How to use this Page

Some really well thought out promotional ideas here. I have mixed feelings about FCBD.
I get the concept alright, but why should they be FREE? It goes against everything I hear from the entire sales channel: comics are worth money and creators should be paid.

The year long promotion of comics is a much more sound practise that enables us to celebrate comics and preserve the perception of their value.

I think most of the creators are paid.

Our comic shop gave out the free mini comic books this year- I saw Smurfs, Casper, Fraggle Rock, and Strawberry Shortcake. Some of those were combined into two sided flip over editions. The owner wisely pasted a sticker with his business information on the cover, and gave his regular customers a small stack each. I gave comics to the reading-aged kids that came to my door on Halloween. I think it was a great idea! Free “teaser” comics are a great way to get people interested.

I ordered all the Halloween mini-comics last year; my LCS donated them to me. I had a special library day at my school just before Halloween to allow every student to come into the library to pick out a free comic for a Halloween treat; the comics were stamped with the store’s name, and I inserted a note that the comics were donated by the LCS. The students (and teachers) have learned to expect fun comics from me.

We have given out the free books every year since 2004. It has grown a great deal. See new faces and people that actually want to read Comics. I am glad to see a peanuts book.

I would be strangely okay with this idea. A comic twice as long as a regular comic with good binding (even if it’s a paperback bind) for $5? Makes sense to me.

Give me 40-50 pages of serial content, bind it well enough that it looks good on a bookshelf, and sell it at a reasonable twice (less than what two comics of a similar total page count). Makes good business sense.

Bear in mind that Neil Gaiman’s Violent Cases is about that long and quite a bit more expensive.

Bear in mind that Bendis’s Takio was $10 for about 100 pages of story content.

Bear in mind that specials like the Miller/McFarlane Spawn/Batman thing were generally a little pricier than that for not much more story.

I think it’s a great idea. I wish more publishers and creators would use the format.

they already do this in europe ( they are bigger though and cost more) but the books are not monthly. and most series are only a few books long not hundreds. so maybe the U.S. should get out of the soap opera of super heros and get more into the novel format of Europe? might be better to go this route? I think we should. it looks great and would hopefully generate some new great stories and talent.
Besides i have no idea how they can afford to do a full color book hardcover for $5 retail. whose their printer!

For retailers, sure it would be nice be able to display on a shelf in any capacity over time, but would the thickness of a hardcover limit the amount they can stock if a store only devotes one facing to a book? And how much of an increase in shipping costs would there be with the added weight?

I do think this would work better with more self-contained one-shots, annuals, or specials and not so much with a monthly series. I can imagine something like DC’s “Solo” in this format.

As a general rule, my preference is always a monthly paper “floppy” soft-cover saddle stitched/stapled comic book.

But it’s great that the format can be experimented with, and these 48 page hardcovers from Archaia look like fascinating art objects.

If you’re going through the trouble of making paper artifacts, you might as well have some fun with it.

Yes. Yes please. This is such a great way to get comics out to a larger audience – you nailed it with “perception”. I hope this continues to grow.

I would gladly buy this format for stories I was buying anyway. It would presumably reduce the temptation to double-dip for a TPB or hardcover edition later. Most of my favorite series in the last few years have either been coming out in as standalone “books” (Scott Pilgrim, 20th Century Boys) or I’ve been buying them that way (e.g. The Unwritten).

That looks just wonderful. My only caveat is that in order to get the (retail) price down to $5 they probably need to print a pretty large number of them.

I can’t help but wonder how the books would fit into the direct market system, in which you print to match the number of pre-orders. If the number of pre-orders was much less than the minimum printing that’s needed to get the $5 price, well then it seems like you’d have to either cancel the book, or pay for a larger printing than you can support with your orders, and a publisher could probably not do that with every book. Or not for very long, any way.

Hell yes I’d buy it. Looks great!

The main logistical problem is that comics are printed and shipped in relatively short turnarounds from North American printers…which are expensive, but practical.

If you want to get really cheap hardcovers like that as a regular thing, you’ll have to print them in Asia 3-5 months ahead of release date, and then have them shipped on a boat around the world. Airfreight is expensive as hell for books. You’d need to print 2-5k minimum to make it worth your while.

I do think having comics bound like books, even in the fake hardcover side sew things that are popular for comics would help them, but i would HATE having a 5 issue arc in individual hardcovers.

also, the staple bound floppy comic book is the cheapest printed booklet that can be produced in printing..and its tough for those to be profitable in this market especially for indies.

Making em hardcovers seems like it would just kill any profit margins off, unless you raise prices and i don’t see that working very well.

I do not see people coming in to stare at a shelf of 100+ small (this book isn’t regular comic book size, btw) hardcovers a week, so no, this isn’t the future of the floppy. I could see it being a nice, occasional addition, however. But not a replacement.

Marvel and DC can’t offer stores 30+ of these a week of all-new material at a 55% discount.

I would buy these, but only if it contained a complete story. There’s no way I’d buy a typical “Part 5 of a 9 part story” in this format.

I’m interested to know the actual production costs of this style vs. the traditional, frail floppy style. Which is more profitable and if it’s not the floppy then why? That might be more telling than anything.

Digital comic, plz.

It’s like a smaller European graphics novel. I’d buy for sure.

You can’t go wrong with Jim Lee.

“You can’t go wrong with Jim Lee.”

I bet we like different comic books.

Did Wonder Woman’s face get stung by one million bees?

@Rich

Your comment made me crack up.

*sigh* Why is everyone so glum? Compare it to the JLGL artwork, where everyone is friendly and smiling…

Is it wrong to still miss Superman and Batman’s over the pants underpants?

Nope, not liking the look. Try again, Lee.

Jim Lee is simply not a good designer. I don’t mind Batman so much, but his Superman is a total whiff. In trying to update the design he’s replaced an iconic classic with something that seems even more dated (it would work for an alternate universe where the point was to make everything as 90’s as possible though). I actually hate his Cyborg more than Superman’s missing underoos though.

I don’t see the need to do an homage to Jose Luis Garcia Lopez. Just hire HIM to draw the shirt image.

Yeah, a Jose Garcia Lopez shirt would be something to get excited about.

Not digging the Jim Lee designs. Not at all.

Jim Lee can draw some corny-ass looking heroes.

It would be nice except for that crappy revamped Superman costume. Heck, they should make a variant version of this tee with Supe’s previous costume (heck, everyone’s previous costumes!).

How can Cyborg move in that armor?

Why are Han and Chewie stealing weighted companion cubes?

Serenity/Star Wars and TransFormers shall be mine.

I hope that everyone gives Transformers a shot and, if they like it, that they follow it on a regular basis. It’s gonna be good stuff!

Speaking for the retailer side: “How much is that Archaia hardcover going to cost to give away free?”. Cuz you do realize that while these are free to the public, they are NOT free to the retailer.

Hey Goofball814…
I believe you will be pleasantly surprised by the Archaia hardcover’s content and price. It’s very forward thinking of Archaia to take FCBD in graphic novel territory.

Only one problem … it isn’t free material. Retailers foot the bill, in addition to having to list inventory at shockingly stupid discounts in order to make sales … in my neck of the woods, no retailer lets you have more than one book free anymore (which is understandable, given the economic risks involved). … and the books aren’t really free for the reader either … the price of gas alone is worth the cost of one “free” comic …

I’d love to know how many of those 500,000 have never really been to a comic book store before …

Someone is benefiting from this crass marketing ploy, but it sure as heck ain’t the little folk …

Always naysayers, huh?

It’s only anecdotal, but my retailer told me that FCBD is their second-best sales day of the year and this one went very well. Otherwise it’d be another random Saturday. I’d say that makes it worth the cost/trouble involved.

Now now ChristopherH. You should know better than to bring up real important questions about this “free” comics business when comics culture is busy touching itself over it.

It kills the buzz that comes with doing nothing in the showiest way possible.

I went to 3 local comic book stores on free comic book day and all 3 of them were packed with people, making a lot of sales on top of giving away the free comics. Only one store was asking for people to buy something to get a limit of one free issue per person. The other two stores had all the free comics on a table giving them out to anyone who dropped by. Meanwhile, in Toronto I heard from friends of long line-ups outside of the Silver Snail going down the block, because the store was at capacity (the store has 2 floors, so that’s a lot of people).

Joe Field = Hall of Fame

you know why I like Free Comic Book Day? Cause my kids love it. People are dressed up like spiderman and everyone is excited, taking pictures and theres free chips and apple juice upstairs.
My KIDS love it, isn’t that what this should be about? Who is going to read comics in 15-20 years? Why? Is it still gonna be Wolverine and Batman and stuff?

“Someone is benefiting from this crass marketing ploy”

—so who is, genius?

you’ve enlightened everyone with your shocking analysis (“it isn’t really free”—such insight!!), why not finish it?

who is it that is raking in money hand over fist in this “crass marketing ploy’??

undeserved, unrelenting cynicism is gonna be the death of us all…

Hmm. I just started thinking about the ‘Free Comic’ aspect in more depth.

Working backward from the end to the beginning: the customer obtains the comic for free.
The retailer buys it for 10¢ or something.

From there, it gets a little hazy. Does Diamond distribute it ( ship it) free?

Does the printer get paid?

What about the writer and artist. Do they get paid, and do they get royalties? What about the copyright holders, such as Disney, etc.

Who donates and who gets paid?

I would not have collected every issue of Love and Capes, if it had not been for the Free Comic day offering….

@TonyJazz

Nor would I have collected every issue of Atomic Robo had it not been for FCBD.

The average cost of the FCBD comics went up this year to about 25 cents each. Retailers also have to pay for the shipping.

Diamond takes no profits from the FCBD comic sales. The publishers are (theoretically) selling the FCBD comics to retailers at below their own production costs.

Some of the indie writers and artists have publicly (or semi-publicly) stated that they donated the work they did on the FCBD comics. I do not know how universal that was.

Oh yeah, Diamond and various publishers also contribute money to the marketing costs for FCBD. That includes the signs, lollipops, buttons, etc.

How many times does it have to be said to people like ChristopherH? It’s not supposed to be free for retailers. Nor is it for the publishers who pay to produce the material, nor is it for the distributors who get it to the retailers, nor is it for the creators who take time off from paying work to sign and sketch for free all day at the retailer events.

It’s supposed to be FREE. FOR. THE. CUSTOMERS.

Which it is. That’s the whole point– it’s what they call a “loss-leader”. Google it.

Bernie Crowsheet has it right.

In my neck of the woods, 4 Color Fantasies in Rancho Cucamonga does it up right: Costumes, free food, gaming demos, and both mainstream and indy creators. It’s like a small comics convention . . . and lots of kids seem to be having a great time there.

Does FCBD result in visitors coming back to a store again and buying things? That matters more than anything else. How many times have Marvel and DC promoted single issues of comics and created some buzz — the Obama issue of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, for instance — only to have stores gain practically no repeat business? The cost of the promotion shouldn’t be an issue.

SRS

Great summary. I might suggest a mention about Dark Horse Digital Comics, which launched around the same time and which also published their FCBD in digital format.

Librarians were acquiring – and promoting – graphic novels and comics since before the 1980s. I started in 1983, when I started working in a public library. By 2002, with the Young Adult Library Services Association Preconference, “Getting Graphic @ the Library,” speakers Art Spiegelman, Neil Gaiman, Jeff Smith, and Colleen Doran were surprised at how many librarians already knew who they were, already had their books in the library, and treated them like rock stars. These were, of course, young adult librarians – librarians who work with teens. Some librarians worked with their local comics shops to have FCBD programs in their libraries for the first FCBD.

You are correct, Kat. I neglected to mention the precedence of librarians such as yourself and others, including Rory Root.

The ALA conference was late May?

Has anyone written an evolutionary timeline of comics and libraries/schools?

When I left Omaha (and my student position at OPL) in 1994, the comics were all non-fiction, and occupied two shelves at the main library, and fewer at the eight branches. I suspect other libraries had similar collections. When did it shift? Probably when more publishers entered the book trade, and Pantheon restarted their GN line, circa 1997.

“After the disastrous speculator collapse triggered by the return of Superman in Adventures of Superman #500″

I’ve never heard the speculator collapse so directly identified with a single issue before. What’s the story there?

The mention of Superman 500 caught my eye. Musty copies, still in their original plastic seal, were handed out here on FCBD.

I opened and read my copy at home, then promptly wrapped it in plastic again to avoid the HazMat team. Then I sailed it into the recycling bin.

I was shocked (sHoCkEd, I tell ya) at how bad the story and art was, but maybe that’s ancient history to everyone else here.

“I’ve never heard the speculator collapse so directly identified with a single issue before. What’s the story there?”

The Death of Superman occurred on a “slow news day”, which meant that numerous news sources reported on the event. Retailers were caught unprepared for the demand from the general public. Not wanting to be caught unawares, many stores over-ordered on the “return” issue, speculating on the speculators.

Here’s CBG’s analysis:
http://cbgxtra.com/frequently-asked-questions/when-did-the-early-1990s-comics-boom-peak

It was absolute crazy day for us….looking at initial numbers for our stores we easily did a 25% increase over last year in sales. That’s *huge*.

Absolutely dug reading the specific regional reports on FREE COMIC BOOK DAY. Nice to hear the success stories, from the big sales due to increased traffic but more specifically the aggressive methods which Brick & Mortar stores are planting the seeds to new comic book buyers…

I have some other ideas for stores to rope in new readers too at http://comicCONMEN.com

As a side note- Richard Starkings sure looks happy in that picture!

I had a great time on FCBD at Comic Stop U-District in Seattle (used to be Zanadu). . .

. . .however, I was a little disappointed in the choices of available free comics this year. There was clearly a slant toward young readers, which is great–who wouldn’t want more kids to read comics?–but very little that might entice a teenager or college-age adult back to the store.

I wonder–does Diamond choose what is made available to retailers, do publishers make that decision, do retailers vote on what they’d like to see more of? How does this process work?

Congratulations, though, to the stores that did well and sold a lot of stuff, too. That’s great news.