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Dustin Harbin on KE Vol. 7’s $125 Price Tag
posted August 16, 2008
 

Man, what is the deal with the Direct Market? I know a lot of progressive, forward-thinking (and more importantly, ACTING) comics retailers, but some of the nettling, wounded, pissy comments I'm seeing about the new Kramer's Ergot have crossed the line from leery to outright childish. Why is it that Direct Market retailers continue to insist that THEY are the only outlet for comics? People like Robert Scott say that Amazon's deep discounting of Kramer's Ergot #7 is "...a poor business practice and definitely hurts publishers and creators as well as retailers." Say what? Perhaps in a world where comics shops were the only place to buy comics, but that world is long gone, and will never return. Ever. If Alvin Buenaventura is selling copies to Amazon at 50% or more off of retail, and they're charging 45% off, that's THEIR risk, and Alvin's gain: he sells more copies of a ground-breaking book.

The Direct Market model of comics distribution is a dinosaur, plain and simple. As retailers we can struggle and beat our chests and demand that our customers buy their comics from us, but in increasing numbers they will not. Instead of complaining about the world we live in, making shrill demands of a customer-base often only tangentially aware of our existence, we should adapt and evolve to this new business environment. I've often bought books for resale from Amazon myself, when Diamond (our sainted agent and protector in these times) was out of them. When the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Black Dossier HC sold out from Diamond a few weeks before Christmas, I bought 20 from Amazon at 35% with a smile on my face. Even selling them at 10% off to our subscription customers, we made 25% a copy, instead of turning 20 gift-buying customers away at a time of year that would subsidize the next 3 months of slow sales.

I would love it if everyone here in Charlotte, North Carolina would buy all of their comics from Heroes Aren't Hard To Find, the store where I have worked since 1996. But they don't. A large number do, because we're really REALLY good at running a comics shop, but many get their books at Borders or Barnes & Noble or Amazon or one of the umpteen online comics services. I'm no more upset about these competitors as I am about the two other comics shops in the city, both of which we're on friendly terms with. Before ordering the new Kramer's I'll carefully poll some of my customers to see if they intend to buy it from us or online, but I won't fret if some or all of them get it elsewhere. I just won't order those copies. I will order exactly how many I think I can sell on the rack (probably 1-2), plus any special orders (2-3, I expect). But even if no one wanted the book, even if I myself decided to buy my copy on Amazon, I would STILL order one for the rack, because I'm dedicated to having a diverse stock in my store. We take extraordinary pride in our stock, and in part because of it our store is a destination shop for comics fans all over the Southeast and beyond.

The new Kramer's Ergot is 96 pages and $125, which has excited the strange world of comics-bloggers and people who are bored at work to comment endlessly about it. But again, this is just a market decision. People who think the price is too high would be best served by NOT PURCHASING the book, rather than creeping around the internet sniping at the creators. Especially when a fair percentage of the snipers are just looking for something to talk about, and would likely never purchase the book in the first place. I don't know what gives people the idea that they are "owed" something by Sammy Harkham, or anyone else. As if by publishing the book in an over-sized format they have dared to fly too close to the sun? When I first heard about the format, I was instantly excited by the idea of the format, the limitations on the contributors, and the potential for some really amazing pages as a result. The price is, at best, an afterthought. Take a woman out for dinner and drinks ONCE and you can easily get up around $100 before midnight.

Kramer's Ergot #7 is an art object, a publishing experiment, AND the continuation of a boundary-expanding anthology series. I not only think it will sell through its small print run, I hope it does through as many outlets as possible. I am wholly uninterested in any conversation that presupposes that we have some sort of "rights" as direct market retailers. It is high time that the comics industry stopped thinking of itself as the comics industry. In the same way that "Biff! Bam! Pow!" -style articles on comics are boring, so are retailers who refuse to come into the light of the 21st century, and comics industry pundits who feel it's necessary to talk about issues that only exist in conversation. Semantics and sophistry are no replacement for good writing, reasoned conclusions, and a real contribution to intellectual discussion.

Man, this really gets me going, but I'm sick of responding to these same dumb topics on discussion boards and having to endure the cleverness of imbeciles. Has wasting my employer's payroll long enough to write and send this preposterous screed helped any? Well, it's helped me at least! I will be PROUD to lose money on a couple of copies of Kramer's Ergot #7 when it comes out. It will feel a lot better than losing the same amount of money on 100 or so unsold copies of Final Crisis #1.