{"id":4781,"date":"2014-01-13T18:30:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-13T18:30:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-08-01T15:07:15","modified_gmt":"2020-08-01T20:07:15","slug":"december-2013-comics-sales-estimates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/2014\/01\/13\/december-2013-comics-sales-estimates\/","title":{"rendered":"December 2013 comics sales estimates now online"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
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The final comics sales estimates for December are out from Diamond Comic Distributors<\/b><\/a>, and as reported here<\/b><\/a> on Friday, the Direct Market closed out the year up 9%. <\/b>Click to see the sales estimates for comics ordered in December 2013<\/b><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Origin II <\/i>#1<\/b><\/a>
\nwas the top-selling comic book of the month; at 131,700 copies, it
\nalmost exactly matches first-month sales of Origin #2 from 2001. Not one
\nof the bigger blockbusters for the year, it’ll likely still make the
\nTop 300 for the 21st Century list.<\/p>\n

December is always a
\nhard month to compare across time because of the variable shipping
\nschedules caused by the holidays. This December, for example, had only
\nfour Wednesdays\u2014but five New Comics Days, because retailers were given a Tuesday release date<\/b><\/a> for the New Year’s Eve shipment. On the other hand, the Christmas Eve shipment was tiny<\/b><\/a> (including only Origins II<\/i> #1, a book of mine<\/b><\/a>, and 11 other items), so it works out to four weeks of new release volume. <\/b>Given
\nsome retailers’ holiday schedules and UPS’s problems at the end of the
\nyear, it’s probably a four-week month for sales purposes, too.<\/p>\n

Something
\nelse was noteworthy. The Top 300 Graphic Novels category vaulted
\nover the $10 million mark \u2014 it had never topped $9 million before \u2014 but
\nthe result should not be taken at face value. Or, rather, at full retail
\nvalue. There was a lot of holiday-season (or end-of-fiscal-year
\nclearance) graphic novel discounting going on this month: more than $3
\nmillion in sales came from older Omnibus hardcovers from Marvel which
\nwere steeply discounted. We can see this because while Diamond’s charts
\nare ranked by units sold, and not dollars, it does offer dollar-ranking
\ninformation \u2014 but both its dollar rankings and its market shares are
\nbased on wholesale dollars.
\n
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\"www.mycomicshop.com\/search?TID=22726921&AffID=874007P01\"<\/div>\n

So, for example, we see that a newer $30 book, Deadpool Classic Vol. 9<\/b><\/i><\/a>, brought in almost as many dollars to Diamond as the $100 Ultimate Spider-Man Omnibus Vol. 1<\/b><\/i><\/a> from last year: they were 15th and 16th respectively in Diamond’s dollar rankings.<\/p>\n

\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/DeadpoolC9\"But retailers ordered 17% more<\/i> copies of the Ultimate Spider-Man Omnibus<\/i>. So the Omnibus<\/i>
\nhad to be selling for less than a third of what Diamond normally would
\nhave sold the book to retailers for. Thus, while the topline figure for
\ngraphic novel sales was way, way up \u2014 up 67% over last December, within
\njust the Top 300 \u2014 the real figure was an increase of 18%.<\/p>\n

I’ve
\nwritten about this several times in the past: there’s not really
\nanything to do about it, as running rankings based on wholesale dollars
\nwould tend to be confusing \u2014 and the central purpose of this site is
\nreporting how many copies entered into the Direct Market. It’s true that
\n$10 million in Top 300 graphic novels by cover price<\/i> were
\nordered by retailers in December: if they sold them all at full retail,
\nthe sum would still reflect what the industry made. In any event, take
\nthe category with a grain of salt this month.<\/p>\n

Records set during the month:<\/p>\n

\u2022 Highest dollar volume for Top 300 Trade Paperbacks <\/b>in a single month: $10.51 million; overstated by the means described above.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Highest dollar volume for comics and graphic novels ordered in a quarter:<\/b> $134.79 million, beating the record set last quarter.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Highest dollar market share for IDW:<\/b> 8.18%<\/p>\n

Additionally,
\nthe combined market shares of IDW, Image, and Dark Horse are higher
\nthan has been seen for the 3-4-5 publishers since 2003. Click to see
\nother Diamond-era records<\/b><\/a>.<\/p>\n

The aggregate changes, which give us our end-of-year figures:<\/p>\n

TOP 300 COMICS UNIT SALES<\/b><\/div>\n

December 2013<\/a>: <\/b>6.6 million copies
\nVersus 1 year ago this month<\/b><\/a>: -5%
\nVersus 5 years ago this month<\/b><\/a>: -14%
\nVersus 10 years ago this month<\/b><\/a>: +4%
\nVersus 15 years ago this month<\/b><\/a>: -9%
\nQ4 2013: 20.98 million copies, -3% vs. Q4 2012
\n2013 YEAR END: 84.51 million copies, +5% vs. 2012, +4% vs. 2008, +16% vs. 2003, unchanged vs. 1998<\/p>\n

ALL COMICS UNIT SALES<\/b>
\nDecember 2013 versus one year ago this month: -3.64%<\/b>
\nQ4 2012 versus Q4 2012: -0.97% <\/b>
\n2013 YEAR END: +6.7%<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

TOP 300 COMICS DOLLAR SALES<\/b><\/div>\n

December 2013: $24.55 million
\nVersus 1 year ago this month: -1%
\nVersus 5 years ago this month: -3%
\nVersus 10 years ago this month: +36%
\nVersus 15 years ago this month: +32%
\nQ4 2013: $78.19 million, +8% vs. Q4 2012
\n2013 YEAR END: $308.71 million, +8% vs. 2012, +17% vs. 2008, +49% vs. 2003, +47% vs. 1998<\/p>\n

ALL COMICS DOLLAR SALES<\/b>
\nDecember 2013 versus one year ago this month: +1.09%<\/b>
\nQ4 2013 versus Q4 2012: +4.16% <\/b>
\n2013 YEAR END: +10.22%<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

TOP 300 TRADE PAPERBACK DOLLAR SALES<\/b><\/div>\n

December 2013: $10.51 million
\nVersus 1 year ago this month: +67%
\nVersus 5 years ago this month: +57%
\nVersus 10 years ago this month, just the Top 50 vs. the Top 50: +66%
\nVersus 15 years ago this month, just the Top 25 vs. the Top 25: +128%
\nQ4 2013: $26.22 million, +19% vs. Q4 2012
\n2013 YEAR END: $93.91 million, +11% vs. 2012<\/p>\n

ALL TRADE PAPERBACK\u00a0 SALES<\/b>
\nDecember 2013 versus one year ago this month: +18.02%<\/b>
\nQ4 2013 versus Q4 2012: +7.8% <\/b>
\nYEAR TO DATE: +6.5%<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

TOP 300 COMICS + TOP 300 TRADE PAPERBACK DOLLAR SALES<\/b><\/div>\n

December 2013: $35.06 million
\nVersus 1 year ago this month: +13%
\nVersus 5 years ago this month: -3%
\nVersus 10 years ago this month, counting just the Top 50 TPBs: +31%
\nVersus 15 years ago this month, counting just the Top 25 TPBs: +45%
\nQ4 2013: $104.4 million, +4% vs. Q4 2012
\n2013 YEAR END: $402.31 million, +9% vs. 2012<\/p>\n

ALL COMICS AND TRADE PAPERBACK\u00a0 SALES<\/b>
\nDecember 2013 versus one year ago this month: +5.93%<\/b>
\nQ4 2013 versus Q4 2012: +5.28%\u00a0 <\/b>
\n\u00a0<\/b>
\n2013 YEAR END: +9.04%<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

OVERALL DIAMOND SALES (including all comics, trades, and magazines)<\/b><\/div>\n

December 2013: approximately $42.22 million (subject to revision)
\nVersus 1 year ago this month: +6%
\nVersus 5 years ago this month: +6%
\nVersus 10 years ago this month: +47%
\nQ4 2013: $134.79 million, +5% vs. 2012
\n<\/b>
\n2013 YEAR END: $517.66 million, +9% vs. 2013<\/b><\/p>\n

RELEASES<\/b><\/span>
\nNew comic books released: 471<\/b>
\nNew graphic novels released: 239<\/b>
\nNew magazines released: 29 <\/b>
\nAll new releases: 739<\/b><\/p>\n

The average comic book in the Top 300 cost $3.66; the average comic book
\nretailers ordered cost $3.72. The median and most common price for comics offered was $3.99. Click to see comics prices across time.<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

The release of December data allows the end-of year estimates to be made: those will be up shortly. (Update: Click to see the Top 1,000 Comics and Top 1,000 Graphic Novels for 2013<\/b><\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The final comics sales estimates for December are out from Diamond Comic Distributors, and as reported here on Friday, the Direct Market closed out the year up 9%. Click to see the sales estimates for comics ordered in December 2013. Origin II #1 was the top-selling comic book of the month; at 131,700 copies, it … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4782,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[76,17],"class_list":["post-4781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-2013-sales","tag-diamond-monthly-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4781"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6443,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4781\/revisions\/6443"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}