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Which was the first Marvel comic?
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Started by shadroch,

41 posts in this topic

Aman619

Aman619

Posted
Posted
Did anyone catch that was nearly 95 million comics per year.

 

IndependentNews1960c.jpg

 

 

Yeah. I did the math too. I think breaking it down to three comics a second undersells the amount of comics they were moving! Three is just too small and manageable a number.

 

3 per second

180 per minute

10800 per hour

240000+ per day!

 

That's a better selling point IMO.

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Sqeggs

Sqeggs

Posted
Posted
http://www.comichron.com/yearlycomicssales.html

 

 

Look at Batman's figures for example:

http://www.comichron.com/titlespotlights/batman.html

 

Slow decline from 60 to 66 where it doubles (TV show no doubt) and then falls like a precipitice in the 70s.

 

 

Cool stuff.

 

The numbers for the 1960s look a little screwy. Take Uncle Scrooge (Copies sold/rank):

1960: (1,040,543/1)

1961: (853,928/1)

1962: N/A

1963: (299,155/9)

1964: (336,380/7)

1965: (330,925/16)

 

Seems odd that the best selling comic would have lost two-thirds of its sales and dropped to ninth place in just three years. hm

 

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Unca Ben

Unca Ben

Posted
Posted
http://www.comichron.com/yearlycomicssales.html

 

 

Look at Batman's figures for example:

http://www.comichron.com/titlespotlights/batman.html

 

Slow decline from 60 to 66 where it doubles (TV show no doubt) and then falls like a precipitice in the 70s.

 

 

Cool stuff.

 

The numbers for the 1960s look a little screwy. Take Uncle Scrooge (Copies sold/rank):

1960: (1,040,543/1)

1961: (853,928/1)

1962: N/A

1963: (299,155/9)

1964: (336,380/7)

1965: (330,925/16)

 

Seems odd that the best selling comic would have lost two-thirds of its sales and dropped to ninth place in just three years. hm

Yeah, I've always looked at numbers from that period with some amazement myself.

 

It appears that print run numbers were oftentimes double of paid circulation numbers. Not uncommon to see a print run of 800,000 with 400,000 sold (roughly).

 

That would be 400,000 copies left over of one title in just one month.

 

Add up all the titles, times the yearly publication of 12 or 8 or 6, and ya end up with tens of millions of unsold books per year. In ten years that's a lot of books.

 

I understand books were printed just to keep the presses running, but that's a heck of a lot of overstock.

 

Were most of those copies returned from local vendors or distributors for credit, or were they destroyed at the printers?

 

Just seems like quite a waste to continue from year to year.

 

I'm not saying it didn't happen that way, it is just amazing at some level.

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Calamerica

Calamerica

Posted
Posted
http://www.comichron.com/yearlycomicssales.html

 

 

Look at Batman's figures for example:

http://www.comichron.com/titlespotlights/batman.html

 

Slow decline from 60 to 66 where it doubles (TV show no doubt) and then falls like a precipitice in the 70s.

 

 

Cool stuff.

 

The numbers for the 1960s look a little screwy. Take Uncle Scrooge (Copies sold/rank):

1960: (1,040,543/1)

1961: (853,928/1)

1962: N/A

1963: (299,155/9)

1964: (336,380/7)

1965: (330,925/16)

 

Seems odd that the best selling comic would have lost two-thirds of its sales and dropped to ninth place in just three years. hm

Yeah, I've always looked at numbers from that period with some amazement myself.

 

It appears that print run numbers were oftentimes double of paid circulation numbers. Not uncommon to see a print run of 800,000 with 400,000 sold (roughly).

 

That would be 400,000 copies left over of one title in just one month.

 

Add up all the titles, times the yearly publication of 12 or 8 or 6, and ya end up with tens of millions of unsold books per year. In ten years that's a lot of books.

 

I understand books were printed just to keep the presses running, but that's a heck of a lot of overstock.

 

Were most of those copies returned from local vendors or distributors for credit, or were they destroyed at the printers?

 

Just seems like quite a waste to continue from year to year.

 

I'm not saying it didn't happen that way, it is just amazing at some level.

 

In the Pre-Distribution days, they were discarded by the Retailers.

 

The large paper drives of WW II took care of about 90% of what was left in closets, garages, etc. A few insane "decency" burnings managed to get some comics destroyed, but comics did not really become the collectible it is today until the hoarding by the "pack rats" in the late 1960's.

 

CAL been around a bit...

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Unca Ben

Unca Ben

Posted
Posted
http://www.comichron.com/yearlycomicssales.html

 

 

Look at Batman's figures for example:

http://www.comichron.com/titlespotlights/batman.html

 

Slow decline from 60 to 66 where it doubles (TV show no doubt) and then falls like a precipitice in the 70s.

 

 

Cool stuff.

 

So in 1968 if you compare average monthly total distribution to average total copies printed you end up with 4,071,640 copies of Batman left over for the year 1968.

 

Granted Batman was one of the top sellers, but that's a lot of books for just one title.

 

Amazing.

 

I wonder if anyone has ever gone through the numbers for a given year and added up the reported returns for every title DC published that year just to see what it would be.

 

I'm just using DC as an example. I imagine Marvel and the other publishers would be about the same, if not in raw numbers but in percentages.

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rockman2008

rockman2008

Posted
Posted
Rodan's posts are great, as always.

 

The drop in Uncle Scrooge could be due to the switch from Dell to Gold Key. Gold Key might've had a different strategy or worse distribution.

 

The drop in sales for Dell was due to their changing the cover price from 10 cents to 15 cents, while the competition raised their cover price to no more than 12 cents. The price difference caused many readers to switch from Dell over to the competition. This was another factor for the rise of Marvel in the early 1960's.

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Calamerica

Calamerica

Posted
Posted
Rodan's posts are great, as always.

 

The drop in Uncle Scrooge could be due to the switch from Dell to Gold Key. Gold Key might've had a different strategy or worse distribution.

 

The drop in sales for Dell was due to their changing the cover price from 10 cents to 15 cents, while the competition raised their cover price to no more than 12 cents. The price difference caused many readers to switch from Dell over to the competition. This was another factor for the rise of Marvel in the early 1960's.

 

True but in part. Marvel had the Super hero genre nailed by 1965, and Dell remained Dell. I can remember all the price increases, and it did not affect me or my friends from childhood. I can safely assume the price changes did not affect the estimated 250,000 other teenage boys either.

 

"It starts with the story" - Alfred Hitchcock

 

CAL w/ long memory

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rockman2008

rockman2008

Posted
Posted
Rodan's posts are great, as always.

 

The drop in Uncle Scrooge could be due to the switch from Dell to Gold Key. Gold Key might've had a different strategy or worse distribution.

 

The drop in sales for Dell was due to their changing the cover price from 10 cents to 15 cents, while the competition raised their cover price to no more than 12 cents. The price difference caused many readers to switch from Dell over to the competition. This was another factor for the rise of Marvel in the early 1960's.

 

True but in part. Marvel had the Super hero genre nailed by 1965, and Dell remained Dell. I can remember all the price increases, and it did not affect me or my friends from childhood. I can safely assume the price changes did not affect the estimated 250,000 other teenage boys either.

 

"It starts with the story" - Alfred Hitchcock

 

CAL w/ long memory

 

I didn't say it was the only factor. The Dell price change came in '61 and the fanboys will admit content-wise 1961 Marvels were not as compelling when compared to the later stuff. They didn't know what they were getting in Marvels. It took the boneheaded mistake by Dell management to cause young readers to try something new. Of course, many readers may have been tired of Dells in the first place, but back then buying decisions in comic books were typically influenced by parents. And that measly three cents made a world of difference to parents.

 

Rockman, w/ a longer memory but will always respect Cal even though he thinks he ought to chuck the purple jacket

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shadroch

shadroch

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Dell was thought of as being "educational", Gold Key was not.

Dell and Archie were widely available in doctors and dentists offices. Not so much Marvels, DCs and Gold Keys.

Aside from that, the rise of marvel Comics meant them taking up more newstand space. Darwinism at its best.

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shadroch

shadroch

Posted
  • Author
Posted
http://www.comichron.com/yearlycomicssales.html

 

 

Look at Batman's figures for example:

http://www.comichron.com/titlespotlights/batman.html

 

Slow decline from 60 to 66 where it doubles (TV show no doubt) and then falls like a precipitice in the 70s.

 

 

Cool stuff.

 

The numbers for the 1960s look a little screwy. Take Uncle Scrooge (Copies sold/rank):

1960: (1,040,543/1)

1961: (853,928/1)

1962: N/A

1963: (299,155/9)

1964: (336,380/7)

1965: (330,925/16)

 

Seems odd that the best selling comic would have lost two-thirds of its sales and dropped to ninth place in just three years. hm

Yeah, I've always looked at numbers from that period with some amazement myself.

 

It appears that print run numbers were oftentimes double of paid circulation numbers. Not uncommon to see a print run of 800,000 with 400,000 sold (roughly).

 

That would be 400,000 copies left over of one title in just one month.

 

Add up all the titles, times the yearly publication of 12 or 8 or 6, and ya end up with tens of millions of unsold books per year. In ten years that's a lot of books.

 

I understand books were printed just to keep the presses running, but that's a heck of a lot of overstock.

 

Were most of those copies returned from local vendors or distributors for credit, or were they destroyed at the printers?

 

Just seems like quite a waste to continue from year to year.

 

I'm not saying it didn't happen that way, it is just amazing at some level.

 

 

Think about how much milk is returned by your local market. It was the same with comics. They'd get a bundle of 200, sell half and return the other half. A publisher can't sell what isn't on the shelf so it makes al the sense in the world to overprint and over distribute.

The retailer simply returned the top third of the cover in most cases and was not billed for the books he didn't sell. It was an inefficent system, but since most of the business existed for the mob to launder its illegal money, it didn't matter if books made a profit or not.

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Bronty

Bronty

Posted
Posted

I just think the numbers are screwy period. The numbers for fantastic four are just as strange:

 

1966 - #19

1967 - #17

1968 - #16

1969 - #12

 

1962-65 - not on the list at all. So obviously there are big gaps in the data. These are not complete lists, just lists of the data points available.

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