Posted in: Comics | Tagged: diamond, greg pak, preorders

Greg Pak Wants to Change the Way We Preorder Comics

Fear not, true believers! Greg Pak is here to save comics! The superstar writer took to Twitter today after coming to a shocking revelation: the way the comic book preorder system works is stupid (our words, not his — but it's the basic gist). Pak started with a plea to Diamond and comic book publishers to build a damn website that lets people preorder comics online.

He makes a good point. We personally pre-order our comics from DCBS, partially because the discounts offer some financial relief from the exorbitantly high price to value ratio of modern comics, but also because it allows us to shop the entire monthly catalog from our desk and build a shopping cart, deciding what we want to buy. If we could do the same thing but pick the comics up at a local shop each week, though, we would definitely do that. Not only would it get our comics to us faster, but we'd have the opportunity more often to check out back issues and maybe impulse-buy a few titles we didn't consider two months prior to their ship date.

Unfortunately, most shops don't make pre-ordering easy, and the alternative, a pull list, has its drawbacks as well, like the ambiguity of crossovers and tie-ins and a similarly onerous planning and management requirement. A centralized system maintained by Diamond, allowing stores to opt in, would combine the convenience and efficiency of online ordering with the personality, community, and service of the local comic shop — the best of both worlds!

Of course, there are some stores which provide this functionality on their own, and Pak recognizes that as well.

And he intends to promote those services alongside his books.

Amen!

Pak's idea is so great, Diamond has even retroactively agreed to start working on it last year!

Here's some more stuff for you to work on, Pak. Tell Diamond and the publishers that they should offer a pre-order or subscription system that includes both digital and physical copies together. You order the comic, and the day it comes out, you can access the digital version on comiXology, and a paper copy gets shipped to you (or you pick it up at your local shop at your convenience). Also, tell them the price is too damn high.

How else do you want Greg Pak to save comics? Let us know in the comments below.

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