I'd agree with your assessment that shops and customers love variants. I'd also agree with those retailers that are complaining. The difficult reality is that the shops complaining about variants are a small minority that are either not profiteering off of those "investor" customers or are profiting but realize that it's unsustainable.
I sold comics full-time during the gimmicks-cover '90s--I started right after the b&w implosion and stopped at the turn of the century--so this is just another step in the cycle. I think there are stores (like yours, even if I've never been in it) that build a business on readers and that is both the minority and yet much more sustainable. Will the industry ever learn? Only through burning off the profiteers, contracting to the customers who buy because they love reading the books, and rebuilding from there.
The biggest challenge I see for stores is the growing availability of digital comics. It is a capitalist problem of needing people to buy artifacts when talking about reading. What will the comic book store market look like when digital buying outpaces printed buying? I'd imagine the successful comic stores of 2040 will be much more like art galleries and community event spaces.
It's an untested theory that the growth of sales variant covers has two main factors. The first will be easier to test when/if 2022 numbers can be added to your list.
1. The economy was a major factor for the boom in "commodity" comics. Those items that were purchased for "investment." By the economy I mean two factors: widespread governmental fiscal support adding to disposable income for many; and the boom and peak of cryptocurrency values. This theory is bolstered by the fact that the price of "investment" collectibles boomed outside of comics (sports and collector cards, fine art, records, movie memorabilia, etc.)
2. The expanded reading of digital comics. If you have a digital version to read that is "good enough" for you, but you also want to own an artifact, all of a sudden a variant is a logical extension for readers. If (the royal) we haven't scratched our collector itch by just reading a book, then variants of a book we already know we enjoy make sense. And if I'm only buying a book for its artifact value, I might choose the "rarer" version to scratch that itch.
That's my two cents, but I'd be happy to sell you a version of this post with a blank sketch cover for $10.
One thing I meant to include: you are right that it makes sense for companies to make more variants if people are buying them. It's always best in business to pay more attention to what people do than what they say. Revealed preferences are the name of the game.
Thanks for these comments. Honestly? I'm not a fan of variant covers. Which is probably strange for a person who named their store Variant Edition, but that's a different story.
You're touching on a few things that I think are very important - but it all comes down to this: single issues are not the best delivery method for comics anymore. Any way you slice it, they just aren't. BUT digital reading will always always ALWAYS create more print buyers than it takes away, because of exactly the experience you're describing.
I'll say the bigger companies need to take a look at how and where most digital consumption is taking place and adjust their models accordingly. I think they're trying, but ineffectually, because the money from digital in "direct market" areas has had pretty negligible growth over the past several years - and yet the appetite is voracious (points to a bunch of recent Webtoon and other like styled platform print releases).
And yes, end of the day, single issues have collectibility built into their DNA. Of course variants work. Of course, those pre disposed to that format are buying them. And of course, the companies are rising to that demand. If that ends up subsidizing the medium in a way that keeps production up? Then so be it.
I don't know if it's a good idea for creators, but I feel like the best solution for the floppy->GN pipeline is not floppies, but patronage. A few bucks a month per reader via a subscription that gives the creators steady income while they show off work in progress, then the books gets published as a GN, then released digitally after three months?
This is heavily weighted towards those creators that don't mind running their own business, since that's what this subscription model rewards. It's not a replacement for the top five comics publishers, with the possible exception of Image, since it's essentially what they offer creators like Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples and Brubaker and Phillips. A floppy to GN pipeline that they don't have to run the whole business, just the production details.
There's definitely a few out there who run this model, but you're right, it takes a creator who has a certain mindset and diligence. It can keep you running healthy in the interim, but does take a lot of personal work.
I'd agree with your assessment that shops and customers love variants. I'd also agree with those retailers that are complaining. The difficult reality is that the shops complaining about variants are a small minority that are either not profiteering off of those "investor" customers or are profiting but realize that it's unsustainable.
I sold comics full-time during the gimmicks-cover '90s--I started right after the b&w implosion and stopped at the turn of the century--so this is just another step in the cycle. I think there are stores (like yours, even if I've never been in it) that build a business on readers and that is both the minority and yet much more sustainable. Will the industry ever learn? Only through burning off the profiteers, contracting to the customers who buy because they love reading the books, and rebuilding from there.
The biggest challenge I see for stores is the growing availability of digital comics. It is a capitalist problem of needing people to buy artifacts when talking about reading. What will the comic book store market look like when digital buying outpaces printed buying? I'd imagine the successful comic stores of 2040 will be much more like art galleries and community event spaces.
It's an untested theory that the growth of sales variant covers has two main factors. The first will be easier to test when/if 2022 numbers can be added to your list.
1. The economy was a major factor for the boom in "commodity" comics. Those items that were purchased for "investment." By the economy I mean two factors: widespread governmental fiscal support adding to disposable income for many; and the boom and peak of cryptocurrency values. This theory is bolstered by the fact that the price of "investment" collectibles boomed outside of comics (sports and collector cards, fine art, records, movie memorabilia, etc.)
2. The expanded reading of digital comics. If you have a digital version to read that is "good enough" for you, but you also want to own an artifact, all of a sudden a variant is a logical extension for readers. If (the royal) we haven't scratched our collector itch by just reading a book, then variants of a book we already know we enjoy make sense. And if I'm only buying a book for its artifact value, I might choose the "rarer" version to scratch that itch.
That's my two cents, but I'd be happy to sell you a version of this post with a blank sketch cover for $10.
One thing I meant to include: you are right that it makes sense for companies to make more variants if people are buying them. It's always best in business to pay more attention to what people do than what they say. Revealed preferences are the name of the game.
Thanks for these comments. Honestly? I'm not a fan of variant covers. Which is probably strange for a person who named their store Variant Edition, but that's a different story.
You're touching on a few things that I think are very important - but it all comes down to this: single issues are not the best delivery method for comics anymore. Any way you slice it, they just aren't. BUT digital reading will always always ALWAYS create more print buyers than it takes away, because of exactly the experience you're describing.
I'll say the bigger companies need to take a look at how and where most digital consumption is taking place and adjust their models accordingly. I think they're trying, but ineffectually, because the money from digital in "direct market" areas has had pretty negligible growth over the past several years - and yet the appetite is voracious (points to a bunch of recent Webtoon and other like styled platform print releases).
And yes, end of the day, single issues have collectibility built into their DNA. Of course variants work. Of course, those pre disposed to that format are buying them. And of course, the companies are rising to that demand. If that ends up subsidizing the medium in a way that keeps production up? Then so be it.
I don't know if it's a good idea for creators, but I feel like the best solution for the floppy->GN pipeline is not floppies, but patronage. A few bucks a month per reader via a subscription that gives the creators steady income while they show off work in progress, then the books gets published as a GN, then released digitally after three months?
This is heavily weighted towards those creators that don't mind running their own business, since that's what this subscription model rewards. It's not a replacement for the top five comics publishers, with the possible exception of Image, since it's essentially what they offer creators like Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples and Brubaker and Phillips. A floppy to GN pipeline that they don't have to run the whole business, just the production details.
There's definitely a few out there who run this model, but you're right, it takes a creator who has a certain mindset and diligence. It can keep you running healthy in the interim, but does take a lot of personal work.