Considering that Marvel currently has (a) a record-breaking movie that everyone is talking about, and (b) wrested control of the Diamond chart back handily, thanks to an event that is going gangbusters, it’s got to feel weird over at DC right now to lose the magic that they’ve seemingly had since the September relaunch, right…? Especially when you see Marc-Oliver Frisch lay it all out like this, over at the Beat:
Sales of the average DC Universe title are at 32,897 units in March, which is well within the spectrum of the last few years, as the average-sales charts at the end of the column show. Likewise, DC’s total unit and total dollar sales are firmly back in familiar territory. Of the individual “New 52″ titles, 18 sold fewer than 20,000 units in March, up from 14 in February. Also notably in this context, the overall DC Universe imprint had 32 titles below the 20K mark in March 2012, which is three more than it did in March 2011 and more than twice the number from March 2010.
Even discounting the lower-selling licensed adaptations, which were published by WildStorm prior to 2011, it’s still 15 DC Universe titles below 20,000 in March 2010, versus 22 in March 2011, versus 29 in March 2012. So while the top-selling series remain relatively stable overall, there is a considerably bigger drop-off the farther down the chart you go.
…Ouch.
Go and read all of Frisch’s column for more detail on the winners and losers at DC right now (and, as ever, to get depressed about Vertigo).
May 10th, 2012 at 10:02 am
DC’s numbers are sad, but not surprising. There have been several warning signs for months. DC has always focused its marketing efforts on its biggest characters. If I remember correctly, DC’s survey indicated the New 52 promotion brought in lapsed readers. However DC did not manage to generate a lot of new buyers. If you do not have new buyers to fortify sales over the long haul, what do you expect is going to happen when Marvel launches its new superduper-mega-crossover-event. Retailers know they only have a certain amount of money to spend on titles. They are speculating that name recognition (ie. The Avengers & X-Men) will generate interest from buyers. This probably became more of a factor, since The Avengers movie has been tracking well for months. As a retailer, the choice is fairly obvious.
I am not a DC-hater; I currently purchase more DC & Vertigo titles than Marvel. I truly believe that DC has done itself a disservice by not promoting the mid-to-lower level titles more. All titles were going to shed readers, especially when Marvel decided to strike back. However, some of the titles could have been better inoculated.
I also agree with Harmen’s comments about Vertigo on The Beat. Vertigo’s monthly titles are not doing well, except for a few. However, Vertigo continues to have a robust back catalog.
May 10th, 2012 at 10:38 am
I saw the new 52 tv commercial while at the gym this morning. couldn’t hear the sound, but i kind of marked out for it in spite of myself.
May 10th, 2012 at 11:14 am
1. It will be interesting to see how the collections of The New 52 sell. Having read JL in a collection, it is clearly meant to be read in a collection.
2. That said, I am just perplexed at how many missteps DC has made. With promoting its books, with substandard creative teams, and with more or less abandoning any efforts to make movies that don’t start Batman or Superman, and with alienating old fans who aren’t me. (I seem to be the only old school fan in love with the new line.) There really are things DC is doing right, but they are getting lost.
3. Since we are talking about books no one is reading, I want to call attention to Resurrection Man, which is dark but fun; and Demon Knights, which has steadily been getting better. I think that new fans and old can enjoy these without reading the rest of the DC line.
May 10th, 2012 at 1:22 pm
DC put all their hope into new fans coming in. That didn’t work out to well. Even the first numbers was good but what industry needed was better numbers. Those numbers didn’t sustain. You can’t expect something to succeed when you piss off part of your fan base, you give some of the worst costumes ever to characters, other characters disappear, you give characters no one wanted books, and make characters be mostly jerks. Just take everything anyone of characters throw most of it away. Instead of trying I don’t know getting back to what made fans like these characters or DCU in first place. Not the dark and crappy stuff we been seeing since Identity Crisis that we are still putting up with.
May 10th, 2012 at 2:45 pm
@Super Mutant – I politely disagree with some aspects of your post. I honestly do not believe that DC’s titles are overly dark. Heroes limbs are not being regularly torn from their bodies and used to beat other people. There have not been a large number of significant others being tortured, maimed, or killed in a while. Sidekicks do not count, I am looking at you Flamebird.
I believe DC’s heroes and heroines (across the line) are being Marvelized. Geoff Johns did this in Teen Titans and JSA. I recall DC doing this in the late 80s after Crisis on Infinite Earths. I miss some of the characters from Pre-New 52, but I do believe there are some good titles being published.
May 10th, 2012 at 2:48 pm
I don’t think DC’s target audience was new fans at all — it was lapsed fans.
I don’t think those numbers are surprising — I don’t think DC does, either. Brands sell these days, and DC’s goal was to improve the sales on their main brands. Everything else is just rolling the dice to see if something works.
How are the sales of the Superman and Aquaman books? On Wonder Woman and Justice League compared to a year ago? Just as Marvel throws “Avengers,” “Spider,” and “X” on most of their books these days, DC’s goal is to increase sales on the brands that are most important.
May 10th, 2012 at 3:32 pm
Right now, most of the books on the bottom pile of new52 are those characters that either never sustained an ongoing or had multiple chances at ongoings. These were thrown out there by DC to pad it up to 52 books and see what’s sticking. The bottom will be culled in waves with new books taking it’s place. Batman Inc and Earth 2 will move to the top echelon. World’s Finest and Ravagers will move to the midlist. Dial H is a toss up and GI Combat will flounder due to lack of interest (not due to quality).
May 10th, 2012 at 5:42 pm
I always thought it was a bad move on DC to do this don’t call it a reboot its a relaunch thing. It should have started from square 1, not keep this part and redo this part. It has made it more confusing for everyone.
The numbers are showing like I said from the start, you will have a big increase but remember speculators do not stick around long. Today’s youth do not want to spend the money every month on buying comic books. DC got some new fans but also lost a lot of their old fan base and more are leaving after trying the ndcu.
DC had 2 clear choices and that was either to get quality writers and artist for the main core books and build up the d list characters. The 2nd choice was to do a complete reboot of the whole DC Universe. That was to start every one from the beginning, that meant not having five Robins and Teen Titans and a few others right at the start. It would have been a better jumping on point for everyone new and olds readers alike.
The ndcu is a mess you have parts of the old DC universe that was allowed to stay and others that are gone. Every now and then they take something from the old and bring it to the ndcu and it is failing.
I still say by September of this years the DC sale numbers will be back to the old DC universe or even worse and it would not surprise me to see a staff change at DC before Winter comes.
May 10th, 2012 at 6:42 pm
and let’s be perfectly clesar who the article was by Marc Oliver who has been anti DC the whole time he write his column… he is like the FOX news of comics repiorting… the same numbers can come in for Marvel he spins it positive the numbers for DC always a negative spin no matter what the results
May 10th, 2012 at 9:22 pm
Marc Oliver by way of Graeme McMillan. What could go wrong with today’s blog? LOL
May 11th, 2012 at 10:43 am
The core titles: your Batmans, Justice Leagues, Supermans, and Aquamans continue to sell well. I think this is how DC is treating things. Stressing the main family characters while reviving/burning through a bunch of C-list titles each month with minimal use of creative resources to see if something sticks while knowing full well it won’t. If New 52 goes on for quite a few years, they may not have any titles left to revive.
May 13th, 2012 at 9:16 am
Going through sales title by title, these results look pretty good for DC. Their big sellers are performing significantly better than a year ago Even a title like Green Arrow, which apparently is unsuccessful creatively, has levelled out at 29k. Of course, a number of titles have performed poorly, but they have either been cancelled or had their creative teams changed. We’ll see how things look six months from now, but if the New 52 didn’t revolutionize the comics industry, it nonetheless appears to have been a solid success.
May 14th, 2012 at 8:54 pm
yeah but it is marc oliver frisch’s big boy column… he spins everything DC does in a negative way … it’s his Frisch Schtick
May 15th, 2012 at 4:49 am
Here’s a wild idea: you ever think maybe he’s not just “spinning” but giving his honest opinion? That maybe it’s totally possible that someone can sincerely dare to disagree with you without having some type of hidden agenda?