February 18, 2009
And They Will All Live Like Cartoonists: The US Economy And Comics, Post #21
* Tim Gagne was nice enough to pass along to a few comics bloggers
this record of a case filed against Diamond Comics Distributor, Inc. et al seeking payment of lost monies. If you combine this with, say, Rich Johnston's
reports of recent judgments against the company, and news that a move like the de-listing of Viz graphic novels was directed by Diamond rather than a mutual decision, and I think there may be more questions than answers for the comics distributing giant right now in terms of general strategic choices.
* speaking of Rich Johnston, he wrote a nice note to me yesterday clarifying a recent article section about my writing on Diamond and their new minimums. He said that he believed I was right about the fact that there other issues potentially in play, but wrong about Diamond in general. I thought he was saying that I was wrong about the other issues in play and therefore wrong about Diamond in general. Thanks, Rich.
*
this PWCW article that provides results and anecdotes based on an informal survey of retailers as to the state of sales right now and their opinions of and attitudes towards the current economy may be less valuable as a comprehensive survey and more valuable for the individual snapshots. In this case, I think the article works best if you focus in on statements by Eric Thornton, owner of one of the country's five best comics stores of the last 25 years. Chicago is a great comics town for the same reason it's a great town for the arts in general: there's a sizable audience for art that's distinct from the makers and close followers of that art. I think that makes Chicago-related industry news that much more worth paying attention to.
* finally,
Shannon Smith wrote in to agree with me about one facet of comics culture that could have been reformed and why that might have been a good idea once upon a time.
"This is the one exact thing that Borders and B&N got right when they were doing good business. Now, not to say anyone should be looking at them as a model for success but they did get that right and it is what kept the customers coming back. (Back when people had discretionary income.) The simple notion that the customer could depend on the store to either have or get what they wanted. It is this exact quality that has kept me loyal to my favorite stores from music to auto parts or even groceries. In my life I've only ever expected one or two comic shops to have what I want and I've never expected any comic shop to be able to order what I want if it was out of stock. Which probably is a big part of why almost all the graphic novels I've bought in the last 10 years were purchased at Borders, B&N or online. When I worked at Borders it was our philosophy that we would do anything to get the book the customer wanted. Special order, store transfer, buy out of print and even call the competition if necessary. Whatever we could do we would do. I've never once in my life had a comic shop try and track down anything that was not on their shelves. I don't think this was because the clerk did not care. On the contrary, some of these clerks were my friends. I just don't think they ever had the tools to make the effort even seem like a good idea. At Borders we had a few options and we exhausted all of them. The comic shops only have one option and it was exhausted before the clerk could even make the effort."
Again, I think this could have been a first step towards reform, and is notable right now not because it will ever happen but because this kind of industry standard seems
totally irrelevant to the general direction comics shops may now be taking.
posted 7:15 am PST |
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