We made it! And so did graphic novels! This morning’s “Think Future” graphic novel panel seemed to have been a success — as one of the participants, I’ll have to let others decide the final verdict but from where I sat, it was worth getting up early for, and that’s the highest praise I can give. Mucho kudos to co-moderator and man about town Calvin Reid and everyone else here at PW who got it set up.
Of course, when you have five super smart people as panelists, the odds of success are greatly enhanced. John Cunningham, Dan Frank, Joe Quesada, Bill Schanes and Rich Johnson spoke on a variety of topics, touching on the traditional comics shop environment, digital delivery systems, the continued need for strong material, the changing creative demographic, and so on. Nothing that hadn’t been spoken of before, but the panelists and the audience were engaged with each other and a good dialog got going.
A couple of interesting notes did emerge. One of the audience members is putting together a collection of graphic novels at Columbia University, and revealed that NYU has just started collecting comics, as well. Reaching the academic audience was discussed, and , revealingly, Johnson related how 10 years ago, that audience was deeply suspicious of comics — now they were begging for more information.
The reasons for comics being taken seriously suddenly? Reviews in the NY Times book review, awards, Fun Home being Time magazine’s book of the year…this stuff is really adding up.
The other thing that caught our ear was Schanes’s response to a question on the health of “indie comics shops.”
“Business is as good as its ever been,” he said, referring to the fact that Diamond accounts are paying in a timely fashion, expanding at a reasonable rate, and showing economic health all around. That may sound like an obvious point, but it gives a good snapshot of where the retail environment is at. Many retailers view everything from manga to MySpace to chain bookstores as a threat to their business. Despite all the NEW sources for graphic literature, comics shops are responding to the challenge by bettering themselves and becoming more successful. That’s a healthy sign for the entire industry.
From an attendance standpoint, it was fascinating to see a room full of people from (primarily) the book business who profiting from — or hoping to profit from — the new world of graphic novels on all levels. Familiar faces, and new ones…from Del Rey’s Betsy Mitchell to Greg Topalian of the New York Comic-Con to the editor at a major house who told me of her ideas for a line of graphic novels. It was a nice little chapter break in the ongoing saga of the “mainstreaming” of comics, a good place reached but many many more hurdles to be cleared.
But just for today, I can nap in peace.
Thanks for a great panel, Heidi & Calvin! Fascinating and informative all at the same time! Hope this can become a series of panels or interviews. All would benefit from it. But for now, take a well-deserved rest!
Jim @ Marvel
Despite all the NEW sources for graphic literature, comics shops are responding to the challenge by bettering themselves and becoming more successful.
That’s wonderful to hear. Even in today’s age of the internet and chain stores, specialty stores can succeed, and indeed can succeed even BETTER if the approach is right. Personally, I go to the comic book store because a) I am greeted and welcomed by name every time I walk in, b) I feel comfortable asking for help or looking for a title, c) they carry specialty items I can’t find in a chain store and novelty items I wouldn’t think to look for online, and d) that 10% discount on all graphic novels gets me every time; there have been plenty of times I’ve been in the Books-A-Million across the street and seen a title I wanted, but as soon as I’ve reached for the spine, to lift it off the shelf, a little voice at the back of my head goes, “Wait. I can get this as Austin Books for LESS,” and I’ll put the book back every time.
I’m excited to see where the retail end continues to progress; maybe I didn’t realize this when I first started in the industry, but the comic book store is such a part of the community of comics, that I can’t imagine it without. The people who own the comic book stores have done so much to promote little guys and girls right along with the big ones; as small as the market once was, and as much as it’s growing, half of us wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for them.
And yeay for the push to POS systems! I worked at Austin Books for like . . . two weeks . . . and it drove me NUTS that they actually tabulate everything by hand; it’s a piece of paper with all the lists of titles and you manually have to count every day how many are on the shelves, and then take note in the graphic novels of what volumes are missing. Crazy.
Despite all the NEW sources for graphic literature, comics shops are responding to the challenge by bettering themselves and becoming more successful.
That’s wonderful to hear. Even in today’s age of the internet and chain stores, specialty stores can succeed, and indeed can succeed even BETTER if the approach is right. Personally, I go to the comic book store because a) I am greeted and welcomed by name every time I walk in, b) I feel comfortable asking for help or looking for a title, c) they carry specialty items I can’t find in a chain store and novelty items I wouldn’t think to look for online, and d) that 10% discount on all graphic novels gets me every time; there have been plenty of times I’ve been in the Books-A-Million across the street and seen a title I wanted, but as soon as I’ve reached for the spine, to lift it off the shelf, a little voice at the back of my head goes, “Wait. I can get this as Austin Books for LESS,” and I’ll put the book back every time.
I’m excited to see where the retail end continues to progress; maybe I didn’t realize this when I first started in the industry, but the comic book store is such a part of the community of comics, that I can’t imagine it without. The people who own the comic book stores have done so much to promote little guys and girls right along with the big ones; as small as the market once was, and as much as it’s growing, half of us wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for them.
And yeay for the push to POS systems! I worked at Austin Books for like . . . two weeks . . . and it drove me NUTS that they actually tabulate everything by hand; it’s a piece of paper with all the lists of titles and you manually have to count every day how many are on the shelves, and then take note in the graphic novels of what volumes are missing, and it was the only way they had of knowing what they’d sold. Crazy.
Columbia College Chicago already has a pretty spiffy graphic novel collection, and recently got a grant to expand it.
Places like Bowling Green (where I studied popular culture in the mid 90s) and Michigan State have had comics collections for quite a while now. Glad more places are jumping on board.
One of the best panels on graphic novels, comics, and where they are headed I have yet been too, in part due to the fine panel and the breadth of experience they cover, as well as the moderators being genuinely informed about the subject and therefore better able to question the panel.
Hearing some of the stories about the expansion of shelf space reminded me of my younger B&N days using my employee recommendations to get Dark Knight and Watchmen into a face-out, and I have been rating my impression of libraries for years based on their placement and depth of graphic novel and trade holdings. Now I just need to find my way into Columbia’s stacks.
There is definitely a lot going on, and hearing an agent say they were considering graphic novel possibilities raise some goosebumps on my arm. We left with a number of ideas and a lot of brainstorming to do, but one thing I was sorry to have missed was a guest list. There were a few people people I would have liked to follow up with.
This panel was informative and interesting, I’m so glad I attended. Being a former graphic novel buyer for the SF book club and now working at a non-fiction publishing house, I was listening on all sides and I’m more keenly aware of the challenges and opportunities in both comic shops and the retail market.
Heidi & Calvin – excellent job moderating! And the panel couldn’t have been better. I also hope this turns into an ongoing comics series with a focus or concentration constantly changing.
What time do you usually get up, Heidi?
Shhhhh! That’s a bloggers secret!
More importantly, what did you eat?
I ate more seaweed today! That stuff is addictive!
In fact, come to think of it, I hope it IS seaweed. You can smoke seaweed, right?
BEATSTER– Did anyone talk about the nature of drawing? Are the kids more into computer generated comics or do they prefer the drawings made by real hands? I noticed on ZUDA that there’s a mix. I react poorly to this stuff, but I am a curmudgeonly old man or is the organic look of drawings by hand something with universal appeal?
Is computer drawing just a way of making work easier?
or is that glossy *bleep!* something the kids wanna see???
is this totally off-point?
As a mid-west retailer in Indianapolis that’s great to hear. As a quick snapshot for us…I know our trade business has skyrocketed over the past two years in our 4 stores. What’s been great for us is that the Indianapolis Public Library system orders their graphic novels from us. We work very closely with them in choosing what to pick, and what’s great for them is that they can track the circulation of their titles so that if a particular series is a hit, they’ll ‘up’ the order on the next volume. What we’ve also been doing is working close with teachers here in town for Free Comic Book Day and supplying teachers with up to 100 comics from Free Comic Book Day…what that does for our trade business is impressive. As we have teachers come into the shop looking for stuff for their personal shelves they keep IN the classroom and we help guide them with age appropriate stuff. What’s also been happening is that we’ve been attending local teacher conferences that are in Indy and setting up a table of trades that range in age from kindergarten to high school. What’s great about that is that a lot of teachers are just amazed at the stuff available and how well they are produced. One of my best friends is doing her masters thesis on Comics in the Classroom and gave a keynote speech at a small conference (about 160 people) and she packed the room, afterwards I was swamped with business and questions, our trade business is very healthy due to these factors. And that’s not even talking about just doing in-store sales on trades.
Ten years ago, if an author of a graphic novel won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the industry would be hooting with pride. This year, that happened, and hardly a word.
How soon before there is a monthly anthology of comics similar to The Magazine Of Fantasy And Science Fiction? How long before a GN is shortlisted for a major literary award? When will comicbook stores realize that they are independent specialty bookstores?
There are a lot of landmarks yet to come. I’ve been seducing the innocent since 1984, and will continue to do so, hopefully even after my death. Until then, I’ll keep reading and selling!
Hey Heidi, it was a great moment and you guys did a great job of keeping the show moving along.
It was nice to see the house packed with publishing folks who are now beginning to realize that a revolution is underway.
This would probably have happened sooner if the traditional graphic novel guys learned how to do publicity. They should hire a publicist to ‘work’ their books for them. There is an art in getting any book some real exposure in the industry trades and that means sending review copies to folks like you and Calvin, the other review sources like Kirkus, LJ, Foreword, Booklist etc… They need to treat these graphic novels like the books we all know them to be.
When you see that happen, then you will begin to see more recognition in the place where it should happen.
Funny thing about those awards though…back when Maus won the special Pulitzer many folks felt that it would open the door. And for a while I kept waiting for another book to open peoples eyes. Fun Home and American Born Chinese did a great deal to elevate the format but it was a dollar sign that really deserves recognition.
At the ICV2 panels Milton Greipp presented his White Paper or State of The Union Address that held an amazing statistic. GN Sales in 2001 were 43 million and climbed to 330 million (libraries bought 30 Million). That is what woke many people up to the possiblility that this “fad” was really much more than that.
Now we have the arrival of The Dark Tower. This book really made the Marvel team step up and create a classic.
I know it was a comic book series but a lot of people in the traditional publishing world dont seem to know that. What they now see though, is an amazing book. The only other thing that could have created such an impact is a GN version of Harry Potter.
The more I study this book, the bigger it gets. Publishing industry is waking up to a new version of rock and roll. This book is probably going to change much more than any of us have considered.
It’s gonna be a really cool ride.
I spoke at two school library systems conferences in upper state New York this past week; at both conferences, my largest audiences were in the elementary school sections. Comics publishers who want to increase their worth really need to seriously increase the output of quality comics and gns for kids. The elementary school librarians wanted to know more, they wanted to see more, they just wanted more comics that they can share with the kids. I hear that art spiegelman and Francoise Mouly are starting a new publishing venture, Toon Books, that will provide beginning level graphic novels for ages 4 through 8. We need more ventures like that. Yes, getting into academic libraries is great. But to grow the audience in a natural way, you need to get the kids started. That’s how I started, as a 6-year-old. More than 40 years later, I’m still reading and loving comics, and they’re a major part of my work life.