David Vega,

Well, you'll be missing out on some of Alan's smaller works which may never see a trade. (Of course, we know that that doesn't matter, since Pat has explained that he has no style and that you shouldn't care who writes a comic.)
However, you'll be relieved to know that hardcover collections of the early issues of the ABC series Promethea and Tom Strong are already being listed on Amazon.

Nat:

I guess I was a bit vague. What I meant was, I'll only buy Moore's work once it is completed. Usually that means a collection, but if the work is not collected, and all of the issues are available, I'll certainly hunt them done and buy them.

What work are you refering to?

Dunc:

Yes, I do believe what I said. All my experience tells me that customers buy what they want. When they don't buy, retailers assign blame for things like lateness or price.

The classic example of this was Ronin. Issues 4, 5, & 6 were resolicited several times. Every time, the orders went down. Within months of shipment, those issues were nearly impossible to find.

In 1986, DC fell off schedule with Dark Knight and Watchmen. I was told, at the time, that DC held Dark Knight 4 and Watchmen 2, which were already late, to ship the same day that Man of Steel 1 shipped. Conventional retailers' wisdom dictated that this would be disastrous for us. If there are lots of any of those books out there, I'd be amazed.

For what seems like years now, Spawn has been late. Every time we get a return notice for it, we seem to have sold out (without cutting orders.) Savage Dragon is like clockwork, but its sales, while good, have never approached Spawn's.

Battle Chasers has shipped 6 issues in a 14-month period. Anyone stuck with any?

I have Battlechasers 4-6 at least a dozen of each in stock currently. Whats your point?

>>The classic example of this was Ronin. Issues 4, 5, & 6 were resolicited several times. Every time, the orders went down. Within months of shipment, those issues were nearly impossible to find.

In 1986, DC fell off schedule with Dark Knight and Watchmen. I was told, at the time, that DC held Dark Knight 4 and Watchmen 2, which were already late, to ship the same day that Man of Steel 1 shipped. Conventional retailers' wisdom dictated that this would be disastrous for us. If there are lots of any of those books out there, I'd be amazed.<<

Well, of course, Jim. In each case, retailers wound up with just enough copies to satisfy immediate demand (and maybe not even that). Now, everybody who has a copy wnats to keep that copy (for the most part), and retailers have no "extras" to place in their back-issue stock. Hence, the books are very scarce on the back-issue market.

This is a classic case of supply-and-demand...where a quality product is in short supply (that short supply created, in part, by retailer reaction to lateness).

Best, Pat

I will say, that smaller publishers should probably be held slightly less accountable than bigger ones. Reason? Simple dollars. There have been numerous reported instances of (relatively) successful self publishers who have books finished, everything is done and ready to ship to the printers, yet because orders were low or a family emergency, could not afford to produce the issue for 6 months. I have all the sympathy in the world for these situations.

That being said, are their potential solutions? Sure. In the electronic age of scanners, how about sending electronic copies of the pencils at least to the letterers? That way they aren't waiting for the inker and the letterer and inker are working simultaneously, knocking 2 or 3 days off a book's production schedule. While the inker may do minor changes, in 90% of the cases this should work. Also, is it possible for the colorist to receive the work directly from the inker (I know DC does not currently do this, unsure as to Marvel or others)? Again three or four days knocked off the process and if the inker has the ability to scan the images with a hi res scanner, than so much the better! These are suggestions, and I realize outside the big 2, and maybe select Image and Dark Horse projects, this isn't always feasible, but if both measures are incorporated, we're talking about knocking 4-5 days off the production process for the book, which can't do anything but help the schedule. Those who have worked at these places, please feel free to poke holes in my theory.

Trying to actually be a part of the solution, not part of the problem!

------------------
Erik Merk

Instituting new systems that take more person-time (additional time scanning, recombining folks output, etc.) is not a way to address the general problem. Even if this took a few days off of the months between when the issue is first planned and when it ships, the only real effect that might have is that they start planning the issue a few days later.

Jim, Are you spending alot of time behind your counter these days? If I was just looking at sales figures, I might not see the problem. Quality titles that are late, will sell better than mediocre titles on time. But that doesn't negate the argument. How much better would the quality titles sell if they were on time? How much worse would the mediocre titles sell if they were late? The example everyone uses is Savage Dragon. Well, I do sell about 6 Savage Dragons a month, and about 40 Battlechasers--when they arrive. My instincts tell me I would sell maybe one or two Savage Dragons if they were late, and probably 60 Battlechasers if they were on time.

I'm also as concerned with the frequency of visits, and the level of enthusiasm of my customers. And these are not really quantifiable. I'll repeat: I have zero doubt that lateness of titles like Danger Girl and Battlechasers has hurt sales.

The examples you use were pretty far in the past(Ronin and Dark Knight). At that time, such lateness (and if I may say, quality) was relatively atypical, and the market could absorb it. Nowadays, lateness is frequent and chronic and the market can ill afford it.

Finally, I'm curious. How to you handle your budgeting of titles that may or may not show up? Don't you find yourself ordering less of other titles because you've expended your budget on the "hot" titles? To me, titles like Danger Girl are "vapor" comics...tying up unspent money that I could use on some other titles. I try to hit certain levels on my comics--reaching the maximum realistic discount level. But usually, not much beyond. Perhaps your orders are big enough not to take such levels into consideration? I suspect most stores are like mine; ordering what we need to get to a certain level of discount and no more. If Battlechasers occupies 60 slots, those are 60 slots that don't go to other titles.

I'm not Jim, but since I agree with him on this issue...

Obviously there's no way to know how much better a late-shipping title would sell if it were on time...but I still think there's no evidence that late shipping, in itself, hurts consumer sales of a title.

That's not to say it's a negligible problem. It's a serious problem for retailers for all the reasons you (Dunc) discuss in your last paragraph, and given the importance of retailers to the comics industry as a whole, it should be (and is, in different ways, at different companies) addressed for that reason alone. But that's a different reason than "it's driving away customers." (Except, of course, for that hopefully-vanishing breed of retailer who complains so much to his customers about late books that he actively discourages sales.)

Best,
Stuart

Listen, being fairly new here and all, I have only one question after a few hours perusing these boards:

Does EVERY thread at some point or another involve Pat O'Neill babbling like an idiot?