book Day and FCBMAY, as we give out free comics every Saturday in May, which has made May our best month other than December the last few years. It's helped bring back over 1000 customers every Saturday in May and about 2000 on FCBD.

As Marvel continues to cancel a few more ongoings at issue 5 or 6, over the next few months, hopefully they will reign in the excessive amount of books as our newest Marvel first issues aren't coming close to selling, even at the start, and they're falling fast from there. How soon until Marvel goes back to meat and potatoes to try to fix this?

I feel like a broken record, but as always, we're still selling lots of Rebirth runs including Batman, Justice League, Superman, Detective, Wonder Woman, plus Walking Dead, Saga, 1990's and early 2000's Uncanny X-Men, early 1990's Action and Adventures of Superman, and Wicked & The Divine, Monstress and more newer Image back issues.

Impulse back issues shocked me by being in demand. It was a fun title. Though a lot of the younger generation do not even know who he is now.

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