{"id":6049,"date":"2006-04-14T22:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-04-14T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2020-07-28T03:09:44","modified_gmt":"2020-07-28T03:09:44","slug":"dead-no-more-first-quarter-alive-with","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/2006\/04\/14\/dead-no-more-first-quarter-alive-with\/","title":{"rendered":"Dead no more: First quarter alive with comics sales"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nby John Jackson Miller<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\n\"http:\/\/www.comichron.com\/monthlycomicssales\/2006\/2006-03.html\"<\/div>\n

No one ever really dies in comics \u2014 and now the “dead quarter,” when
\ncomics sales traditionally go into hibernation, isn’t dead any more,
\neither. Retailers ordered at least a million more comic books in the
\nfirst quarter of 2006 than in the first quarter of 2005, according to my analysis of the sales reports released by Diamond Comic Distributors on April 14.<\/p>\n

We’re at $89 million overall for the first three months of 2006, up
\n9% from the first quarter of 2005. The chart analysis for March appears here<\/b><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Marvel<\/strong> reached a notable threshold in March, placing 100 comics on Diamond’s Top 300 list. That’s a quantity
\nwe haven’t seen in many years, although as the list includes
\nreordered comics, many are appearing for the second time. The period of
\nhighest volume for Marvel offerings would have been in the early 1990s,
\nwhen it often had more than 120 titles in the market.<\/p>\n

Comics unit sales:<\/strong> The Top 300 comic books had
\nretailer orders of 6.99 million copies in March 2006, 4% more than March
\n 2005, which also had five shipping weeks. Retailers ordered 27,000 more
\n comic books in March 2006.<\/p>\n

For the first quarter of 2006, the Top 300 comic books had orders of
\n18.61 million units, 6% more than 2005?s total of 17.56 million units.<\/p>\n

Infinite Crisis<\/strong> #5’s sales of at least 201,800
\ncopies led the field, representing significant growth from #4’s January
\nsales of 182,600 copies. In addition to the book’s heat,  the March issue also benefited from both the generally stronger retail
\nconditions of March relative to January and from its placement in the
\ncalendar. Infinite Crisis<\/strong> #4 shipped on January 18,
\nmeaning the January chart captured only two weeks of reorders; #5
\nshipped on March 1, meaning a whole month’s reorder activity appeared on
\n the March charts. With #6 shipping April 5, the same phenomenon should
\nrecur in April’s charts.<\/p>\n

The continuing phenomenon of ever more Marvel and DC issues in the
\nTop 300 continues to push most new publishers off the Top 300 list.
\nExceptions were Tales of Alvin<\/strong> #1 from the Dabel Brothers<\/strong>, placing 282nd with 3,300 copies, and Full Cirkle<\/strong> #3, by the differently spelled Full Circle<\/strong>, which placed 286th with about 3,050 copies.<\/p>\n

A comic book now needs to sell more than 2,600 copies to make the Top
\n 300 chart. That’s a higher threshold than we’ve seen in a
\n long time. By contrast, in the “bad old days” \u2014 going back to March
\n2001, near the beginning of the revival \u2014 you only needed to sell 800
\ncopies to make the chart. You’d make the high 200s with 2,600 copies.<\/p>\n

That fact does not necessarily<\/strong> mean that independent
\n titles are selling better, only that there are enough
\nhigh-volume titles from the heavy hitters to soak up spaces on the chart
\n smaller titles once took.<\/p>\n

Comics dollar sales:<\/strong> The Top 300 comic books had sales worth $21.51 million in March 2006, 11% more than March 2005’s total of $19.06 million.<\/p>\n

For the first quarter of 2006, the Top 300 comics from each month
\nhave sold a combined $56.3 million, an increase of more than $6 million,
\n or 13%, over the same period in the previous year.<\/p>\n

Trade paperbacks :<\/strong> The Top 100 trade paperbacks and
\ngraphic novels reported by Diamond had orders worth $4.05 million at
\nfull retail in March 2006, a drop of 5% from the total in March 2005.
\nAdding those to the Top 300 comics for the month yields $25.56 million,
\nan increase of 9% over March 2005’s total of $23.35 million.<\/p>\n

For the first three months of 2006, the Top 300 comics and the Top
\n100 trade paperbacks from each month had orders worth $67.34 million, an
\n increase of 11% over the same period in 2005.<\/p>\n

Exclusive: Diamond’s overall sales:<\/strong> Diamond publishes dollar market shares for its top 20 publishers
\nacross all comics, trade paperbacks, and magazines. Knowing the exact total<\/strong> orders of any publisher on
\nthat list right down to the oldest backlist item allows you to calculate
\n Diamond’s total orders across these product groups.<\/p>\n

The March 2006 total was $34.8 million, which increases to $38.6
\nmillion, when Diamond’s United Kingdom orders are added. The figure is
\n10% over March 2005?s U.S. total of $31.58 million. Overall, the first
\nquarter stands at $89 million, 9% more than last year’s total of $81.43
\nmillion.
\nThe “overall” category overstates
\ncomics’ actual performance to the extent that magazines that do not have
\n comics content are included. The comics publishers’ market shares would
\n actually be slightly higher, if ancillary items were removed.<\/p>\n

Market shares:<\/strong> Marvel again topped DC in Diamond’s
\nreported overall unit and dollar market shares. Marvel hit a historical
\nmark of sorts by placing 100 titles in the Top 300; that figure includes
\n many reordered comics making the list for a second time, but it recalls
\n the days of the mid-1990s when Marvel last had 100 monthly titles. DC
\nhad 83 comics in the list \u2014 and Image’s 40 is the highest that publisher
\n has produced in some time.<\/p>\n

IDW actually took fourth in both units and dollars when only the Top
\n300 Comics are considered, owing to its slate of 15 comic books
\nreleasing in March versus Dark Horse’s 10. Dark Horse’s market share is
\nnearly double that of IDW when trade paperbacks are added, however.<\/p>\n

Price analysis:<\/strong> The average comic book on Diamond’s Top 300 list cost $3.15, up from $3.06 in March 2005.<\/p>\n

The weighted average price \u2014 that is, the cost of the average<\/strong>
\n comic book Diamond sold \u2014 was $3.08, way up from $2.84 last year. The
\naverage price of the comics that made the Top 25 was $3.06, also up from
\n $2.70 in March 2005.<\/p>\n

The comics being offered haven’t gotten that much more expensive,
\nbut the comics people are buying the most have.<\/p>\n

Methodology:<\/strong> Diamond keys orders for all comics it lists sales for to Batman<\/strong>, with one “order index point” being equal to 1% of that title’s orders. Using actual Diamond final orders from titles accounting for more than 25% of Diamond’s Top 300, I determined that one point on Diamond?s order index was likely to equal
\n698 comic books \u2014 with a 95% probability that the real figure was
\nbetween 697 and 699.<\/p>\n

Be sure to follow Comichron<\/b> on Twitter<\/b><\/a> and Facebook<\/b><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by John Jackson Miller No one ever really dies in comics \u2014 and now the “dead quarter,” when comics sales traditionally go into hibernation, isn’t dead any more, either. Retailers ordered at least a million more comic books in the first quarter of 2006 than in the first quarter of 2005, according to my analysis … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6050,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[128,127,17],"class_list":["post-6049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-2006-sales","tag-archival-reports","tag-diamond-monthly-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6049","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=6049"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6049\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6051,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6049\/revisions\/6051"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comichron.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}