Posted in: Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, DC Comics, Image, Marvel Comics | Tagged: 2023, comic shop

Comic Store In Your Future- 2023 Was Our Best Year Ever, So… 2024?

The future of the comic book industry has been debated a lot over the last few months. But how did 2023 go for us? And how will 2024?

The future of comics has been debated a lot over the last few months. I wrote in previous columns how essential marketing seems to be forgotten, Marvel's little to no discount for stores when ordering Foil Covers, and Is This Business Or Craziness? New comic sales slowed in June, while back issues were still doing well for us. But how did 2023 go for us?

2023 Was Our Best Year Ever as a Comic Book Store

Two things happened on March 4th. I got punched in the face, and Rodman Comics had its best sales day in its thirteen years of being open. 2023 is the store's best sales year. Sounds great, right? I did more work store-wise than ever before. Through the store's Facebook page, we started doing livestreams selling products. It started weekly and did well, so we do it twice a week. It has slowed down; with the holidays, we assume people are busy shopping and spending time with their families. The other part of it is finding comics that people are interested in. Once people have completed their collection of a title they wanted, they do not need more of the same.

New comic sales have slowed down for us month to month. I do not believe the direct market that comics use is broken. The big two publishers (Marvel and DC) have been foolish and aimless for too long and must return to the basics. Long-time comic customers will come in and be confused due to a cover that does not have a title on it and characters that are not even in the book or have anything to do with the comic, such as the Disney characters featured in the Amazing Spider-Man variant covers. I had people come in after the latest She-Hulk first issue came out confused and asking didn't the last issue just come out last month? Why is it relaunched again?

You Can Have Too Much of a Good Thing

If something does sell, Marvel and DC spin it off until it doesn't. Batman used to be an easy sell. A new limited series would sell if it featured Batman. Now, with so many Batman-related titles, it is a guessing game what will sell if it features Batman. Same with Spider-Man and the X titles. The worst is when a title doesn't sell, it gets spin-offs. Avengers is not a top seller for us. This year, Avengers Inc., Avengers Beyond, Avengers Forever, Uncanny Avengers, and Avengers War Across Time all came out. Why? Less is more is not what the big two American publishers follow. If a title is not selling, Marvel relaunches it with a new number one, often from the previous issue the following month. Not publishing a character for a while to let people miss the character or characters is a foreign concept to Marvel and DC.

For new comics, what are our big sellers in 2023? Image's Transformers and G.I. Joe. Part of the reason is because the two titles were gone for a while. Not just one month, months, many months. In this day and age, that is shocking. Are they letting people miss characters? Marvel and DC would instead flood the market and milk out their readership until their customers do not want or cannot afford to collect their favorite characters. Something not selling? Just relaunch it. Still not selling? Relaunch it. That has been going on for years.

Getting a creative team that readership will like is like catching lightning in a bottle. It is tough. I give the publishers that. Keeping the same innovative team and relaunching due to low sales is lazy. Many years ago, if sales were not high enough, a comic would be canceled and not seen for a while. It is how the market corrected itself. Too many titles? The market would shrink back to what it could support at the time. The cycle would start anew. Now, publishers flood the comic market, unwilling to have fewer titles, so the market will never be able to correct itself so it can grow again. The comic industry is like a garden. Right now, there is too much in the garden crowding out and killing each other. Relaunching has been a gimmick the publishers have been using for years. Another gimmick that comics use is variant covers. It has lasted much longer than I ever dreamed it would. Demand for variants has been slowing down.

Everyone Has Back Issues These Days

I can hear people asking if new comic sales were so bad, then how was 2023 a positive record-breaking year? Back issues. People still love comics; people enjoy picking up a title when there is only one cover for a comic book. I have a Daredevil fan trying to figure out the back issues he needs over the last ten years; needless to say, the relaunches over those years are not helping. It makes it confusing. Imagine what new comic readers and collectors face trying to get into comics. So many old comic readers and collectors have left for the same reasons.

Back issues sell for us. When we opened thirteen years ago, back issues were mostly dead product. A person who worked at another comic store stopped back then and told me that back issues could not move. Then, comic book movies and TV shows helped increase interest in older comics. The shutdown over COVID helped renew interest in back issues. People find it more straightforward to collect older comics. People want comics from their youth.

Characters that sell well surprise those who ask. Namor, Sergent Rock, Lady Death, Conan, Men of War, Hellwitch, Terminator from the movies, and more are characters that are not flooding the market; when we do auctions, Sergent Rock graded comics go for a higher price than graded Amazing Spider-Mans and Batmans—weird fact.

What is the problem if back issues are doing so well for us? We got lucky in 2023; people came in and were willing to sell valuable comics to us. It is not every day we get a chance to buy the first appearance of the Punisher. Often, we get people wanting to sell comics with no demand or people who think comic stores should buy their comics for what they are worth or what a comic store will sell them for. That is not how retail business works; material cost has to be less than what it is sold for. One person told me to buy their comic for $100 and hold on to it for a year, and then it would be worth more. Comic stores are not banks, either.

We can order new comics, and old back issues are challenging to get. Our Lunar orders for DC Comics are down from the previous year. We will not keep our current 55 percent discount next year. Penguin is 50 percent off no matter what, so that will stay the same. Diamond orders? Ouch, I hope other stores are doing better with them than we are as we go into 2024.

Will 2024 be a new record year for Rodman Comics? Positive record sales year? Headwinds make it look like that will be a tall order. Every year, I try to make it a record sales year. I once was told I was setting myself up for failure. I see it as more of a give-it-all to say I did not leave anything on the table. I hope that in 2024, the publishers will finally get out of the habits they have developed and try a new direction that leads to improving sales. I hope that I do not get punched in the face again… or feel like 2024 is a punch to the face business-wise.

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