Tag: Sales Charts

Gentleman, start your crunchers! It's a big change at Publishers Weekly this week, as they initiate a new way of running the bestsellers lists. As Sr. Editor Digital Media Jonathan Segura explains:

Diamond released their comparative numbers for the first quarter vs last year, and it was all good. Total sales were up 7.3% in Q1 2012 vs Q1 2011, led by comics (up +14.8%) and graphic novels (+6%).

Brandon Graham's KING CITY is something of a poster child for the fusion comics generation—begun as a "OEL manga" it was rescued from contract limbo and returned to lead the vanguard of Image's newly invigorated and eclectic line. But it's more than just a symbol—people actually seem to be buying it.

Although DC's "New 52" relaunch was well past its prime in February, sales were still good enough for the publisher to take the Top 10 slots on the Diamond Top 300 chart again, for the second month in a row. The average "New 52" title dropped by 7.6% in February, which is in line with January's 7.4% drop and suggests that, while the bigger drops seem behind us, the numbers haven't quite found their level yet, either. The average DC Universe title now sells fewer copies again than it did two years ago (34,456 vs. 35,895), but then again, the company's main imprint had 20 more titles on sale this time around: In February 2010, it was 47; in February 2012, it's 67. On balance, consequently, DC is still selling a lot more superhero comics than it has in most months in the last 10 years. In the 108 months since March 2003 we have comparable data on, February 2012 is only No. 71 in terms of average DC Universe sales, but it's still No. 17 in total DC Universe unit sales (2.3 million) and No. 20 in total DC Universe dollar sales ($7.3 million). Looking at the individual "New 52" books, meanwhile, we're once again getting a mixed picture. The top-selling books mostly continue to be very stable, but the farther down the chart you go, the steeper the decline. There were 14 "New 52" books selling below 20K in February (up from 10 in January) and 21 selling below 25K (up from 19).

Indie seems to be having something of a renaissance at the moment, with a lot of books selling out and going to second print. Walking Dead and Buffy top the chart once more this month, with the new Magic The Gathering and Conan titles taking the next two spots, Fatale holding strong and the new Star Wars book, Dawn of The Jedi, looks to be a genuine hit. Rob Kirkman’s new book Thief of Thieves and a new Stephen King adaptation also score high, with kids comic Adventure Time also launching very well.

134 indie books charted this month, 2 down on last month. The bottom book sold 4,270, over 1,500 up on last month. In total those books sold approximately 1,257,329, well up on last month’s 1,052,459 with fewer titles. Average sales are 9,389 per book, also up on last month’s 7,739. As usual, UK and European sales from Diamond UK are not reported in this chart.

This month IDW were the number three publisher, thanks to the first two issues of Magic the Gathering, with 6.66% dollar share and a 5.62 market share, followed by Image with 5.53% dollar share and 4.88% market share, Dark Horse with a 4.98% dollar share and a 4.06% market share, Dynamite with a 4.20% dollar share and a 3.82% market share and Boom with 1.61% dollar share and 1.40% market share. Everyone but Boom was up for the month.

If you watch the cable newsers these days, you know that instant analysis and punditocracy of the kind once confined to sports is now the only way to analyze anything of import. Sound bites, gotchas, double backs, keeping em honest...analyzing what people are saying about what people are saying is way more productive than actually identifying and solving problems...so everyone does it. And while it isn't quite as entertaining as 2011's Republican primary debate analysis, say, comics have developed their own "Counterpoint Arena" in the last few months, as executives from DC and Marvel come out and give their play-by-play on the just released sales charts.

Yesterday's initial sales charts left no doubt that so far 2012 has been a strong year for comics sales, but the numbers were also flat from last March -- five Wednesdays in 2011 vs four in 2012, perhaps? The numbers prompted a vague shadow of worry to cloud the brow of Milton Griepp at ICv2:

With Marvel refocussing on more issues of fewer titles, and with the next wave of new titles presumably not due until after AVENGERS VS X-MEN, it's a pretty quiet month for new titles. The main new launch is WINTER SOLDIER, there's the much-delayed return of THE TWELVE… and that's pretty much it. Normal service is resumed, as Marvel had the largest share of the direct market, leading DC by 39% to 35% in unit share, and 36% to 29% in dollars. Bear in mind, though, that February was a five week month and DC didn't take advantage of that extra week to ship further material. Thanks as always to ICV2.com for permission to use these figures.

Marvel bashed its way back to the top in March, winning both dollars and units and the top book with AvX #1. After getting shut out of the top 10 books for the last few months, they had three books, including the AvX 0 issues and AVENGERS ASSEMBLE #1. AvX #1 is invoiced for March although it only went on sale yesterday, in April, because it shipped to retailers a week early. Comparative charts showed March 2012 pretty flat with 2011, with only graphic novel sales up appreciably -- and that's because of a surge in WALKING DEAD VOLUME 1 sales. This perrennial led the GN chart yet again, buoyed by the TV show no doubt.

Over the weekend, I did a rough estimate of Diamond Top 100 sales chart. Good 'ole Walking Dead turns out to have sold 32,361 in the "official" estimates vs. the 31,596 from January I used for the estimate. That +2.4%, which is just barely outside standard deviation, so it looks like the initial estimates were close again.

The official sales estimates are out and it turns out that February 2012 was a legit strong month for comics, and it wasn't just those five Wednesdays, ICv2 writes. Turns out digital isn't killing comics just yet.

Here are the complete sales charts from Diamond for last month: