MattBrady
11-28-2002, 09:05 AM
Admit it – it’s slowly starting to creep up on you – your local WaldenBooks, Borders or Barnes & Noble is beginning to become on of your favorite comic book shops. When did that happen? How did that happen? And dang, don’t they have a lot of trades in bookstores these days?
Newsarama.com looked inside the book trade.
First up, we spoke with Robert Boyd of CDS, which has become one of the major distributors of graphic novels in the industry, following LPS’s bankruptcy. As a whole, Boyd said that bookstore sales of graphic novels (bookstore lingo for both original graphic novels and trade paperbacks) has grown several hundred percent from around 1995, when the category was practically nonexistent in many larger book stores and chains.
Given the breakdown of distribution however, coming up with a solid figure on sales is tough. For example, Warner Books handles sales for all of DC’s bookstore products, while Diamond handles Top Shelf, Antarctic, IDW, and a handful of other smaller publishers, CDS handles Marvel, TokyoPop, CrossGen, Humanoids, and Titan; while Norton handles Fantagraphics, and PGW moves Viz’s product. Each publisher views their sales through the respective markets, bookstore and direct sales, as proprietary information, while most bookstore chains view information about specific product sales in their stores as confidential and proprietary as well.
As far as DC, Marvel, CrossGen, Viz, and other publishers contacted by Newsarama.com for this article were willing to report, bookstore sales of their products represent an important and growing segment of their annual business. Likewise, representatives from Barnes and Noble and Borders declined to share any information.
However, coming from the now defunct LPC to work at CDS, Boyd does has a perspective on the overall book store trade, and is able to give a brief history as well as its current condition.
“We’re seeing steady growth every year across the board,” Boyd said. “Keep in mind we’re starting from a relatively small base. There was a blip of graphic novel sales in the ‘80s, and then I guess bookstores overbought a lot of crappy graphic novels, and they got burned by the experience. The book trade went through a rough patch in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, so graphic novel sales dropped really low for a time, and only cautiously have they started getting back into the chains and independent stores in the mid ‘90s to the late ‘90s. The growth has been pretty strong, partly because the return rate has been so low, and that’s encouraged them to keep buying.”
For the return rate to be low, that is, few graphic novels being returned to the distributor for credit, the sell-through is high, and so is the turn – the turnaround time from the store getting the book and it going out the front door in a customer’s hands. “The sell-through is higher on graphic novels than on other categories of books,” Boyd said. “The return rate is about half or less of the industry standard.
The performance of graphic novels among bookstores is why most chains and smaller stores have increased the amount of shelf space devoted to them – after all, why not offer your customers more of a product that is selling well, rather than one that sits on the shelf for months on end, and finally goes back to the distributor, or into the bargain bin?
“That’s sort of what we’ve been seeing with graphic novels – the shelf space devoted to them in different stores has increased – drastically,” Boyd said. “We’ve seen some stores double their shelf space, and this affects sales from the publishers. For example, if Barnes and Noble decide to increase the shelf space next week for graphic novels, the number of graphic novels sold to bookstores will grow tremendously. But B&N doesn’t make those kinds of decisions lightly.
“But - some small independent stores start to invest in graphic novels, or a smaller chain, such as Virgin decides to invest heavily in graphic novels, all these things cumulatively add up to the growth that we’re talking about. That of course, and people buying them – that’s the critical thing, naturally.”
The Manga Influence
One buyer from a major chain who was willing to go on the record was Kurt Hassler, Buyer -- Science Fiction, Fantasy, Graphic Novels and Role Playing for Waldenbooks. As Hassler explained it, while graphic novels sell well, there’s no hard and fast rule as to what will sell – at least in WaldenBooks. “My experience has been that the wants of bookstore customers vary depending on the bookstore in question,” Hassler said. “My particular customer tends to be most interested in manga imports and collections of relatively recent storylines from the major houses.”
“Sales in my stores on this product have increased dramatically in the past year both as a part of industry trends and increased focus on the category within Waldenbooks, Hassler added. “Manga and superhero titles tend to work best in my stores, although I wouldn't classify a particular genre as ‘worst.’ Certainly not all manga or superhero books sell at comparable levels. There are strong and weak licenses within any of the genres.”
Hassler’s report of bookstore readers going after manga is echoed by Boyd, who reported that as a category, manga sales to the book trade are increasing by roughly 200% a year for the past three or four years, while all other graphic novel genres have seen roughly a 25% annual increase.
Citing <both Ranma ½ and Cowboy Bebop as standouts in manga, Hassler said he feels manga does so well in bookstores is because its properties reach a much wider audience than traditional American comics. Given the accessibility of over a dozen anime series on national cable networks, as well as the “kewl” factor surrounding anime, it’s no wonder that customers in a large bookstore can see teens reading manga near the displays who have no idea there is one, or have ever visited the comic shop in the same town.
Anime tie-ins often acts as the gateway manga, introducing readers to other titles as they grow older, or their interests change. “Anime ties often help drive some of the strongest manga sales although that certainly isn't always the case,” Hassler said. “Sailor Moon certainly was leading the back sales-wise this time last year, and it continues to do well as do Gundam and Evangelion.
“Manga has been the success story in bookstores,” Boyd said. “TokyoPop and Viz are huge sellers. For example, TokyoPop’s shojo manga, which is aimed at girls, just kills in the book trade – it’s just awesome. Some of it is Sailor Moon, and based on television shows, but a lot of it isn’t. A lot of it doesn’t even have any fantasy elements – it’s just straight romance, high school fantasy romance kind of stuff, and it sells great. That to me says that there are girls buying this, and it’s probably pretty young girls. The comic stores aren’t capturing that audience, and that’s really exciting. It shows that it’s possible to expand the demographic of comic book buyers.”
Manga’s strength in the bookstore market was a topic at SDCC as well. At the panel on comic book statistics, Boyd, using Bookscan data (Bookscan tracks sell-through on books, much like Musicscan tracks sell-through on records, and is good for indicating general trends, rather than specifics) estimated that for 2001, TokyoPop was the #1 seller in bookstores, with roughly 22% of the market. Viz was #2, and DC was #3, followed by Dark Horse at #4, and Marvel at #5.
DC Publisher Paul Levitz, who was also at the panel, immediately questioned Boyd’s calculations, claiming that Bookscan’s estimations of DC’s sell-through were wrong by an order of magnitude, and therefore the entire ranking was wrong. Boyd, for the most part, stood by his numbers, while bookstore buyers who were in the audience, tended to agree with Boyd’s assessment.
Hassler refused to rank the publishers in terms of sales at Walden, but did offer: “I will say that current industry rankings do not necessarily well account for the book market, and I think people might be surprised at where the publishers shake out.”
In the Trenches
Speaking more to what he’s seen at WaldenBooks, Hassler said that his stores do well in both summer and winter with graphic novels, and sales are heavily influenced by the school year, but reaffirmed that the category does well year-round.
Outside of manga, other media tie-ins, such as movies have a wildly variable impact on graphic novel sales, depending upon the type of attention the movie gets, as well as the appeal of the property itself. “I wouldn't want to generalize that all movie tie-ins do ‘x,’” Hassler said. That simply isn't the case. The Spider-Man movie certainly drove great sales on Spider-Man tie-in titles, graphic novels and non-graphic novels alike. I wouldn't say that it drew new readers to other licenses, but Spider-Man continues to do well.
“Likewise, Ghost World, From Hell and Road to Perdition all had lifts, but nothing comparable to the performance of Spider-Man with my customer.”
Looking at Marvel’s business in the bookstores as a whole, Hassler and Boyd offer different views of Marvel’s performance than the publisher. While yesterday’s press release from Marvel implied that the growth the company saw was due solely to recent changes, Boyd said that the sales on Marvel trades had been increasing, along with sales of other trades, even before the Quesada/Jemas administration took control.
“Marvel’s done the right thing – they’ve taken advantage of a good situation where a publisher can sell books, but the growth was already there,” Boyd said. “It just means that Marvel now has enough product to fill the need. But Marvel’s push has been a growing thing for years. Even though they announced it was going to be one of their major pushes last year or so, they’ve really been doing it for several years prior in the book trade.”
According to Boyd’s numbers and observations, the increased presence of Marvel on the shelves of bookstores hasn’t come at the expense of other publishers. For example, a 10% increase in Marvel graphic novel sales isn’t mirrored by a 10% decrease in DC’s sales. “Everyone is still experiencing growth right now, Boyd said. “I can’t speak for DC, but everyone that I’ve had access to numbers on has grown. So Marvel’s push, and it has been successful – if you look at Bookscan, Marvel right now is very successful.”
Hassler reported the same from WaldenBooks. “Marvel's presence on my shelves has increased simply by virtue of the fact that they are producing more books on a more regular schedule than they have in the past,” Hassler said. “Their sales have increased as a result of this and the fantastic media that they've been garnering with Spider-Man and X-Men and other movies in the works.
“Marvel sales are most definitely not detracting sales from other publishers. If anything, other publishers should be pleased by the successes of their competitors because it makes the category healthier and allows for a deeper representation of their titles as well as whatever happens to be performing best.”
The strong growth in the category that keeps Marvel and other publishers from cannibalizing current sales is so robust, according to Boyd, that within limits, anything will sell.
“There’s not really enough stuff being produced to fulfill the demand, especially stuff that has real innate popularity, like Spider-Man and similar titles,” Boyd said. “So, Marvel’s growth, is not atypical. I think you’d find the same thing is true with TokyoPop and Viz, who’ve seen the same, if not more growth.
“It’s not going to be like that forever, because there’s no way they can continue growing forever. At some point, there will be a struggle for market share that will be rugged. But at this point, as long as the bookstores will put it out, it will get bought, pretty much. So – they can absorb a lot of growth.”
The rugged competition Boyd foresees is one that will be won by publisher’s dollars more than anything else. Like many businesses, bookstores will place your product in a prominent location – for a price. The prime location of DK #3 at Borders on the front table, greeting customers, as well as the upcoming CrossGen Months coming at prominent chains were not done by the bookstores out of the kindness of their hearts.
But back to the growth itself - how much can the bookstore market grow before it has a serious impact on how publishers do business? It’s already happening – Marvel has made several changes that make their monthly series more trade paperback friendly. TokyoPop has virtually all but ceased publishing monthly titles in lieu of graphic novels, which do very well in bookstores. DC has adopted a publishing program that includes many original hardcover projects aimed at bookstore, rather than comic shop audiences. CrossGen’s Compendia are designed for strong book store as well as comic shop sales.
Going back to Marvel’s press release, the publisher stated that 8% of it’s sales are through the book trade. With triple digit increases in sales expected this year, 8% is expected to grow – and continue to grow, and Marvel’s increased sales to book stores will surely be mirrored by those of other publishers. In a few years’ time, some major publishers could be seeing 50% of their sales come from book stores. When that percent ticks over to 51% of sales occurring through the book trade, the comic book market will have made a fundamental shift, and entered another brave new world, one that will most likely affect the market and industry as much as the advent of the direct market.
By Publisher
Breaking it down by publisher as much as either were comfortable, despite the sales of manga, both Hassler and Boyd give major credit to DC for keeping the book trade as a viable market for comics over the years.
“I'd go back a great deal further than five to seven years to where the trend of graphic novels in bookstores started really, and point to The Dark Knight Returns,” Hassler said. “That book was really an igniting factor in the bookstore market, and DC has worked hard and diligently to cultivate this market. In many ways, they are still the standard by which others are judged.”
Boyd also had positive things to say about two of the smaller bookstore presences (when compared to manga and DC): “CrossGen is coming in at just the right time – the book trade is eager for new product, and here’s a company with high end, new product and a willingness to go out and promote it, which is often a problem with comic book publishers, because they’re not cash-rich,” Boyd said. “They’ve had a fantastic launch for a new publisher – the best I’ve ever seen because of good timing and super-aggressive marketing.
“Also, Dark Horse has been very exciting this year as well, just because of Star Wars blowing everything else away. The best-selling graphic novel in the book trade for us is the Star Wars: Episode II adaptation. That’s the best-seller so far this year, and I expect that it will be the #1 graphic novel of 2002.”
On the smaller side yet, Hassler said that even publishers who barely capture market share in the direct sales arena can do well and grow in the book trade. “Fantagraphics and Drawn & Quarterly are growing and have the potential for growth just the same as any of the larger publishers,” Hassler said. “Their respective sizes pretty much dictate where they land in terms of overall sales, but they have great product. In a year they may be publishing twenty titles a month and the entire landscape could change.”
Overall, Hassler said that he really wasn’t caught off guard by any books over the past year, but every now and then, he can be left scratching his head. “Things often perform beyond my expectations, but that isn't quite the same as being caught by surprise by a product. If I had to pick one real shocker, I'd have to point to DC's Danger Girl collection. I'm still trying to figure out what happened with that book.”
Given the current landscape, both Hassler and Boyd expect the steady growth in bookstores to continue for the foreseeable future, with few big changes. “I expect to see some changes based on certain avenues some publishers are exploring more than others, but I wouldn't say that it would be anything that would shock the industry if it's been paying attention,” Hassler added, explaining that while many factors can have an affect, sales are really dependent upon one thing – what’s between the covers.
“There are a bounty of titles of various prices, formats, bindings and sizes that I know I'm going to sell extremely well. I can sell books at $9.99 and $70.00. There is no magical format that guarantees a success. It is all contingent on the strength of the material inside.”
And to help the growth to continue, according to Hassler, publishers need to keep the appeal of the material broad, the quality high, and listen. “We see these sales on a grand scale that give us a perspective on trends at a national level,” Hassler said. “We see what works and what doesn't. Come to the table with an open mind.”
Newsarama.com looked inside the book trade.
First up, we spoke with Robert Boyd of CDS, which has become one of the major distributors of graphic novels in the industry, following LPS’s bankruptcy. As a whole, Boyd said that bookstore sales of graphic novels (bookstore lingo for both original graphic novels and trade paperbacks) has grown several hundred percent from around 1995, when the category was practically nonexistent in many larger book stores and chains.
Given the breakdown of distribution however, coming up with a solid figure on sales is tough. For example, Warner Books handles sales for all of DC’s bookstore products, while Diamond handles Top Shelf, Antarctic, IDW, and a handful of other smaller publishers, CDS handles Marvel, TokyoPop, CrossGen, Humanoids, and Titan; while Norton handles Fantagraphics, and PGW moves Viz’s product. Each publisher views their sales through the respective markets, bookstore and direct sales, as proprietary information, while most bookstore chains view information about specific product sales in their stores as confidential and proprietary as well.
As far as DC, Marvel, CrossGen, Viz, and other publishers contacted by Newsarama.com for this article were willing to report, bookstore sales of their products represent an important and growing segment of their annual business. Likewise, representatives from Barnes and Noble and Borders declined to share any information.
However, coming from the now defunct LPC to work at CDS, Boyd does has a perspective on the overall book store trade, and is able to give a brief history as well as its current condition.
“We’re seeing steady growth every year across the board,” Boyd said. “Keep in mind we’re starting from a relatively small base. There was a blip of graphic novel sales in the ‘80s, and then I guess bookstores overbought a lot of crappy graphic novels, and they got burned by the experience. The book trade went through a rough patch in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, so graphic novel sales dropped really low for a time, and only cautiously have they started getting back into the chains and independent stores in the mid ‘90s to the late ‘90s. The growth has been pretty strong, partly because the return rate has been so low, and that’s encouraged them to keep buying.”
For the return rate to be low, that is, few graphic novels being returned to the distributor for credit, the sell-through is high, and so is the turn – the turnaround time from the store getting the book and it going out the front door in a customer’s hands. “The sell-through is higher on graphic novels than on other categories of books,” Boyd said. “The return rate is about half or less of the industry standard.
The performance of graphic novels among bookstores is why most chains and smaller stores have increased the amount of shelf space devoted to them – after all, why not offer your customers more of a product that is selling well, rather than one that sits on the shelf for months on end, and finally goes back to the distributor, or into the bargain bin?
“That’s sort of what we’ve been seeing with graphic novels – the shelf space devoted to them in different stores has increased – drastically,” Boyd said. “We’ve seen some stores double their shelf space, and this affects sales from the publishers. For example, if Barnes and Noble decide to increase the shelf space next week for graphic novels, the number of graphic novels sold to bookstores will grow tremendously. But B&N doesn’t make those kinds of decisions lightly.
“But - some small independent stores start to invest in graphic novels, or a smaller chain, such as Virgin decides to invest heavily in graphic novels, all these things cumulatively add up to the growth that we’re talking about. That of course, and people buying them – that’s the critical thing, naturally.”
The Manga Influence
One buyer from a major chain who was willing to go on the record was Kurt Hassler, Buyer -- Science Fiction, Fantasy, Graphic Novels and Role Playing for Waldenbooks. As Hassler explained it, while graphic novels sell well, there’s no hard and fast rule as to what will sell – at least in WaldenBooks. “My experience has been that the wants of bookstore customers vary depending on the bookstore in question,” Hassler said. “My particular customer tends to be most interested in manga imports and collections of relatively recent storylines from the major houses.”
“Sales in my stores on this product have increased dramatically in the past year both as a part of industry trends and increased focus on the category within Waldenbooks, Hassler added. “Manga and superhero titles tend to work best in my stores, although I wouldn't classify a particular genre as ‘worst.’ Certainly not all manga or superhero books sell at comparable levels. There are strong and weak licenses within any of the genres.”
Hassler’s report of bookstore readers going after manga is echoed by Boyd, who reported that as a category, manga sales to the book trade are increasing by roughly 200% a year for the past three or four years, while all other graphic novel genres have seen roughly a 25% annual increase.
Citing <both Ranma ½ and Cowboy Bebop as standouts in manga, Hassler said he feels manga does so well in bookstores is because its properties reach a much wider audience than traditional American comics. Given the accessibility of over a dozen anime series on national cable networks, as well as the “kewl” factor surrounding anime, it’s no wonder that customers in a large bookstore can see teens reading manga near the displays who have no idea there is one, or have ever visited the comic shop in the same town.
Anime tie-ins often acts as the gateway manga, introducing readers to other titles as they grow older, or their interests change. “Anime ties often help drive some of the strongest manga sales although that certainly isn't always the case,” Hassler said. “Sailor Moon certainly was leading the back sales-wise this time last year, and it continues to do well as do Gundam and Evangelion.
“Manga has been the success story in bookstores,” Boyd said. “TokyoPop and Viz are huge sellers. For example, TokyoPop’s shojo manga, which is aimed at girls, just kills in the book trade – it’s just awesome. Some of it is Sailor Moon, and based on television shows, but a lot of it isn’t. A lot of it doesn’t even have any fantasy elements – it’s just straight romance, high school fantasy romance kind of stuff, and it sells great. That to me says that there are girls buying this, and it’s probably pretty young girls. The comic stores aren’t capturing that audience, and that’s really exciting. It shows that it’s possible to expand the demographic of comic book buyers.”
Manga’s strength in the bookstore market was a topic at SDCC as well. At the panel on comic book statistics, Boyd, using Bookscan data (Bookscan tracks sell-through on books, much like Musicscan tracks sell-through on records, and is good for indicating general trends, rather than specifics) estimated that for 2001, TokyoPop was the #1 seller in bookstores, with roughly 22% of the market. Viz was #2, and DC was #3, followed by Dark Horse at #4, and Marvel at #5.
DC Publisher Paul Levitz, who was also at the panel, immediately questioned Boyd’s calculations, claiming that Bookscan’s estimations of DC’s sell-through were wrong by an order of magnitude, and therefore the entire ranking was wrong. Boyd, for the most part, stood by his numbers, while bookstore buyers who were in the audience, tended to agree with Boyd’s assessment.
Hassler refused to rank the publishers in terms of sales at Walden, but did offer: “I will say that current industry rankings do not necessarily well account for the book market, and I think people might be surprised at where the publishers shake out.”
In the Trenches
Speaking more to what he’s seen at WaldenBooks, Hassler said that his stores do well in both summer and winter with graphic novels, and sales are heavily influenced by the school year, but reaffirmed that the category does well year-round.
Outside of manga, other media tie-ins, such as movies have a wildly variable impact on graphic novel sales, depending upon the type of attention the movie gets, as well as the appeal of the property itself. “I wouldn't want to generalize that all movie tie-ins do ‘x,’” Hassler said. That simply isn't the case. The Spider-Man movie certainly drove great sales on Spider-Man tie-in titles, graphic novels and non-graphic novels alike. I wouldn't say that it drew new readers to other licenses, but Spider-Man continues to do well.
“Likewise, Ghost World, From Hell and Road to Perdition all had lifts, but nothing comparable to the performance of Spider-Man with my customer.”
Looking at Marvel’s business in the bookstores as a whole, Hassler and Boyd offer different views of Marvel’s performance than the publisher. While yesterday’s press release from Marvel implied that the growth the company saw was due solely to recent changes, Boyd said that the sales on Marvel trades had been increasing, along with sales of other trades, even before the Quesada/Jemas administration took control.
“Marvel’s done the right thing – they’ve taken advantage of a good situation where a publisher can sell books, but the growth was already there,” Boyd said. “It just means that Marvel now has enough product to fill the need. But Marvel’s push has been a growing thing for years. Even though they announced it was going to be one of their major pushes last year or so, they’ve really been doing it for several years prior in the book trade.”
According to Boyd’s numbers and observations, the increased presence of Marvel on the shelves of bookstores hasn’t come at the expense of other publishers. For example, a 10% increase in Marvel graphic novel sales isn’t mirrored by a 10% decrease in DC’s sales. “Everyone is still experiencing growth right now, Boyd said. “I can’t speak for DC, but everyone that I’ve had access to numbers on has grown. So Marvel’s push, and it has been successful – if you look at Bookscan, Marvel right now is very successful.”
Hassler reported the same from WaldenBooks. “Marvel's presence on my shelves has increased simply by virtue of the fact that they are producing more books on a more regular schedule than they have in the past,” Hassler said. “Their sales have increased as a result of this and the fantastic media that they've been garnering with Spider-Man and X-Men and other movies in the works.
“Marvel sales are most definitely not detracting sales from other publishers. If anything, other publishers should be pleased by the successes of their competitors because it makes the category healthier and allows for a deeper representation of their titles as well as whatever happens to be performing best.”
The strong growth in the category that keeps Marvel and other publishers from cannibalizing current sales is so robust, according to Boyd, that within limits, anything will sell.
“There’s not really enough stuff being produced to fulfill the demand, especially stuff that has real innate popularity, like Spider-Man and similar titles,” Boyd said. “So, Marvel’s growth, is not atypical. I think you’d find the same thing is true with TokyoPop and Viz, who’ve seen the same, if not more growth.
“It’s not going to be like that forever, because there’s no way they can continue growing forever. At some point, there will be a struggle for market share that will be rugged. But at this point, as long as the bookstores will put it out, it will get bought, pretty much. So – they can absorb a lot of growth.”
The rugged competition Boyd foresees is one that will be won by publisher’s dollars more than anything else. Like many businesses, bookstores will place your product in a prominent location – for a price. The prime location of DK #3 at Borders on the front table, greeting customers, as well as the upcoming CrossGen Months coming at prominent chains were not done by the bookstores out of the kindness of their hearts.
But back to the growth itself - how much can the bookstore market grow before it has a serious impact on how publishers do business? It’s already happening – Marvel has made several changes that make their monthly series more trade paperback friendly. TokyoPop has virtually all but ceased publishing monthly titles in lieu of graphic novels, which do very well in bookstores. DC has adopted a publishing program that includes many original hardcover projects aimed at bookstore, rather than comic shop audiences. CrossGen’s Compendia are designed for strong book store as well as comic shop sales.
Going back to Marvel’s press release, the publisher stated that 8% of it’s sales are through the book trade. With triple digit increases in sales expected this year, 8% is expected to grow – and continue to grow, and Marvel’s increased sales to book stores will surely be mirrored by those of other publishers. In a few years’ time, some major publishers could be seeing 50% of their sales come from book stores. When that percent ticks over to 51% of sales occurring through the book trade, the comic book market will have made a fundamental shift, and entered another brave new world, one that will most likely affect the market and industry as much as the advent of the direct market.
By Publisher
Breaking it down by publisher as much as either were comfortable, despite the sales of manga, both Hassler and Boyd give major credit to DC for keeping the book trade as a viable market for comics over the years.
“I'd go back a great deal further than five to seven years to where the trend of graphic novels in bookstores started really, and point to The Dark Knight Returns,” Hassler said. “That book was really an igniting factor in the bookstore market, and DC has worked hard and diligently to cultivate this market. In many ways, they are still the standard by which others are judged.”
Boyd also had positive things to say about two of the smaller bookstore presences (when compared to manga and DC): “CrossGen is coming in at just the right time – the book trade is eager for new product, and here’s a company with high end, new product and a willingness to go out and promote it, which is often a problem with comic book publishers, because they’re not cash-rich,” Boyd said. “They’ve had a fantastic launch for a new publisher – the best I’ve ever seen because of good timing and super-aggressive marketing.
“Also, Dark Horse has been very exciting this year as well, just because of Star Wars blowing everything else away. The best-selling graphic novel in the book trade for us is the Star Wars: Episode II adaptation. That’s the best-seller so far this year, and I expect that it will be the #1 graphic novel of 2002.”
On the smaller side yet, Hassler said that even publishers who barely capture market share in the direct sales arena can do well and grow in the book trade. “Fantagraphics and Drawn & Quarterly are growing and have the potential for growth just the same as any of the larger publishers,” Hassler said. “Their respective sizes pretty much dictate where they land in terms of overall sales, but they have great product. In a year they may be publishing twenty titles a month and the entire landscape could change.”
Overall, Hassler said that he really wasn’t caught off guard by any books over the past year, but every now and then, he can be left scratching his head. “Things often perform beyond my expectations, but that isn't quite the same as being caught by surprise by a product. If I had to pick one real shocker, I'd have to point to DC's Danger Girl collection. I'm still trying to figure out what happened with that book.”
Given the current landscape, both Hassler and Boyd expect the steady growth in bookstores to continue for the foreseeable future, with few big changes. “I expect to see some changes based on certain avenues some publishers are exploring more than others, but I wouldn't say that it would be anything that would shock the industry if it's been paying attention,” Hassler added, explaining that while many factors can have an affect, sales are really dependent upon one thing – what’s between the covers.
“There are a bounty of titles of various prices, formats, bindings and sizes that I know I'm going to sell extremely well. I can sell books at $9.99 and $70.00. There is no magical format that guarantees a success. It is all contingent on the strength of the material inside.”
And to help the growth to continue, according to Hassler, publishers need to keep the appeal of the material broad, the quality high, and listen. “We see these sales on a grand scale that give us a perspective on trends at a national level,” Hassler said. “We see what works and what doesn't. Come to the table with an open mind.”