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Alright, now we're entering the third and final round of our bestselling comic books of 2023. You can catch up with Part 1 here (now updated with an All-Time-Bestseller chart!) and Part 2 here. And now you want to read a third part?! What's wrong with you??? (nothing, actually you're pretty great!)
We have arrived at Single Issue (aka Comic Books). In the past, I've referred to them as the 'fourth pillar' of Walt's, but to be honest, that's been a bit of an overstatement. While this segment is growing, it's not keeping up with the other areas of our business, such as Big Books, Trade Paperbacks & Graphic Novels, and Manga. And considering its lower starting point, let's just say that our involvement with Single Issues isn't primarily driven by financial motivations. I still believe the format is unique, though I must concede that the current approach to handling it by publishers isn't ideal. The scalability for profitability remains a puzzle to me. It almost seems as though the Singles market has not only resigned itself to a niche but is actively burrowing deeper into it.
In the United States, there are currently many discussions about this, and many long-established stores and chains are reducing their Singles business and shifting, whether to older backissues, or to the formats that already make up our main business. So why even bet on an 'obsolete' format when the commercial prospects are not exactly bright? Because Singles are American Comic Book culture in its purest form. And despite all the dirges, they will not die. But they will have to reinvent themselves.
So let's get started:
I am well aware that our figures are not at all represenatative of the overall market, since we are not a traditional dealer in single issues. However, I believe that they do provide some insights into trends that are likely noticeable across the industry.
I've consolidated all the variant editions. In cases where it seemed appropriate, I've highlighted which covers were particularly influential in the consolidation. At least the best selling issues are selling because of their covers rather than their stories. Six of our top ten titles come from the current Spider-Man series, each alternating with a Disney100 variant every second or third issue. These special editions reimagine classic Marvel covers with Disney characters, such as Mickey Mouse and the Ducks. They're charming, but the focus seems to have shifted away from the content itself, as evidenced by a substantial drop of over 80% in sales for issues without a Disney Variant.
Facsimile editions account for another quarter of our chart. The fact that these old classics, often reprinted multiple times in both solo and collected editions, are overshadowing new series isn’t something I’d overstate. These issues are also highly sought after by customers who generally don’t purchase single issues. They’re like little bonuses added to an Omni order.
Then there are the first issues. The market in the past decade has been somewhat oversaturated with relaunches, at least this is what everyone's saying. bBut customers still seem to favor new beginnings. First issues sell well, which is why Marvel and DC keep relaunching.
Only two non-big-2 titles, Devil's Cut One-Shot (DSTLRY) and Transformers #1 (Image), made it into our top 50. This shows how much especially the Singles segment is dominated by Marvel and DC.
Our sliver of hope: The relaunch of the Ultimate Line, but especially Spider-Man by Hickman. It has brought people back to the format who swore them off a good while ago. U-Spidey has by far the highest pre-order numbers we ever had for a series. But how will Marvel handle this success? Will they cautiously expand the line? Or rapidly flood the market with new series and a myriad variants? I think you can guess the answer...
Now let's take a look a closer at the publishers.
When you look at this chart, you can understand why they are called the Big2, huh? But first impressions can be deceiving. Because when we look at the column on the right (revenue comparison with the previous year), we see where the trend is heading. While Marvel is still the dominant force, it must be noted that they were, relatively put, the biggest loser in 2023 (it becomes even clearer when you look at the same values for just the last 90 days, where Marvel has already slipped below the magic 40% mark). A revenue increase of 50% might look great on its own, but is well below our 91% average growth.
On the other hand, one shouldn't overstate the astronomical growth numbers of Manga. We only seriously dedicated ourselves to this segment in 2023 and the '22 sales were very modest.
The counterbalance to Marvel's loss in significance is not to be found in the growth of Manga, but rather in the second and third ranks. While DC was only able to slightly improve its share, in absolute numbers, we more than doubled our revenue with DC. But the clear winner of the year for us is undoubtedly Rick Remen-- er, I mean Image! I actually wanted to combine all Remender books to measure the author's contribution to our annual sales. But, unfortunately, my lifetime is not infinite... Nonetheless, I hereby declare Rick Remender the Dav Pilkey of the Direct Market! I am pretty sure that a good half of Image's sales are due to him, which would place him solo at about third place in our publisher ranking.
Next, we have Dark Horse, who have clearly outperformed our average revenue growth. With them, it's the Library Editions and the Berserk HCs that are mainly responsible. The problem: Dark Horse has already published most of its top material in oversized editions, and whether other Manga IPs can trigger a similar collecting frenzy in HC like Berserk is questionable. Volume 14, which was released in 2023, concludes the series for now. Of course, all 14 volumes will continue to sell (especially thanks to our bundle deal :)), but I look a bit worriedly at Dark Horse in 2024 and 2025.
Alternatively, IDW benefits from having cultivated (and essentially monopolized) a particular format all to themselves. This format finally made a breakthrough into the mainstream in 2023 and I'm of course talking about Artist Editions. Once of interest only to hardcore comic art lovers, more and more comic fans are now captivated by experiencing some of their favorite stories anew in a format that is both purist and high-end (AND oversized!). And then, of course, there are the Turtles. And Turtles will always perform well. Taking into account that there's an abundance of material to be released in Artist Edition, I don't think there's any need to worry about IDW as a publishing house, despite the loss of the Transformers and ROM licenses (it's debatable how significant those revenue losses really are).
I've already discussed Manga extensively, particularly in my commentary on Manga sales. In brief, it's performing well, but there's still a lot of untapped potential. Following our move earlier this year, we plan to innovate and further expand in the Manga sector. The main challenges, however, remain unchanged. We've secured a reliable supplier for Viz titles through Simon & Schuster UK (resp. HarperCollins), but the lead times for new releases are still lengthy. For Kodansha we are currently best positioned with our largest supplier PRH, but the publisher is lacking a real mega-hit at the moment (Blue Lock didn't do that great for us, unfortunately). We're eagerly anticipating the Vinland Saga hardcovers, curious if they'll match the high quality of Dark Horse's hardcovers, especially given their relatively high price. Seven Seas holds great promise, but PRH lacks the rights to sell their most interesting titles in Europe. We could get them through Diamond, but the terms are unfavorable, so we'll only order these titles upon request. It's a pity, but issues with rights are a major obstacle in selling English-language manga in Europe. This was an unexpected challenge for us, as the American publishers we usually deal with don't have many licensed titles, thus facing minimal sales restrictions.
Moving into the smaller percentages, Fantagraphics and Boom have shown solid, albeit slightly above-average growth last year. In contrast, the waning hype around 'The Boys' has led to a stagnation in Dynamite's numbers, effectively halving their relative share. It's worth noting that Boom, Dynamite, and Titan are now the 'major publishers' still exclusively distributed by Diamond. While our figures shouldn't be used as the standard, it's evident that their significance cannot compensate for the departure of the truly large players. This situation suggests that concerns about Diamond's viability in the coming year are unfortunately warranted.
Okaaaaaay. This took much much longer than expected. I hope you found it somewhat intriguing to take a glimpse behind the scenes. I'm aware that not all comic shops and businesses, in general, are open to sharing insights into their operations. There are sometimes good reasons for this secrecy. But I've always been fascinated by the comic market and its inner workings, and I hope that among you, there are also a few fellow numbers enthusiasts who enjoyed this DEEP peek into the data ;)
