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Moving The Line to $3.99…?

January 9th, 2012
Author Graeme McMillan

The news that Batman and Detective Comics will be gaining back-up strips to accompany Action Comics, All-Star Western, Men of War and Justice League in DC’s “$3.99 for 40 Pages Club” makes me think of how shortlived the “Drawing The Line at $2.99″ experiment really was for DC – It only launched last January, and lasted just eight months before The New 52 reinstituted the $3.99 price point. Now, we’re seeing more books being “upgraded” to the format, along with back-ups, which makes me wonder whether DC is admitting that the $2.99 pricing isn’t inherently more attractive to the mass audience despite a vocal minority saying otherwise? After all, both Action and Justice League have been top-sellers since launch even though they cost $3.99… If Batman and Detective continue their sales dominance with the new pricing, how long before even more DC books go to this format? How many New 52 books will be $2.99 and 20 pages by this time next year…?

This entry was posted on Monday, January 9th, 2012 at 1:30 pm and is filed under DC Comics, News & Views. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

14 Responses to “Moving The Line to $3.99…?”
  1. Aaron Poehler Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 1:53 pm

    Again: it never meant “all books we publish will be $2.99 forever” and they have done quite well as far as keeping extra content in all $3.99 books. That is nowhere near the same thing as Marvel selling 20-page books for $3.99.

  2. GT Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 2:18 pm

    The $3.99 price point is what caused me to stop buying single issues months ago. I understand the work that goes into the product, but it takes me 10-15min to read…

    Full magazines are about $1 more and they have way more content than your average $2.99/$3.99 comic. I’ve seen the added pages that include interviews, script pages, reviews, etc and that’s a step in the right direction, but only a step.

  3. Mo Walker Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 2:46 pm

    I do not expect to see the mid-to-lower selling DC titles being bumped up to $3.99 (in the near future). However, it would not shock me to see Green Lantern join the $3.99 club by summer. In the end, consumers are going to make a choice. Personally, if I have to choose between a lower selling $2.99 book versus a higher selling $2.99 title, the $3.99 title will go. Let’s face it, Batman and Superman are safer than Demon Knights. I can always purchase Batman later on when it is cheaper. It will be interesting to see how the price bump will affect digital sales since the price drops after a month.

  4. Chris B Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 3:25 pm

    I despise the $3.99 price point, but to be honest, I would gladly pay that much for the books I’m reading (Flash, GL, JL, Batman, OMAC, Captain Atom). Thankfully I don’t have to pay that much since I purchase most of my books digitally now. I love the fact that they throw in the variant cover, too.

  5. Michael Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 5:47 pm

    New comic math: 30 pages of Snyder’s Batman for $3.99 > 20 pages of Bendis’ Anything at that same price.

  6. Rob C Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 9:43 pm

    When a 100 page magazine that features way more content is only a dollar more, there’s something wrong. Granted, I’m reading $3.99 books right now, though I’m not very happy about that. I realize how much time goes into making a comic, but it’s the principle of what I’m getting for what I’m paying.

  7. shameonshamus Says:
    January 9th, 2012 at 9:49 pm

    comparing 30 pages of story for 3.99 to 20 pages of Marvel story at 2.99 and still you are talking about 10% of the line ….

    again how stupid are you are aMUCKmillan?

  8. Chuck Jones Says:
    January 10th, 2012 at 10:11 am

    The Library is my friend.

  9. Darius Says:
    January 10th, 2012 at 1:26 pm

    Justice League? Action Comics? Batman? I guess the defence for the 3.99 price is basically “we’re not charging $3.99 for overexposed, derivative garbage – we’re charging $3.99 for overexposed, derivative garbage with a short backup feature that you probably don’t want or care about.

  10. wordbigram Says:
    January 11th, 2012 at 10:43 am

    DC copying Marvel. Marvel copying DC. Water is wet

  11. J Says:
    January 11th, 2012 at 1:00 pm

    @Darius: You don’t know the meaning of any of those words, do you?

  12. Travis Says:
    January 11th, 2012 at 4:38 pm

    At some point the Comic companies are going to look up and realize they just priced themselves out of business. Sure people are buying comics now, but how many are the same people that fell in love with comics as a kid.

    Now think how many kids out there can afford to buy a bunch of 3.99 comics? They are building to a time where the main audience they want didn’t read comics as a kid and so will be less likely to as adults. The comics industry as well as any should know to “get em while their young.” Isn’t going to happen at 3.99 a pop.

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    January 11th, 2012 at 6:49 pm

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    January 11th, 2012 at 6:50 pm

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