“Think Future” Panel Ponders Changing World of Comics

By Laura Hudson -- Publishers Weekly, 11/14/2007 2:03:00 PM

The inner workings of the comics shop distribution system, the impact of downloadable comics, casual comics fanatics versus über-buyers, and the overall growth of the graphic novel category were the big topics when Publishers Weekly held the second breakfast panel in its “Think Future” discussion series. Wednesday's panel featured John Cunningham, vp- marketing at DC Comics, Dan Frank, editorial director at Pantheon, Joe Quesada, editor-in-chief at Marvel Comics, Bill Schanes, v-p of purchasing at Diamond Comics Distributors, and Rich Johnson, co-publishing director of Yen Press. The panel was moderated by PW Comics Week co-editors Calvin Reid and Heidi MacDonald.

According to Reid, times are rosy in world of comics; sales of graphic novels in the United States and Canada tripled between 2002 and 2006, jumping from $110 million to $330, and Schanes commented that at Diamond, the primary comics distributor in comics, “business is as good as it's ever been.”

In the aftermath of recent announcements of digital comics initiatives by the two dominant comics publishers, Marvel and DC, the panel addressed the changing methods of comics distribution, both in bookstores and on the Internet.

“I think the world is becoming more online, and I don't think you're going to be able to keep print alive unless you find ways to engage people every place their eyeball is,” said Cunningham. “There’s another generation for whom acquiring information is all screen-based, and they’re not going to do [comics] any differently.”

Quesada attributed much of the success of Marvel’s Ultimate Spider-Man graphic novels to the fact that a digital version of the comic has been available for free on the Marvel Web site for several years. He predicted that despite retailer concerns, the comics industry will come to regard digital comics as a “feeder system” for print publications, much as newspapers now do. “It's something that’s going to help sales,” said Quesada.

Similarly, Schanes remarked that rather than hurting sales, “bookstores are also good breeding grounds for more readers in comic specialty stores.” Although consumers may initially pick up a graphic novel at a chain store, “the hardcore fans will migrate, and find a comic book store near them. We look at that as really important fuel for us.”

As graphic novels continue to claim more and more shelf space at traditional bookstores, the issue of how to categorize graphic novels in bookstores—by format or content—remains complicated. Johnson reported that Barnes & Noble recently decided to shelf the Yen Press title With the Light, a manga tale about raising autistic child, in the child developmental section, rather than the manga section. But Frank, who recalled “the tremendous amount of difficulty” he experienced in 2000 getting traditional bookstores to stock the critically-acclaimed Chris Ware graphic novel, Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth, remarked that “even to this day [we] can have trouble with the more traditional chains. They don’t know quite where to put some of our things.”

Despite some hurdles, the overall growth of the category remains impressive. Cunningham, who had a long career in traditional book publishing before joining DC two years ago, said he was amazed to realize that graphic novels had the second largest sales of any trade paperback category last year.

« Back | Print