Posted in: Boom, Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, Dark Horse Comics, DC Comics, Image, Marvel Comics | Tagged: donald trump, tariffs

Comic Books Set To Rocket In Price Next Week Over Tariffs

Comic Books are set to rocket in price next week over the new imposed tariffs and taxes on American companies printing their comics in Canada.

The decision by the US government to make their tariffs against Canada, Mexico and China kick in this Tuesday means that comic books already printed in Canada and going through shipping processes are about to rocket in price. Not for this Wednesday; the comics have already left Canada for the USA, and plenty of them are already in store. But next week? Those comics, just in time for Valentine's Day, may be the first to get caught up in the new 25% tariffs being imposed by the USA. Remember, comic book stores are not obliged to charge the cover price for their comics, and if they have to pay 25% more, then you will pay 25% more. With Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse, IDW, Dynamite, and Boom, most publishers printing their monthly comics in Canada expect a four-dollar comic to be a five-dollar comic overnight. And we can say goodbye to Todd McFarlane's $2.99 Spawn line. Expect that to be the case going forward unless a) savings can be made and b) US printers can be found. The latter are generally more expensive than those in Canada, don't have the comic book experience of Canadian printers, and demand for their services will be going up as well, so their prices will, too… Bad Idea Comics is already feeling the $200,000 pain.

Most American comic books are printed in Canada and driven across the border, with a significant amount of graphic novels published in East Asia and shipped in on the boats. Canada's paper stock is cheaper due to an abundance of timber forests, economies of scale and expertise of printers and paper mills.  Comic books are generally an inelastic good, which means that an increase in price will not lead to a commensurate drop in demand, but that inelasticity cannot last forever, and it may reach a point when it snaps.  The price jump will drop off readers/collectors faster than any gender swap or refusal to have Spider-Man married to Mary Jane. A source with strong links to, and much experience of, the import/export industry tells me that "The right defense of this tactic is to print in the US. But paper is cheaper in Canada and labor and manufacturing costs in the US will make publishing comics in periodical form unsustainable. As much as we all want manufacturing all of all kinds to return to the US, the fact of the matter is 25% duty won't do that either."

It's not just about the money

It's not just the cost of the tariffs that will cause problems. The pipeline from Canada to the USA was incredibly smooth, almost like shipping from state to state, so delays at the border have not been an issue for decades, and so have not been factored in the publishers' release schedules. Now that tariff processing has to be carried out on every package, this will no longer be the case. So expect delays to start hitting everyone- not just Diamond – from next week as well, The extra costs will also have an exponential effect on the cheapest of books such as Previews and other catalogues, as well as books for Free Comic Book Day. The tariffs may kill that off as well. More on that to come this week.

And then what about the 10% tariffs on China? During his first administration, Trump instituted 15% tariffs on books coming from China, though exempting Bibles and other religious books, then reducing the tariffs on books from 15% to 7.5%, and suspended for children's books. This was maintained by the Biden administration. Most collected editions are printed in China and shipped by boat because manufacturing, labour and importing are more cost-effective outside of the US and are less time-sensitive than monthly comics, so shipping by boat is less of an issue. My import source asks me "Will periodicals go away and everything be OGN? Cheaper to print and ship from China. Will Trump rescind the tariffs? The majority of the direct market will close with the exception of DCBS, Midtown, Mile High and Mycomicshop." Is that chicken little? I don't know. But the Chinese tariff is smaller, not as bad as it was in 2019, and less of an increase than that already baked-in existing tariff. If, however, Donald Trump increases that tariff to a threatened 100%, that will have a major impact.

Another publisher tells me, "based on Trump's previous term, I expect there will be a back-and-forth, posturing, etc., during that time before we finally know where the tariff percentages land and what exactly it impacts. At that point, we'll evaluate if it makes sense to move business to domestic printers, but my gut is it won't."

Of course, plenty of smaller publishers already print in the USA, but my importing source reminds me that "the cost is higher, and they are printing lower numbers. Does anyone have the printing capabilities here to print comics at that scale? Could a company open or expand and make it possible without prices to spike? I don't believe so. Many retailers are already picking and choosing what they order and do not stock every title and every cover anymore. The winners in the comic industry will be DCBS and Midtown. The rest will cease to exist." I am not sure I share that pessimism, but it does feel like a shock to the system, at a time when it is already feeling many shocks, including the Diamond Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

This could, of course, all be negotiation tactics, the US government using it to put pressure on other policies. And, of course, customers could always throw the comics into the harbour bay when they arrive rather than pay the additional 25% tax. I hear you folk have a history with that sort of thing…

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