As I mentioned earlier today, I emailed about 20 retailers and asked them some questions about BOOM!’s promotion with MySpace, where BOOM!’s North Wind #1 was made available for free the day it hit comic shops. Subsequent issues will also appear on MySpace on the same day they’re released in shops. I spoke with Chip Mosher, BOOM!’s sales and marketing guy, yesterday about the promotion. BOOM! also announced today that the book has sold out from the distributor.
So that brings us up to speed. So far I’ve heard from five retailers, whose comments you can find after the jump. I also touched base with Larry Young, AiT/Planet Lar publisher, to get his thoughts on a similar tactic they tried out with the graphic novel Continuity a couple of years ago.
I’d like to thank all the retailers and Larry Young for taking the time to respond. If you are a retailer with thoughts on the promotion and I haven’t contacted you or you haven’t had time to respond, drop me an email. If I have enough material, I will follow up with a second collection of responses early next week.
Robert Scott, Comickaze Comics Books and more in San Diego
JK: In general, what are your thoughts on companies putting their comics out on the Web for free like this? Do you think it helps bring people to your store or does it give them a reason not to come in?
Robert: There has been no evidence that companies putting comics online has increased sales in any meaningful fashion. There are many ways that such an act could help but unfortunately I have yet to see a publisher who understands how to use the internet effectively, especially BOOM! Mosher’s comments are unfounded and the comparisons to CrossGen and Heroes are erroneous.
JK: From your perspective, are there any additional positives and negatives about how this particular promotion was carried out?
Robert: The negatives are different for each group, but basically as a retailer who buys product like North Wind on a non-returnable basis, here’s the major bone of contention. The day before North Wind #1 ships (and #2 & 3 have already been irrevocably ordered) the publisher tells me that even though I still have to pay for issues ordered, to help me out he’s going to give away the book to anyone with access to MySpace.
So now I (and all retailers) are in a position where our sales could be undercut by a deal that we were not made aware of until we had already committed to buying copies from BOOM!
BOOM! is also “promoting” this mainly to existing comic fans on a comic fan site, meaning they really aren’t creating new readers. They may move some customers from a shop that didn’t carry this title to one that does but overall, it doesn’t benefit the industry. Having the writer posting their trailer from a popular non-comic site, like his TV Guide Blog, linking to the preview would have done far more to help.
Understanding the basic principles of promotion, having a specific goal and way to measure it’s success and including retailers in the process probably would have been helpful as well, especially if we take the comment, “I’d like to stress that we don’t make any money on North Wind if it doesn’t sell in the direct market”, at face value.
Last, here we are talking about releasing the entire series for free simultaneously with the print version, Every example Mosher used for comparison used a collected version of online material published well after it’s online release and retailers were able to gauge the material and the demand for it, before committing any money to it. With North Wind we were denied that opportunity.
JK: Did you order North Wind #1? If so, how has it done?
Robert: Yes, we’ve sold about 30 percent in the few days it’s been available, all to store regulars and had no mention of the download availability.
JK: Has the MySpace promo affected how you plan to order future copies of North Wind?
Robert: Yes. I’m going to cut orders to the bare minimum (based solely on sales history) and rely on BOOM!’s promise to overprint and to absorb the usual reorder fees associated with BOOM! titles, to reorder if necessary.
Oddly enough though, had BOOM! thought this program out and worked with retailers beforehand, they might have found a lot of us ordering extra copies to meet their expected increase in demand.
Randy Lander, Rogues Gallery in Round Rock, Texas:
JK: In general, what are your thoughts on companies putting their comics out on the Web for free like this? Do you think it helps drive people to stores or does it keep them from buying a physical copy?
Randy: I’m not sure, honestly, and neither is anyone else. Now maybe it’s because I’ve only been a store owner for about a year and I’m not paranoid enough yet, but I didn’t freak out the way a lot of retailers did about it. How digital comics are going to affect my business is probably my No. 1 concern for the future, but burying our head in the sand or getting outraged whenever someone tries it sounds an awful lot like what the music industry tried, and as I recall, those tactics didn’t work out so well for them.
My gut feeling is that putting these issues online at the same time as their physical release, with every single issue, is probably not 100 percent the right move. Putting them online when the physical issue sells out makes sense, putting the first issue up simultaneously with release for promotion makes sense, the every issue thing I’m not so sure about. It seems like competing with themselves. But honestly, I don’t mind BOOM! giving it a chance with a new series, because it’s tough as hell for the smaller companies to survive in the direct market, and if they can come up with something that works for them and gets more people to buy their book, in the end that’s great for them and great for us, as the guys who sell their book. I understand the anger of some retailers, but I can’t say I particularly share it.
I do think that making the book returnable would be a nice show of faith in the book and a welcome apology to the retailers who felt legitimately blindsided by the MySpace announcement. But I actually knew about the MySpace announcement a few weeks ago thanks to a conversation with Chip Mosher, and though I warned him that some retailers were going to be unhappy about the situation, when he told me about it, I thought it sounded like a reasonable gambit to take.
JK: Did you order North Wind #1? If so, how did it do?
Randy: I did order North Wind, I’ve ordered pretty much all of Boom! Studios’ books. It’s a little early to get a good read on things, since it’s only been out for two days as I write this, but a few of my folks have tried it out, and I’ve pushed it to our sizable crowd for post-apocalyptic comics like Walking Dead and Y The Last Man.
JK: Has the MySpace promo affected how you plan to order future copies of North Wind?
Randy: Nope. If it sells, I’ll order more of it, if it doesn’t, I’ll cut it. I don’t have any particular need to send a “message” about using MySpace and digital comics.
Now if Marvel announced a simultaneous free upload of every issue of Ultimates or the Millar/Hitch Fantastic Four, or DC said that Final Crisis was going to follow this tactic, then I might be a little more nervous… but BOOM! is a smaller company, and so I don’t mind them trying out something risky to try and grow both our businesses. I happen to know and like Chip Mosher and Ross Richie, and I know that they aren’t out to end-run the retailers or bring an end to our business model, so I’m inclined to put a little trust and faith their way and let them try something big and different.
If this turns out to be the domino that caused the end of paper comics and destroyed the direct market, sure, I’ll look rather silly holding this position. But I’m not too terribly worried that’ll be the case.
Brian Jacoby, Secret Headquarters in Tallahassee, Fla.
JK: In general, what are your thoughts on companies putting their comics out on the Web for free like this? Do you think it helps bring people to your store or does it give them a reason not to come in?
Brian: I think that having a first issue available on the web is probably a good idea for a print series, in general. Having an entire series available that way is not, unless the model from the outset is web first, collection later, like some others (PVP, Finder and Devil’s Panties) have already done successfully. I have had no interest in the series yet, or any customers mention the MySpace promotion.
JK: From your perspective, are there any additional positives and negatives about how this particular promotion was carried out?
Brian: Retailers should have been told in advance about the promotion, to give us a chance to decline ordering, or to use it as a springboard for our own marketing efforts on the title. Having no advance notice meant having no plan.
JK: Did you order North Wind #1? If so, how has it done?
Brian: Yes. No sales yet.
JK: Has the MySpace promo affected how you plan to order future copies of North Wind?
Brian: It will continue to get standard “indy book” ordering from me. One for the shelves through the first couple of issues. If there are no sales, drop it. If there are sales, increase orders.
Phil Boyle of Coliseum of Comics, which has multiple locations in Florida
JK: In general, what are your thoughts on companies putting their comics out on the Web for free like this? Do you think it helps bring people to your store or does it give them a reason not to come in?
Phil: We’ve always supported putting the first issues of comics on the web as a way to introduce new readers to a series. However, doing so while you’re still trying to sell #1 undermines the ability for retailers, who bought comics non-returnable for more than ‘free’, to sell them. So far we have had no response to the posting from our customers.
JK: From your perspective, are there any additional positives and negatives about how this particular promotion was carried out?
Phil: Too soon to tell the impact, but it’s a bad precedence to set when you’re publishing comics but the same story is available LEGALLY for free on the Internet. There is limited perceived value in anything given away for free.
JK: Did you order North Wind #1? If so, how has it done?
Phil: Yes. No feedback yet.
JK: Has the MySpace promo affected how you plan to order future copies of North Wind?
Phil: North Wind and all BOOM! books. We won’t carry books that are available online for free; that’s just a price we can’t compete with, and rack space isn’t free.
BOOM! Studios was either naive in doing this or they were trying to drum up articles like this one in response to their actions to promote the book. Either one was duplicitous to their partners in sales, the retailers. Without assurances that they won’t be giving away every issue online, we will discontinue carrying BOOM! on our stands though as always, everything is available via pre-orders or reorders should any customer ask.
Christopher Butcher, manager of The Beguiling in Toronto:
At The Beguiling in Toronto, we’re happy to stock and sell BOOM! comics and graphic novels. North Wind has been something of a non-starter for us, both in terms of sell-through as well as the controversy surrounding it. While it only makes sense that these types of promotions should be mentioned at time of ordering so that retailers can make informed decisions for ordering, we don’t really think that for this book the online promotion either hurt OR helped our sales. Maybe it’s because we’re in Canada, or perhaps better known for promoting a different sort of book (ask us how many copies of Scott Pilgrim Volume 4 we sold this year, the numbers will surprise you!). At any rate, we appreciate that BOOM! is trying new things to get their material, and comics in general in front of new audiences. Hopefully they won’t let the errors they’ve committed this time out deter them from trying new things in future.
Larry Young, AiT/Planet Lar publisher
JK: Back in 2006, you put the graphic novel Continuity out on the Web for free when you solicited it. What were you hoping to achieve by doing that, and how did it work out?
Larry: The Continuity pdf was a very interesting test-case, because usually I do marketing experiments with *my* books, so if things don’t work out, it’s only me who’s impacted, and if things do work out, we can implement them later for the benefit of our creators. The size of the Astronauts in Trouble: Master Flight Plan collection was just us testing the book-trade’s lament of “We want 6×9 manga-sized books.” That worked very well, and so we released the Demo collection at that size and it’s sold gangbusters. Now, I’m sure Demo would have sold relatively similarly if it was 7×10, because Brian and Becky were on their games, but at least we can tell folks in the book trade and in the libraries that we are responding to their needs… Matt Silady’s award-winning The Homeless Channel was that size, and this February’s Holmes collection by Omaha Perez is going to be 6 x 9, too…
But Jason McNamara and Tony Talbert were gung-ho with me to test the whole Napster-esque legal-download thing for comics, so we posted the pdf at the same time that direct-market preorders were due and popped open a couple of beers and sat back to see what would happen. Initial orders of our books in the direct market are in the 1,000-3,000 range, depending on project and creative team, and that’s where Continuity fell. About average for an AiT book. The month that the pdf was first offered, it had on the order of 30,000 individual downloads. That tells me that the Internet audience and the dead-tree enthusiasts are basically two different sides of the stadium.
So, we got a very good bump in attention in general which has to be a favorable thing, but is pretty un-quantifiable in terms of sales. It’s my *feeling* that it was a positive thing overall, but feelings don’t pay the rent, right? Continuity hit about what I was expecting, so we learned quantifiably that Internet eyeballs and paying customers are two different things, and I sure do appreciate Jason and Tony sticking their necks out with me to find out that that was so. That really could have backfired on us, but I’ll give the pdf thing a ‘neutral-to-positive’ score. Nobody got hurt, but nobody broke out the Cristal, either. It told us something about the state of comics in 2006, so it was a valiant effort.
JK: Do you think you would ever try putting a book online like that before it is published — or even on the same day it is published, like BOOM! did — again?
Larry: Based on the Continuity thing, I’m not sure I presently see the value in putting whole books up, for either the company and our creators, or for our various business partners in distribution and retail. Previews of books in pdf form, distributed to retailers and their audience before orders are due, are gold, though. You can generate awareness of the book with a sample and retailers can stock what they need and as long as the lines of communication are open, everybody goes home happy.
January 12th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Good article! More like these please.
January 12th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
I read Northwind online for free and it sucked pretty hard in my opinion. I don’t see how this will boost sales.
Also, I love the follow up “story” about how they’ve sold out at the distributor. They
ll spin it as this being a success of being on Myspace when there’s no evidence of that from retailers at all. There aren’t hordes of, or even a couple NEW people coming into shops saying they want to buy a copy because they read it on Myspace. This is a lame PR move, that worked.
January 12th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
I can see an unknown publisher trying this or I can see Boom doing it with some advance notice to retailers but I have to agree that it stinks to not at least mention to retailers this would be online free at the same time it was showing up in their Diamond shipment.
I notice Previews always has a note which tells you if a product is already available somewhere else so retailers can know if a reader can already buy it at Barnes & Nobel. I just think that there needs to be a cooperative relationship between publishers and retailers. While I know many retailers don’t order Boom products, they shouldn’t punish the ones that do support them by withholding information that may mean unsold product and bitter feelings.
January 12th, 2008 at 9:24 pm
Interesting piece. Online distributions will probably replace print within 15 years, so it’s interesting which retailers will support a hybrid format.
January 12th, 2008 at 11:02 pm
On the face of it, the argument that retailers should have been notified of this beforehand seems to have some merit.
However, based on the reaction of retailers - let’s face it, a pretty conservative group - they would have a) tried to put a stop to this and/or b) ordered less copies of Northwind (either because they believed online readers wouldn’t buy the book, or just to punish Boom!).
I think Robert makes a good, constructive section about the writer linking to his TV Guide blog. But I imagine that might not be within the writer’s control, or Boom!’s for that matter.
Randy seems to have a forward thinking attitude about this as well. If it’s the same Randy Lander who wrote such great reviews, I wish him the best of luck as a store owner.
He makes a good point that not only would a smaller company like Boom! try something innovative and risky - they pretty much NEED to in today’s market.
That point was reinforced for me by the retailer that said they only order one shelf copy for an indy, but would re-order if a customer asks. That makes no sense to me. Let’s say I walk in as a customer and the book isn’t there. If I’ve never heard of it, how do I know to ask for it? And if I’ve come in looking for it, and you don’t have it - I’m not going to ask you to order it for me - I’m going to go to another store.
Of course, the irony of all this is that this “controversy” probably caused more people to buy the book. I for one wasn’t aware of it until all this back and forth.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:28 am
This is vaguely similar to Jim Shooter and Defiant’s first book. They were putting a book out on trading cards - you put the cards in the 9-up pages and you could read the comic. The first issues of Warriors of Plasm was done like this. You basically had to buy a box of cards (20-30 bucks) to read the comic.
Then after the orders were taken, he printed the entire comic in Previews the month it’s coming out. Retailers went ballistic. Great for the readers, bad for the dealers.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:30 am
Yeah, the “Continuity” experiment was a mistake. I can vouch for the fact that I would have been more than happy to have preordered the GN before they put the entire PDF online for free. Simply put, they lost a sale.
January 14th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
I read NW #1 on myspace and enjoyed it. At that point I thought I’d like to follow the story, so I’d planned to buy #1 the next time I visit my LCS (which usually stocks BOOM! titles). Then I read here that subsequent issues will also be posted online, so…why would I bother to pay for the floppies at my LCS? (And don’t suggest that I support my retailer. Trust me: he couldn’t care less where I buy my comics.)
January 14th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
If you only make 20 copies and it sells out at the distributor, you can tout SOLD OUT all day long - doesn’t make it a success. As a budding writer, I don’t support putting entire issues online unless it’s after the fact (usually done to drum up sales for TPB anyway). I DO like to see 5-6 page previews of books that have the opportunity to pique people’s interest.
January 14th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
I just want to stress, as a retailer, that we are not, in this case, against online distribution. If a company like boom (or anyone else) wants to NOT make money and put it out online for FREE that is fine with us. If we hear a lot of good about it, we’ll order the Graphic Novel later.
What we dont want to do is pay for something that is available to our customers for Free. That is the point. We asked Boom to provide return ability on this issue, and adjust ability on the other issues we have ordered. We never even got a “sorry, but no”. We got IGNORED.
Boom heard our complaints about this matter as soon as the original announcement was published. What was their response? They made a Shelf Talker for us, which said “Read this book online for free by going to Myspace”. They are INSULTING our intelligence and our years of hard work building up our businesses.
They claim they have Overshipped the title, but most of us have not received these overships. They claim that stores are supporting this effort, but that is UNTRUE, except for one store that is located within 3 miles from the company’s offices (what a coincidence). They claim that it’s sold out, but if you wanted to make this point, you would not print too much extra, so that you COULD say that it sold out. It’s blatant Marketing to create Something out of Nothing.
I have been trying to support this company (as well as other indies) for a while. With this move, Oni and Archaia just got more of my business, and Boom has become SUBSCRIPTION ONLY!
Retailers are sometimes thought of as archaic and conservative. Not all of us are. Many support the new and exciting trends in the marketplace. But the only way we get to vote is with our Money. That is what I am doing for Boom. Let’s see if they win in the long run. It’s not vindictive, it’s just.
January 14th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
On the surface, I will back what Collector’s paradise is saying. Retailers are outraged at the fact that we were told that the #1 issue of NW would be available on Myspace for free a day before it hit our racks. We had no warning before our money was committed on #1, let alone #2 and #3. We’ve been treated shabbily on that point.
BOOM! is ignoring our repeated requests for information, returnability, and order adjustment (on issues #2 and #3 of NW). In fact, BOOM! is ignoring the retailers completely thus far.
Speaking as a retailer, I’ve no problem with #1 issues being available online, but please let it be some time after #1 hits (say, by issue #3, so those who missed it can still get the story). A few pages available to pique interest at any time. Something to prime for TPB sales. Most retailers are not against generating interest and advertising, but do not cut off those who work with you at the knees.
Many retailers who support BOOM are going to withdraw their support over this (and considering BOOM’s lateness problems, many retailer have been amazingly patient with this company), which will damage BOOM’s market position.
Some bad decisions have been made on BOOM’s part. Many tempers have flared up. Retailers are wanting to talk, but BOOM has closed their doors and aren’t listening evidentially.
Overall, it is a sad and lamentable situation. it would have easily been avoided if both retailers and BOOM had discussed things at ordering time. Instead, this came as a not too pleasant surprise.
Thanks for reading my long blah blah blah.
-Gary
January 14th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Maybe it’s just me, but I think this is a good idea. One of my friends sent me the link to the comic on MySpace. I read the issue there, liked what I read, and then went out to buy a hard copy (I refuse to call them “floppies”).
While the online version was enough to get me intrigued, I still prefer actually holding a comic in my hands. On the other hand, without the issue online, I doubt I would have ever heard of North Wind or sought it out. Now I’ll order the rest of the issues. Seems like it worked just like it was supposed to.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
I say kudos to BOOM! For trying something new. There may come a time when the direct market gets put out to pasture and people can order direct from the publisher…
but it seems to be the wave of the future.
January 15th, 2008 at 1:49 am
One thing that is important to remember is that Comic publishers do NOT sell to READERS, they sell to COMICSHOPS. That’s their biz (thanks to the direct market), then it’s up to the retailers to sell it to readers. Of course most publishers know they have ultimately to convince readers but their primary business is not with them. Knowing that, the Boom stunt makes no sense.
But Boom hasn’t been in the business of selling comics for a very long time now: they sell movie options. They get some TV/Movie writers, spit out a miniseries done for almost no money, and then pimp out the books heavily to any and all movie or tv studios in Hollywood. I would think that right now they are pimping North Wind, and that they needed some kind of press, some attention by any mean possible. Myspace was the perfect choice for that.
January 15th, 2008 at 4:09 am
Wow. I shop at Collector’s Paradise. Make that shopped, past tense.
I made my mind up when I read this.
“Boom has become SUBSCRIPTION ONLY!”
I like Boom’s books. I liked Talent and Potter’s Field and I enjoyed Northwind, which I read online and have been planning to pick up in the store.
But I don’t like subscribing to books. I like quietly walking in every Wednesday and picking up what I like, and leaving.
There are plenty of comic stores in 818 (that’s the valley for you non-LA folks). I’m sure I’ll be able to walk into one that carries what I like without me having to pre-order it.
Please understand, it’s not your opinion about whether Boom is wrong or right. It’s your attitude. “It’s not vindictive, it’s just.” Justice? Vengeance? You sound like Batman.
I’d prefer not to shop at store that punishes a publisher at the customer’s expense.
So let’s see…you are saving money on the books you won’t order from Boom…but losing at least one customer that buys 4-5 books from you a week. You do the math and tell me if you came out ahead.
January 15th, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Delpy, they’ll never even notice you are gone. Nothing personal meant, but 5 books a week is such a minor loss that they won’t even notice. Customers come and go all the time. Gross profit on 5 books is about $7.50. After rent, lighting, phone, heating/cooling, and employee costs, that might be as little as $1 profit.
You would be farther ahead to go in and discuss this with the owner (not yell at), telling him why you think this is a bad idea. Maybe you could change his mind.
January 16th, 2008 at 7:33 am
Okay. Let´s see.
Retailer X says: “I don´t like what BOOM did, mostly because they…” then gives you some reasons so you can see it´s not just one thing, but a whole lot of things BOOM did or did not do. His conclusion? “BOOM is subscribers only.”
Customer Y says: “I don´t like the attitude of Retailer X, mostly because he…” then gives you reasons so you can see that he is not just the Simpsons Comic Book Guy. His conclusion? “I will shop elsewhere.”
So can you tell me how what customer Y does is different from what retailer X does? No reason to go all high and mighty for any of ´em. “What you are doing is wrong, so I am going to do just the same thing.” Makes no sense to me. Doesn´t validate the retailer´s decision either.