How To Break A Comics “Habit”

Kevin Church's open letter on the subject of fans buying comics they dislike (among other things) describes an area of comics culture that's hard for an outsider to understand. To put it bluntly: who the hell buys something they don't want?

What happens is that some comics readers, usually those in the habit of buying comics at a comics shop every week, find that some factor beyond liking and wanting an individual comic begins to assert influence over their buying choices. This can be any number of things: a collector's desire to have a complete run of books, affection for certain characters, hope that a feature will return to its former glory, loyalty to a certain company, curiosity about a popular title, the desire to have a certain number of new comics to read every week, you name it.

I don't think there's anything wrong with this. If I were rich, I would buy tons of crappy comics I didn't like that much. However, I think if you're not enjoying yourself and want to change your buying habits, you should do so immediately. So as an example here's what I did when I was in my early 20s, an every-week comic shop visitor, after I suspected that I wasn't maximizing my woefully limited spending dollar.

1. I closed my "pull box" (an agreement to buy certain comics that are held for you in exchange for a nominal discount).
2. I took a short break from comics shopping.
3. I figured out what I spent for comics every week on average.
4. I opened a no-fee checking account and began depositing 1/2 of my spending average into that account every week, using the break to build up a few dollars.
5. The first three months after the break I only bought comics if they were a week or more old.

I soon found I was unable to spend anywhere near as much money as I deposited. And eventually, my comics became just another media purchase.

Obviously no one needs a separate bank account devoted to funnybook buying. I was a sad, very uptight 23-year-old. But if you're serious about buying a lot of something, there's no harm in whipping up a strategy that facilitates your passion rather than makes you a slave to it. If you think of comics as a massive library of works that's been added to for 100 years and a spinner rack that gets refilled once a week, you may find you have a lifetime of reading ahead of you beyond those blissful Wednesday afternoons.
 
posted 2:02 am PST | Permalink
 

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