|
Post by johnnypt on Aug 15, 2016 12:02:26 GMT -5
Well, it did draw about twice as many readers to this first issue compared to the ones who bought CTA #25. So they were at least able to get a bunch of people who weren't buying it to give it a try. It's now up to them to hold onto as many of them as they can for as long as they can. They can't afford a 30-40% drop for the 2nd issue.
|
|
|
Post by lordyam on Aug 15, 2016 14:53:06 GMT -5
Those numbers are disappointing all around. I had expected Slayer to do close to 15k and that King Conan trade really needed to be closer to 950-1,000, considering the quality that goes into those minis, it is a bummer for sure and I doubt we'll get anymore King Conan for now, if ever. I realize that Conan is still selling well for DH but it isn't selling well for what Conan could potentially do in this market. It's the highest DH has gotten in years. Iron Shadows 4 was around 15,000 if I recall correctly. If they keep it up it may help. It may inspire them to get another artist or writer. When I was at a comic store the guy said that he didn't stock Conan because it didn't sell well. Nowadays I think this MIGHT encourage them to sell more.
|
|
|
Post by mrp on Aug 15, 2016 15:25:32 GMT -5
Always remember, these numbers are not sales to end customers, but to retailers. There is no tracking what actually sells to end customers. On average, the logic is that retailers have to sell 4 out of 5 copies ordered to make a profit, so not all those copies are reaching readers/customers. Also, retailers were probably ordering more on Slayer than they were on Avenger because Cullen Bunn has a bigger sales rep for his big 2 (Marvel & DC) work than Van Lente had.
The other factor is did Dark Horse have a variant cover for #1 that required retailers to order a specific number of copies of the issue to be eligible to buy. That would have inflated sales numbers to retailers on the first issue as they can make the money back on extra copies for selling the limited variant for a premium price. The normal sales attrition trend for comics these days is between a 33% and 50% drop off between issues 1 and 3 as they have to order the first couple of issues before the first issue goes on sale and they see how many actually sold in the shop of that issue, and most lower orders for #3 accordingly.
It is also not surprising that the Chronicles and King COnan trades wound up back to back. Retailers will see those as virtually the same product for the same audience and order the same number of copies. Also remember on these, those numbers are just Diamond sales, so only those distributed through comics shops and Diamond accounts. It doesn't reflect sales through other book distributors such as Amazon sales, Barnes & Noble, etc. and the larger trade paperback market is outside Diamond distribution not inside it.
-M
|
|
|
Post by johnnypt on Aug 15, 2016 18:41:37 GMT -5
The Chronicles up until recently had been selling fairly well, but the last couple of volumes have seen a big drop in the preorders. It was a little surprising to see it this low. The King Conan trades have generally come in around 1000 preorders. I guess since this mini sold a little lower, they ordered a little less.
If the attrition rate does end up around 50% by issue #3, we'll be right back to where we were. Avenger ended up shedding 40% over 25 issues. They'd better hope for that kind of rate over the next two years.
And of course we always have the digital unknown. I've been seeing the 7% number more and more, who knows if it's correct. We'll see where we end up by Christmas.
|
|
|
Post by Jason Aiken on Aug 16, 2016 0:09:23 GMT -5
Thanks for the numbers Johnny! I'm excited for The Slayer #1 numbers, but I wonder how much of a factor the two covers played. Could stores order them individually? If so, that could be inflating the numbers a bit if retailers ordered heavy on both covers. We could see a big drop for #2 as a result.
Those King Conan trade numbers, though....such a disappointment. The best Conan comic we had in years and not only was the mini a low seller, but the trade was under ordered too. I wonder if more and more people are buying trades off Amazon now. They have to be cheaper than comic shops I would think.
|
|
|
Post by mrp on Aug 16, 2016 1:12:14 GMT -5
Thanks for the numbers Johnny! I'm excited for The Slayer #1 numbers, but I wonder how much of a factor the two covers played. Could stores order them individually? If so, that could be inflating the numbers a bit if retailers ordered heavy on both covers. We could see a big drop for #2 as a result. Those King Conan trade numbers, though....such a disappointment. The best Conan comic we had in years and not only was the mini a low seller, but the trade was under ordered too. I wonder if more and more people are buying trades off Amazon now. They have to be cheaper than comic shops I would think. The King Conan Wolves Beyond the Border trade retails at $17.99. It's Amazon price is currently $11.92 or about 34% off retail price. A couple of Amazon sellers have an even lower price point (pre-shipping that is). So yes Amazon is cheaper. Here are its rankings on Amazon... Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #41,695 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #54 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Publishers > Dark Horse #101 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Fantasy Graphic Novels #705 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Graphic Novels no actual sales numbers attached to that and that encompasses not just new releases but all books available on Amazon. -M PS Just for reference-that comic book shop buying from Diamond is only getting about 40% off the retail when ordering from Diamond, so cannot even come close to matching the Amazon discount, so Amazon has to be buying a fair number of copies to get the kind of volume discount to be able to offer it at that discount and still make profit.
|
|
|
Post by johnnypt on Aug 16, 2016 6:48:31 GMT -5
$11.92 was the pre-order price as well, so that seems to be Amazon's price for KC:WBTB for the time being.
I know I got both covers for CTS #1, Midtown Comics looks like they had about a 50/50 mix. If that really did inflate the numbers we'll know it as soon as next month. If it holds over 10K, that'd be a decent sign.
|
|
|
Post by mrp on Aug 16, 2016 7:38:56 GMT -5
$11.92 was the pre-order price as well, so that seems to be Amazon's price for KC:WBTB for the time being. I know I got both covers for CTS #1, Midtown Comics looks like they had about a 50/50 mix. If that really did inflate the numbers we'll know it as soon as next month. If it holds over 10K, that'd be a decent sign. Well retailers had to order #2 before #1 arrived in stores for them to see how it sold, so orders on second issues tend to be a little inflated as well. It is usually not until the third issue that retailers can adjust to actual sales during the final order cutoff period that the numbers start to reflect actual sales to end customers. Their initial orders for #3 were done before #1 arrived as well (comics are ordered 3 months in advance) but some publishers allow adjustments after orders are due (this is FOC or final order cutoff) and the window for FOC for issue #3 is usually a week or so after #1 arrives on a monthly book. Issue 2 is the hardes tto orde rfor retailers because i is being ordered as a shot in the dark, #1 issues can sell because they are #1s and people try them sometimes, but you never know how many will come back for #2 and people rarely buy #2 if they didn't buy #1, so you have to order less for #2 and hope it's accurate because #1 hasn't even been previewed online usually when the orders are due, and you won't know what sales are like for #1 when FOC is due for #2. So all sales numbers for second issues tell you is how retailers think it will sell, not how it actually sold. If there is no incentive (variants, additional discounts, etc.) retailers sometimes cut harder on #2 issues so they have more capital available to spend on issues with incentives. If they do that, it makes it unlikely the book's audience will grow as there simply won't be issues for customers to buy on the shelves as they will likely cut back to pulls + x shelf copies where x is usually a fraction of the number of pulls, so that the 80% sell through needed for profitability is reached. So for example if you have 6 customers pulling Conan, you order 8 copies to guarantee your profitability. That leaves only 2 shelf copies. You might up that to 10 for a first issue to see if you get any fliers on walk ins, but that's risky if they don't sell, because then you lost money on Conan #1 because of the margins on the books. Now stores like Midtown that have a huge online sales presence and more capital available can afford to order more because they have a broader customer base to sell to, but most smaller customer shops are going to be very conservative in ordering because ordering is a zero sum game for them because of limited capital. If I order extra copies of this book, I can't order copies of that book. Which has a better chance of walk in sales? That's the book that gets more shelf copies ordered, so if it's a choice of ordering extra copies of Conan or Suicide Squad, they'll order Suicide Squad and cut Conan because there is a greater chance they will sell extra copies of SS than Conan because it has greater recognition among a casual customer walking in. So it's very hard for a book like Conan to grow its audience beyond the core customers who pull it because most retailers won't order extra copies to have on hand. There are simply too many books on the market for them to order extras of everything, and most retailers will have tracked sales of Conan over the years and know how many pulls their shop has and will order according to the track record of the sales history rather than potential of a new series. Cullen Bunn is a hot name with super-hero customers, so #1 gets a bump... #2 gets cut back because you don't take risks on second issues, #3 will reflect what #1 actually sold for most stores and then attrition sets in every issue as people drop and not many add. It's not like the newsstand days where books were returnable and copies were available because the retailer didn't pay for unsold copies. With the direct market model and books being non-returnable, the retailer pays for every copy he gets and if it doesn't sell, he eats it. Variants sold at premium prices can defer costs of issues and allow you to order more but if that doesn't happen, retailers aren't going to order much more than what they already know they can sell on books like Conan, so you won't see surges in growth no matter what the quality of the book is because retailers won't risk their limited capital on it and you can't grow an audience with no copies available. Digital sales and trades via the book trade (not Diamond) allow a little more room for growth than the direct market model, but it is not a case of if Dark Horse makes a good Conan comic suddenly sales will bloom. It's more a case of does the retailer have the capital available to order extra copies of Conan beyond his pull customers and if so, if he willing to invest that money in Conan over any number of the hundreds of other books on the market? Barring a yes answer to both questions, sales will drop every issue, thus the attrition rate I cited above (33%-50% from issue 1-3), but worse is that most books tend to bleed off 4-5% every issue after that because there is no influx of new purchasers to balance out those who lose interest or stop buying for whatever reason (budget, moving, loss of job, birth of a child making less disposable income available, shop closing, shops cutting order to pull customers only because shelf copies don't sell, creative team changes, late books, etc.). That is the economic reality of ordering books in the current market. Shops live and die on pre-orders from customers and pull lists. Ordering copies of books beyond those numbers are a risk to their profitability. A little more perspective-there are approximately 5000 Diamond accounts in North America total. If Conan sold 15K copies, that means each account ordered 3 copies on average. If it's 10K that's 2 per account average. Now if you take into account stores like Midtown Comics (or DCBS, Mile High, Lonestar, Thing From Another World, Westfield, etc.) where they are (each) probably order in the hundreds of copies due to online sales, being in NYC etc. that means there are many of those Diamond accounts who are ordering 0 copies of books like Conan, and you can't grow an audience if there is no copies of the book in a lot of shops for anyone to buy-not that they sold out and customers missed out, but that they were never in the shop to begin with. Quality of the book doesn't matter if it's never ordered by the account, and no matter how good it is they likely won't order it in any case. So as you look at Diamond sales numbers to measure the health of Conan as a comic property understand the context that it is happening in and how much of an uphill battle it is to get the numbers to shift in the right direction for a book. -M
|
|
|
Post by johnnypt on Aug 16, 2016 8:43:10 GMT -5
Yep, it's just a small snapshot of a much larger picture. Between the two sites, we've been doing this for about, what, four years? Jeff Shanks started it to try and see what the differences were between Cimmerian, Road of Kings and Barbarian after there was a lot of writing that the Wood run was selling way better than anything recently. The preorders show the general trends, but the specific numbers that move the company to make certain decisions, we just can't know.
There's the story I've often told about trying to pick up a copy of Conan The Cimmerian #25 the Wednesday before Thanksgiving 2010. The store in central NJ I'd always gone to when I'm in the area had no copies, didn't order it. The shop went under three months later. The other store in the area had a few copies, but they weren't kept on the racks, he had them in the back. Stores do what they need to do to stay afloat and sometimes they don't make it. It gets to be the vicious cycle: you can't get the book because the store doesn't order it, but the store didn't order it because not enough people were buying it. Now at least you have the digital option with practically everything from the big companies, so that also plays into things to some unknown degree.
That's why I look at any boost as a good sign, at least for the moment. Retailers will probably have already cut back on #2 because like you mentioned, there's now just the one cover. By #3, the store will have hard data to base orders from: the # sold and the # still sitting there on the shelf. When I have trouble finding a title at Midtown, you know it's in trouble! Conan is thankfully not in that boat, they usually have it on the corner of the rack towards the front of the store, so it's almost the first thing you see. After the first issue comes out, it's up to the creators to keep people hooked. Over the past 3 titles, it's fair to say they've had some trouble in this area. What a normal attrition rate is and what is people just not reading the book, good question. Just from the first issue and the previews for #2 we can see the different approach they're taking now. We'll see how it holds up.
|
|
|
Post by Jason Aiken on Aug 16, 2016 16:30:03 GMT -5
I'd be happy if the title stayed above 10,000 as well. If it drops any lower than that, I think it will probably level back out to around 6-7,000 before the first arc is finished, which wouldn't be a good thing. I'm hoping Bunn has the clout to bring and keep new readers.
Yeah I don't buy trades from comic shops for that reason anymore, they can't compete with Amazon as far as prices go. I buy floppies from them, but that's it.
|
|
|
Post by johnnypt on Sept 19, 2016 13:12:54 GMT -5
So how do we hold up with issues #2?
203 6.25 $3.99 DAR Conan the Slayer (2016) 2 9,561 1 13,388 -3,827 -28.59%
30% drop off is kind of expected, especially with the 2 covers for #1. Disappointed to see it below 10k already but as we spoke of earlier, we'll have a good sense by #3 of how many people are going to stick around. It's the #6 DH book, with several new titles, Buffy and the Alien/Predator/Dredd mash-up above it.
Trade
171 0.51 $19.99 DAR Conan v19: Xuthal of the Dusk 782 782
This was the hardcover, boys & girls.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 19, 2016 13:30:56 GMT -5
Not bad, I guess. I feel comic shops under-ordered this title. In London the second issue sold out by the first weekend - the same with Forbidden Planet (the biggest comic shop in the UK), but, Forbidden Planet seem to have enough copies to re-stock after about a week. Most comic shops played it safe. Can hardly blame them after sales with the main Conan book in the last 4 years.
|
|
|
Post by lordyam on Sept 19, 2016 15:35:34 GMT -5
Rather disappointing. I suppose you could say the return of Buffy helped knock it down. It still outsells other brands (Mirrors edge, Dragon Age)
|
|
|
Post by lordyam on Sept 22, 2016 4:46:26 GMT -5
I'm actually optimistic. Many of the higher earners had two covers, and Conan still outsells most of DH's other products (it's consistently in the upper 25%). They kinda have to hold on too it, and depending on how issue 3 sells it may be good news (if it only falls by like 100 issues than it'll be profitable for a long while). If it's at 7500 by the end it will be good.
|
|
|
Post by mrp on Sept 22, 2016 10:19:18 GMT -5
One thing to remember when considering how profitable it is for DH to keep the book is that they have to pay for the license, so it has to sell significantly more than a non-licensed books to be as profitable as that non-licensed book. SO you really have to divide DH offerings into licensed books and non-licensed books and compare Conan only to the licensed books to see how it fits in the companies hierarchy of profitable books. The license fee makes it more expensive to produce Conan comics (and Buffy, and Aliens, etc.), so those books have to perform better than the non-licensed books to make keeping the licenses worthwhile. Hellboy or Black Hammer or other books can sell less and be more profitable for Dark Horse because there is no license fee to raise the production costs of the books.
The licencor can also pull the license if it is not making enough money from the product, or if they negotiate a deal somewhere else-for instance now that the Conan movie rights have lapsed, Paradox/Malmut could negotiate a deal with Legendary Pictures for the COnan rights and as an ancillary give the Conan license to Legendary Comics as part of the deal (much the way Lucasfilm ended the license for Star Wars with Dark Horse to move it to Marvel when Disney acquired them. Assuming it is an at will contract, either side can end it if the deal no longer suits them.
-M
|
|