A Comic Shop makes a stand against Variants

[samurainoir]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DowjM...layer_embedded

It's really interesting to see a comic shop take this stance. Choosing between a customer willing to pay $30 bucks for one variant cover comic vs one that would walk out of the store with ten regular comics for the same amount of money. I know many comic shops these days have been using those limited variant covers as a source of additional supplementary income by jacking up the prices on them.

Something to watch.

[BlackKnight]

Most (saught after & not 1to1) Variants these days can only be purchased by the shops, after a certain # of regular books have been ordered.

[kingdom warrior]

I despise variants and gimmick covers I like great art and story in my books. Glad to see a comic shop stand up and say no.........

[Brue]

interesting commentary on the OCD people.

i (and I am guessing many collectors) have the disease of needing to complete collections. variant covers really do promote to the people who "need" to collect regardless of joy in the comic. I haven't done it with variants but i have completed runs i haven't and prob won't ever read just to complete the run. anyone have 20 variants of Mego Spider-man here? Is SOS circle suit spidey more fun to play with? (not dissing anyone for wanting one - or other collectible rarity. just make sure you have the spare cash and you actually love the thing your buying)

i also feel like variants perpetuate the problem the 90's saw with decline of comic sales. rather than market to their base (12 year olds who will supply them with the next 30 years of revenue) they market toward collectors and adults.

any variant covers i have are pure coincidence.

my brother who had a box at the local comic shop would recieve variants instead of regular covers in his box. this was nice I though because it provided the established customer with a little something extra for hteir steady stream of cash.

[spamn]

Variants' existence only bothers me when the more expensive cover is more attractive than the regular one. I ain't spending no $30 on a variant cover no matter what. If someone else is willing to spend that much to get it, more power to 'em.

If I like that picture so much, I can get a copy from online and look at it whenever I want.

[samurainoir]

That is often the case when they put A-list talent onto variant covers. It would be nice to have but not if you end up paying through the nose for it.

Then I look at a cover like this one...


and I can only think the appeal is it's scarcity for folks that need to have what they perceive to be a "complete" collection.


On the other hand... print sales are waaaaaay down for the month of August. I can't help thinking that this might have something to do with the recent launch of all the digital comics apps via itunes/ipad/iphone etc. The big two are offering digital comics for roughly half the price of the regular print comics. In a difficult economy and as primarily a comics reader (rather than collector) drowning in long boxes, that ease of storage and accessibility to them on your computer or ipad is quite appealing to me.


I'm thinking that the future of print will be as the limited edition collectible. Particularly as we the print-reader gets older and new generations of readers who have spent their entire lives reading off of computer monitors become primary consumers.

[johnnystorm]

Or sales could be down as the companies retread event after event and cash-strapped consumers are getting tired of it? Especially since most books just jumped another buck to $3.99?

Maybe if they stopped wasting time & money on gimmicks & variants and paying Hollywood directors, writers, & authors to do the books and just went back to decent storytelling?

[The Toyroom]

Or sales could be down as the companies retread event after event and cash-strapped consumers are getting tired of it? Especially since most books just jumped another buck to $3.99?

Maybe if they stopped wasting time & money on gimmicks & variants and paying Hollywood directors, writers, & authors to do the books and just went back to decent storytelling?

There ya go

[johnmiic]

I love how Joe Quesada laments in the History Channel Documentary, Superheroes: Un-masked!, that comic publishers were making variant covers and driving up print runs that couldn't be sustained. MARVEL was making variant covers you dumb-azz! The very company you work for was doing it and doing it ugly! You can thank MARVEL for doing that in the `90's.

[ctc]

>comic publishers were making variant covers and driving up print runs that couldn't be sustained.

Remember the housing bubble? The dot coms? Corporate raiders? The Death of Superman? Comic publishers don't.

>You can thank MARVEL for doing that in the `90's.

They actually set the stage earlier. The BIG killer of comics in the 90's was Image.... but through no fault of their own. The most hyped guys at Marvel decided to start their own company so's to get a bigger slice of the pie. (Holy Atlas Comics Batman! Or is that Holy Demon Hunter! Holy Spawn?) And they made a LOT of money in a short period.... and then EVERYBODY wanted to make a lot of money, so they hopped on whatever bandwagon was coming along.... and the attention went from READING comics to HOARDING comics. One the speculators realized a book that had a 1.2 million print run that EVERYBODY double bagged isn't gonna be worth squadoo, they left. The readers had left a long time ago.

On the UP side; the focus on compilations means stories are gonna be in print long past the point they would have been, so people can easily read them. On the DOWN side; those stories are all stunt-written non-events originally produced with twenty different variant covers, thrity different special chase issues, half a dozen limited edition inaction figure sets....

"....It's the cccIIiiiiirrrrclllllle of life!"

Don C.

[Adam West]

Variants' existence only bothers me when the more expensive cover is more attractive than the regular one. I ain't spending no $30 on a variant cover no matter what. If someone else is willing to spend that much to get it, more power to 'em.

If I like that picture so much, I can get a copy from online and look at it whenever I want.

I understand your point about the more attractive cover but in a sense that is why there is a premium. There is a market for it and just you, me, or anyone else might not be willing to shell out $30 for a variant...someone is willing. It's the whole supply/demand issue.

[samurainoir]

Or sales could be down as the companies retread event after event and cash-strapped consumers are getting tired of it? Especially since most books just jumped another buck to $3.99?

Maybe if they stopped wasting time & money on gimmicks & variants and paying Hollywood directors, writers, & authors to do the books and just went back to decent storytelling?

This is the DC spin on it, but it's hard to argue with the profits from hundred thousand payed downloads without the cost of printing/distribution and the main cut going to the front line comic stores. Other than infrastructure and marketing, digital is pure profit for DC Entertainment.

With nearly two million free downloads and hundreds of thousands of paid downloads, our digital foray is already reaching a new audience worldwide. We could not be more excited by the successful launch of our Digital Publishing products in June, which exceeded all sales forecasts and will be building on our early success with new applications for DC material on all major formats and hardware, partnering with Warner Bros Digital Distribution. It has extremely been rewarding to hear anecdotal stories of lapsed readers returning to the art form and of brick and mortar stores gaining new customers who sampled digital comics.