Greetings, sales charts fans! It's time once again to look at DC's sales figures. Back in June 2014, DC kicked off their freely-orderable variant (f.o.v.) cover program (or as DC has taken to calling them, open-to-order variants) with Bombshell variants with covers by Ant Lucia that evoked pin-up art from the 1940s. It was a big success, with the comics sporting them seeing huge gains and has spun off into a line of statues. So it makes sense that DC would want to return to the Bombshells theme, and this month sees a batch of all-new Bombshells covers as well as the launch of a DC Comics Bombshells comic (reprinting the digital-first comic of the same name). It's a moderate success this time out, especially compared to last month's Teen Titans Go! variants (all of those sporting both variants see a jump up in sales this time out), and the comic itself sells very well for a digital-first comic. While we can be fairly sure that the f.o.v.s are giving a boost beyond the natural sales level for titles bearing them, it is clear that the size of that boost is greatly dependent on the demand for that month's theme (or rather the perceived demand by retailers, which as in all cases on these charts has to stand in for actual consumer demand).
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By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 10/1/2015
Blog: PW -The Beat (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
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By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 10/1/2015
Blog: PW -The Beat (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: DC You, bomcshells david carter, dc sales charts, m August 2015, DC, Sales Charts, Top News, Add a tag
10 Comments on DC Comics Month-to Month Sales: August 2015 – Bombshells Return, last added: 10/3/2015
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Didn’t DC just spotlight the writer and artist for GL:TLA in their books this week?
GOTHAM ACADEMY TP sales (via ICv2) June, July, August 2015
13 2.51 GOTHAM ACADEMY TP VOL 01 (N52) $14.99 DC 3,561
138 0.83 GOTHAM ACADEMY TP VOL 01 (N52) $14.99 DC 980
178 0.56 GOTHAM ACADEMY TP VOL 01 (N52) $14.99 DC 701
Not bad… new titles rarely chart more than one month.
It’s currently #50 on Amazon’s DC list (between Justice League v3 and Sandman v.2). #70 in Superheroes.
For comparison: Ms. Marvel v.1 2,331, 2,033 , 1,534
There may be a need to do a correction here. Not sure if the free to order variants started with the first Bombshells run of covers. Because customers couldn’t order them that way. Retailers were all still selling them for increased prices.
The first time you actually could order the variants and pay the same price as the regular covers were the Batman 75 ones.
@Evan: June 2014, the Bombshells covers, was the first month that DC’s themed variants were open-to-order. See the June 2014 DC month-to-month column for the details.
Well darn, then retailers should have sold them that way. They were still overcharging them at the time. I would have ordered all of em myself.
People still believe this is a growth market? With these numbers? Here’s what really happened- the publishers decided to take over the back issue market with the trade program. There’s all your revenue growth of the past decade right there. That and the price point increases. Except back issues were an important part of retailers’ revenue stream and the whole idea behind non-returnability in the first place. Especially on hot books. Now retailers are stuck with unsaleable backstock on unsold monthlies AND have to carry trades, most of which they end blowing out below cost at cons or clearance sales. This is why the entire direct market is on the verge of collapsing, not because of variants. Why every retailer out there is carrying unsustainable debt. If we don’t see a serious turnaround on these monthlies you’re going to see another wave of store closings when this next recession hits. One thing we will see in the months to come is a lot of books you thought were hot taking huge plunges as retailers realize new readers aren’t coming for them.
These numbers only reflect the direct market in the US, not overseas, not book stores, and not digital. Any lack of growth here may or may not be made up for in those other markets.
Indeed Glenn. When I see how small those numbers are for the whole US, it baffles me. As those numbers get weaker and weaker, international sales are more and more taken into account, because those ones are not falling, I don’t think so. But it takes a quite a long time for them to reach the base, so it can’t really save second/tiers books -who, sadly, are often not translated anyway overseas.
It was mentioned that DC’s growing reliance on the $3.99 price point doesn’t make a difference in sales. Maybe so, but look at DC’s $4 titles vs their $3 books. The books featuring A-list characters are the more expensive ones. In the market these days, readers for the most part stick with the most familiar, iconic characters, and are reluctant to try out books (past issue #2 anyway) starring untested, less proven characters. If DC raised the price of Lobo, Doctor Fate, or Prez, those books would see a drastic drop in readership, whereas fans are perfectly willing to pay more for Batman, Harley Quinn, and the Justice League. Personally, I hope DC keeps the second/third string books at $2.99, because I enjoy them overall far more than the “iconic” characters.
“People still believe this is a growth market?”
Given that Star Wars #1 passed a million copies and Secret Wars #1 is well over 500k, yep.