Convince Retailers to Carry Your Comic
Ah, the Indie comic book. I have a lot of respect for people that make their own comics. You folks have about as hard a time making it big as a screenwriter or a novelist, and for a much smaller payout. You do it because you love it.
As a lover of the comic book medium I salute you and I’m glad you’re there. As a retailer with limited space and time, who has to pay rent and payroll every month, I’m a lot less enthusiastic. So I’m going to impart some words of wisdom to you about how to get that comic on a store’s shelves. As usual, this advice is not necessarily universal. My comic book store is a small space in a very high volume location, so I rely a lot on blockbuster titles. A spacious suburban store paying $5 a square foot (as opposed to my $140/sf) probably has a much lower threshold for what it’ll carry. But if you can convince me to carry your book, you can probably convince anybody.
So if I were an indie comic book creator, this is how I’d do it.
Make the cost worth the retailer’s trouble. It’s nice to think that there’s an unlimited amount of money out there to be spent on comics. And I am a big believer in growing the customer base. But we have to be realistic, too. My regulars generally have a weekly budget they stick to, and I want to maximize how much of that revenue stays in my pocket. If someone is spending $5 at my store on your comic, and I bought it from you at 40% off, that means I made $2. Win-win, right? Not exactly, because the way I see it is that if the customer spent that $5 on a Marvel or DC comic, I’d have made $2.65 on the sale. See what I’m saying? Your book takes longer to sell and for 25% less profit! This applies even if you’re willing to offer your book on consignment. So offer the retailer terms that match or beat the mainstream guys. I recommend 55% off or more. If you have to lose money on the deal, well then, consider it an investment. Which brings me to my next point: pricing the comic for consumers.
Price the first issue to sell. You’re not writing your first issue to make money. Your first issue is basically an advertisement, with the only goal being to garner interest in your series as a whole. With that mentality, ask yourself this: how much money would you pay to read someone’s advertisement. Not much, if anything. So make it a buck. We can sell almost anything for a buck. If you come to me with 20 copies of a $1 comic that I can buy at 60% off, you have my interest. Don’t forget to keep telling yourself: 1st issues are an investment, not a money-maker.
If you can afford to do a graphic novel, do it. Not everyone can afford to put out an 80-page comic with a spine. But if you can, do so. Graphic novels can stay on my shelf a lot longer than floppies, so I’m more prepared to take a chance on them, and if they sell out, I reorder them. Here’s how you do it: spend the time and money knocking out a full graphic novel. Sell it as the first 4 issues of the series. Get some great cover art for it. Then sell it to retailers cheap with a low cover price (per the previous two comments). Give the graphic novel a year or so while you work on the next few issues, and be sure to maintain a relationship with the retailer, being sure to restock him whenever he asks. Then sell issue 5 as a floppy. If your graphic novel is any good, you’ll already have a following, and you’ll be able to promise a steady stream of new issues based on the work you’ve done over the past year. These 2 points (followers and consistent release times) are key to getting the retailer to carry your comic.
Color your book, or else be damned sure it has another selling point. Do you have a blurb from Grant Morrison on your cover singing your praises? If so, you do whatever you want. Otherwise, black & white comics are a hard sell. Indie readers will still pick up your comic, but that’s about it. If you want to ensure a permanent place on my shelves you need a broader audience, and people want their comics in color. What about the Walking Dead, you say? I say: I admire your confidence, but let’s try to keep things real. Besides, Kirkman had Image behind him.
Stick to standard comic book sizes. I HATE oversized comics, and only like undersized comics a little bit better. They don’t fit well on the shelves, they confuse the customers (I kid you not) and they’re harder to store. Let the story and art sell your book, not a novelty size.
Be smart when approaching a retailer. Having a well written and drawn comic is great, but from a retailer’s stand-point it’s a secondary concern. Our number one goal is to make money off your comic. There are plenty of comics that I – as a reader – love. But I don’t stock them. Why? Because this isn’t my personal library. These books have to sell. So, to bring back my Morrison example, unless you’ve got an endorsement from someone like him, don’t approach me with an email or a pitch that focuses on how great your comic is. First off, everyone tells me their comic is great; secondly, even if it is, that’s not my primary concern. Here’s what you send me, preferably via email: 1) A very short blurb so I know what I’m dealing with. Very short; 2) How much the book sells for and how much it’ll cost me; 3) What will you do to promote my store? Do you have a FB page with 100 fans? Or a Twitter account, or a website? Tell me, and tell me how you’ll mention my store every week. Give me something.
I hope this advice helped. I went out of my way to be harsh, presenting the worst-case scenario because I want would-be creators to know what they’re up against and be as prepared as possible.
And don’t be discouraged! It’s not all dollars and cents for us, you know. We’re in the biz because we love comics, and we want to help you out. So help us out and make it as easy as possible to get your work in front of readers’ eyeballs.
What do you think? Comment below and I’ll be happy to respond.
Running various business for more than ten years, I totally get what you are saying and where you are coming from. But it is really funny because I followed most of the advices you gave a few weeks ago – emailed over 100 retailers to tell them about our books – especially the next one which is coming out in September through Ardden). Told them we have over 12,000 Twitter followers. Over 6500 Facebook fans – and that we are are generous with our mentions when people help us – http://www.expertcomics.com knows that!
. We even mentiooned we would put a list of retailers where people can get our books – we get a thousand unique visitors a day on average. That our first book was out of stock in three weeks when it came out through Diamond in February (with a generous retailer discount). After three weeks, I got only one answer from one retailer who was basically making fun of indie comics creators, saying the only people who by comics nowadays are retailers and that we should help them by giving our work for free. Which is basically the case when you factor in all the costs anyhow – and the huge Diamond cut. So…. yeah. I know it is hard for everyone. And this business is getting worse by the day. But I failed to see the support. I know it is not your fault – and that people are struggling – but I don’t think most retailers want to go beyond the obvious. Sorry. Our first and second books are 80 pages, full colors, selling for 5.99 (to the consummer) which I think is a darn good deal. So I am frankly at a loss.
Christian, thanks for your story. It’s interesting to hear about the business from the other side, and I really feel for you here.
Okay, so here’s my perspective: I was writing this for more of the local creators, reaching out directly to the comic book stores they have some kind of relationship with. You’re in a very unfortunate spot – I think – in that you’re playing with the big boys (ie going thru Diamond, right next to Marvel, DC and Image) but not yet a big boy yourself. To put it bluntly: buying your comic has the twin disadvantages of neither being a locally created work that will give my shop community-based cred while still carrying the risk that nobody will ever buy it.
On top of that, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how massive and daunting that Diamond catalog is, and I’ll be honest, I typically don’t even bother experimenting with an indie publisher in Diamond. I know it sucks, but look at it from the retailer’s perspective: it is far, far too risky for me to order every indie comic that is listed in every Diamond catalog (we’d be talking thousands of dollars at risk to me each month if I gave every indie comic a chance). And as for mass emails, I typically ignore those as well. I get way too many of them.
So that’s my parade raining. Let me try to offer some advice. Ever hear of Barry Wernick, creator of ‘Bad Kids Go To Hell’? I sure hadn’t. He’d been in Diamond for months before he contacted me with a personally tweaked email asking to do a signing at my shop. I love signings. They cost me nothing and give me a marketing tool to get people into the shop. He came on a Wednesday (which is the ideal day, I think) and sold dozens of copies of his comics and increased my subscriber base for the title from zero to 8. Not a huge number, but that’s 12 copies (8 for subs, 4 for the shelf now that there’s local word of mouth) that I’m ordering every month rather than zero. So my suggestion for someone like you – not an amateur but not in the big leagues yet, either – is to set up a tour of comic book stores. Take time off your day job if you have one and invest in a 6-month tour of as many shops as you can. Get to know the owners and the customers. Get the book in their hands.
Dear Matt,
Thanks for the read. I’ve been putting my comic book out there for a few months and am proud to say that the comic is in 5 cities. I’ve used some of the same techniques, offering to promote the store, giving free digital copies with purchase, free boards and bags, etc.
Since I’ve been growing, I’m hitting my first convention in Oct, I’m taking your advice about lowering the price. The printers charge me $2 so the cover price is $4. The shops I’m dealing with are fine with the 50% cost, so I’m not making any profit, but selling at a dollar and eating the cost will help open more doors.
I’m going to spend money on promotion anyway, so might as well eat the cost to get on the shelf and gain more readers. Thanks for the insight. Hopefully, I’ll be in your shop one day.