IDW/DCD: IDW Becomes Premier

IDW Publishing announced today via press release that it will become a premier publisher with Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. This would make IDW the first publisher to advance to that status with Diamond since the terms were implemented 14 years ago.

IDW recently broke into the top tier of comics publishers based on market share, a tier traditionally reserved for premier publishers. That achievement was a sign of the company's growing sales presence and indicates a generally positive partnership with Diamond -- also the company's book distributor through a separate arm of the company.

In addition to the status involved -- and don't discount the status involved: as I recall, not getting this status was a real blow to CrossGen once upon a time, although their candidacy was much less convincing than IDW's by a country mile -- IDW will move its listing to a reserved section at front of the catalog and will participate in the Final Order Cut-Off Program before the end of the year. Unlike Marvel and DC, IDW will retain a traditional buy/sell relationship with the distributor. I don't know if IDW will start designing its own catalog pages or if it was already doing so; a query to the publisher has as of this writing yet to be answered.

Although it's unclear just how great an advantage that premier publisher status brings almost 15 years since it was, indeed, a very big deal that helped shape today's market, it's difficult to deny that 1) IDW has achieved that status due to the original sales performance parameters in a much less fruitful economic climate, 2) any assistance in negotiating the Direct Sales Market is, one would imagine, more than welcome. So good for them.
 
posted 10:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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